and was sentenced to twenty years' penal servitude. The judge asked the
dead man's brother if he was satisfied. "No, I am not," he answered,
"because now I shall have to wait twenty years to kill him." Their
ancient custom of blood-vengeance continues to flourish, though in
Serbia the police and public opinion are against it; thus, at Luka, in
the department of Pe['c], one Alil Mahmoud was murdered by a Berisha to
avenge his uncle, so that now the sons of this Mahmoud propose to kill a
Berisha--not the murderer, but one equal in rank to their late father,
and in consequence Ahmed Beg, son of Murtezza Pasha, of Djakovica, is
afraid to leave his house, which the Serbian police, at his request, is
guarding.

How much the Albanian conceives that he owes a duty to the State may be
instanced by the application of a smuggler that he be granted a permit
to go to Zagreb in order to dispose of 6000 oka[96] of tobacco which he
had brought over the frontier. He was talking to a Serb who has the
confidence of the Albanians because he does not treat them as if they
were Serbs; and when this father confessor advised him to get rid of the
tobacco locally (which he succeeded in doing) the Albanian objected that
the excise officers gave him constant anxiety, they were thieves who
insisted on payment being made to them if they came across his
merchandise. And if it be said that this is too humble a case, we may
mention that of Ali Riza, one of the chief officers of the Tirana army
which was last year operating against the Serbs. So indifferent is he as
to the uniform he bears that the year before last, in Vienna, he begged
an influential Serb to recommend him for a lieutenancy in the Serbian
army. (His request was not granted because it was ascertained that,
besides being unable to read and write, his work as an Austrian gendarme
had been more zealous than creditable.)

12. SERBIA'S GOOD INFLUENCE

What, then, is Europe to do with these wild children of hers?... The
tribes, Catholic and Moslem, who dwell between the Big Drin and the
frontier allotted to Serbia in 1913, asked the aforesaid Pouni[vs]a in
1919 to intervene in their quarrels; and the result was that a small
number of Serbian soldiers were scattered about that country. They were
placed at the disposal of the chief, whom they assisted in maintaining
order. (Needless to say, they collected no taxes or recruits, and all
their supplies came to them from Serbia.) The people we