inhabited when the Turks withdrew in 1716;
some villages had only three or four occupied houses. So the Government
in 1722 collected into one village the people of several others, and in
this way Zsam, which had hitherto been Slav, became Roumanian, the Serbs
being established in the neighbouring Sredi[vs]te. In 1809 the
Roumanians were transplanted from Zsam to Petrovasela, between Ver[vs]ac
and Pan[vc]evo, where they entered the Pan[vc]evo Frontier Regiment;
their place at Zsam was taken by Germans, who, being more industrious,
were preferred by the landowners.

Some of the delineators of this frontier--French and British--have told
me that they were guided throughout by the ethnical principle. But
various unfortunate exceptions seem to have been made: for instance, at
Ko[vc]a it runs through a certain house in such a way that the lavatory
alone is in Roumania; and in another village there lives a man who,
since his stables are situated in Roumania, would have had his horses
requisitioned if he had not been able to bring them into the other part
of the house. Another village has its cemetery in Roumania, so that the
Yugoslavs carry their dead friends over during the night. Perhaps the
Entente officials, perceiving that their ambitious resolution to divide
the country on ethnic principles was not feasible--there would always be
alien islands to the right and to the left of any line--perhaps they in
despair drew an arbitrary line upon a map and hoped the poor inhabitants
would make the best of it. But this was rendered more difficult by the
Yugoslav and Roumanian authorities, for the people who desire to cross
the line are put to endless trouble. Apart from the expense, it usually
involves a delay of three weeks before permission can be obtained, so
that the frontier is rarely traversed save by smugglers and by those
who, like the afore-mentioned man of Ko[vc]a, have been driven into
chronic lawlessness.

The first line agreed upon after the War, which temporarily bestowed the
eastern county on Roumania, the western on Yugoslavia and the chief
parts of the central (or Teme[vs]var) county also on Yugoslavia--with
French co-operation--did not find favour in Paris; whether or not this
decision was influenced by the frequent journeys of the Queen of
Roumania and her fascinating daughters to that town I do not know. At
all events another boundary was made which included the large town of
Teme[vs]var and all the northern par