powers which have at different times been strong
in the neighborhood. Cattaro was in the reign of Basil the Macedonian
besieged and taken by Saracens, who presently went on unsuccessfully to
besiege Ragusa. And, as under Byzantine rule it was taken by Saracens,
so under Venetian rule it was more than once besieged by Turks. In the
intermediate stages we get the usual alternations of independence and of
subjection to all the neighboring powers in turn, till in 1419 Cattaro
finally became Venetian. At the fall of the republic it became part of
the Austrian share of the spoil. When the spoilers quarreled, it fell
to France. When England, Russia, and Montenegro were allies, the city
joined the land of which it naturally forms the head, and Cattaro became
the Montenegrin haven and capital. When France was no longer dangerous,
and the powers of Europe came together to parcel out other men's goods,
Austria calmly asked for Cattaro back again, and easily got it.

In the city of Cattaro the Orthodox Church is still in a minority, but
it is a minority not far short of a majority. Outside its walls, the
Orthodox outnumber the Catholics. In short, when we reach Cattaro, we
have very little temptation to fancy ourselves in Italy or in any part
of Western Christendom. We not only know, but feel, that we are on the
Byzantine side of the Hadriatic; that we have, in fact, made our way
into Eastern Europe.

And East and West, Slav and Italian, New Rome and Old, might well
struggle for the possession of the land and of the water through which
we pass from Ragusa to our final goal at Cattaro. The strait leads us
into a gulf; another narrow strait leads us into an inner gulf; and on
an inlet again branching out of that inner gulf lies the furthest of
Dalmatian cities. The lower city, Cattaro itself, seems to lie so
quietly, so peacefully, as if in a world of its own from which nothing
beyond the shores of its own Bocche could enter, that we are tempted to
forget, not only that the spot has been the scene of so many revolutions
through so many ages, but that it is even now a border city, a city on
the marchland of contending powers, creeds, and races....

The city of Cattaro itself is small, standing on a narrow ledge between
the gulf and the base of the mountain. It carries the features of the
Dalmatian cities to what any one who has not seen Traue will call their
extreme point. But, tho' the streets of Cattaro are narrow, yet they are
c