erely to their fondness for
his ballads. A considerable number of fine songs are marked in Vuk's
collection as having been first heard from Muhammedan singers.

Although the same ballads are not heard every where, yet the poetical
feeling and productiveness seem to be pretty equally distributed over
all the region inhabited by the Servian race. The heroic ballads
originate mostly in the southern mountains of Servia, in Bosnia,
Montenegro, and its Dalmatian neighbourhood. Towards the North-East
the productiveness diminishes; the songs are still _known_ in the
Austrian provinces, but the recitation of them, and the Gusle itself,
are left to blind men and beggars. Pirch heard, nevertheless, the
ballads of Marko Kralyevitch in the vicinity of Neusatz, in Hungary.
On the other hand, the amatory Servian ballads, and all those
comprised under the name of female songs,--although by no means
exclusively sung by women,--originate chiefly in those regions, where
perhaps a glimpse of occidental civilization has somewhat refined the
general feeling. The _villages_ of Syrmia, the Banat, and the Batchva,
are the home of most of them; in the Bosnian towns also they are
heard; while in the _cities_ of the Austrian provinces they have been
superseded by modern airs of less value, perhaps, and certainly of
less nationality.

It remains to remark, that while in all the other Slavic popular
poetry, the _musical_ element is prominent, it is in the Servian
completely crowded into the background. Even the little lyric pieces,
or female ballads, are not only in a high degree monotonous, but even
without the peculiar sweetness of most popular airs. They also are
chanted rather than sung.

The Bulgarian language is said to be particularly rich in popular
ballads; and it would hardly be credible, that the numerous nations
with which they mixed for centuries, should not have influenced their
poetry as well as their language. Nevertheless, those ballads we have
met with are not distinguished in any way from the Servian; especially
from those Servian ones sung in the provinces where intercourse with
a Turkish population is more frequent. One specimen will be
sufficient.

THE SLAVE GANGS.[52]

O thou hill, thou high green hill!
Why, green hill, art thou so withered?
Why so withered and so wilted?
Did the winter's frost so wilt thee?
Did the summer's heat so parch thee?
Not the winter's frost did wilt me,
Nor the summer's