some occasions the 37th
desisted from going over in order not to bring persecution upon their
homes. In 1914, opposite the Montenegrins at Gora[vz]da, all the plans
were worked out, but at the last moment Dr. Count Gozze (of Dubrovnik)
said he had just thought of what would happen to their families, and
they refrained. After the battalion had gone over in 1916 General
Seidler told them he would do his best to have the regiment dissolved
and the men divided among other regiments, but that not all the
officers would go. This was an ominous hint that he intended to
decimate them, after the fashion of Field-Marshal Liposcak. A
fortnight later, in the presence of Field-Marshal Boroevi['c], General
Wurm and General Seidler, they were highly praised; and when they, in
company with a Magyar regiment, took Hill No. 166, it was announced
that this had been achieved by the "fame-covered regiment," which was
done to throw dust in the eyes of the Italians and the Entente.
Various other methods were used to escape service at the front. A Slav
doctor, whose hospital at Konjica could hold 400 patients, used to
have 4000-5000 on the books; those whom he was unable to keep he gave
convalescent leave. In this way he saved a great many of the Dalmatian
_intelligentsia_. He and another Dalmatian doctor would send the men
backwards and forwards, now to one hospital, now to another. One
ordinary method for avoiding the front was to bribe the company
commander and the N.C.O. who made out the lists. Yet sometimes there
was no help for it. When, for instance, in September 1914 they were at
Banjaluka, the enemy advanced to Pale, very near Sarajevo. My
informant has a vivid recollection of the way in which a Viennese
captain, the leader of the contingent, trembled. In a Bosnian valley
they met a woman with five small children, one of whom was at her
breast. The captain told my acquaintance (who was then a N.C.O.) to
stay behind with some men and shoot her, but not to let him hear
anything. He said that the General at Sarajevo had commanded that
everything Serb that goes on two legs must be cut down. Yelavi['c]
refused to carry out this order, whereupon the captain told Dr.
Gozze, whom he greatly disliked, that he must do it. Gozze stayed
behind, fired a few shots in the air and informed the captain that
everything was over.

What the Austrian command really thought of the 37th Regiment, and of
others, may be seen from a report dated December 2, 1