ussigne, Plav and Ipek, the best scenery
in all Montenegro he said; he himself had just returned from Scutari,
whence he had advanced with a Montenegrin army halfway across Albania.
At each village the natives had fled, burying their corn and driving off
their cattle, leaving the villages deserted, and the army, starving, had
at last been forced to retire. Dr. Ob promised us a motor by four, but
added that they had no oil and very little benzine. Then growing more
confidential, he took us by the buttonholes and asked us to use our best
influence with the Count de Salis, and request him to tell the Admiralty
to allow petrol to be brought up from Salonika, where the British had
laid an embargo upon it. He promised pathetically that _all_ the petrol
would be brought up overland.

Intensely amused by the doctor's idea of our importance, we solemnly
delivered his message to the Count.

We went to the Serbian Minister, a charming man with a freebooter's
face, for our passports, and then back to Dr. Ob. The motor was going
off at 6.30 he said. We cheered internally, for we were getting tired of
Cettinje, which reminded us of a watchmaker's wife with her best silk
dress on. On our way downstairs we called in to thank the Minister of
War for our jolly trip; and he wished us "Bon voyage."

We got en route almost up to time, with us was Mrs. G----, who was also
going back as far as Podgoritza. She was storekeeper and accountant for
the Wounded Allies, and ever had a hard and troublesome task between
what she needed and what she could get from the Sanitary Department. She
took the front seat with Jo, and inside Jan found a French sailor of the
wireless telegraphy, who had had typhoid fever, but was now going back
to work. As we rattled down the curves and along the edge of the
darkening chasms of the mountain side, he summed up with the brevity of
a "rapin."

"Dans la journee ici, vous savez, il y'a de quoi faire des cliches."

We stopped at Rieka for water, and then on once more. In the glare of
our headlights, little clumps of soldiers, with donkeys loaded with the
new uniforms, loomed suddenly out of the darkness. Once a donkey took
fright and bolted back, and the soldier in charge yelled and pointed his
rifle at us. If we had moved he would have shot without compunction.
Later the men had bivouacked, and all along the rest of the road we
passed little fires of fresh brushwood, the sparks pouring up like
fountains into the