Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 364, February 1846. VariousЧитать онлайн книгу.
A Frank traveller is a sight scarcely known; and Mr Paton soon had abundant evidence, on his approach to Novibazar, which lies in a fertile plain about a mile and a half in diameter, surrounded by low hills, that his visit here would be even less favourably received than at Sokol. The gipsies, whose tents covered the plain, and who here profess Islamism, cried furiously after them, "See, how the Royal Servians now-a-days have the audacity to enter Novibazar on horseback!" Youssouf Bey, the governor, was said to be asleep in his harem, (the usual Not-at-home of an Oriental,) but, as they afterwards ascertained, was actually afraid to receive them; and while they were sauntering round the town, a savage-looking Bosniak starting up, exclaimed, "Giaours, kafirs, spies! I know what you come for! – Do you expect to see your cross one day planted on the castle?" The threat of a complaint to the Bey only provoked fresh insolence; and, warned by a Christian bystander that the whole town would soon be in commotion, they prudently beat a retreat, and reached the Servian frontier in safety.
After this narrow escape from Bosniak hospitality, Mr Paton's next object was the Kopaunik mountain, lying a little to the south, and from the top of which (as he had been informed at Csatsak) a panoramic view of all Servia might be obtained; and having prevailed on the captain of the district to accompany him, they crossed the Ybar, and reached the summit with little difficulty, if (as seems to be implied) the whole ascent was accomplished on horseback. "The Kopaunik is not much above 6000 English feet above the level of the sea. But it is so placed in the Servian basin, that the eye embraces the whole breadth from Bosnia to Bulgaria, and very nearly the whole length from Macedonia to Hungary. When at length I stood on the highest peak, the prospect was literally gorgeous. Servia lay rolled out at my feet. There lay the field of Kossovo, where Amurath defeated Lasar, and entombed the ancient empire of Servia. I mused an instant on this great landmark of European history, and following the finger of an old peasant who accompanied us, I looked eastwards, and saw Deligrad, the scene of one of the bloodiest fights that preceded the resurrection of Servia as a principality. The Morava glistened in its wide valley like a silver thread in a carpet of green, beyond which the dark mountains of Rudnik rose to the north; while the frontiers of Bosnia, Albania, Macedonia, and Bulgaria, walled in the prospect."
After luxuriating to his heart's content in the contemplation of this magnificent panorama, and taking leave of his companion, Mr Paton descended the north-eastern slope of the mountain; and lodging for the night in a shepherd's hut, where he found an officer sent by the Natchalnik of Krushevatz to meet him, arrived next day at Zhupa. "Here the aspect of the country changed – the verdant hills became chalky, and covered with vineyards, which, before the fall of the empire, were celebrated;" and after partaking of a repast, in which choice grapes and clotted cream (a national dish in Turkey) formed the dessert, they pushed on in all haste, and reached Krushevatz (often marked in the maps by its Turkish name of Aladja-Hissar) late at night. He was hospitably received by the Natchalnik, whose wife kissed the visitor's hand on his arrival, in compliance with the old Servian customs, now fast wearing out, which assign to woman a social position intermediate between the seclusion of eastern manners and the graceful precedence which she enjoys in the west. The next morning, they walked out to inspect the town, which was the metropolis of the Servian kingdom immediately before its overthrow by the Turks; and which, lying as it does in the midst of the rich vale of the Morava, which here expands into a wide and fertile plain, extending from the foot of the mountains by which it is flanked to the river, occupies a site well adapted for all inland capital. The author here introduces a dissertation on the history, laws, and customs of the ancient monarchy; but as our own business is rather with Servia as it is, than Servia as it was, we shall pass unnoticed the glories of the house of Neman – the warlike trophies of Stephan Dushan the Powerful, at whose approach the Greek Emperor trembled within the walls of Constantinople – and the tragical fate of Knes Lasar, with whom Servian independence fell on the fatal plain of Kossovo, June 15, 1389. Of the palace of Lasar in Krushevatz, only the gateway and the ruined walls are now remaining; but the chapel, having been converted by the Turks into an arsenal, is still in perfect preservation. "It is a curious monument of the period, in a Byzantine sort of style, but not for a moment to be compared in beauty to the church of Studenitza. Above one of the doors is carved the double eagle, the insignium (!!) of empire; but instead of having body to body, and wings and beaks pointed outwards, as in the arms of Austria and Russia, the bodies are separated, and beak looks inward to beak. The late governor had the Vandalism to whitewash the exterior; but the Natchalnik told me, that under the whitewash fine bricks were disposed in diamond figures between the stones. This antique principle of tessellation, applied by the Byzantines to perpendicular walls, and occasionally adopted and varied ad infinitum by the Saracens, is magnificently illustrated in the upper exterior of the ducal palace of Venice."
A grand field-day against the bears and boars in the forest, with a couple of hundred peasants as beaters, had been arranged by the Natchalnik for his guest's amusement; but their plans were frustrated by the unpropitious state of the weather; and as soon as it became favourable, we find Mr Paton again in motion, ascending the eastern branch of the Morava to Alexinate, the quarantine station on the Bulgarian frontier, where the British govermnent has established a konak or residence for the Queen's messengers, who here await, on the extreme verge of the sanatory system, the return of the Tartars with despatches from Constantinople. He found it tenanted by Captain W – , whose guest he became for several days, to his infinite satisfaction: – "It seemed so odd, and yet was so very comfortable, to have roast-beef, plum-pudding, sherry, brown stout, Stilton cheese, and other insular groceries, at the foot of the Balkan. There was, moreover, a small library, with which the temporary occupants of the konak killed the month's interval between arrival and departure." He was compelled, however, to tear himself from the delights of an English cuisine; and on arriving at Tiupria, (more properly Kiupri-Ravenatz,) where he first heard tidings of the emeute at Shabatz, and the murder of his friend the collector Ninitch, he diverged from his route to visit the monasteries of Ravanitza and Manasia, the former of which was the burial-place of Lasar. But as his reminiscences of these saintly retreats are rather convivial than antiquarian, we shall pass on at once to Svilainitza, (the place of silk,) where he was entertained in the chateau of M. Ressavatz, the richest man in Servia; the only chateau-residence as he tells us, which he saw in the country. This part of Servia appears indeed to be, as Mr Paton says – "Ressavatz quà, Ressavatz là" – since to the patriotism and command of capital of this enlightened family, it owes not only the introduction of the growth of silk as above-mentioned, but the construction of an excellent macadamized road, by which Mr Paton travelled on the following day, through a country richly cultivated and interspersed with lofty oaks, to Posharevatz, (commonly written Passarowitz,) where he was welcomed on his arrival by another of the name of Ressavatz, the Natchalnik of the place. Posharevatz is celebrated in history for the treaty there concluded in 1718, by which, in consequence of the victories of Prince Eugene, Bosnia and Servia passed under the dominion of Austria for twenty years, till restored to the Porte at the peace of Belgrade in 1739: in the present day it is a place of considerable importance, both as the capital of a province of ninety thousand inhabitants, and the seat of a court of judicial appeal for Eastern Servia. By the president of this court Mr Paton was entertained at dinner, where he met all the élite of Posharevatz; "and the president having made some punch, which showed profound acquaintance eith the jurisprudence of conviviality, the best amateurs of Posharevatz sung their best songs, which pleased me somewhat, for my ears had gradually been broken into the habits of the Servian muse. Being pressed myself to sing an English national song, I gratified their curiosity with 'God save the Queen,' and 'Rule Britannia,' explaining that these two songs contained the essence of English nationality; the one expressive of our unbounded loyalty, the other of our equally unbounded dominion." And now having extracted, to the best of our ability, the plums from the pudding of Mr Paton's gastronomic circuit of Servia, in which, (as he cordially admits,) "by inter-larding my discourse with sundry apophthegms of Bacon, and stale paradoxes of Rochefaucault, I passed current considerably above my real value," we shall here leave him to find his way by the beaten track through Semendria, Belgrade, and Vienna, to England. But before proceeding to the consideration of the "Servian Question," a point scarcely touched on in the volume before us, it will not be amiss to give a brief summary of the social condition and internal organization of the Servian nation, on which Mr Paton gives some valuable information in his concluding chapters.
The Servian territory