In the first place, whereas it would have been easy to have handed over lands to Montenegro which are inhabited by co-religionists of hers, who would have welcomed their new masters, it was thought fit to give her districts and villages inhabited by the most fiercely fanatical Mohammedans of Albania. That bloodshed and future troubles would result, any one who knew the country could have foreseen. I shall have a good deal more to say on this subject when I get to Albania. The fact of the matter is, there is no reliable map of this country, so the representatives at Berlin worked in the dark, confused between the utterly contradictory description of the region given by Turkish and Montenegrin envoys.
A good story is told, illustrative of the geographical knowledge of some members of the congress. A noble English representative was conversing with one of the Turkish representatives. He had recently been studying the map of this coast.
"Now," said he, "look here. This little Montenegrin difficulty must be settled. They want a sea-port; give them one: let them have Cattaro."
"We have no objection to that," replied the Turk with a smile, for he knew that the port in question belonged to Austria.
The Englishman was delighted. He went straight to his Austrian colleague. "Ah, the Montenegrin difficulty is settled," he said. "All is smooth now; the Turks have given in."
"I am glad of that. What, then, is proposed?"
The amusement of the Austrian can be imagined when he heard that the Turks had no objection to giving up an Austrian fortress to Prince Nikita.
A frontier commission was sent over last spring to mark out definitely the new boundary-line. It was composed of course of representatives of all the Powers interested. I heard, from several people I met, of the sufferings and difficulties of this much-to-be-pitied expedition. To draw out any frontier-line based on the instructions they had received was hopeless.
At last, about two months before our arrival, a melancholy troop might have been seen descending the rough track that leads from Cettinje to Rieka. The gates of the heavens were opened. The path was converted into a foaming torrent. They reached Rieka wet and miserable. The commissioners then retired to bed and hot beverages, fearful of fever and rheumatism.