ing with the Croats, have
already surmounted a more serious obstacle. They believe that for
three reasons their union with the Bulgars is a more natural one: they
practise the same religion, they use the same Cyrillic alphabet and
their civilization, springing from Byzantium, has been identical. The
two people are bound to each other by the great Serbian, Saint Sava,
who strove to join them and who died at Trnovo in Bulgaria. Vladislav,
the Serbian prince, asked for his body; Assen begged that the Bulgars
might be allowed to keep it, but, when the Serbs insisted, a most
remarkable procession set out from Trnovo, bearing to his homeland the
remains of him whom the Bulgars called "our Saint." ... If, then, the
two people will for a few years demand that the misguided professors
shall confine themselves to their original functions--and, likewise,
those students who sit at the professors' feet--one may hope that in a
few years the miserable past will be buried and all the Yugoslavs
united in one State. The time has vanished when Serbia and Bulgaria
stood, as it were in a ring, face to face with one another, paying far
more attention to the disputes of the moment than to those great
unifying forces which we have mentioned. But now Serbia is a part of
Yugoslavia, which has to deal with a greater Italy, a greater Roumania
and others. And the question as to whether a certain town or district
is to be Serbian or Bulgarian sinks into the background.

Fortunately, in the Balkans--where one is nothing if not personal--you
can express yourself concerning another gentleman with a degree of
liberty that in Western Europe would be thought unpardonable. And so,
if the Serbs and the Bulgars will in the main follow the tracks of
their far-sighted leaders, they need not quite suppress their
criticism of each other. No great animosity is aroused by such a
statement as was made to me with regard to a dispossessed Macedonian
prelate, who had told me that he had appealed to the Archbishop of
Canterbury in the hope that he would assist him to return to his
diocese. I asked a member of another Balkan nationality whether he
knew this ancient cleric of the extremely venerable aspect, and
whether he knew what kind of political and religious propaganda had
brought about his downfall. "I know all about that old ruffian," he
replied. "He stole over fifty pigs and one hundred sheep, and about
twenty-five cows and 200 lb. of fat." Anyhow, if his lordshi