sake, the last of the great medieval
Servian Tsars.

"There is a day that we still mark every year," he went on. "The day of
the battle of Kossovo, when the Turks annihilated us--though that was
more than five hundred years ago. But in the last war we had our
revenge, on the great day of Kumanovo, when, though the Turks
outnumbered us, we drove them before us and crushed them.

"But I spoke of the women, and I am wandering from the point! We do not
want the women to fight, but they come from the villages, where whole
companies are recruited from relatives, since we still have almost a
patriarchal system. The woman wears men's clothes, and she marches with
her husband or her brothers. The officers do not know, and--they fight
well. They have known what it is, some of those women, to see their
homes burned and their mothers slain by Turks. They know that a free
Servia means more than a name!"

"I hadn't thought about it just that way," said Dick. "But I see that
you are right. It is just the same thing as with our pioneers. The women
of those days did fight the Indians, and for just such reasons. I'm
going to get you to tell me more about Servian history some time. You
know, until the Balkan War Servia and Bulgaria weren't much more than
names to us in America or to most of us. We were surprised and mighty
pleased, of course, when you smashed the Turks the way you did."

"Everyone was surprised," said Stepan. His face grew dark. "And there is
another thing we hold against Austria. We were good friends, we little
states of the Balkans. We had fought a great war, and we would have
continued to be good friends had it not been for Austria. But she
stepped in when peace was to be made, and said what we could have and
what we must not touch. She would not give us the window on the sea that
we had paid for with our blood. And she tricked Bulgaria into attacking
us and so starting the second war."

"How was that?"

"She thought Bulgaria was strong enough to beat us, and she promised to
help if Bulgaria were too weak. Everyone thought, you see, that the
Bulgarian troops were the best in the Balkans. They forgot that we
helped them to win Adrianople, and that we and the Greeks won our great
victories unaided. And then, when we crushed Bulgaria within two weeks,
Austria broke her word, and Bulgaria was left helpless. We acted in self
defence, but we were sorry."

"I supposed that Servia hated Bulgaria now, Steve. And Greece,