FALSE IMPRESSIONS OF MONTENEGRO—AGRICULTURE ON A MINOR SCALE—FIELD-LABOURERS—MONTENEGRIN FACCHINI AT CONSTANTINOPLE—FEMALE LABOUR—PRODUCTION OF SUMACH—COMMERCIAL RELATIONS WITH OTHER COUNTRIES IMPEDED—IMPOSING PAGEANT.

TRULY very little is known about Montenegro and its mountaineers, and that little is very incorrect. They have been generally represented as wild, savage, bloodthirsty, thieving scoundrels, closely allied to Italian brigands and Greek palikari—if anything, worse than either. Fond of fighting for fighting's sake, and when not engaged in that amiable recreation, spending their time in 249 strutting about in their fine clothes, peacocking in the sunshine, while those too poor to have fine trappings whiled away the weary hours and forgot their fleas and their sorrows in the tones of their national guzla, while the women were left to do all the labour in the fields.

Such was certainly not my impression. The part of Montenegro through which I travelled, though sterile and barren to a degree, was a wonderful specimen of what man could do when driven to it. Every little nook, where the least bit of soil could be found, among that wilderness of rocks where stones had rained from Heaven, was carefully taken advantage of; the rocks adjoining these little nooks were often removed by the most laborious exertions, and in some instances earth was scraped up here and there, and carried in small baskets to these spots, in order to increase their depth of soil. I saw clearings of so small a size as barely to admit of one potatoe plant or three of maize, and little fields not one yard in diameter!

Hard at work, cultivating the soil, I saw not only women but plenty of sturdy mountaineers. 250 At Niegosh I observed one of the Petrovichs, the handsome young fellow who entertained me on my way to Cettigne, superintending himself a number of men who were working in a field near his house; and the only difference I could observe between them and our own labourers was that they were all fully armed, although employed at the peaceful occupation of agriculture. They have not yet turned their yataghans into spades and reaping hooks, but they have done the next best thing by keeping the first at ease while energetically plying the others.

I have seen the Montenegrins in their own valleys and mountain fastnesses, and I utterly deny the charges brought against them. They are not lazy—leaving all the hard work to their women—that is utterly false, and the best proof I perhaps can give, lies in the self-asserting fact of the toiling colony of three thousand Montenegrin Facchini at Constantinople, well known as about the most hard-working and honest labouring men in that capital. It is true that they allow the women to do much of the heavy agricultural work, and carry heavy loads up and down the mountains; 251 but it must be remembered that for years past the Montenegrins, like the proscribed clans of Scotland in the last century, have been treated by their neighbours, the Turks, very little better than wild beasts. They would long ago have been exterminated, but for their indomitable courage and constant fighting, during which period, of necessity, the agricultural duties fell entirely on the decrepit old men and the women, as all men who were at all able to carry arms were engaged in fighting—and many of the women too! It must also be remembered that in all mountainous countries the women toil more heavily than in the plains, and even in civilized Italy hear what a distinguished Italian, Massimo d'Azeglio, writes:

"For example, if a faggot of wood and a bunch of chickens have to be carried down to the shore from one of the villages half way up the mountain, the labour is thus distributed in the family. The wife loads herself with the faggot of wood which weighs half a hundredweight, and the husband will take the chickens which weigh a mere nothing." The Montenegrins are not, therefore, singularly and atrociously barbarous in this respect. 252

Considering the small extent of the Principality and its great sterility, it is wonderful the amount of produce they are able to export, even with the disabilities under which they labour, being entirely deprived of any seaboard, though clearly entitled to one. One of the most important of their natural products, one which under favourable circumstances might be increased a thousandfold is "sumach," a substance largely used in tanning the more expensive kinds of leather. A small amount is exported to Holland, none comes to England, but a small parcel I brought over with me was declared by competent judges to be equal to the best Sicilian, which is considered the best of all sumachs.

They have vast forests of walnut trees which, under proper management and due facilities of exportation, might be rendered most productive, both as to wa............