Through the lands of the Serb,

SHABATZ I6I and a market-place. The houses in the suburbs all stand in their own gardens, and there are plenty of clipped acacias in the streets. And in every town a few tumbledown timber shops and shanties are almost all that is left of Turkish times. Shabatz is no exception to the general rule, and I left early next day for Valjevo. It was a ten and a half hours' drive in a burning sun and a cloud of white dust, through miles of very fertile and most English-looking country, with English hedges, English oak trees, and English post and rail fences. My first experience of travelling inland in Servia was a very fair sample. There were days when I sighed for the drivers of Montenegro and their wiry ponies, but I always reflected that it was the Servians that I had come to see and that I was seeing them. The Montenegrin is always anxious to get to the journey's end, but the Servian never seems to care whether he arrives or not, provided he can get enough black coffee on the way. He slugs along, takes innumerable rests, and is disappointed if you won't go to sleep in the middle of the day at a wayside inn. Nothing hurries him up; he looks at his watch and says it isn't dark yet, and lets the horses stand still while he rolls his hundredth cigarette. The horses are like the driver, and seldom trot unless urged to, though they are generally in fair condition. But the average Servian does everything in a leisurely manner, and horses and driver but follow the national fashion. I thought at first I was being taken along slowly because I was a foreigner, but I found that when I had native fellow-travellers we went slower still. Though my driver was a slug, he was always a II

Pages

About this Item

Title: Through the lands of the Serb,
Author: Durham, Mary E.
Canvas: Page 161
Publication: London,: E. Arnold,; 1904.
Subject terms: Montenegro -- Description and travel; Serbia -- Description and travel.

Technical Details

Collection: Travels in Southeastern Europe
Link to this Item: https://name.umdl.umich.edu/afg3925.0001.001
Link to this scan: https://quod.lib.umich.edu/b/bosnia/afg3925.0001.001/199

Rights and Permissions

The University of Michigan Library provides access to these materials for educational and research purposes. These materials are likely in the public domain. If you decide to use any of these materials, you are responsible for making your own legal assessment and securing any necessary permission. If you have questions about the collection, please contact [email protected] . If you have concerns about the inclusion of an item in this collection, please contact [email protected] .

DPLA Rights Statement: No Copyright - United States

IIIF

Manifest: https://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/t/text/api/manifest/bosnia:afg3925.0001.001

Cite this Item

Full citation: "Through the lands of the Serb,." In the digital collection Travels in Southeastern Europe. https://name.umdl.umich.edu/afg3925.0001.001. University of Michigan Library Digital Collections. Accessed April 28, 2025.

Through the lands of the Serb,

Annotations Tools

Actions

About this Item

Technical Details

Rights and Permissions

Related Links

IIIF

Cite this Item