Travels in Southeastern Europe

The burden of the Balkans / by M. Edith Durham.

336 THE BURDEN OF THE BALKANS. memory corpses rotted and stank on wayside gibbets even in England, and the heads of the Cato Street conspirators were hacked from their dead bodies in the year I820. And these are some of the things the West should remember, for in spite of them it has evolved a civilization that it admires so much that it wishes to force it on all the world. Through Western glasses the Shpata shepherd is seen as a mad dog, but he was explained otherwise to me. He had played the game according to the code of his district. The first was an affair of honour; here a man's honour is very dear to him. His life is nothing compared to his honour. He was a Shpatiote; he followed the Albanian rule. But the Turkish Government put him in prison for it. In Shpata they do not recognise the right of the Turkish Government to interfere in their private affairs. Afterwards, when he shot the gendarme, it was vengeance for those in the village who had been wounded and captured, and for his own wrongs. His last exploit upon the Berat road was not clearly explicable for want of details, but the other man had fired first, and had brought the consequences on himself. If he was to be avenged, it was the business of the dead man's family, and not of the Turkish Government. If there were an Albanian Government, that would be another thing. But the Turks!-no, thank you. 'You think in England you are civilized, and
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Title
The burden of the Balkans / by M. Edith Durham.
Author
Durham, Mary Edith, 1863-1944.
Canvas
Page 336
Publication
London :: Nelson,
[1905]
Subject terms
Eastern question (Balkan)
Balkan Peninsula -- Description and travel.

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"The burden of the Balkans / by M. Edith Durham." In the digital collection Travels in Southeastern Europe. https://name.umdl.umich.edu/ans3900.0001.001. University of Michigan Library Digital Collections. Accessed April 30, 2025.
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