cutting.  One of the men at the convent took it, and with a common whetstone (for there was nothing in the nature of a grindstone in the place) brought it to razor edge,—­a job which a carpenter alone can appreciate; and, when I tried to give him something for it, he put his hands behind him and then ran out of sight.  A little fellow, not over four years old, stumbled upstairs to my room to bring me an ear of green maize, the greatest delicacy they know, and another ran to me in the road to offer me a huge and fine potato he was nursing with pride.  The walnuts were just then eatable, and one of the men brought me a quantity in his closed hands so that I should not see what he had, and, emptying them into my hands, ran away with all speed lest I should give him something in return.  They had been carefully cracked and removed from the shells, as the most delicate attention he could show me.

The convent is an old-time stronghold, but, dominated on three sides by hills which look down into its quadrangle, it would be untenable to rifle fire.  It was founded by Stefan Nemanides, son of Bolkan, Prince of the Zeta (a term which comprised all Montenegro and the Berdas), and eldest son of Stefan, Emperor of Servia.  The Romanesque church, which occupies the centre of the quadrangle, was built about A.D. 1250, but, having been burnt out by the Turks, it was restored in 1400, the walls being uninjured, and it has never been since damaged; and the frescoes in the chapel, which are older than those in the church, are dated 1420.  There are some in the church painted later by a monk from Mount Athos, but decidedly inferior to those in the little chapel.

I was hardly in shelter at the convent when the rains set in, and for nearly two weeks I was weather-bound, for in that wild country, with no roads but the tracks the horses wear in the ground, traveling in the mud of rainy weather is out of the question.  In a lull of actual downpour we made an excursion to Kolashin, four hours away, passing through the scene of the defeat of Mehemet Ali Pasha.  The hegumenos, who commanded the half battalion of the monastery, showed me the line of the fighting, and described the battle, and certainly it was one of the most extraordinary battles even in the history of this fighting people.

The Turks came from Kolashin by a road which debouches into the valley by a steep descent of about five hundred feet, and they had crowned the heights and planted their battery before the clans could gather, since these had been scattered along a line of thirty or forty miles, uncertain what point would be attacked.  Voivode Vucovich, hereditary chief of the Wassoivich, with half a battalion of his own people, was watching and following the Turks from a distance, and, when he saw that the movement was intended for the convent, he sent runners to Peiovich in Drobniak and warned the convent, where was a half battalion of local forces.  The regulars formed on the ridge, intrenched themselves,