“Urrgh,” said a man, “you should see this in winter.  Snow ten and twelve feet deep, and only just the roofs and the tops of the telegraph-poles emerging.”

The village escorted us to see the famous Black Lake below the peaks of Dormitor.

The lake is beautiful enough, but too big for mystery, too small to be impressive.  One had imagined it twinkling like the wicked pupil of a witch’s eye, with cornea of white stones and eye-lashes of pine trees, and we desecrated even its stillness by shooting at wild duck with a rifle.

Jan had been describing to the villagers how well Jo rode; they now think he is a liar.  Her horse took an unexpected jump at a small obstacle; the huge hump at the back of the saddle rose suddenly, threw her forward, and before she had realized anything, she was hanging almost upside down about the horse’s neck, helpless because of the enormous steeple in front.  This horse, as though quite used to similar occurrences, stood quietly contemplative, till Mike had restored her to a perpendicular.

Then on again.  At times the tracks grew very muddy, and the horses side-slipped a good deal.  At the top of a pass we halted to get coffee from a leafy hut.  Before us were the mountains of Voynik, a blue ridge with shadowy, strange crevasses and cliffs; behind us Dormitor was still visible, a faint stain on the sky, as though that great canopy had been dragging edges in the dew.

Four women clambered up towards us.  When they had reached the top they flung down their enormous knapsacks and sat down.  They were a cheery, pretty set, and we asked them where they were going.

“To the front,” they said.

“What for?”

“Those are for our husbands and brothers,” answered they, patting the huge coloured knapsacks.

“How far have you to walk?” we asked.

“Four more days.”

“And how far have you walked?”

“Four days.”

No complaining, no repining, just a statement of fact, these women were cheerfully tramping eight days with bundles weighing from 45 to 50 pounds upon their backs, to take a few luxuries, or necessities, to their fighting kin.

We bade them a jolly farewell, wished them luck, and started downhill.

The track became so steep that we had to descend from our horses and walk, and so we came to Shavnik.

Shavnik is not of wood; it is stone, and as we came into its little square—­with the white river-bed on one side—­we realized that no welcome attended us.  To our indignant dismay the inn was full, and no telegram from the “State” had arrived.

[Illustration:  Peasant women of the mountains.]

[Illustration:  A village of north Montenegro.]

We learned that in Montenegro are two kinds of travellers—­royalties and nobodies.  Royalties are done for, nobodies do the best they can.  We found a not overclean room over a shop—­there was nothing better—­we had already experienced worse:  so we ordered supper, and went off to the telegraph station, to make sure that we arrived as “Royalty” at the next stop.