Over the front door of each little house a sort of barber’s pole stuck outwards, striped with the national colours of the minister living within.

We noticed with pride and relief that the Count de Salis’ pole was painted a reticent white.  The sympathetic old lady who opened the door directed us to the Legation.  There we found him inspecting the damages wreaked by the storm of overnight.  The Legation was big and cold, and as the handsome fireplaces sent out by the British Board of Works were for anthracite only (and Montenegro produces only wood), the English minister preferred his warm cottage to the unheated Palace.

He wished us luck in our quest for Scutari, and asked us to tea.  We then hurried to an awful building where the governing of Montenegro was done—­a concrete erection, presented to Montenegro by the British Government, and an exact imitation of one of our workhouses.  Here we found the Minister of War, a gorgeously dressed little man with a pleasant grandfatherly gleam in his eye.  He only spoke Serbian, but with him was an unshaven young man whose chest was covered with gold danglers, who immediately began to air his quite passable French.  We explained what we had been doing and what we wanted to do.  The War Minister had not heard of us from the Sirdar, who had been resting after his terrific ride, but said that they were to see each other that day.  The little man beamed upon us, and said they always wished to do anything for the English, but he must first see the Sirdar.

“By the bye,” he said, “I forgot to introduce you.  This is Prince Peter, commander of the forces on the Adriatic coast.”  The young man arose and clicked his heels.  We too got up.  He shook hands with us solemnly, and Jo, unused to addressing Royalty, said, “Dobra Dan” (Good day).

Then we all sat down again, a further rendezvous was arranged for the evening, and we left, carrying away the impression that the War Minister and we had bowed thirty times to each other before we got out of the door.

Out in the streets, as we were sketching, we saw a large smile under a Staff officer’s cap bearing down upon us.  It was the Sirdar, quite rested and looking twenty years younger.  He was going to the War Minister’s, and promised to arrange at once for our visit to Scutari.  He looked at our cryptic drawings of road scavengers, threw up his hands and ejaculating “Kako”—­strode out of our lives.

Tea in the little house with the discreet white pole was a great pleasure.  Such tea we had not drunk since leaving England—­butter, jam made by the old housekeeper, who pointed this out to us when she brought in a relay of hot water.

She was the daughter of a man who had been exiled from his village because he had taken a prominent part in a blood feud, and the old Gospodar had told him he would be healthier elsewhere.  So they had emigrated as far as Serbia, where she had learnt to read and write.