From the young officers who wore on their shoulders the silver greyhound of the American Courier Service we heard many discouraging tales of the annoyances and discomforts for which we must be prepared in traveling through Hungary, the Banat and Jugoslavia.  But, to tell the truth, I did not take these warnings very seriously, for I had observed that a profoundly pessimistic attitude of mind characterized all of the Americans or English whose duties had kept them in the Balkans for any length of time.  In Salonika this mental condition was referred to as “the Balkan tap”—­derived, no doubt, from the verb “to knock,” as with a hammer—­and it usually implied that those suffering from the ailment had outstayed their period of usefulness and should be sent home.

Thrice weekly a train composed of an assortment of ramshackle and dilapidated coaches, called by courtesy the Orient Express, which maintained an average speed of fifteen miles an hour, left Bucharest for Vincovce, a small junction town in the Banat, where it was supposed to make connections with the south-bound Simplon Express from Paris to Belgrade and with the north-bound express from Belgrade to Paris.  The Simplon Express likewise ran thrice weekly, so, if the connections were missed at Vincovce, the passengers were compelled to spend at least two days in a small Hungarian town which was notorious, even in that region, for its discomforts and its dirt.  All went well with us, however, the train at one time attaining the dizzy speed of thirty miles an hour, until, in a particularly desolate portion of the great Hungarian plain, we came to an abrupt halt.  When, after a half hour’s wait, I descended to ascertain the cause of the delay, I found the train crew surrounded by a group of indignant and protesting passengers.

“What’s the trouble?” I inquired.

“The engineer claims that he has run out of coal,” some one answered.  “But he says that there is a coal depot three or four kilometers ahead and that, if each first-class passenger will contribute fifty francs, and each second-class passenger twenty francs, he figures that it will enable him to buy just enough coal to reach Vincovce.  Otherwise, he says, we will probably miss both connections, which means that we must stay in Vincovce for forty-eight hours.  And if you had ever seen Vincovce you would understand that such a prospect is anything but alluring.”

While my fellow-passengers were noisily debating the question I strolled ahead to take a look at the engine.  As I had been led to expect from the stories I had heard from the courier officers, the tender contained an ample supply of coal—­enough, it seemed to me, to haul the train to Trieste.

“This is nothing but a hold-up,” I told the assembled passengers.  “There is plenty of coal in the tender.  I am as anxious to make the connection as any of you, but I will settle here and raise bananas, or whatever they do raise in the Banat, before I will submit to this highwayman’s demands.”