The Cupboard of the Yesterdays

by H.H. Munro (SAKI)

　　

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"War is a cruelly destructive thing," said the Wanderer, dropping hisnewspaper to the floor and staring reflectively into space. "Ah, yes, indeed," said the Merchant, responding readily to what seemedlike a safe platitude; "when one thinks of the loss of life and limb, thedesolated homesteads, the ruined--" "I wasn't thinking of anything of the sort," said the Wanderer; "I wasthinking of the tendency that modern war has to destroy and banish thevery elements of picturesqueness and excitement that are its chief excuseand charm. It is like a fire that flares up brilliantly for a while andthen leaves everything blacker and bleaker than before. After everyimportant war in South-East Europe in recent times there has been ashrinking of the area of chronically disturbed territory, a stiffening ofthe area of chronically disturbed territory, a stiffening of frontierlines, an intrusion of civilised monotony. And imagine what may happenat the conclusion of this war if the Turk should really be driven out ofEurope." "Well, it would be a gain to the cause of good government, I suppose,"said the Merchant. "But have you counted the loss?" said the other. "The Balkans have longbeen the last surviving shred of happy hunting-ground for theadventurous, a playground for passions that are fast becoming atrophiedfor want of exercise. In old bygone days we had the wars in the LowCountries always at our doors, as it were; there was no need to go farafield into malaria-stricken wilds if one wanted a life of boot andsaddle and licence to kill and be killed. Those who wished to see lifehad a decent opportunity for seeing death at the same time." "It is scarcely right to talk of killing and bloodshed in that way," saidthe Merchant reprovingly; "one must remember that all men are brothers." "One must also remember that a large percentage of them are youngerbrothers; instead of going into bankruptcy, which is the usual tendencyof the younger brother nowadays, they gave their families a fair chanceof going into mourning. Every bullet finds a billet, according to arather optimistic proverb, and you must admit that nowadays it isbecoming increasingly difficult to find billets for a lot of younggentlemen who would have adorned, and probably thoroughly enjoyed, one ofthe old-time happy-go-lucky wars. But that is not exactly the burden ofmy complaint. The Balkan lands are especially interesting to us in theserapidly-moving days because they afford us the last remaining glimpse ofa vanishing period of European history. When I was a child one of theearliest events of the outside world that forced itself coherently undermy notice was a war in the Balkans; I remember a sunburnt, soldierly manputting little pin-flags in a war-map, red flags for the Turkish forcesand yellow flags for the Russians. It seemed a magical region, with itsmountain passes and frozen rivers and grim battlefields, its driftingsnows, and prowling wolves; there was a great stretch of water that borethe sinister but engaging name of the Black Sea--nothing that I everlearned before or after in a geography lesson made the same impression onme as that strange-named inland sea, and I don't think its magic has everfaded out of my imagination. And there was a battle called Plevna thatwent on and on with varying fortunes for what seemed like a great part ofa lifetime; I remember the day of wrath and mourning when the little redflag had to be taken away from Plevna--like other maturer judges, I wasbacking the wrong horse, at any rate the losing horse. And now to-day weare putting little pin-flags again into maps of the Balkan region, andthe passions are being turned loose once more in their playground." "The war will be localised," said the Merchant vaguely; "at least everyone hopes so." "It couldn't wish for a better locality," said the Wanderer; "there is acharm about those countries that you find nowhere else in Europe, thecharm of uncertainty and landslide, and the little dramatic happeningsthat make all the difference between the ordinary and the desirable." "Life is held very cheap in those parts," said the Merchant. "To a certain extent, yes," said the Wanderer. "I remember a man atSofia who used to teach me Bulgarian in a rather inefficient manner,interspersed with a lot of quite wearisome gossip. I never knew what hispersonal history was, but that was only because I didn't listen; he toldit to me many times. After I left Bulgaria he used to send me Sofianewspapers from time to time. I felt that he would be rather tiresome ifI ever went there again. And then I heard afterwards that some men camein one day from Heaven knows where, just as things do happen in theBalkans, and murdered him in the open street, and went away as quietly asthey had come. You will not understand it, but to me there was somethingrather piquant in the idea of such a thing happening to such a man; afterhis dullness and his long-winded small-talk it seemed a sort of brilliant_esprit d'esalier_ on his part to meet with an end of such ruthlesslyplanned and executed violence." The Merchant shook his head; the piquancy of the incident was not withinstriking distance of his comprehension. "I should have been shocked at hearing such a thing about any one I hadknown," he said. "The present war," continued his companion, without stopping to discusstwo hopelessly divergent points of view, "may be the beginning of the endof much that has hitherto survived the resistless creeping-in ofcivilisation. If the Balkan lands are to be finally parcelled outbetween the competing Christian Kingdoms and the haphazard rule of theTurk banished to beyond the Sea of Marmora, the old order, or disorder ifyou like, will have received its death-blow. Something of its spiritwill linger perhaps for a while in the old charmed regions where it boresway; the Greek villagers will doubtless be restless and turbulent andunhappy where the Bulgars rule, and the Bulgars will certainly berestless and turbulent and unhappy under Greek administration, and therival flocks of the Exarchate and Patriarchate will make themselvesintensely disagreeable to one another wherever the opportunity offers;the habits of a lifetime, of several lifetimes, are not laid aside all atonce. And the Albanians, of course, we shall have with us still, atroubled Moslem pool left by the receding wave of Islam in Europe. Butthe old atmosphere will have changed, the glamour will have gone; thedust of formality and bureaucratic neatness will slowly settle down overthe time-honoured landmarks; the Sanjak of Novi Bazar, the MuerstegAgreement, the Komitadje bands, the Vilayet of Adrianople, all thosefamiliar outlandish names and things and places, that we have known solong as part and parcel of the Balkan Question, will have passed awayinto the cupboard of yesterdays, as completely as the Hansa League andthe wars of the Guises. "They were the heritage that history handed down to us, spoiled anddiminished no doubt, in comparison with yet earlier days that we neverknew, but still something to thrill and enliven one little corner of ourContinent, something to help us to conjure up in our imagination the dayswhen the Turk was thundering at the gates of Vienna. And what shall wehave to hand down to our children? Think of what their news from theBalkans will be in the course of another ten or fifteen years. SocialistCongress at Uskub, election riot at Monastir, great dock strike atSalonika, visit of the Y.M.C.A. to Varna. Varna--on the coast of thatenchanted sea! They will drive out to some suburb to tea, and write homeabout it as the Bexhill of the East. "War is a wickedly destructive thing." "Still, you must admit--" began the Merchant. But the Wanderer was notin the mood to admit anything. He rose impatiently and walked to wherethe tape-machine was busy with the news from Adrianople.

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