Petar II Petrovic Njegos

The Mountain Wreath

Unabridged Internet Edition [First Serbian Edition: Wien, 1847]

Translated into English by Vasa D. Mihailovich, Professor of Slavic Languages, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill (USA)

TABLE OF CONTENTS

• Publisher's Foreword
• Introduction by Vasa D. Mihailovic
• The Mountain Wreath by Petar II Petrovic Njegos
• Dedicated to the Ashes of the Father of Serbia
• Dramatis Personae
• A Meeting on the Eve of Whitsuntide on the Mount Lovcen
• An Assembly at Cetinje on the Day of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Convened With the Purpose of Reconciling Some Leaders
• Christmas Eve
• New Year's Day
• Commentary

FOREWORD

In our desire to take part in the celebration of the 150th anniversary of our greatest poetic work, we have decided to publish it with a parallel English translation, the first of the kind in our country.*

The first edition of The Mountain Wreath in English was published in 1930, in the translation by the first English lector in the newly founded Department of English at the University of Belgrade, James W Wiles, who had learnt Serbian quite well. But, as any translation of a great poem into another language, Wiles could not quite adequately render into English all intricate lines and phrases of Njegos's linguistic and stylistic features. All students of this work, especially the translators of poetry, know that it is impossible to satisfy all the requirements of a perfect translation. It was observed a long time ago that translations are like women: if they are beautiful, they are not faithful, if faithful - they are not beautiful.

Apart from the desire to improve on the previous translation, it is necessary for every new generation to attempt a new translation of a great poem in order to refresh it with new features and qualities of the language into which it is translated.

The translation by Mr. Vasa D. Mihailovic, a naturalized American and an outstanding Slavic scholar at the University of North Carolina, (Chapel Hill, USA), appeared in the USA more than half a century after the first English translation, for both reasons just mentioned. This jubilee is an additional reason for this translation to appear in the poet's native country, as a new and revised edition. It was recommended to us by some English Slavicists as well as by some of our local Njegos scholars.

In Introduction to his translation, also republished here, Professor Mihailovic presents not only his interesting observations on Njegos and his works, particularly those on Njegos's contribution to world literature, but he also enlarges on his approach to rendering The Mountain Wreath into English different from the one chosen by James W Wiles and still more clearly justifies his call for a new translation of this epic. That is why we have decided to publish his introduction also, both in English and in Serbian.

Our English scholars and British Slavicists are, naturally, most competent to judge Mihailovic’s translation, but it will be done with due justice if his translation is compared with Serbian translations of Shakespeare. Shakespeare's works have been translated into Serbian since 1860 and we are still not satisfied with those achievements. To be sure, neither are other European nations that began that work long before us and whose languages are far more similar to English than the Serbian language is.

We are obliged to Professor Vasa D. Mihailovic' for his contribution to the appreciation of English speaking readers of the best South Slavic epic; and for enabling us to join the celebration of this anniversary with this new and unusual edition.

* The first such edition of The Mountain Wreath, in Vasa D. Mihailovic’s translation, appeared in the USA in 1986. Three years later its reprint edition appeared in Belgrade, and this is its first Serbian edition with a parallel English verse translation thoroughly revised by the translator so that it is almost a new version.

INTRODUCTION

Petar Petrovic Njegos was a great poet, a prince by inheritance, and the Bishop of Montenegro in the first half of the nineteenth century. In fulfilling successfully these roles imposed on him by circumstances, he not only built for himself a pedestal among the immortals but also set his beloved Montenegro on the road toward full self-realization. Today he is revered as Montenegro's most illustrious son and the greatest poet in Serbian literature.

Born November 1, 1813, in the village of Njegusi in Montenegro, Njegos was a member of a leading family which had produced state leaders for several generations in that small mountainous country. He grew up among illiterate peasants and shepherds, whose main duty was to fight incessant battles with the invading Turks and to till their infertile land. He left home when he was eleven and entered the Cetinje monastery, at that time the only place of any culture and education in Montenegro. His schooling was meager and unconventional; first in the monastery, then as tutored by the self-educated and eccentric poet Sima Milutinovic Sarajlija. Milutinovic taught the young Njegos a few basic disciplines and instilled in him an appreciation for heroic folk poems, through which he called forth Njegos 's own poetic inspirations. Njegos was sent by his uncle, the state and spiritual leader of Montenegro, to a school near Herceg-Novi, on the Adriatic coast, just beyond the Montenegrin border. His brief stay there was highly beneficial to him because for the first time he was able to live in a more civilized environment. It was at this time that he began to write poems in imitation of folk poetry, which was then the only kind of literature of which the people of Montenegro were aware.

Though he had meager theological training, at the age of seventeen, in October 1830, Njegos inherited his uncle's title as the head of both the state and the church. He remained in that capacity until his death. During his rule Njegos spent most of his energy in leading Montenegro out of the Middle Ages, while nonetheless finding time to write. He had to bring order among the Montenegrin tribes, which resisted his attempts to eradicate common crime and often conducted bloody wars against one another. He tried to convince his countrymen that they ought to pay taxes so that the country could be modernized. He also fought to establish the borders of Montenegro and played diplomatic games with the great powers - Turkey, Austria, and Russia - in order to achieve formal recognition of Montenegro as a sovereign state, while at the same time organizing military campaigns against the Turks and their Montenegrin converts. He built schools and roads, very few of which had existed before him; organized a small governing body called the Senate; created the first organized police force in Montenegro to combat crime, collect taxes, and prevent tribal wars; imported a printing press and started publishing books; and sent gifted youths abroad to provide for an enlightened future leadership for the country. All the while he was dreaming of the liberation of all Slavs from the Turks, placing his greatest hope in Russia as the protector of the Slavs. In 1833 he went to Russia, where he was officially ordained Bishop of Montenegro. While on his journey to Russia, in Vienna, he twice met Vuk Karadzic, the great reformer of the Serbian written language and collector of Serbian folk literature. Njegos gave Vuk some of his writings to be published and, in turn, was encouraged by Vuk to write more. From Russia Njegos brought many books, which represented his first real encounter with world literature. His second trip to Russia, in 1837. contributed even further to the recognition of Montenegro as a sovereign state and to the security of its borders. He remained a loyal admirer of Russia all his life, even when Russia had to make peace with his arch-enemy, Turkey.

The next ten years were a period of lively literary activity in Njegos's life, during which he wrote his greatest works - The Ray of Microcosm and The Mountain Wreath, while continuing his struggle for a strong and secure Montenegro. The revolutions of 1848 in Europe strengthened his hopes that all Slavs, especially the South Slavs, would completely free themselves from foreign domination, and that his beloved Montenegro would finally be left in peace. When the revolutions failed, Njegos was bitterly disappointed. In addition, strenuous work under unsavory conditions and the constant fighting which surrounded him undermined his health. He fell ill of tuberculosis and after several trips to Italy and Austria in search of a cure, died on October 19, 1851, at his capital Cetinje, in his thirty-eighth year, too young to finish his two main missions - as a statesman and as a poet. He is buried at Lovcen, a mountain peak he had chosen himself. His mausoleum is now a shrine for his whole nation.

Njegos began to write poetry at a very early age, when he was only six-teen. His four books of poetry The Voice of Mountaineers (1833), The Cure for Turkish Fury (1834), The Song of Freedom (1835, published 1854), and The Serbian Mirror (1845) - attest to the fact that poetry was foremost on his mind and in his heart, even when he was preoccupied with other concerns. His early poems imitate the folk poetry with which he grew up and whose influence stayed with him his entire life. As he matured, imitation gave way to his own renditions of the overriding theme of Serbian folk epic poetry - the struggle against the Turkish occupation or the threat thereof, and the eventual liberation from it. The freeing of all Serbs from the Turkish yoke was Njegos lifelong dream, both as a statesman and as a poet. In poems like "A New Montenegrin Poem about the War between the Russians and the Turks"(1828) and “A Montenegrin Captured by a Fairy” (1834), Njegos glorifies the bravery of the Serbs in that struggle as epitomized by Karageorge, the leader of the First Serbian Uprising against the Turks in 1804. Yet, even though these poems are imbued with the heroic spirit of folk poetry and follow its formalistic features, they also reveal the authenticity and potential power of Njegos's own poetic talent, which would be manifested in his later works.

Njegos’s first important work, and one of the greatest achievements in Serbian literature, is the epic poem The Ray of Microcosm, (1845, in English, 1952 and 1957). Written in the decasyllabic meter of Serbian folk poetry, it deviates from the spirit of folk poetry in that it deals with the poet's philosophical and religious views on man, his origin, his relationship with God, and his ultimate fate on earth. The six cantos of this epic present, through the eyes of a poet who is given the opportunity to visit the cosmos in its pre-existence, Njegos’s own interpretation of the origin of the world and man's role in it. As in Christian tradition, Njegos sees the world as God's creation after the titanic struggle of Light and Darkness, but Njegos’s man is created by God before the creation of the earth and is condemned to eternal suffering on earth after he has joined Satan in the rebellion against God. Thus, Njegos's religious outlook is basically in agreement with the Christian view although it differs in details. The poem is written in an exalted tone as befits the subject matter, and the depth of his views and thoughts resembles that of Dante's Divine Comedy and Milton’s Paradise Lost, to which it is often compared. While it is true that Njegos was familiar with both of these works, his epic is the result of his own thinking and poetic power.

Njegos published his magnum opus, The Mountain Wreath, in 1847, the banner year in Serbian literature. In the same year Vuk Karadzic published his own translation of the New Testament into a language that every Serb could understand, and Branko Radicevic published his Poems, the first collection of Serbian lyric poetry in the language of the people. To be sure, The Mountain Wreath goes beyond the significance of the year. It is a modern epic written in verse as a play, thus combining three of the major modes of literary expression.

The Mountain Wreath represents a synthesis in another sense as well. It is based on historical facts, thus it can be called a historical play. It epitomizes the spirit of the Serbian people kept alive for centuries; indeed, there is no other literary work with which the Serbs identify more. it gave Njegos an opportunity to formulate his own philosophical views, views which also reflect and further inspire those of his nation. Finally, in this work the author reaches artistic heights seen neither before nor since in Serbian literature. These are the main reasons for the universal reverence for and high estimation of The Mountain Wreath the highest achievement in all of Serbian literature.

The play is based on a historical event in Montenegro that took place toward the end of the seventeenth century, known as "the exterminations of the Turkish converts." Although the historical facts about this event are somewhat uncertain, it is known that at approximately that time Montenegrins attempted to solve radically the problem of many of their brethren who, having succumbed to the lure of Turkish power, had agreed to being converted to Islam, mainly to improve their increasingly harsh lives. The fact that Njegos used this event only as a general framework, however, without bothering about the exact historical data, underscores his concern with an issue that had preoccupied him throughout his entire life: the struggle for freedom from foreign oppression. He subjects the entire plot and all characters to this central idea.

The themes presented in The Mountain Wreath lend the work dimensions that go far beyond its local limitations. The basic theme is the struggle for freedom, justice, and dignity. The characters are fighting to correct a local flaw in their society - the presence of turncoats whose allegiance is to a foreign power bent on conquest - but they are at the same time involved in a struggle between good and evil, which is found everywhere in nature. Thus, while depicting the local problem Njegos points at the ideals that should concern all mankind. He expresses a firm belief in man and in his basic goodness and integrity. He also shows that man must forever fight for his rights and for whatever he attains, for nothing comes by chance. Apart from these universal concerns, Njegos presents the centuries-old struggle of his people for the ideals just mentioned. Perhaps no people on earth has been forced by historical circumstances to pay for every speck of land and every piece of bread with blood and sweat as have the Montenegrins. In elevating their struggle to a universal level Njegos seems to find both justification and reward for their efforts. It should also be pointed out that much of the action and many characters in The Mountain Wreath point at similarities with Njegos and his own time. By connecting the past with the present he gave vent to his own frustrations which were caused by the often insurmountable difficulties he had to endure in his attempts to create a better life for his people. It is safe to assume that many of the thoughts and words of Bishop Danilo and Abbot Stephen reflect Njegos's own, and that the main plot of the play - the extermination of the converts - illuminates the one overriding ambition of his life -to free his people and enable them to live in peace and dignity.

The Mountain Wreath is not a drama in the usual sense of the word. Divided into four scenes of unequal length, it has many subscenes which tend to weaken the unity of action. There is little direct action, moreover, most of it is related by characters, sometimes at great length. It is more of a Lesedrama and it is not performed often: even when it is, it is done with revisions. It cannot be said, however, that the play is totally devoid of dramatic quality: at times it is highly dramatic, even in the speeches relating the action. There is also a healthy dose of humour which enlivens an otherwise sombre and often tragic atmosphere.

One of the most important merits of The Mountain Wreath is its high artistic quality. Employing a decasyllabic meter borrowed from folk poetry, the play is written in the pure language of folk poetry, a language that never ceases to astound the reader and listener. There are many powerful metaphors and striking images. When numerous profound thoughts are added, frequently expressed in the laconic manner of proverbs (indeed, many of them have become proverbs), the picture of The Mountain Wreath as a masterful work of art is complete.

Njegos wrote his second play - and his last major work - Stephen the Small, the Pretender (1847), soon after The Mountain Wreath. Yet, despite some similarities (both plays are based on history and are written in the decasyllabic meter, for example), the two plays could not be more different. Njegos collected the material for this play in the archives at home and in Venice, as well as in the rich folklore about the main character and his exploits. Stephen the Small was published in 1851, the last of his books which he would see in print.

The historical background of the play covers one of the most fascinating and bizarre events in Montenegrin history. A man appeared in Montenegro in 1767 claiming that he was the Russian Tsar Peter III, who had disappeared in Russia under mysterious circumstances and was believed to have been murdered. Most Montenegrins believed Stephen and installed him as their ruler. His rule lasted only until 1774, however, because some Montenegrin leaders doubted his story; a Russian envoy, Dolgorukov, arrived to claim his extradition; and the Turks demanded that he be handed over to them. The Turks even attacked Montenegro for that purpose, but were defeated. During the brief war Stephen behaved in a cowardly manner, thus losing respect among Montenegrins. But because he did some good during his short reign - he brought unity among the feuding tribes, effected reforms, and defeated the Turks - his shortcomings were forgiven, even after he finally admitted that he had come from Dalmatia as an adventurer. Stephen was murdered by a Greek in Turkish service, who cut his throat while shaving him.

Such an adventure tale could have served Njegos well had he been a more skillful playwright. But instead of concentrating on the plot, dramatic as it was, he used the dramatic form mainly to put forth his views on Montenegrin history, on the never-ending war against the Turks, and on the Montenegrin character in general. The play is much less exalted and much more down to earth than The Mountain Wreath. It is also much more of a traditional play than The Mountain Wreath. Even though it does not always adhere to the unities of time and place and the scenery sometimes changes in the midst of an act, it is clearly divided into five acts, with eleven scenes on an average in each act. Still, the fact of the matter is that Stephen the Small is also more of a Lesedrama than a play to be acted (it is indeed seldom performed). The actors spend most of their time talking rather than acting, and the author seems to be carried away by their incessant talk.

The lack of a truly dramatic quality in Stephen the Small reveals that Njegos was more preoccupied with his own views about this brief and strange episode in Montenegrin history than with its dramatic potential. It is also conceivable that, having experienced similar difficulties in dealing with his own people and with the Turks, he wanted to point out the basic differences between his approach through strength of mind, will, and character, and Stephen's through deceit and adventurism. At the same time Njegos could not ignore the fact that, despite his shortcomings Stephen did have some success in dealing with the Montenegrins and the Turks in the area in which Njegos had a lifelong ambition to succeed - in dealing with the Montenegrins and the Turks.

Stephen the Small is, therefore, less successful as a traditional play than it is in offering a fascinating picture of the conditions in Montenegro in the second half of the eighteenth century, of some, often humorous, traits of the Montenegrin character, and of Montenegro's relationship with Russia. Perhaps the greatest significance of this play lies in showing the organic development of the author, as Vido Latkovic sees it, from an idealist in The Ray of Microcosm, and romanticist in The Mountain Wreath to a realist in Stephen the Small, the Pretender.

The importance of Njegos's contribution to Serbian, as well as world, literature can be seen both from a local and a universal point of view. Locally, his appearance at the time when Serbian literature was making its first unsure steps after centuries of dormancy lent this reawakening a strong impetus. Coming in the midst of the struggle for the use of the people's language in literature, Njegos's use of the vernacular, which he patterned after folk poetry, assured the success of this all-important linguistic reform. His poetic power, depth of thought, and ability to express himself in artistic form, moreover, an ability not seen before or after in Serbian literature, enabled this literature to rejoin the rest of the world during the period of Romanticism. From the universal standpoint, Njegos's preoccupation with some of the most basic themes of human existence - man's origin and the meaning of his life, the constant struggle between good and evil, man's yearning for freedom - makes him a poet of universal significance and appeal. For these reasons he is considered to be the greatest Serbian and South Slavic writer. Although a lack of adequate translations has precluded him so far from reaching a wider audience, he is still well-known abroad, as attested by his frequent comparison with such great writers as Pushkin, Milton, Dante, Mickiewicz, and others.

Printing of The Mountain Wreath

Most of The Mountain Wreath was written in 1846 in Cetinje, the capital of Montenegro. In October 1846 Njegos took along the manuscript on his visit to Vienna, where it was published the following year by the printers in the Armenian Mechitarist monastery. The first edition was prepared by Njegos himself and he was supposed to have overseen the printing of the book. He either did not have time or was in no mood to pay attention to every detail, however, because he had come to Vienna on an important mission: to ask the Russian government to help his country stricken by drought and threatened by famine and the Turks. Since the Russians were hesitant in allowing him to come to Russia for fear of angering the Turks, with whom they were on good terms at that time, Njegos was in no mood to devote much time to the printing of his magnum opus. It is, therefore, possible that some minor changes were made by someone else during the printing. The comparison of the only preserved manuscript (verses 1-1528) with the first edition shows differences whose authorship is difficult to ascertain.

Since the first publication in 1847, there have been almost a hundred new editions, all of which adhere to the first. Njegos did not see another publication of The Mountain Wreath for he died four years later. It is difficult to imagine that he would have made significant changes, however, had he lived longer. To be sure, there are changes in subsequent editions, mainly to correct obvious misprints or grammatical inconsistencies, or to conform to new orthographic rules. Thus, even though there is no official standard version of The Mountain Wreath, the edition of 1847 suits that definition as far as the meaning of the text is concerned, minor changes notwithstanding. This fact speaks for the unerring creative power of Njegos, who was able to write his major work in one sitting, so to speak.

Textual interpretations

The Mountain Wreath has been translated into most modern languages, in some cases more than once (in German, Russian, Czech, and now English). The changes mentioned above and other references that are difficult to illuminate fully have led to constant interpretations of The Mountain Wreath by various scholars. The main interpreters are Milan Resetar, Vido Latkovic, Risto Dragicevic, and Nikola Banasevic. There are many other, less ambitious interpretations of individual passages or lines. It is safe to say that the definitive interpretation of The Mountain Wreath is far from being complete and that this greatest work in Serbian and South Slav literatures will keep inspiring research forever.

On translating The Mountain Wreath into English

The first translation of The Mountain Wreath into English, by James W Wiles, was published in 1930. Wiles was a great friend of the Serbs, well acquainted with their culture having spent many years among them. He first read The Mountain Wreath in 1913, translated it for many years, and finally consented to demands for its publication. It was until now the only English translation of this work.

Wiles's translation remains a gallant effort. Only those readers who are familiar with the drama, its aphoristic thoughts, at times oblique references, and the strange beauty of The Mountain Wreath in the original can comprehend the difficulties of translating it into another language.

Yet, his motives and gallant efforts notwithstanding, the end result of Wiles's labour was not an unmitigated success. His entire approach to the task reveals several inadequacies and fallacies, which prevented his translation from doing justice to Njegos's masterpiece. Some of these inadequacies were inherent in the circumstances under which he had to work and over which he had little or no control at all: the inevitable, at times profound differences between the Serbian and English languages; the inability of a non-native to grasp the fine literary and linguistic nuances of the original; and most certainly, some peculiarities of The Mountain Wreath which are often difficult to master even for a native (witness several interpretations by Yugoslav scholars, some of which are still unreconciled).

Over other problems Wiles had better control but failed to, or chose not to, exercise it. His decision to abandon the decasyllabic meter of Njegos’s verse was, no doubt, dictated by the extreme difficulty of following it strictly in English. Yet, the translator often went too far in his freedom. His verses not only fail to reproduce the ten-syllable meter of The Mountain Wreath, but they often show great unevenness in the number of feet per line. Sometimes one verse of Njegos is split into two.

The greatest fallacy of Wiles's approach was his belief that The Mountain Wreath must have sounded extremely exalted and archaic even at the time of publication in 1847. As a consequence, the translator strove consciously to recreate the elevated tone of Njegos’s epic by deliberately choosing expressions that are no longer in common use: ye, dot/i, thou, thee, tliy, hast, shouldst, wilt, and so on, not to speak of expressions which may be pardonable in a poetic style but are still quite outlandish: reconipense, maw, mischance, puissant, thereto, spake, ambuscade, methinks, and so on. Such an approach leads not only to a high degree of unusualness, unbefitting a work patterned after folk poetry whose beauty lies primarily in its noble simplicity, but also to a highly stilted language and even stammering speech. One of the best illustrations of this can be found in the verse

That thus thou dost delay to us to come.

To be sure, just as Shakespeare sounds somewhat archaic to the present-day English reader, The Mountain Wreath does at times sound somewhat antiquated to a modern ear. When it was written, however, it sounded quite natural to a contemporary reader. When such a work is translated into a modern language, for a modern reader, there is no reason why it should be translated in a language belonging to a different era. It is here that the greatest weakness of Wiles's translation lies. It is primarily this strange sounding language used by Wiles, coupled with other inadequacies, that encouraged me to undertake a new translation.

While working on the translation of The Mountain Wreath into English, I was faced with many of the same or similar problems and dilemmas which beset my predecessor. At the same time, there were problems which my predecessor was not aware of or, more likely, chose to ignore. It is in this area that my translation differs substantially from that of Wiles.

First of all, strenuous efforts were made to be as faithful to the original as possible, without making the translation sound like one. My overwhelming awe before Njegos stifled any temptation to change his work. Such temptation has ruined many a translation, revealing in actuality a frustrated writer in the translator himself. Changes that were made are of a minor nature, dictated only by the impossibility of expressing some word phrase, or idea of Njegos's exactly the same way in English.

The second important element of my approach deals with the question of how contemporary the translation of The Mountain Wreath should be. As mentioned, it makes no sense to render this work in a version of a foreign language that is at least one to two hundred years old. On the contrary, the language of the translation should be just as contemporary as it was to the first reader. There is no reason, therefore, to deny to a modern reader in English the beauty, clarity, and freshness of the original.

The question of form was probably the most difficult to solve. Apart from a few passages in prose, most of which are stage instructions, one brief passage in the nine-syllable meter (verses 1855-73), and the lament of Batric's sister, which is in the twelve-syllable meter (verses 1913-63), the entire work is in the decasyllabic meter (deseterac). Strenuous attempts were made to adhere strictly to the meter of the original. Blank verse, consisting of unrhymed iambic pentameter, would have offered a natural solution. Unfortunately, the meter of The Mountain Wreath is not iambic but, most often, trochaic, which is not indigenous to English verse. Both the iamb and the trochee, therefore, had to be abandoned. The decasyllabic meter, however, has still been preserved in all but a very few verses. At the same time, the caesura, which occurs in The Mountain Wreath regularly after the fourth syllable, has been kept in almost all verses. The only concessions were a few "untruet' caesuras and sporadic "filler" phrases such as "indeed", "pray tellt', "surely", and so on, in order to complete the decasyllabic line: in no case was the meaning of the original compromised.

In order to preserve the flavour of Njegos's masterpiece, instead of explaining or interpreting unusual metaphors, they were kept whenever possible. For example, the frequent use of the metaphor "gray falcon" for a young brave man is so beautiful that any attempt to find a similar metaphor in English would be a pale reflection of it. Similarly, the use of "doe" for a beautiful girl, as in verse 1843, is best left unchanged unless one wants to correct Njegos at his craft. Another metaphor, "the evil wind put out the holy lamp", is a good example of the author's way of expressing his religious preference in a poetic fashion; for this reason, it is best to preserve the metaphor in the form Njegos meant it.

In selecting words, I have often refrained from long or "intellectual" words; instead, simpler, one-to-two syllable words, the so-called Celtic words, were used, not only because they are more direct and more powerful poetically, but also because they correspond more closely to Njegos's folk-imitating speech. Thus, for example, the Serbian word "Podosmo" (verse 2607) is translated as "set out" rather than "departed" or "journeyed"; and "pocine" (verse 1873) is rendered as "rests" rather than "reposes" or "reclines."

Many more short sentences were used in translation than one finds in Njegos. It is quite common in a Serbian text to find two or more independent clauses in the same sentence, separated by a comma; such practice is not tolerated in English. For this reason punctuation frequently had to be changed. Fortunately, these and other changes in punctuation did not alter the meaning of the original at all.

At times an inversion of phrases or clauses within a verse or of verses themselves was necessary in order to produce a smoother reading in English. The inversion of entire verses was mostly of adjacent ones (for example, verses 487-88, 597-98, 827-28, 1153-54, 2150-51, and so on). At times it was necessary to invert verses separated by two and even more lines (verses 668-72, 927-29, 2212-14, 2601-03, and so on). On some occasions enjambment was used (verses 772-73, 971-72, 1476-77, 2294-95, and so on), although it seldom occurs in The Mountain Wreath. The tense sequence was kept uniform within passages. In Serbian the switching from one tense to another, usually from the past to the present, is done with abandon, often in the same paragraph; no such switching is possible in English. The best examples of this are found in verses 998-1005 and 1299-1304. Finally, there is little rhyming in The Mountain Wreath except in the Dedication poem and in a few other verses. Rhyming was completely abandoned in the translation simply because it would have necessitated many deviations from the original.

As for the many difficult passages, phrases, and references in The Mountain Wreath, I have relied for the most part on the interpretations of Professor Nikola Banasevic in his commentaries for its latest edition (Belgrade: Srpska knjizevna zadruga, 1973). He has, in turn, made a compendium of all previous commentaries. When an interpretation was still in doubt, I have tended to side with Professor Banasevic.

All these problems and their attempted solutions have undoubtedly resulted in a certain loss of poetic quality in this translation of The Mountain Wreath. This is inevitable in any translation that strives to be faithful to the author and his work, especially if that work is a poetic one. In addition to this general circumstance, there is something in the nature of Serbian sounds and the way in which syllables are formed that causes a loss of poetic quality in translation. Serbian sounds, especially those of vowels, are both shorter and clearer than in English. Syllables are usually made through regular interchange of vowels and consonants, producing a much greater musical effect than in English.

It is therefore not surprising that neither James W Wiles nor myself have completely succeeded in reproducing the artistic and musical quality of Njegos's work, as is evidenced by the translation of the above verses. What we have accomplished, I believe, are decent renderings of this beautiful but difficult work.

It is not my intention to pass judgment on the merits of the two translations - the reader should be the judge. Nor do I wish to denigrate Wiles's translation, which, as stated at the beginning, still deserves our respect and gratitude. I myself have used it for comparison and have borrowed a few lines that cannot be improved upon. There are, however, only a few identical lines.

A literary work of the magnitude of The Mountain Wreath deserves to be translated in, by, and for every generation. It is my hope that this is the translation for the second half of the twentieth century.

***

I would like to express my gratitude to the University of North Carolina Research Council and to Bonnie Carey for their generous assistance as well as to Professor Vujadin Milanovic from the University of Belgrade for his suggestions for better English rendering of quite a number of lines in this edition and for making this bilingual edition splendid as it is.

Vasa D. Mihailovich

Petar II Petrovic Njegos

The Mountain Wreath

Translated into English by Vasa D. Mihailovich

Contents

DEDICATED TO THE ASHES OF THE FATHER OF SERBIA

DRAMATIS PERSONAE

A MEETING ON THE EVE OF WHITSUNTIDE ON THE MOUNT LOVCEN

AN ASSEMBLY AT CETINJE ON THE DAY OF THE NATIVITY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY, CONVENED WITH THE PURPOSE OF RECONCILING SOME LEADERS

CHRISTMAS EVE

NEW YEAR'S DAY

Translator's Commentary

DEDICATED TO THE ASHES OF THE FATHER OF SERBIA ^[1]

Let this century of ours be the pride of all the centuries,
It shall be a fateful era striking awe for generations.
In this century eight children were born as if from the same womb;
from the cradle of Bellona^[2] they made their appearance on earth:
Napoleon; Charles^[3]; Blucher^[4]; the Duke of Wellington^[5], and Suvorov^[6];
Karageorge, the scourge of tyrants; Schwarzenberg^[7] and Kutuzov^[8], too.
Ares^[9], the horror of the earth, made them drunk with martial glory
and gave them the earth's arena in which to fight one another.
It is not hard for a lion to come forth from a spacious bush.
The nest of genius is built only among greater nations.
There, above all, he finds the stuff needed for his deeds of glory
and a proud garland of triumph to adorn the hero's bold head^[10].
But the hero of Topola^[11], the great, immortal Karageorge,
saw many hurdles in his way, yet he reached his grandiose goal.
He roused people, christened the land,^[12] and broke the barbarous fetters,
summoned the Serbs back from the dead, and breathed life into their souls.
He is the Immortal's secret: he gave the Serbs the chests of steel
and awakened the lion's heart in those who had lost their courage.
The bands of the Eastern Pharaoh^[13] turn to ice in fear before George^[14].
Through George the Serbian hearts and arms were instilled with high bravery!
Stamboul, the bloodthirsty father of the plague, trembles before him,
even the Turks swear by his sabre - no other oath have they indeed.
^[15]---------------------------------------------------------------------
---------------------------------------------------------------------
---------------------------------------------------------------------
---------------------------------------------------------------------
---------------------------------------------------------------------
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Yes, a hero's life is always haunted by a tragic ending.
It was destiny that your head had to pay the price for its wreath!^[16]
---------------------------------------------------------------------
---------------------------------------------------------------------
---------------------------------------------------------------------
---------------------------------------------------------------------
---------------------------------------------------------------------
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Later generations judge deeds and give to all what they deserve.
Everybody's curse falls on people like Boris^[17] and Vukasin^[18].
The disgusting name of Piso^[19] must not blemish the calendar.
Orestes'^[20] justice comes like the bolt from heaven to Aegisthus^[21].
---------------------------------------------------------------------
---------------------------------------------------------------------
---------------------------------------------------------------------
---------------------------------------------------------------------
---------------------------------------------------------------------
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Mean envy vomits forth darkness upon your illustrious grave,
but who can put out the powerful, celestial light of your soul?
Miserable, ugly darkness - can it dim the glow of such light?
Darkness hides from the light, and yet it only makes the light more bright^[22].
The life-giving flame of your torch will shine for the Serb forever,
and it will grow more luminous and miraculous for ages.
Serbian women used to give birth to Dusan^[23] and nurse Obilic^[24],
and now Serbian women give birth to such heroes as Pozarski^[25],
all wonderful and noble men! Serbdom breathes nobility now.
Away from the Serbs, you vile curse - the Serbs have now fulfilled their vow!^[26]

Vienna, New Year's Day. 1847 The Author

THE MOUNTAIN WREATH

DRAMATIS PERSONAE

The persons not mentioned in poet's DRAMATIS PERSONAE list:

Vuk Markovic, a Cuca, a soldier, a second soldier,
a Montenegrin wedding guest, a Turkish wedding guest, the student, students 

A MEETING ON THE EVE OF WHITSUNTIDE ON THE MOUNT LOVCEN ^[27]

It is the dead of night. Everyone is asleep.

BISHOP DANILO (talking to himself)

Lo the devil^[28] with seven scarlet cloaks,
with two swords and with two crowns on his head,
the great-grandchild of the Turk, with Koran!
Behind him hordes of that accursed litter,
march to lay waste to the whole planet Earth,
just as locusts devastate the green fields.
If the French dike had not stood in the way,
the Arab sea would have flooded it all!^[29]
Osman^[30] was crowned in an infernal dream
and given the half-moon like an apple.
Orkan!^[31] What an evil guest in Europe!
Now Byzantium is indeed nothing but
a dowry of youthful Theodora;^[31]
the star of doom still hovers over it.
Upon Murat^[32] Paleologos^[32] calls
to bury both Greeks and Serbs together.
Brankovic^[33] and Gerluka^[34] want the same.
Thanks, Mohammad,^[34] for hanging Gerluka!
Besides Asia, where their nest is hidden,
the devil's tribe gobled up the nations -
one every day, as an owl gulps a bird:
Murat Serbia, and Bajazet Bosnia,
Mohammed Greece and Murat Epirus,
the two Selims Cyprus and Africa.
Each took something, nothing was left over;
it is dreadful to hear what's happening.
World is too small for the devil's large maw
to eat his full, let alone overeat!^[35]
Janko defends the dead King Wladislaw;^[36]
but why do so when he failed to save him?
In Skenderbeg^[37] beats Obilic's heart,
but he perished as a forlorn exile.
What can I do? Who is there to help me?
There are few hands and all too little strength.
I'am a lone straw tossing in the whirlwind,
a sad orphan without friend or kinfolk.
My people sleep a deep and lifeless sleep;
no parent's hand to wipe away my tears.
Above my head the heaven is shut tight;
it does not hear my cries or my prayers.
The world has now become a hell for me,
people have turned into hellish spirits.
O my dark day! O my black destiny!
O my wretched Serbian nation snuffed out!
I have outlived many of your troubles,
yet I must fight against the worst of all!^[38]
Yes, when the head on a body is smashed,
the limbs die out in frightful agony.
Plague of mankind, may God's wrath be on you!
Is half a world you've already poisoned
with your mean deeds not large enough for you,
that you had to spew out all the venom
of your black soul on this hard rock as well?^[39]
Is Serbia from the Danube River
to the blue sea too small an offering?
You rule the throne you've unjustly taken^[40]
and are prideful of your bloody scepter;
you insult God from the holy altar,
a mosque rises where the broken Cross lies.^[41]
Why do you want to poison its shadow,
which people took to the mountain shelters
for their lasting pride and consolation,
to remind them of their heroic past?
It is washed in blood so many times over,
a hundred times in yours, as oft in ours!
Behold the work of that wicked monarch,^[42]
whom the devil teaches all kinds of things:
"Montenegro I cannot win or tame,
nor call it mine in any real sense;
this is how one should deal with its people."
And so began the devil's Messiah^[43]
to offer them sweetmeats of his false faith.
May God strike you, loathsome degenerates,^[44]
why do we need the Turk's faith among us?
What will you do with your ancestors' curse?^[45]
With what will you appear before Milos^[46]
and before all other Serbian heroes,
whose names will live as long as the sun shines?
When I think of today's council meeting,^[47]
flames of horror flare up deep inside me.
A brother will slaughter his own brother,
and the arch-foe, so strong and so evil,
will destroy e'en the seed within mothers.
O wretched day, may God's curse be on you!
when you brought me to the light of this world.
A hundred times I've cursed that hour last year
when the Turks failed, or didn't want, to kill me;
my people's hopes I would not betray now.^[48]

Vuk Micunovic lies near the Bishop. He is pretending to sleep but can hear everything very well

VUK MICUNOVIC

Don't, my Bishop, if you have faith in God!
What misfortune has come over you now
that you do wail like some sad cuckoo-bird
and drown yourself in our Serbian troubles?
Is today not a festive occasion
on which you have gathered Montenegrins
to cleanse our land of loathsome infidels?
Besides, this is our slava holiday^[49]
on which our best and noblest lads gather
to test their strength and their abilities,
the strength of arms, and fleetness of their feet,
to vie also in the target-shooting,
to cleave the roast ram's shoulder in wager,
to hear also the liturgy in church,
dance the kolo^[50] all around the churchyard,
and thrust their chests in knightly exercise.
To all brave men that is a holy incense,
making youthful hearts as strong as iron!
Banish, Bishop, such dark and gloomy thoughts!
Men bravely bear, wailing is for women.
A timid chief has no business ruling!
You are not left just to your resources.
Do you not see these five hundred brave lads?
What marvels of strength and fleet-footedness
have we not seen here among them today?
Did you see how they were target-shooting,
how skilfully they played the game of grad,^[51]
and how nimbly they did grab the small caps?^[52]
As wolf-cubs start to follow their mother,
so they begin playfully to sharpen
their dreaded teeth upon each other's throats.^[53]
As soon as the falcon grows his first plumes,^[53]
he cannot be peaceful any longer.
Instead, his nest he keeps rearranging,
Grabbing the straws one after another,
he flies shrieking toward the light blue sky,
In this there is a lesson to be learned.
Beside the youths present here around you,
there are six times as many back at home.
Their strength, Bishop, is surely your strength too.
Before the Turks will have conquered them all,
many a wife of the Turk will wear black.
Our struggle won't come to an end until
we or the Turks are exterminated.
What right to hope has anyone of us
except in God and in our own two hands.
The hope we had was buried forever
in one large tomb at the Kosovo Field.^[54]
When things go well, 'tis easy to be good;
adversity shows who is the hero.

Crosses have been carried from Lovcen to the hill above the Crkvine.
Men are sitting on the hill, shooting and counting the echoes of each shot.

SIRDAR JANKO DJURASKOVIC

What a fine gun, worth a human head!
Every one of our guns echoes six times,
but dzeferdar^[55] of Vuk Tomanovic
keeps echoing nine times of equal strength

SIRDAR RADONJA

Montenegrins, do you see this wonder?
Fifty full years I've spun of my life's yarn.
I've always spent my summers on Lovcen
and have clambered up to this high summit.
Hundreds of times I have gazed at the clouds
sailing in flocks from the sea down yonder
and covering this entire mountain range.
I've watched them float and rush now here, now there
with lightning bolts and with mighty rumble
and with the roar of terrible thunder.
Hundreds of times I have rested up here,
warming myself in the sun peacefully.
I've watched often the lightning beneath me,
listened to the thunder rending the sky,
as in the din of the frightening hail
the clouds below make everything barren
-but this wonder I have yet to witness!
Do you notice, upon your faith in God,
how much there is of the sea and the coast,
of proud Bosnia and Hercegovina,
Albania way down there by the sea,
how much there is of our Montenegro?
The clouds cover all these lands evenly!
The thunder's roar can be heard all around,
all beneath us the lightning keeps flashing,
but we alone are lying in the sun.
It has become rather hot up here now,
since the top of this mountain's always cool.

OBRAD

Did you see this miracle and omen
when two flashes made a cross in the sky?
One flash came from Kom^[56] straight on to Lovcen;
the other flashed from Skadar^[57] to Ostrog^[58].
They formed a cross made out of living fire.
How lovely it is just to look at it!
Never before in this wide world of ours
has someone heard or seen such a cross.
God, help us Serbs in all our misfortune;
this, too, must be a good omen for us!

VUK RASLAPCEVIC

What do you aim at with your gun, Drasko?

VOIVODE DRASKO

I want to kill one of the cuckoo-birds,
but I don't want to waste a single cartridge.

VUK RASLAPCEVIC
Please don't do that, Drasko, upon your life!
It isn't proper to kill a cuckoo-bird.
Do you not know, may the devil take you,
that cuckoos are the daughters of Lazar?^[59]

A great commotion arises above the Crkvine,
on the northern side above the lake.

SIRDAR VUKOTA

What's this clamour? What is troubling you now?
So help me God, you are worse than children!

VUKOTA MRVALJEVIC
Straight at us flew a flock of partridges
and we captured each one of them alive.
The great uproar arose for that reason.

EVERYONE SHOUTS AT THE TOP OF HIS VOICE:

Let them all go, may God's grace be with you,
because trouble has driven them our way;
you wouldn't have caught one of them otherwise.
They've fled to you only to find shelter,
and surely not for you to slaughter them.

They let the partridges fly away and returned with crosses
to the place they had taken them from.

AN ASSEMBLY AT CETINJE ON THE DAY OF THE NATIVITY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY, CONVENED WITH THE PURPOSE OF RECONCILING SOME LEADERS

The leaders are standing by while the people are dancing the kolo.

KOLO^[50]

God is angry with the Serbian people
because of their many mortal sins.
Our kings and tsars trampled upon the Law^[60].
They began to fight each other fiercely
and to gouge out each other's very eyes.
They neglected the government and state
and chose folly to be their guiding light.
Their servants ceased to obey their masters
and washed themselves in the blood of their tsars.
Our own leaders, God's curse be on their souls,
carved the empire into little pieces
and sapped the strength of the Serbs wantonly.
Our own leaders, may all their trace vanish,
sowed the bitter seed of disharmony
and thus poisoned the entire Serbian tribe.
Our own leaders, miserable cowards,
thus became the traitors of our nation.
O that accursed supper of Kosovo!^[61]
It would have been better had you poisoned
all our chieftains and wiped out their traces,
and left Milos standing there on the field,
along with both of his true sworn brothers;^[62]
then would the Serb have remained a true Serb!
Vuk Brankovic,^[63] O you shameful scoundrel,
was that the way to serve your fatherland?
Was that the way to uphold honesty?
O you, Milos, who does not envy you?
You are the victim of your noble feelings,
you, a mighty military genius,
a terrific thunder that shatters crowns!
The greatness of your noble knightly soul
surpasses the immortal, valiant deeds
of great Sparta and of powerful Rome.
All their brilliant courageous endeavours
your knightly arm places in deep shadow.
Leonidas^[64] and Scaevola,^[65] can they
match Obilic on any battlefield?
His powerful arm with a single blow
toppled a throne and shook all Tartarus.^[66]
The wonder of all valiant knights, Milos,
fell victim at the throne of the world's scourge.
So lies proudly the magnificent duke,
bathed in the spirts of his noble blood,
just as he walked proudly a while ago
among the hordes of the savage Asians,
his chest heaving with a fearsome thought,
devouring them all with his fiery eyes
just as he walked proudly a while ago
to a sacred grave of immortal life,
showing disdain for human worthlessness
and the intrigues of the mad assembly.^[67]
God is angry with the Serbian people.
A dragon with seven heads^[68] has appeared
and devoured the entire Serbian nation,
the slanderers as well as the slander.^[69]
On the ruins of the heroic empire
Milos shone forth with his holy justice.
Made immortal and crowned was the glory o
f both the true sworn brothers of Milos
and the lovely wreath of Jugovics.^[70]
The Serbian name has perished everywhere.
Mighty lions have become meek peasants.
Rash and greedy converted to Islam -
- may their Serb milk make them all sick with plague!
Those who escaped before the Turkish sword,
those who did not blaspheme at the True Faith,
those who refused to be thrown into chains,
took refuge here in these lofty mountains
to shed their blood together and to die,
heroically to keep the sacred
oath, their lovely name, and their holy freedom.
Our heads withstood the hard test in battles!
Our brave lads have shone like the radiant stars.
Those who were born in these lofty mountains
fell day by day in the past's bloody wars
and gave their life for honour, name, and freedom.
All of our tears were always wiped away
by the deft sounds of the lovely gusle.^[71]
Sacrifices have not been made in vain
since our hard land has now truly become
of Turkish might the insatiable tomb.
What is the cause that for quite some time now
our native hills are shrouded in silence
and no longer echo with warlike cries?
Our idle arms are all covered with rust.
Our land has been left without its leaders.
The high mountains are reeking with heathens.
In the same fold are both wolves and sheep,
and Turk is one with Montenegrin now.
Hodja bellows on the plain Cetinje!^[72]
A stench has caught the lion in the trap,^[73]
wiped out is now the Montenegrin name,
no one crosses himself with three fingers.

VOIVODE MILIJA

Do you hear the kolo dancers singing?
And all that has been set forth in their song
comes from the minds of the entire people.
And good reason have the Montenegrins
to bury us under a hail of stones.
We do not dare to begin any work
that would spur folks to some heroic deeds,
warm the sacred bones of our forefathers,
and make them dance in the grave joyfully.
Instead we keep cackling something like geese.
Strike the devil and leave of him no trace,
or relinquish this world and the next, too!

VOIVODE STANKO (LJUBOTINJANIN)

You are quite right, Voivode Milija!
May God remove all the trace of our race
if we should live in cowardice and disgrace!
Why the devil in Christian land of ours?
Why do we feed a snake in our bosom?
In great God's name, what kind of brothers they
who dishonour the Montenegrin face
and spit on the holy Cross openly?

SIRDAR IVAN

Why is it that they have not arrived yet,
our border folks, the good Ozrinics?^[74]
For without them there can be no business.
All together, we can work much better.

VOIVODE MILIJA

They have gone to a meeting with some Turks
to talk about the prisoners' exchange.
I sent to them an envoy with message
to hasten here as soon as they return,
to hurry up so that we waste no time,
for this business stands no further delay.

The Ozrinics arrive.

VUK TOMANOVIC

Why, for God's sake, are you so late, brothers?
Waiting for you we almost perished here.
Food in our bags has almost disappeared,
tobacco in our pouches has gone.
I sprained my neck looking across the field,
waiting for you to make your appearance.

SIRDAR VUKOTA

We did hurry to come here earlier,
but we could not make it any faster:
Our Pecirep and the old Baleta
gathered about twenty to thirty lads
and to Duga^[75] went with the company,
to wait for the caravan from Niksic.^[76]
On the highway they ambushed the Turks there,
fourteen of them they cut down in battle
and seventy horses captured from them,
along with two or three of their women.
Then a dispatch came to us from Niksic,
offering us ten new sworn brotherhoods,^[77]
asking us to meet them at Poljane^[78]
to return their prisoners for ransom.
Se we went to the meeting with the Turks,
and that is why we are a little late.

KNEZ BAJKO

What did Hamza^[79] and the Niksics say?
Was it that they desire so fervently
to graze their stock in peace at Rudine?^[80]

SIRDAR VUKOTA

You know, Bajko, that it was indeed so.
No one has fled from good things in life yet.
Why should the Turks not desire the good thing,
that of grazing their flocks of sheep in peace?

KNEZ ROGAN

Did you argue with each other also
about prisoners or other affairs?

KNEZ JANKO

It's true, Rogan, there was much quarreling.
Do you not know the Turks of Niksic town?
We just about flew at each other's throats.
Generations would tell one another
the tale of our bloody get-together.

VUK MARKOVIC

And why was it that you had to quarrel?
Who was the first to upset the meeting?

KNEZ JANKO

At the outset it was as in a joke.
Vuk Mandusic and Vuk Micunovic
began to talk with Hamza the Captain
for and against each other's religion.
Suddenly the talk turned thick and heavy,
and they exchanged several bitter words.
Then Hamza said to Vuk Micunovic:
'I am better than you. - Do you hear, Vlach?^[81]
And my faith is much better than your faith!
I ride a horse and carry a sharp sword.
I am captain of an imperial town,^[82]
which we have ruled for full three hundred years.
My grandfather had won it by his sword,
when empire was divided by the sword,
and the town was left to his heirs to rule."
This fired up our Vuk Micunovic
and he came up closer to the Captain:
"You call me 'Vlach', you swinish renegade?
How can a traitor be better than a knight?
What is this talk of 'sword' and 'Kosovo'?
Weren't we both on the Field of Kosovo?
I fought then and I am still fighting now,
you were traitor then and you are one now.
You've dishonoured yourself before the world,
blasphemed the faith of your own ancestors.
You have enslaved yourself to foreigners!
As for your boast about your town and rule -
haven't I with marble stones^[83] embellished
all Turkish towns in our vicinity,
so that they are no more fit for people
but are prisons for unhappy captives?
I am a scourge of God always ready
to bring to mind the evil you have wrought."

MANY VOICES

Micunovic' talks as well as he acts!
Serbian woman has never born his like,
since Kosovo or even before it!

KNEZ JANKO

I have not yet mentioned the real reason
for our coming to blows at the meeting. -
We reconciled Vuk with Captain Hamza.
As you well know, the youths of Ozrinics
always make jokes wherever they may go.
The mad devil had brought to the meeting
an old hodja by the name Bruncevic,
who had with him some kind of short carbine
of an arm's length, perhaps a bit shorter.
He had the gun slung over his shoulder,
strutting proudly up and down the field,
together with the rest of his people.
One of our youths then from us slipped away,
passed the hodja sideways as if by chance,
and stuck a horn over an elbow long
in the barrel of his upright carbine.
Oh, my dear Lord! three hundred of our lads
fell to the ground splitting their sides laughing!
But the hodja wondered as he strutted
what might have come over all these people,
until he saw the horn in his carbine.
Our mood became quite dark and threatening.
Soon we clashed and fire shot forth from our guns.
Fifteen stretchers were made ready quickly -
six for our men, nine for men of theirs.

BOGDAN DJURASKOVIC

It's time for us to gather together.
It's time to come to some firm decisions.
The word has spread about our intentions.
When our heathen brethren hear about it,
they won't waste time and drag on as we do.

SIRDAR RADONJA

Each one has come who should be here with us,
except for the five Martinovics.
Very likely they've met with some trouble;
yet without them, we can do so little.

KNEZ BAJKO
Come on, people, let's tend to our business,
or else let each return to his own home,
lest our children should be laughing at us;
and let each one cope with the Turks alone.
I myself know what to do should they come.
But here we're like the mice in the fable^[84]
who wanted to hang a bell on the cat.

The Martinovics arrive

VUK MICUNOVIC

You're here, at last! We've waited long enough!
We are, brothers, getting all together
like drunk wedding guests, as the story goes.^[85]
But you should be especially ashamed
since you had the shortest road to travel.

TOMAS MARTINOVIC

Do not blame us, Vuk and other brothers!
We would have come to the meeting sooner,
but ill fortune came to us on our way;
for that reason we are a bit tardy.

KNEZ ROGAN

Has wine perhaps caused the guests to quarrel?
After all, this is your patron saint's day.^[86]

TOMAS MARTINOVIC

No, there was no quarrel among the guests;
the Turks captured one of our own women.

VUK MICUNOVIC

Say, what woman? Sure, you must be joking?
Please go ahead and tell us what happened.
And don't worry, everyone will listen.
Everyone likes to listen to such tales.

TOMAS MARTINOVIC

I will tell you 'bout that devil's business.
We were dancing the kolo with our guests
and passing round the jug of ruby wine,
when suddenly, above the Piste stream,^[87]
a shot rang out, a man began to shout,
"Who is a knight and a brave fighter, hear!
Montenegrins have been led off for slaves!"
At that message we all laughed heartily:
Captives in the heart of Montenegro?
He's drunk and thinks he's singing, we reckoned.
Two shots rang out one after the other:
Bang - bang - again echoed without a pause,
and the same man kept shouting as before.
That cannot be without serious trouble!
We grabbed our guns and started off to run.
When we got there, there was a sight to see:
Mujo Alic, the Turkish chief of guards,
had run away with Ruza, Kasan's wife,
and fled with her and his youngest brother.
More than a year, perhaps, it has been now
since those two had put their heads together,
but who would dare even to imagine
a Serbian woman marrying a Turk?

KNEZ ROGAN

A woman's mood is a funny business!
A woman cares not about a man's faith.
A hundred times she would change religion
to accomplish what her heart desires.

TOMAS MARTINOVIC

But I have not told you the whole story.
Eternal woe may be unto that soul
who caused Ruza such a great misfortune,
who gave Ruza in marriage to Kasan,
and locked up a fairy in a prison,
for Kasan is such a lowly coward.
Listen to me, my dear Montenegrins!
Had she run off with any Serbian man,
may all my trace be wiped out forever
if I had then so much as turned my head,
no matter how painful it were to me.
But when I heard she had gone with a Turk,
we could wait and put it off no longer:
we decided to go and pursue them.
At Simunja^[88] we found the wedding guests.
We killed both Alic brothers right there,
with them, alas, the unlucky bride, too.
Because of that we've besmirched our honour
and lost our grace with the Almighty God.

KNEZ JANKO

Oh, my dear Lord, what a strange assembly!
Would our children act and behave like this?
We dare not do what we are yet doing,
and not announce what everybody knows.^[89]
We are loading these thoughts upon ourselves
as if to think were all we have to do,
as if we didn't know what is to be done.
Whenever I have spent much time thinking,
my work has lagged always too far behind.
Those who delay never find the right way.

Bishop Danilo, seeing that evepyone has gathered,
comes out among them, too.

VUK MICUNOVIC

Don't hold us back any longer, Bishop.
but rather send these people on their way.
All wait to hear what you have to say now,
but you have lost yourself in gloomy thoughts.
You neither speak nor send us on our way.
Your face mirrors the colour of the earth.
Alone you pace up and down on the field.
You do not eat, nor can you fall asleep.
Oppressive thoughts are crowding in your mind -
your dreams always circle around the Turk -
but I do fear too much contemplation.

BISHOP DANILO

Now, listen, Vuk and my other brothers!
Do not wonder at what you see in me,
that dark thoughts are tearing my soul apart
and that my chest is heaving with horror.
Who stands on a hill, even a small one,
sees more than he who stands below the hill.
Some things I see more clearly than you do. -
That is either for the good or the bad.
I fear them not, this brood of the devil,
may they be as many as forest leaves,
but I do fear the evil at our home.
Some wild kinsmen of ours have turned Turkish.
If we should strike at our domestic Turks,
their Serbian kin would never desert them.
Our land would be divided into tribes,
and tribes would start a bitter, bloody feud.
Satan would come to the demon's wedding,
and thus snuff out the Serb slava's candle.
One bears evil for fear of greater one!
The drowning man clutches even at foam
and by instinct reaches over his head.

KNEZ RADE (brother of the Bishop)

Why soot your hands if you don't want to forge?
Why this meeting if you're afraid to speak?
Once you escaped the Turkish impalement;
you should've rotted on their gallows instead!^[90]
You mourn something, but you do not know what.
Some Turks you fight, others you treat like friends
in vain hopes of placating your own Turks.
But just the same, do not deceive yourself!
Should they ever catch you again, brother,
they'd cut off your head that very instant,
or they would tie your hands behind your back
and torture you then to their hearts' delight.
Birds of the same feather flock together!
Turks are always brothers to each other.
Strike while you're still able to swing your arm,
and feel sorry for nothing in the world.
Everything has gone the devil's way.
Of Mohammed our entire country reeks.

VOIVODE BATRIC (to Knez Rade)

You're right, Knez, but you have gone too far.
You could have said all that but more gently,
without rubbing the salt in Bishop's wounds
and poisoning him with bitter sadness.

All are silent, hardly breathing.

KOLO

No one has yet drunk a cup of honey
without mixing it with a cup of gall.
A cup of gall needs a cup of honey;
they are swallowed the easiest when mixed.
Beg Ivan-beg,^[91] a scion of heroes,
against the Turks he fought like a lion
all over these bloodied hills and mountains.
Half of his lands the Turks did take from him,
but not before soaking it with our blood
and not before killing his one brother,
the fierce dragon, bold Voivode Uros,^[92]
in a fight on the broad Cemovo field.
Ivan mourned his only brother Uros.
He mourned more him, the Voivode Uros,
than he would mourn the loss of his two sons.
Indeed, he mourned Voivode Uros more
than all the land he had lost to the Turks.
Indeed, he mourned Voivode Uros more
than he would mourn the loss of his own eyes.
Yes, he would give both his eyes for Uros!
Many a time the cloudless sky would laugh
at a hero with a roaring laughter.
Ivan raised and drank the toast of revenge,
a holy drink consecrated by God.
Down his shoulders he let his white hair fall.
His long white beard was curled down to his waist.
In his old hands he held his sword and spear,
and his hands and weapons became bloody.
Counting Turkish corpses with his footsteps,
the old man bounced like a nimble youngster.
O my dear Lord, it sure must be a dream
that the old man was jumping up so high?
His old fortune has been resurrected:
in Karuce,^[93] upon Crmnica's end,
of a whole band of fifteen thousand Turks
not one of them was allowed to escape.
Their marble tombs, which can still be seen there,
hail the glory of Knez Crnojevic.
God grant mercy to the soul of Uros!
Great offerings were made in his honour.^[94]

VUK MICUNOVIC

Without effort no great song can be sung;
without effort no saber can be forged!
Bravery is the lord of all evil,
as well as the drink most sweet to the soul;
generations make themselves drunk with it.
Blessed is he whose name lives forever.
A good reason had he to be alive!
A lasting torch in the lasting darkness
neither burns out nor loses its bright light.

BISHOP DANILO (among them, as if alone)

There where a seed has first begun to sprout,
There it should find its rest and bear its fruit.
Is it instinct or spiritual guidance?
It is here that all human knowledge fails.
Just as a wolf has the right to his sheep,
so has every tyrant to a weakling.
To place foot upon tyrany's neck,
to lead tyrants to knowledge of the right,
this is the most sacred of man's duties!
If you lay a kiss on a bloody sword
and sail across the turbid waves of night,
the memory of you deserves to live.
Europe's cleric from his holy altar
scoffs and spits at the altar of Asia.^[95]
The heavy club of Asia ravages
the holy shrines in Crucifix' shadow.
The blood of the just smokes at the altars,
broken relics here are turning to dust.
The earth groans, but the heavens are silent!
Awesome symbols, the Crescent and the Cross;^[96]
their kingdoms are the realms of graveyards.
Following them down the bloody river,
sailing in the small boat of great sorrows,
we must honour the one or the other.
But blasphemy against the old relics
that have nourished us like milk since childhood
enkindles fires of hell within my chest.
A smooth sapling has no need for a knot.
So why, then, does the Crescent mar the Cross?
Why this gray screen on the sun's white pupil?
O my True Faith, my poor, helpless orphan!
Ill-fated tribe! O how long will you sleep?
To be alone is not being at all,
loneliness brings only more suffering.
The devil's might has surrounded us all.
If in the world somewhere we had brothers,
their sympathy would be the same as help.
Darkness now rules supreme over my head,
and the moon seems to be my only sun.^[97]
But woe, where do I think I am going?
Ripen, young wheat and corn, into the grain!
Your harvest has arrived before its time.
I see precious offerings piled up high
at the altar of our Church and nation.
Wailing echoes I hear in the mountains.
We must uphold our honour and our name!
Let the struggle go on without respite.
Let it be what men thought could never be.
Let Hell devour, let Satan cut us down!
Flowers will sprout and grow in our graveyards
for some distant future generation.

SIRDAR VUKOTA

God be with us, He and all His angels!
But here you are sailing hard - O Bishop,
into confused and very troubled winds,
like the witch who stalks in the month of March
or the wizard in the gloomy Autumn.

The Bishop starts, as if from a dream.

BISHOP DANILO

Let those who bear the honour-studded arms
and those who hear the heart beat in their chest
strike for the Cross and for heroic name!
We should baptize with water or with blood
those blasphemers of Christ's glorious name.
Let's drive the plague out of our sheephouses!
Let songs ring forth, songs of all these horrors.
On blood-stained stones let the true altar rise.

All leaders jump to their feet, aud there is a great commotion:

It is so, and no other way!

BISHOP DANILO

No ... no ... sit down. Let us talk it over!
If we agree, my brothers, I would like
to invite the leaders of the converts
to a meeting of all of our brothers,
we'll guarantee their lives until they leave.
Perhaps they will return then to our faith
and extinguish the flame of our blood-feud.

SIRDAR JANKO

All right, Bishop. Let us try that, also.
So help me God! It will be in vain, though.
He who has been nurtured by the devil
will abide him faithful and forever.
They'll come to us even without our pledge
and start giving themselves airs before us.
Judging by the conceit of those chieftains,
they see themselves as the Sultan's true sons!

Three or four men are sent to invite the Turkish chieftains to a meeting.

THE KOLO SINGS:

A bitter curse fell on the renegades.^[98]
A mother cursed her own unworthy son,
and so Mara, the princess and the wife
of Ivan-beg, cursed her son Stanisa.
He bit her breast while nourishing himself
and spilled the drink of Eden on her chest.
The parent's curse caught up with the children.
All his honour lost her son Stanisa
by blaspheming at the true Christian faith
and at the brave, proud tribe of Crnoje,^[99]
He clad himself in the enemy's faith
and grew thirsty for blood of his brothers.
A din arose above the Ljesko field!^[100]
Two brothers fought over their faith fiercely,
together with thousands of warriors!
The mother's curse thus fell upon her son,
and massacred was his entire army.
Stanko ran off headlong to Bajazet,^[101]
to eat with him Hungarian noses.^[102]
o lofty nest of heroic freedom,^[103]
God's eye has kept guard over you often.
What suffering you have had to endure!
What victories are still in store for you!

About seven or eight Turkish chieftains come and sit down with the Montenegnns. They are silent and keep looking at their feet.

KNEZ JANKO

For heaven's sake, why have you turned to stone?
Why don't you start to talk to each other?
You let yourselves be lulled to sleep instead.

HADJI-ALI MEDOVIC, KADI

Those are right words, for sure, Knez Ozrinic!
If no one will, I will begin to speak.
Gathered here now are one hundred chieftains,
both Turkish and Montenegrin chieftains.
I know full well why we've been assembled:
to make a peace between our blood brothers.
Listen to me, you chieftains of the land,
let's try to find a way among ourselves
to reconcile two warring families
of Ceklici^[104] and of Velestovo,^[105]
then Bajice and the clan of Alic.
Let us all try to bring a peace to them,
let's offer them at least our pledge for peace.
I'll be the first to go with the kumas^[106]
and compensate for life that's been taken.
Let us make peace, cut the dinar in two,^[107]
and hang our guns all bloodied on the wall!

KNEZ ROGAN

You, Effendi, clearly failed to divine
the reason for our getting together,
and you started therefore from the wrong end.
Yet you are wise and a writer, they say.
You attended the school in Istanbul
and paid visit to some sort of Mecca,
yet more wisdom you're surely in need of.
This school of ours is harder to master.

Again everyone is silent, looking down at the ground.

BISHOP DANILO

Dear Lord, You who rule the whole universe,
You who reside on Your heavenly throne
and ignite with Your all-powerful glance
each bright body in the whole universe;
You who have set in motion the fine dust
under Your throne, shiny and translucent,
and proclamed it to be Your many worlds;
You who gave life to every speck of dust
and sowed in it the seed of intellect;
You who maintain the Book of Creation,
in which are writ the fates and destinies
of the whole world and intelligent stuff;
You who have so graciously decided
to give power to the agile bodies
of the tiny ant and the proud lion, -
send cheering light over Montenegro,
remove from it the lightning and thunder,
the turbulent and hail-carrying clouds!
It may not be the turncoats' fault as much.
The infidel enticed them with falsehood
and entangled them in the devil's nets.
But what is man? In truth, a weak creature!

The Turks look at each other fiirtively

Honey is sweet even to cold, aged lips,
let alone to youthful, passionate ones!
The bait was sweet but attached to a hook:
"Drink sweet sherbet from the Prophet's cup
or expect his axe blow between your ears!"
The fear in life often stains one's honour.^[108]
Our weaknesses bind us down to the earth;
though slight the bond, it may yet firmly bind.
The light that shines in the eye of the fox^[109]
terrifies birds, the weakest of creatures,
yet the fox looks at the eagle in fear.
News of the death of a brother or son
strengthens threefold our affection for them;
sweeter to find the lost than ne'er to lose.
After a storm the sky becomes clearer,
after sorrow the soul is more serene,
and after tears the song is more joyous.
Oh, that these eyes of mine could only see
Montenegro regain what it has lost!
It would then seem to me indeed as if
Tsar Lazar's crown is shining on me now
and that Milos had returned to the Serbs.
My soul would be truly contented then
like a peaceful morning in the springtime,
when the sea winds and even the dark clouds
slumber upon the bosom of the sea.

The Turks look at one another gloomily

SKENDER-AGA

In the name of my fair faith, I wonder
what reproach there you are making, Bishop!
Have you e'er seen a cup to hold two drinks,
or seen a cap to fit two heads at once?
A small brook runs into a larger stream,
on emptying, it loses its own name;
at the seashore both lose identity.
Are you trying to catch bees in your cap
and with it start a beehive in the woods?
From such beehive no one will eat honey!
You are pushing a stone up hill in vain!
An old tree breaks before it is straightened!
Animals are very much like people.
Each living sort has its own character.
I don't ask 'bout the hen and the eagle,
but does, pray tell, a lion fear a goose?

KNEZ ROGAN

I marvel at this strange business also.
The priest questions the sinner 'bout his sins,
whether Satan has a firm hold on him,
but I have yet to witness the devil
go to the priest to make a confession!

KNEZ JANKO

When my wife asks where I have been today,
I will tell her that I've been sowing salt.^[110]
And woe to her if she does not believe!

KNEZ BAJKO

Now I remember that well-known story^[111]
of the devil who was pulled from the pit:
half of his face was black, the other white.

OBRAD

A fly just flew straight into my nostril.^[112]
Some misfortune will surely come my way.

VUK RASLAPCEVIC

The way my palms are itching this moment,
if someone should begin to quarrel now,
we would surely get a handsome reward.^[113]

VOIVODE MILIJA

What a heavy rifle! Need any help?
By God, Stanko, how can you carry it?

VOIVODE STANKO

It is only a bother to me now;
I haven't had to use it for some time.

SIRDAR JANKO

Oh, how I shook with laughter last evening!
Into our house there came by from somewhere
two wonderful young men of Bjelica.^[114]
They began to joke, as only they can.
They told me that some of their own people
had built a mill upon a certain place
without a pond or even a small brook;
when they finished, they thought about water!^[115]

VUK MANDUSIC

My brother's wife must have lost her senses.
You could not keep her quiet without ropes!
I took her to 'prophets" who read from books.
One said, "She has stepped on some dog's scratchings."^[116]
Another said, "She is bewitched for sure."
I took her to all the monasteries,
where they read to her over holy oil.
In the cloisters I beseeched the devil
to stay away from our Andjelija.
I entreated the devil, all in vain!
At last I took my whip of triple throng,^[117]
and scourged her shirt right into her own flesh.
The devil fled somewhere without a trace,
Andjelija, in turn, regained her health.

VOIVODE BATRIC

Turkish brothers - may I be forgiven! -
we have no cause to beat around the bush.
Our land is small and it's pressed on all sides.
Not one of us can live here peacefully,
what with powers that are jawing for it;
for both of us there is simply no room!
Accept the faith of your own forefathers!
Guard the honour of our dear fatherland!
The wolf needs not the cunning of the fox!^[118]
Nor has the hawk the need for eyeglasses.
Start tearing down your minarets and mosques.
Lay the Serbian Christmas-log on the fire,^[119]
paint the Easter eggs various colours,
observe with care the lent and Christmas fasts.
As for the rest, do what your heart desires!
If you don't want to listen to Batric,
I do swear by the faith of Obilic,
and by these arms in which I put my trust,
that both our faiths will be swimming in blood.
Better will be the one that does not sink.
Bairam^[120] cannot be observed with Christmas!
Is that not so, Montenegrin brothers?

ALL CRY

It is so, and no other way!^[121]

MUSTAI-KADI

What do you say? Have you all lost your wits?
You drive a thorn into a healthy foot!
Why d'you burden the one true religion
with eggs and fasts and all those Christmas-logs?
Torches are lit in the darkness of night,
but who needs them when the sun is shining?
In Allah's name, what clever discourses!
They always talk of Cross and Infidel
and dream about something that cannot be.
Allah be praised! Two hundred years have passed
since we embraced first the only true faith
and became servants of our Allah.
We're not cunning, by the Holy Kaaba!
How can a weak linden cross^[122] be pitted
against the edge of our sharp, supple steel?
When the true saint^[123] strikes with his mighty mace,
the earth begins to quiver from his blow
like a hollow pumpkin on the water.
Petty people, how can you be so blind?
You do not know the joys of paradise.
You fight against both God and the people.
You live without hope and die without it.
You serve the Cross, want to be like Milos!
"The Cross" - indeed an empty, lifeless word.
Milos throws you into a strange stupor
or leads you to excessive drunkenness.
Bowing one day to Mecca is better
than four years spent making Christian crosses.
O Hurias,^[124] with those azure-blue eyes!
It is your fate to be mine forever.
Where is the shade, and who can put it up
between me and your beautiful blue eyes?
Those eyes from which swift arrows keep darting;
those eyes which can easily melt a stone,
not to speak of a weak human being,
born to melt before those lovely eyes;
those eyes that are like crystal clear water,
through which in two divine, radiant drops
Allah's power can be seen more clearly
than from a mount on a bright spring morning,
as one gazes at the clear sea surface!
o Istanbul, earthly delight and joy,
a honey's cup, a mountain of sugar,
the sweetest spa of human existence,
where the women bathe in honied sherbet! -
O Istanbul, palace of the Prophet,
the source of his power and his holy shrine -
it is Allah's pleasure to rule the earth
only from the palace of the Prophet.
What can ever separate me from you?
Hundreds of times in the days of my youth
I've hurried forth fresh from my bed, at dawn,
toward your stream, crystal clear and lovely,
in which your fair image is reflected
more beautiful than the sun, dawn and moon.
In the sky and in the waters I saw
your stone towers and pointed minarets,
from which thousands of worshipful voices
rose piously toward the azure skies
in the wondrous silence of the daybreak,
proclaiming to skies the almighty name
and to the earth the awesome Prophet's fame.
What other faith can compare with this one?
What altar stands closer to high heaven?

KNEZ JANKO

O Effendi, I thank you very much! (raises his hat)
You have preached us a marvelous sermon.
We have got what we have been asking for!

VUK MICUNOVIC

Let the Cross and the Mace strike each other,
but woe to him whose forehead gets broken!
A whole egg wins over the one that's cracked.^[125]
You'll hear what I can do if I want to.

KNEZ JANKO

So help me God, I don't want to listen
to the hodja in Ceklici again
cooing on the top of that hollow tree,^[126]
perched like an owl on a rotten beech-tree!
Whom does he call from that high position
every morning at the break of the dawn?
Whomever he calls, he has summoned him -
why should I hide, for me he's not lighter
than if he were perched on top of my head.

KNEZ ROGAN

Suddenly my left ear begins to ring.
That means, I hope, some happy news for me.

VUK MANDUSIC

Come on, Bajko, blow once into my eye,
a lot of dust has gotten into it.

SIRDAR JANKO

Let someone strike fire so that we may smoke!
That's the essence of the faith of Islam.
Effendi won't feel offended by it.

TOMAS MARTINOVIC

Now the ravens are croaking and fighting,
soon there will be cheap meat in abundance.

VUKOTA MRVALJEVIC

Don't step over my good rifle, Bajko!^[127]
Go back over it retracing your steps!

VUK MICUNOVIC (whispers in Sirdar Janko's ear)

He holds the tail of the Hadji-Hadja^[128]
and will never loosen his grip on it
till a bitch or, perhaps, a millstone dies.^[129]

SKENDER-AGA (sees Vuk whispering and is displeased)

What is all this, Montenegrin brothers?
Who has fanned this ugly flame of discord?
From where did come this unfortunate thought
of conversing about changing our faith?
Aren't we brothers despite differences?
Didn't we fight the same battles together?
We share the good and the bad like brothers.
Doesn't both Turkish and Serbian maidens' hair
cover in grief the graves of slain heroes?

SIRDAR VUKOTA

O accursed land, may you perish in doom!
Your name is most horrible and dreaded.
No sooner does a young hero appear
than you take him away in early youth.
Or if there is a brave man of honour,
you snatch him, too, long before his time comes.
Or if there is a garland of flowers
to decorate the heads of lovely brides,
you harvest it at the peak of flowering.
My land, you have turned to blood for me now!
In very truth you are now nothing more
than piles of bones and graveyard monuments,
on which our youth, resolved and without fear,
holds a solemn festival of horror.
O Kosovo, the site of Judgment Day,
may Sodom burst into flames on your field!

VUK MICUNOVIC

Shame on you for such ugly talk, Sirdar.
What of our lads with their young ardent chests,
in which the heart overcomes and rejects
quick blood inflamed with fiery haughtiness?
Say, what are they? The noblest sacrifice
in heady flight from the fields of battle
to a joyful kingdom of poetry,^[130]
just as along joyous rays of the sun
translucent drops of dew move to the sky.
There is hardly greater shame than old age!
Legs become weak, and the eyes betray us;
the brain grows dim in the old pumpkin-head;
the frowned forehead resembles a child's face;
ugly pockmarks make the face look deformed,
and bleary eyes recede into the head.
Death laughs ghastly from under the forehead,
as a turtlee peers from beneath its shell.
Why d'you speak of Kosovo and Milos?
It is there that we lost our happiness.
But bravery and our Montenegrin name
have risen from Kosovo's tomb again
above the cloud into the knights' kingdom,
where Obilic holds sway over shadows.

SIRDAR IVAN PETROVIC

With Mohammed came nonsense to your head!
May your souls be accursed forever, Turks,
for deluging the land in its own blood!
One manger is too small for two horses.

FERAT ZACIR, KAVAZBASA

No, no, Sirdar, you're missing your target!
The Turk cannot let his faith be blasphemed
as long as his head is on his shoulders.
Though this country is a bit too narrow,
two faiths can live together side by side,
just as two soups can be cooked in one pot.
Let us live on together like brothers,
and we will need no other love indeed!

KNEZ JANKO

We would like to, Turks, but it cannot be!
This love of ours is a strange kind of love.
Our eyes do clash in a terrible way.
They do not look at each other friendly,
but vengefully and even savagely.
The eyes do say what the heart commands them.

VUK MANDUSIC

Look, my brothers, at this lovely turban!^[131]
For goodness sake, where d'you buy it, Aga?

ARSLAN-AGA MUHADINOVIC

Vuk Mandusic, I didn't buy it at all,
the Vizier gave it to me as present
when last summer I visited Travnik.

VUK MANDUSIC

For your love's sake, do get me one like it.
I will trade you an ox out of the yoke.

ARSLAN-AGA MUHADINOVIC

I will give it to you for present, Vuk,
if you agree to become my son's kum.^[132]
I'd like to have such brave man for a kum.

VUK MANDUSIC

There can be no kumstvo^[133] without baptism, even if it is done four times over.

ARSLAN-AGA MUHADINOVIC

The hair-cutting is the same as baptism.

VUK MANDUSIC

A kum I'll be, but a stand-by never!

A great commotion and altercation begins among the Turks and Montenegrins.
The wiser men separate them so that they won't cut each others' throats.
All of them quiet down. No one utters a word.

KOLO

Three sirdars brave and two voivodes bold,
with three hundred falcon-heroes^[134] of theirs -
falcon Bajo^[135] with his thirty dragons -
they all will live as long as time endures.
They lay in wait for Sendjer the Vizier^[136]
on the top of Mount Vrtijeljka^[137]
and fought till noon on a hot summer day.
No Serb wanted to betray another,
so that people would not blame him later
and point at his descendants as they do
at the traitor house of Brankovics.^[138]
So they all fell, one beside the other,
while still singing and striking at the Turks.
Only three Serbs came forth from there alive,
from under the piles of dead Turks' bodies -
the Turks had run horses o'er the wounded.
Beautiful death, glory to their mothers!
Unto these brave men God will amply grant
fame to their souls and incense on their graves.
Three thousand youths, one brave as the other,
struck suddenly at Sendjer the Vizier
before daybreak on the Field of Krstac.^[139]
God gives power to those who always strive!
They broke the might of Sendjer the Vizier!
Lucky the man who happened to be there!
The Kosovo wounds pain him no longer,
he blames the Turks for nothing any more.
Serbian heroes of Mount Vrtijeljka!
A shining light will always be seen there
burning atop your consecrated tombs!

Ten kavasses come from Podgorica,^[140] sent by the new vizier;
who is making a tour of the empire. They give Bishop Danilo a letter
The Bishop reads it thoughfully

VOIVODE BATRIC

Tell us, Bishop, what does the Vizier write?
We would not want anything to be hid,
even if all Turks had grown mighty wings!

BISHOP DANILO (reads the letter word for word)

"Selim Vizier,^[141] slave of the Prophet's slave,
servant of the brother of the world's sun,
envoy of him who rules all of the earth.
Now be it known, leaders with your Bishop,
that the tsar of all tsars has ordered me
to make a tour of his land long and wide,
to see if all is in perfect order,
to see that wolves do not over-eat meat,
to see that sheep do not wander astray
and lose their fleece in a bush by the road,
to shorten that which is overly long,
to pour out that which has been overfilled,
to check the teeth of all the young people,
to see that a rose doesn't get lost in thorns
and that a pearl doesn't perish in the mire,
and to tighten the reins of the raya,^[142]
since the raya is like other livestock.
And so I've heard about your mountains, too.
The family of the holy Prophet
knows the correct value of bravery.
People lie when they say of the lion
that he's afraid of a mouse - not at all!
Come to me now under my spacious tent,
you, Bishop, and you, the leading sirdars.
Show up only under the tsar's emblem
in order to receive gifts from my hand,
then you can live as you have lived before.
Strong teeth can crack even the hardest nut.
A good sabre can cut a club's handle,
not to speak of a head of ripe cabbage.
How can the reed be trained never to bend
before the force of a strong hurricane?
Who can prevent the onrushing torrents
from rushing on toward the wide blue sea?
He who comes out from the splendid shadow
of the Prophet's temlying banner
will be burned by the sun as by lightning.
A feeble fist can never forge tough steel!
In a pumpkin mouse - what's but a captive?
Why champ the bit - it only breaks the teeth!
Without thunder heaven has no value.
In a poor man eyes are like dishwater.
The common folk are like stupid cattle -
servile only when their ribs are cracking.
Woe to the land over which armies pass!"

KNEZ JANKO

A merchant lies to you with a coy smile,
a woman lies while she is shedding tears,
but no one lies as deftly as a Turk.

SIRDAR JANKO

Let's not detain the envoys much longer;
let us, instead, send them away quickly,
that their pasha won't remain long in doubt.
Let him know soon, then do whate'er he may.

VUK MICUNOVIC

Please answer him, Bishop, as best you know,
and save his face just as he has saved yours!

BISHOP DANILO (writes the answer)

"An answer to Selim-Pasa's letter
from the Bishop and the other leaders.
Hard walnut is a peculiar fruit.
You'll not break it, but it will break your teeth.
The price of wine is not what once it was,
nor is the world what you think it should be.
To give Europe as present to Prophet -
it is a sin even to think of it!
A large pear sticks easily in the throat.
Human blood is dangerous nouirshment.
It has started gushing out of your nose.
You have stuffed your belly with many sins!
The saddle-girth snapped on the Prophet's mare.^[143]
Charles, Leopold's courageous voivode,^[144]
John Sobieski, too, the Duke of Savoy,^[144]
all together they broke the demon's horns.
The book of fate does not reveal the same
for two brothers^[145] carrying the same name.
Burak^[146] stumbled just before Vienna.
The wagon was overturned down the hill.
To the cruel men an empire is no good
except to spread their shame before the world.
A savage mind and a poisoned temper
has a wild boar, not a human being.
He whose law is written by his cudgel
leaves behind stench of inhumanity.
I have divined what you wanted to say.
Many footprints are leading to the cave.^[147]
Do not prepare for guests from the mountain!
I am sure they have no other thoughts now
than to sharpen their teeth for their neighbours
and to guard their flocks against predators.
The entrance to a beehive is narrow.
An axe has been made ready for the bear.^[148]
You have other lands and sheep besides ours.
Go oppress them and fleece their skin instead!
Where'er you come, groans rise on every side;
bad is oppressed by worse, good by evil.
I used to climb down your rope in the past,^[149]
but the rope snapped almost in two pieces;
we have become much better friends since then.
You have driven wisdom into my head."

Finishes the letter and reads it before all Montenegrins and Turks.

KNEZ ROGAN

Here's you letter. Now on your way quickly!
Take it to him. Let him amuse himself!

The Vizier's envoys leave sadly

VUK MICUNOVIC

Take this cartridge, servant of the Sultan,
and give it as present to the vizier!
Tell him also, a cartridge is the price
of every one of Montenegrin heads.

RIDZAL OSMAN

A cartridge as present for the vizier?
You insolent and unbelieving haiduk!^[150]
One does not talk in such way to viziers;
for where viziers come, there fever follows.
Unbidden tears spring quickly to the eyes,
and the land starts to echo with laments!

VUK MICUNOVIC

If you were not a guest here in our house,
I would know how to answer properly.
But just the same, I will tell you something.
Are we not both haiduks, each in his right?
Of shackled slaves, he remains a haiduk,
a better one, surely, since he grabbed more.
I'm a haiduk who pursues the haiduks,
my haidukship is more famous by far.
I don't burn down either lands or people,
but many of those evil torturers
have fallen on their noses before me.^[151]
And many a wailing Turkish woman
has unwound black balls of wool after me.^[152]

The Vizier's kavasses depart.

Two cocks are fighting before the assembled men.

KNEZ ROGAN

Take a good look at those devilish cocks!
Why do they fight each other so fiercely,
and why are they gouging each other's eyes?
Thirty or so hens always follow them.
Those two gamecocks could live like two sultans
if they only were fortunate enough.
I do not care, in truth, about the fight,
yet I would like the smaller one to win.
And you, Aga, by the Prophet's long beard?

SKENDER-AGA

And I would like the bigger one to win.
Otherwise, why has God made him bigger?
He is bigger, let him be stronger, too!

A moonlight night. Evervone is sitting around the fire
while the kolo sings at the big threshing-floor.

KOLO

O Novi Grad,^[153] you sit by the sea-shore
and count the waves as they roll in and out,
like an old man who, sitting by the rock,
counts and recounts bids of his rosary.
You must have dreamed a most beautiful dream!
The Venetians besieged you from the sea,
Montenegrins from the mountains around.
Beneath your walls they greeted each other,
sprinkling them with blood and holy water.
You have not reeked of infidels since then.
Topal-pasa,^[154] with twenty thousand men,
sped to the aid of besieged Novi Grad.
Montenegrins, all young, met him headlong
on Kameno, an even, narrow field.
The Turkish fez suffered a sound defeat.
All of the Turks sank into a mass grave.
You can still see their charnel-house today.

[They lie down.]

VUK MICUNOVIC (reclines, together with Sirdar Janko)

What do you want, Sirdar, with that belt there?

SIRDAR JANKO

I want to place it over all my clothes.

VUK MICUNOVIC

But why place it over all your clothes?

SIRDAR JANKO

A mean nightmare keeps on oppressing me.
When I'm asleep, it won't let me breathe, Vuk.

VUK MICUNOVIC

What mean nightmare are you talking about?
There're no nightmares nor are any witches,
but since you are as round as a barrel,
your fat chokes you when you are lying down.
Never yet have nightmares troubled my sleep.

SIRDAR JANKO

I have had just about enough of it.
I always have some horse-radish with me
and a thorn-sprig in the hem of my coat.
I know nothing better for nightmares though
than to place a belt over all my clothes.

(Knez Janko reclines with Knez Rogan.)

KNEZ JANKO

What a bad stench from these Turkish turncoats!
Have you noticed any of that, Rogan?

KNEZ ROGAN

How could I not, Knez, since it is so bad!
When I sit near them in the assembly,
I always hold my nose with both my hands.
If I did not, I would surely throw up.
For that reason I've moved away from them,
else I wouldn't live to see another day.
You see how far away from them we are,
and yet that same heavy, stifling
odour keeps wafting in from all those infidels.

It is late at night. Everyone is asleep. Someone is talking in his sleep.
Knez Janko and Kner Rogan get up to see who it is and find Vuk Mandusic talking as if awake.

KNEZ ROGAN

Vuk Mandusic, what's bothering you now,
that you're talking with someone all night long?

KNEZ JANKO

Don't wake him from his dream, please, Rogan,
because he talks in sleep as if awake.
We can ask him a few private questions
so that at least we can have a good laugh.

KNEZ JANKO

Tell us now, Vuk, what were you just saying
about our good brother, Ban Milonjic?
Has there been a quarrel between you two?

VUK MANDUSIC

No, no, brother, there's nothing between us,
I was talking about his daughter-in-law.

KNEZ JANKO

And what is that? Tell me in confidence!

VUK MANDUSIC

She is prettier than any white vila! ^[155]
She is hardly full eighteen years of age,
yet she's captured my whole heart completely!

KNEZ JANKO

How is it that she has captured your heart?

VUK MANDUSIC

Are you joking? There is a good reason,
There is no one like her in the whole world!
Had I not been, mind you, a godfahter
nine times over for our Ban Milonjic,
I would have seized his young daughter-in-law
and run with her to the end of the world.

KNEZ JANKO

Don't be silly, may your mother mourn you!
She has truly taken your wits away.

VUK MANDUSIC

Is the devil or is witchcraft at work,
or something worse than either of those two?
When I see her smiling, that young beauty,
the world begins to whirl fast around me.
I could stand that, even though with sorrow,
but one evening the devil compelled me
to spend a night in Milonjic's hut.
Just before dawn, the moon was still shining,
the fire burning on the freshly mown field,
from somewhere came that most beautiful girl
and sat down by the fire to catch the glow.
She heard that all in the huts were asleep.
Then she unwound her lovely wreath of hair,
and the tresses fell down below her waist.
She began to comb her hair on her breasts
and to lament in a high-pitched, clear voice,
like nightingale on a tall oak-tree branch.
The young woman mourned her husband's brother,
Andrija, the son of Ban Milonjic, who met his death about a year ago,
slain by the Turks in the bloody Duga.^[156]
But the Ban would not let her cut her hair,^[157]
He pitied more his daughter-in-law's wreath
than the head of his own son Andrija.
The young woman's lament tore at my heart.
Her burning eyes were brighter than the flame.
Her forehead was prettier than the moon -
and I, too, was weeping like an infant.
Andrija is lucky that he was slain.
What lovely eyes are weeping over him!
What lovely lips are mourning over him!

KNEZ ROGAN (whispers to Knez Janko)

Don't ask him about such things,
for God's sake, or else he'll bleat something out!

It is dawn. They wake up and rise.

OBRAD

Let me tell you what I have dreamed about.
A large crowd of people got together
to bear crosses in a church procession.
The scorching sun made our eyes a-burning,
and the ground was hard where we were going.
Till on such field as this one here we came
to rest a while under an apple-tree.
Down by the tree a small brook was running.
In the tree shade we sat close together
and there we picked several ripe apples.
They were all sweet, just as sweet as sugar.
Under the tree the priest read the Gospel.
At that moment five Martinovics
got up quickly, one after another,
and three or four of their friends followed them.
Everyone watched them as they walked away.
They put ladders up against the church wall,
then they all climbed onto the church altar
and upon it placed a large golden cross.
The cross shone like the sun on the mountain.
To their feet rose all the people around,
bowing deeply before the holy cross.
At that instant, I awoke in cold sweat.

VUK MICUNOVIC

Luck was with you! You've had a splendid dream!
I, too, have had a peculiar dream.
I was guarding myself from some fierce dogs,
and I cut down five or six with a sword.
Had 1 gone off somewhere with my fighters,
I would have come to blows with Turks for sure.

SIRDAR JANKO

I dreamed last night of a wedding party,
married Bogdan to a nice Turkish girl.
We baptized her in our faith in the church.
We baptized her and then we married them.

Angry and sad, the Turks leave, one after another.

SIRDAR VUKOTA

I dreamed about our old Ozra last night.
We were in all two hundred Oznnics,
and we drove on just as many horses,
to purchase wine for Saint Michael's day.
So we returned with our wine from Kotor,^[158]
people singing and firing off their guns.
When we reached the top of Potocine,^[159]
three hundred lads we saw sitting about,
each one wearing a green dolman jacket
and every one with shoulder plates and arms.
Who might they be? We started to wonder.
Could they be guests? But it's early for them!
At that moment we noticed old Ozra
and some select Ozrinic's with him.
(Not one of them is alive any more.)
They reproached us with a torrent of words,
for not building a chapel in Cevo^[160]
for Saint Michael, to help us everywhere.
We just about started fighting for real.
I still tremble for fear of old Ozra!

VUKOTA MRVALJEVIC

All long night through I dream all sorts of things,
but when I'm up, I soon forget it all.

Knez Bajko and Vuk Mandusic are sad.
Neither wants to say anything.

KNEZ JANKO

My Knez Bajko, you are a little sad.
Whate'er will be cannot be avoided.
Tell us your dream, even if unpleasant.

KNEZ BAJKO

So I will, Knez. It's all the same to me!
I had last night a most terrible dream:
all my weapons were broken to pieces.
Some misfortune awaits me for certain,
perhaps a loss in my own family,
for whenever I have dreamed such a dream,
for burial I had to get ready.

KNEZ ROGAN

Why, Mandusic, are you so downhearted?
Why don't you tell what you dreamed of last night?

VUK MANDUSIC

I've had no dream, nor can I tell a tale.
I spent the night by sleeping like a log.

KNEZ ROGAN

Since you all stopped, I will tell you something.
I dreamed I saw our Drasko Popovic!
And it's as if I have won a wager -
I'd say it's he coming down the field now.

SIRDAR RADONJA

Just think, how mean a creature man can be!
Till this moment no one even mentioned
the ablest from among our voivodes.
Where has he been, our Drasko Popovic?

SIRDAR VUKOTA

Drasko had gone on business to Venice.
When Sendjer^[161] launched an attack on Kotor,
he shelled the town with ancient beechwood guns,
Scepan the priest happened to be there then.
He fired just once with a gun from Kotor
and hit Sendjer's ancient gun directly.
He knocked a shell right clean into its throat,
broke it into some three hundred pieces.
Then the Doge' awarded him for that
a yearly pay of a hundred sequins.
The priest has been suffering from old age,
so Drasko went all the way to Venice
for his father's pension from the Doge.

KNEZ ROGAN

Keep those five-six rams turning on the spit,
so that we may have our meal and go home.

Voivode Drasko arrives, hugs and kisses everyone,
and sits down among them.

KNEZ ROGAN

Tell us something about Venice, Drasko!
What kind of folks did you meet over there?

VOIVODE DRASKO

What kind of folks, you are asking, Rogan?
Just like any other - they had no horns.

KNEZ ROGAN

My dear fellow, we know they had no horns,
but were they rich and were they good looking?

VOIVODE DRASKO

There were, brother, many handsome people,
but ugly folk outnumbered them ten times,
much too ugly for you to look at them.
There were many, many rich people, too.
Their riches seem to have gone to their heads.
They carried on like some silly babies.
I saw poor folks on every street corner,
toiling until their eyes were popping out
to earn a crust of meager, dried-out bread.
I used to watch them as in groups of two
on their shoulders they would hoist a woman
a huge body, lifeless and bone-lazy,
(She must've weighted close to three hundred pounds!)
and would carry her hither and thither,
through busy streets at noon, in broad daylight.
They're not afraid to lose face and honour,
thinking only of food and survival.

KNEZ JANKO

Are their houses any good, dear Drasko?

VOIVODE DRASKO

O yes, they are, the finest in the world!
But it is not without pain for people:
they are stifled by terrible closeness
and by mighty stench and stuffy air, too.
In their faces people had no colour.

VUK MICUNOVIC

And how did they welcome you there, Drasko?

VOIVODE DRASKO

Who would think of welcoming me there, Vuk?
I did not know a single living soul.
How could I hope for someone to greet me?
Besides, all that crazy hurly-burly
made me stay in the house most of the time.
The steady noise always surrounded me
when I went to look over the city,
as it's here the last week before the Lent
when our youths go to make their masquerade.
Had it not been for a very good friend,
the very son of Zane Grbicic,
I wouldn't have seen my home again ever,
but I would have, rather, left my bones there.
He welcomed me in brotherly fashion
and he took me everywhere in Venice.

VUK MANDUSIC

And are they brave, those people, Voivode?

VOIVODE DRASKO

No, Mandusic', on your faith in the Lord!
Of their bravery nothing good could be said!
With promises they have lured to their land,
with promises lured and then imprisoned
those poor falcons, wretched brothers of ours,
the Dalmatians and the valiant Croats.
So they loaded their large ships with those lads
and dispatched them into the wide, wide world
to bring treasures from all over the world,
thus oppressing other lands and cities.

SIRDAR IVAN

And are their courts just and honourable?

VOIVODE DRASKO

Oh sure, brother, may God save you from them!
Little better than the Turkish justice!
There was this one monstrous building I saw,
in which they built and put together ships.
There were thousands and more of wretches there,
enchained and weighed down by heavy iron.
They were building vessels for the Doge.
Because of cries and dreadful misery
one felt no wish to enter that building.
Some of these slaves were nailed fast by fetters
on larger ships - high-towering galleys,
which they rowed on and around all the seas,
while constantly the summer sun scorched them
and bad weather and drenching rains drowned them.
From the shackles they could not free themselves,
but like a dog tied fast to a sheepfold,
they pined away their days and nights down there.
But worst of all were their many dungeons
underneath the palace of the Doge;
the deepest pit that you can imagine
is no worse than those horrible prisons.
In those dungeons e'en a horse would perish.
Man would not tie even his own dog there,
not to speak of his wretched fellow man;
and yet, they keep enchaining people there
and choking them to death in dark chambers.
I still do shake, may God's curse be on them,
when I think of that terrible monster.
No one dares show pity for another,
let alone come to his aid whatever.
When I saw how those decent men suffered,
my heart began to ache, and I spoke out:
"What're you, scum, doing to these people?
Why don't you just kill them off like a man?
Why do you keep them under such torture?"
Then Grbicic whispered to me softly:
"Please do not say words of that kind and tone.
To speak the truth is not permitted here.
You are lucky - they did not understand."
Listen, brothers, what I say to you now:
Those same prisons made one thing clear to me,
that those men had sinned much against God's will,
and that surely their kingdom will perish
and pass into the hands of better men.

VUK MICUNOVIC

Since you do make such daring predictions,
tell me, fear they anyone in this world?

VOIVODE DRASKO

There is no man who is without some fear,
even if of his own shadow only.
They are afraid of nothing else indeed
but of spies and of secret policmen.
All men tremble before them in Venice.
When on the street two people start talking,
the third cocks his ear to listen to them,
then with all speed runs to the officials,
telling them what the others talked about
and adding to their tale some of his own.
Those who spoke are right away arrested
and sent to be tortured in the galley.
From such bad deeds they are all perishing
and losing faith among each other, too.
From end to end, as large as Venice is,
one could not find a single person there
who did not hold his fellow citizen
to be a spy and a secret agent.
The other day Grbicic swore to me
that one time secret agents and spies
had denounced one of the Doges himself
in the senate and before the people,
because of which he paid with his own head
right on the steps of his very palace.
Why would others not be afraid of them
when they denounce e'en the Doge' himself?

KNEZ JANKO

And did you see any games in Venice,
say like the games we play here among us?

VOIVODE DRASKO

Yes, I did, but their games are different.
They would all get together in one house
after supper, when evening had fallen.
The house was filled with all kinds of people,
and in it were lit thousands of candles.
There were big holes all around the long walls,
and those holes were all filled up with people,
and so were the other parts of the house.
You could see them in the walls, all around,
peeping from the holes like mice from their nests.
Then a curtain rose, all of a sudden,
and the third part of the house opened up.
O my dear Lord, what a sight to behold!
Out of somewhere crawled all sorts of people:
you won't see such even in a wild dream,
all in many colours, just like wild cats.
Then a shouting and loud yelling began
and everyone started to clap his hands;
I nearly fell dead from so much laughter!
After a while they all went out somewhere,
but after them others took their places.
Such ugliness, such gross deformities
no one has seen anywhere in the world!
Their noses were almost a full foot long,
their eyes bulging as if they were vampires,
their mouths gaping like those of hungry wolves.
They stood there on some kind of wooden legs