Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1924-02-17

lit flows into the Danube at" beiSFane'
the capital, -
x x r -
LOW small the fields, are: Many
IL of them are not more, than lone
or two acres, and there are. no great
estates in this part Of the country.
Old Serbia was a great peasant de-
mocracy, made up of small land
holders, each of whom owned his
farm. In some sections nine out OF
every ten persons own some land. AS
a result but little scientific cultiva-
ton is done, as the tracts are so
small On our way to the mountain
I'VE saw men grading the grain and
women binding it with their hands.
The rude plows We're pulled by oxen.
The lands shows signs of earth wash
ing, and the whole country reminds
me of the highlands of North and
South Carolina in what is known as
the Piedmont. 1t is different in the
new lands that have been taken from
Austria Hungary and united with the
old Serbia. They We're held largely,
by the rich and the mobiles, many OF
them containing estates of from $4,000
to 100000 acres, with other large
tracts decreasing in size to the little
farms OF the peasant. Those tracts
have been taken over by the govern
ment, and they are now being sub
divided by the laws of the new land
reform. In those sections Of the,
kingdom hardly third of the people
owned enough land to maintain a
family. They worked for the rich
farmers by the day or became ten
ants, cultivating the soil for one
third or one-fourth of the produce. A
large part of the new Jugoslavia is Of
that character Such lands are in
excellent condition. Many of them
have been farmed with tractors and
the most up-to-date machinery, and
1t remains to be seen whether they
will yield as much, now that they
are going into the hands of small
farmers.
But to understand this new king
dom you must know something Of
the people who inhabit it. They come
Of three great families who lived on
the northern slopes Of the Carpathian
mountains between the Black and the
Caspian seas, and who. a little after
the birth Of Mahomet and during the
time his followers took Jerusalem
and Constantinople, made their way
to the west and established them
selves here and there on the rich
lands Of the valley of the Danube.
These three families were Slavs.
They belonged to the great Slav race
which we know best IN Russia, but
which altogether today constitutes
perhape one-twelfth of the whole hui
man race. In other words. if you
could collect all mankind into one
field and divide them up into dozens,
every dozen would contain one man,
woman or child who IS a Slav. To
the same race belong the Russians,
the Poles, the Czechs and the Bulga-
rians. There are 100000 Slays in
this kingdom. and they are made up
OF Serbs, Croats and Slovenes. About
40 per cent Of the people are Serbs,
80 per cent are Croats and perhaps 10
per cent are Slovenes. Jugoslav
means South Slav. and the kingdom
is that OF South Slavia.
OF these three families the slovenes
and Croats drifted northward ana
westward. They made their way to
the borders Of Austria and Hungary
and filled in much Of the land to the
south along the Adriatic sea. Tho
Serbs settled here, and when the great
Turkish invasion occurred they were
conquered and had to submit to tho
rule of the Turks for more than 400
years. ALI this time they kept their
traditions. They fought with their
masters again and again, so that
when the Turks were finally driven
back they had created the sturdy, in
domitAble character which makes
them the strongest force Of the new
nation. They have stuck to their own