We left the shops for further explorations. Scutari has always been
described as such a beautiful town. The adjective does not seem
picturesque: yes, quaint, strange decidedly. One's second impression
after the shops is this:--
[Illustration]
Miles and miles of walls with great doors. The main streets branch out
into thousands of impasses each ending in a locked door. There are
hardly any connecting streets, for somebody's walled garden is between.
The Mahommedans hide in seclusion on one side of the town, while their
hated enemies the Christians live on the other. Each house, Turk or
Christian, has the same air of defiant privacy, the only difference
being that the Turk's windows are blocked with painted lattice. The
Mahommedan women's faces are covered with several thicknesses of
chiffon, generally black, while the Christian peasant women walk about
with an eye and a half peering from the shrouding folds of a cotton head
shawl which they hold tightly under their noses.
With difficulty we found the English consul's house, as the Albanians
speak no Serb and Montenegrins were not to be found at every street
corner.
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