Then down to the
restaurant, where we had a beefsteak which was a dream, and back to bed,
which was a nightmare, for all night long we bounced and banged and
bruised our journey over again, and awoke quite exhausted.
The first impression of a town which is entered by moonlight is usually
difficult to recover on the following morning, it is often like the
glimpse of a pretty girl caught, say, in a theatre lobby, and the charm
may never be rewoven. So it was with Mitrovitza, which in daylight
seemed just a dull, ordinary Turkish town. The Prefect was a bear, and
sent us on a long unnecessary walk to the station, a mile and a half.
Sitting on the road was the dirtiest beggar we had yet seen. As we came
towards her she chanted our praises, bowing before us and kissing the
dust; but she aroused only feelings of disgust and getting nothing, she
turned to curses till we were out of sight. The chief imports at the
station seemed to be cannons and maize; the only exports, millstones,
which looked like and seemed almost as palatable as Serbian bread.
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