Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: May 6, 2025
For, looking across the Adriatic, she sees the monstrous vision of a united and aggressive Slavdom, untold millions strong, of which the Jugoslavs are but the skirmish-line, ready to dispute not merely Italy's schemes for the commercial mastery of the Balkans but her overlordship of that sea which she regards as an Italian lake. Jugoslavia's claims to Fiume are more briefly stated.
All is so green and peaceful, in spite of the countless fortifications which render the harbour well-nigh, if not quite, impregnable, that Nature and War seem for once to go hand-in-hand. At twilight Zara looms up into view, and another short stay is made. The town turns out en masse for the coming of the Wurmbrand or the Pannonia the fast boats from Trieste or Fiume are the events of the week.
She had been provided with a passport made out in the name of a certain Countess Rocca di Santo Fiume, who had died a short time ago, and had come quite calmly to Russia, though she did not know a single word of Italian and had the most typical of Russian faces. Paklin brought her to his humble little lodging.
If, in the London Agreement, instead of claiming large areas of Dalmatia which are entirely or almost entirely Slav, provision had been made for the constitution of a State of Fiume placed in a condition to guarantee not only the people of Italian nationality but the economic interests of all the peoples in it and surrounding it, there is no doubt that such a claim on the part of Italy would have gone through without opposition.
Soon after ten we were en route for Abbazzia close to Fiume slanting along the neck of the Istrian peninsula by a smooth and well-made road that showed the Austrians were good at highways.
The Adriatic spread itself pure and clean as a field of spring flowers, and as full of delicate changing colour. Away on a remote horizon remote as all trouble and worry seemed, in this fair spot hovered islands, opaline and shimmering, like a mirage. Nearer rose a stretch of green hills, travelling by the seashore until they fell back for Fiume, a white town veiled with a light mist of smoke.
The following lands in the Adriatic Sea are accorded by the Powers of the Quadruple Alliance to the territories of Croatia, Serbia and Montenegro: In the north of the Adriatic, the entire coast, commencing from the Bay of Volosca on the frontier of Istria as far as the northern frontier of Dalmatia, including the whole of the coast-line now belonging to Hungary, the entire coast of Croatia, the port of Fiume and the small harbours of Novi and Carlopago, as also the islands of Velia, Pervicchio, Gregorio, Goli and Arbe.
Thereupon the Great Powers compromised the matter by according them three, and with stealthy rage they submitted to the refusal of recognition. They were not again heard of until one day they proposed that their dispute with Italy about Fiume and the Dalmatian coast should be solved by submitting it to President Wilson for arbitration. The expedient was original.
The Italians of Fiume, as I have already shown, outnumber the Slavs almost three to one, and it is they who are demanding so violently that the city should be annexed to Italy on the ground of self-determination. But I do not believe that, because there is an undoubted Italian majority in Fiume, the city should be awarded to Italy.
One of the most telling arguments employed by President Wilson to dissuade various states from claiming strategic positions, and in particular Italy from insisting on the annexation of Fiume and the Dalmatian coast, was the effective protection which the League of Nations would confer on them.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking