separated them. This event led to the creation of a female police or vigilance committee in this and some other villages, whose chief duty it apparently was to check indiscreet gossip concerning the Committee.

As in Labcha and the surrounding villages all the men were strong partisans of the Committee, there was no more work to be done here for Niazi's band, and therefore, after purchasing provisions and refreshing themselves, the fedais set out again to march through the night.

In the following afternoon they came to the neighbourhood of the Albanian town of Ochrida, where there were many Palace spies and a considerable garrison, so that it was not possible for the band to enter it; but there was also here an important branch of the Committee of Union and Progress, and a large proportion of the inhabitants were at heart adherents of the cause. So Niazi, leaving his band encamped in a cherry orchard in the hills, walked into the town under cover of the night. Major Eyoub Effendi and other members of the Committee, who were old friends of his, had a meeting with him at the house of one of the faithful, and welcomed him heartily. They told him that two detachments of troops had left Resna to surround his band. They sent up to his camp leather water bottles and other necessaries of which his men were in want, and gave him great encouragement. Here he took the oppor

tunity of sending a manifesto to the Albanian Committee, as it turned out later, with excellent result, for Niazi, whose birth-place was near the Albanian border, and who was himself of Albanian stock, had many friends among the Albanians, and was much respected by them. He also wrote a letter to his old foe Cherchis, the famous leader of Bulgarian bands. In this letter he explained his aim to Cherchis, and told him that he, Niazi, who had formerly pursued Cherchis' band with such vigour, now extended to him the hand of friendship, and asked for an interview under any conditions that Cherchis might propose, in order that they might devise a scheme for concerted action against the Government, and he reminded him of the proverb which says, "the sheep who leaves the flock is torn by the wolf." Niazi's friends took him back to his camp by back lanes and paths, and the band, leaving this dangerous neighbourhood, made another long night march to the north, its objective being Dibra on the Black Drin, the centre of a district in which Niazi knew that he would find many adherents, and where the forests and rugged mountains afforded safe retreats and easily defensible positions.

And now Niazi's work of preparing a general insurrection commenced in earnest. The story of his wanderings cannot be fully told here, but I will give some explanation of the methods he

employed. It was his intention, in the first place, to carry on his operations in the Moslem villages and afterwards to bring in the other elements of the population. He worked with the greatest energy, often visiting and organising several villages in the same day. It was his custom to send a small advanced party of his followers under an officer to reassure the people, and, this done, he would enter the village with the rest of the band. In all save a very few Moslem villages thus visited the fedais were received with extraordinary enthusiasm, and Niazi's task of making the inhabitants sworn adherents of the Committee was not difficult. He would call a meeting of the villagers, or, having attended prayers in the mosque with his band, he would there, after the prayers were over, address those present with stirring words, explaining to them the lofty aims of the movement whose soldier he now was. The leading men would be called up one by one to take the oath prescribed by the Committee of Union and Progress, and afterwards the other inhabitants would come up eagerly to be sworn in. Among those who thus became adherents of the Committee were many deserters from the army who had been hiding among their families.

Niazi used to impress it upon these newly made members that, as they were now united as brethren to serve the same high purpose, they must put away all differences among themselves,

and forgive each other for wrongs inflicted. The cause demanded that their blood feuds should cease. Throughout this region, and especially in some of the Albanian districts, relentless blood feuds between families and individuals are very frequent, and to be murdered in a vendetta is regarded as the natural ending to a man's life. But now was beheld the astonishing spectacle of a general reconciliation. Men whose families had been slaughtering each other for generations, embraced publicly, united by devotion to a common cause; and old men who had not dared to go outside their houses for years, because some ancient crime was yet unavenged, once more went forth freely and without fear.

The villagers, in the sincerity of their welcome to Niazi's fedais, whom they regarded as the saviours of Turkey, often refused to accept payment for the food and other necessaries which they freely and gladly supplied to the band; but Niazi, when he did not pay in cash for these supplies, insisted on giving receipts for their value, and instructed the villagers to show their receipts to the authorities and deduct the amounts from the taxes which they paid to the Government. At the same time he used to send manifestoes to the local mudirs and other officials, warning them that death would be the penalty for the tax collector who refused to accept these receipts as part payment of taxes.

A village, after its inhabitants had been sworn in, was "organised" according to certain rules laid down by the Committee, and became a wellordered centre of revolt. In the first place the authority of the Government and its officials was disclaimed, and tyrannical oppression was prevented by the united opposition of a population that had become as a band of brothers. A local form of government on constitutional lines was set up. The sources of the Government revenue were appropriated whenever it was possible to do this, and in some districts the villages refused to pay any taxes to the Government, offering a passive resistance that would have taken an active shape had the tax collectors ventured to push the matter.

For the purpose of mutual protection, relations were established between the various villages of a district; and a certain number of the inhabitants were secretly organised as a sort of militia. Niazi found that from one hundred to two hundred and fifty rifles were concealed in each village of the Dibra and other neighbouring districts, so arms were not wanting. These villages had suffered greatly from the raids of the Bulgarian bands, but from this time the organisation introduced by Niazi enabled them not only to hold their own against the largest bands, but to defy the attempts of the Government to coerce them. This general preparation for defence brought a peace to this region such as it had not known for years, and the