torrid Asian deserts, so few in numbers and without hope of assistance. Though I was not capable at the time of deriving broad conclusions from this, it certainly contributed to my later realization that there did not exist a single ideal only, but that there were on our globe countless co-ordinate human systems.
We were suspicious of the British and held ourselves aloof from them. Our fears were made especially great because of our primitive notions about their espionageâthe Intelligence Service. Our attitudes were a mixture of doctrinaire clichés, the influence of sensational literature, and the malaise of greenhorns in the great wide world.
Certainly these fears would not have been as great had it not been for those sacks filled with the archives of the Supreme Command, for they contained also telegrams between ourselves and the Comintern. We found it suspicious too that everywhere the British military authorities had shown no more interest in these sacks than if they had contained shoes or cans. To be sure, I kept them at my side throughout the trip, and to avoid being alone at night, Marko slept with me. He was a prewar Communist from Montenegro, simple but all the more brave and loyal for that.
It happened in Habbaniya one night that someone silently opened the door of my room. I was aroused even though the door did not creak. I spied the form of a native in the light of the moon, and, getting enmeshed in the mosquito net, I let out a shout and grabbed the revolver under my pillow. Marko sprang up (he slept fully clothed), but the stranger vanished. Most probably the native had lost his way or intended to steal something. But his insignificant appearance was sufficient to make us see the long arm of the British espionage in this, and we increased our already taut vigilance. We were very glad when, the next day, the British placed at our disposal a plane for Teheran.
The Teheran through which we moved about, from the Soviet Command to the Soviet Embassy, was already a piece of the Soviet Union. Soviet officers met us with an easy cordiality in which traditional Russian hospitality was mixed in equal measure with the solidarity of fighters for the same ideal in two different parts of the world. In the Soviet Embassy we were shown the round table at which the Teheran Conference had been seated, and also the upstairs room in which Roosevelt had stayed. There was nobody there now and all was as he had left it.
Finally a Soviet plane took us to the Soviet Unionâthe realization of our dreams and our hopes. The deeper we penetrated into its gray-green expanse, the more I was gripped by a new, hitherto hardly suspected emotion. It was as though I was returning to a primeval homeland, unknown but mine.
I was always alien to any Panslavic feelings, nor did I look upon Moscowâs Panslavic ideas at that time as anything but a maneuver for mobilizing conservative forces against the German invasion. But this emotion of mine was something quite different and deeper, going even beyond the limits of my adherence to Communism. I recalled dimly how for three centuries Yugoslav visionaries and fighters, statesmen and sovereignsâespecially the unfortunate prince-bishops of suffering Montenegro âmade pilgrimages to Russia and there sought understanding and salvation. Was I not traveling their path? And was this not the homeland of our ancestors, whom some unknown avalanche had deposited in the windswept Balkans? Russia had never understood the South Slavs and their aspirations; I was convinced that this was because Russia had been tsarist and feudal. But far more final was my faith that, at last, all the social and other reasons for disagreements between Moscow and other peoples had been removed. At that time I looked upon this as the realization of universal brotherhood. But also as my personal bond with the being of the prehistoric Slavic community. Was not this the homeland not only of my forebears but also
We were suspicious of the British and held ourselves aloof from them. Our fears were made especially great because of our primitive notions about their espionageâthe Intelligence Service. Our attitudes were a mixture of doctrinaire clichés, the influence of sensational literature, and the malaise of greenhorns in the great wide world.
Certainly these fears would not have been as great had it not been for those sacks filled with the archives of the Supreme Command, for they contained also telegrams between ourselves and the Comintern. We found it suspicious too that everywhere the British military authorities had shown no more interest in these sacks than if they had contained shoes or cans. To be sure, I kept them at my side throughout the trip, and to avoid being alone at night, Marko slept with me. He was a prewar Communist from Montenegro, simple but all the more brave and loyal for that.
It happened in Habbaniya one night that someone silently opened the door of my room. I was aroused even though the door did not creak. I spied the form of a native in the light of the moon, and, getting enmeshed in the mosquito net, I let out a shout and grabbed the revolver under my pillow. Marko sprang up (he slept fully clothed), but the stranger vanished. Most probably the native had lost his way or intended to steal something. But his insignificant appearance was sufficient to make us see the long arm of the British espionage in this, and we increased our already taut vigilance. We were very glad when, the next day, the British placed at our disposal a plane for Teheran.
The Teheran through which we moved about, from the Soviet Command to the Soviet Embassy, was already a piece of the Soviet Union. Soviet officers met us with an easy cordiality in which traditional Russian hospitality was mixed in equal measure with the solidarity of fighters for the same ideal in two different parts of the world. In the Soviet Embassy we were shown the round table at which the Teheran Conference had been seated, and also the upstairs room in which Roosevelt had stayed. There was nobody there now and all was as he had left it.
Finally a Soviet plane took us to the Soviet Unionâthe realization of our dreams and our hopes. The deeper we penetrated into its gray-green expanse, the more I was gripped by a new, hitherto hardly suspected emotion. It was as though I was returning to a primeval homeland, unknown but mine.
I was always alien to any Panslavic feelings, nor did I look upon Moscowâs Panslavic ideas at that time as anything but a maneuver for mobilizing conservative forces against the German invasion. But this emotion of mine was something quite different and deeper, going even beyond the limits of my adherence to Communism. I recalled dimly how for three centuries Yugoslav visionaries and fighters, statesmen and sovereignsâespecially the unfortunate prince-bishops of suffering Montenegro âmade pilgrimages to Russia and there sought understanding and salvation. Was I not traveling their path? And was this not the homeland of our ancestors, whom some unknown avalanche had deposited in the windswept Balkans? Russia had never understood the South Slavs and their aspirations; I was convinced that this was because Russia had been tsarist and feudal. But far more final was my faith that, at last, all the social and other reasons for disagreements between Moscow and other peoples had been removed. At that time I looked upon this as the realization of universal brotherhood. But also as my personal bond with the being of the prehistoric Slavic community. Was not this the homeland not only of my forebears but also