Bosnian Chronicle

by Ivo Andrić

  This sceptic and philosophe had seizures of religious ecstasy and spells of practical piety. He would then go to the monastery at Gucha Gora, pester the friars, ask to be allowed to do spiritual austerities with them, only to discover that they hadn’t enough zeal or theological acumen or devout fervor. The monks at Gucha Gora, who were genuinely pious but simple hardy people, had, in common with all Bosnian friars, an ingrained loathing of bigoted chest-beating, exalted zealots, and all those who hang on to God’s coat tails and “lick the stones of the altar.” The old “uncles” used to bridle and grumble, and one of them has even left a written record of how spurious and distressing they found this mundane doctor “who professes to be a great servitor of the Catholic (texterase/)aring Mass every morning and performing all manner Of Devotions.” Nevertheless, because of his connection with the Austrian Consulate, and out of the respect they had toward von Mitterer, the friars could not altogether shake off the latter’s Illyrian doctor.

  But Cologna did the same with the Orthodox monk Pakhomi, and frequented the Orthodox homes of Travnik, in order to see their religious customs, to hear the service and the ritual chanting, and to compare them with the Greek service. And with the headmaster of the Moslem school, Abduselem Effendi, Cologna carried on learned discussions about the history of the Islamic faith, for he was not only well grounded in the Koran but was familiar with all the theological philosophic currents from Abu Hanif to Al Gazali. At every opportunity, too, he would shower the other members of the Travnik Ulema with quotations from Islamic theologians, of whom in most cases they had never heard. In this he was tireless and unrelenting.

  And the same chameleon quality seemed to animate the man’s character. At first sight, he impressed everyone as tractable, pliant, and acquiescent to a degree that was embarrassing. He would invariably accommodate his own opinion to that of the person he was talking with, and would not only adopt the latter’s viewpoint but also surpass him in vehemence of expression. But then again, just as often, he would suddenly and quite without warning take up daring positions against everything and everyone and would defend them doggedly and well, with his whole being, regardless of the cost and danger to himself.

  From his youth on Cologna had been in the Austrian service. This was perhaps the only thing in which he had been consistent and steadfast. He had spent a certain time as personal physician to the Pasha of Scutari and Janina, but even then he had kept up his connections with various Austrian consuls. Now he was attached to the Consulate of Travnik, not so much for his reputation as a doctor as on account of those old ties, his linguistic proficiency, and his knowledge of local conditions. In fact, he was not a member of the Consulate staff but lived separately and was registered with the authorities merely as a doctor under the protection of the Austrian Consulate.

  Von Mitterer, who had no aptitude for fantasy and no understanding of philosophy, and whose knowledge both of the language and the country far exceeded Cologna’s, was hard put to decide what to do with this unwanted co-worker. Frau von Mitterer had a physical rev (texterase/)ard the Levantine and declared excitedly that she would die sooner than accept a medicine from the man’s hands. In conversation she would refer to him as “Chronos,” because to her he resembled the symbolic figure of Time—though a Chronos without a beard, whose hands held neither the mortal scythe nor the sand-filled hourglass.

  Such was the life this doctor without patients led in Travnik. He lived away from the Consulate, in a ramshackle house on top of an abandoned stone quarry. He had no family. A single servant, an Albanian, ran his whole household, which was frugal and eccentric in every respect, in its furnishings, its food, and its daily program. He spent a good deal of time in vain attempts to find someone to converse with who would not grow bored and run away, or poring over his books and notes which encompassed the sum total of human knowledge, from astronomy and chemistry down to military skills and diplomacy.

  This man without roots and equipoise, who nevertheless had a pure heart and an inquiring mind, had one morbid but great and selfless passion: to delve into the mystery of human thought wherever it might appear and whatever direction it took. He catered to this passion with his whole being, immoderately, without any clear objective or reserve of any kind. All the religious and philosophical movements and endeavors in the history of mankind, without exception, fascinated his mind and lived and hobnobbed inside it, clashing and overlapping one another like waves on the sea’s surface. Each one was equally close to him and equally remote; with each he was able to agree and identify himself for a certain time, while he was occupied with it. These inner intellectual adventures were to him a real world; in them he enjoyed real inspirations and profound experiences. But at the same time they marked him apart and estranged him from people and society, and brought him in conflict with the logic and common sense of the rest of the world. Thus, what was best in him remained unnoticed and inaccessible, while the sides of him that could be observed and sensed put everybody off. Even in another, less taxing environment, a man like this could not have won a fitting place for himself or any real respect. Here, in this town and among these people, he was fated to be unhappy and to seem odd, ludicrous, suspicious, and futile.

  The friars considered him a maniac and a scatterbrain, the townspeople a spy or else a learned fool. Suleiman Pasha Skoplyak said apropos of this doctor: “The biggest fool is not the man who cannot read but the man who believes that everything he reads is true.”

  Desfosses was the only one in Travnik who did not shun Cologna and had the desire and the patience to talk with him from time to time, unreservedly and at length. However, the upshot of this was that Cologna was accused in the Austrian Consulate of being in French service.

  It was hard to tell just what Cologna’s medical competence and interests consisted of, but it was certain that they were among his least worries. In the glare of the philosophical truths and religious illuminations which swept and washed through him without pause, human needs and pains, even life itself, did not represent anything of particularly great importance or deep meaning. To him illness and changes in the human body were merely one more incentive to exercise his mind, a mind that was condemned to perpetual ferment. Because his own links with life were rather tenuous, he could not begin to appreciate the meaning of blood ties to a normal man, of bodily health, or the problem of whether an individual lived a shorter or a longer life. The fact was that as far as Cologna was concerned, in questions of medicine too, everything started and ended with words—a flood of words, animated exchanges, disputes, and often in abrupt and complete changes of opinion about a given disease, its causes, and methods of treating it. It goes without saying that very few people would have thought of calling or asking for such a doctor unless they were quite desperate. One might say that the main professional occupation of the garrulous doctor was his standing quarrel with, and passionate dislike of, César D’Avenat.

  Having studied in Milan, Cologna was a follower of the Italian school of medicine, while D’Avenat, who despised and took a dim view of Italian doctors, maintained that the University of Montpellier had centuries before beaten and surpassed the school of Salerno, which was considered antiquated and passé. Cologna did, in fact, glean his wisdom and his many aphorisms from that great miscellany Regimen Sanitatis Salernitanum, which he jealousy kept hidden under lock and key and from which he lifted and liberally distributed verse maxims on physical and mental hygiene. D’Avenat, on the other hand, drew his sustenance from several volumes of lecture notes by celebrated professors at Montpellier and from the great classical manual Lilium Medicinae. But the wellspring of their differences lay not so much in books and professional knowledge, which they had very little of, but in their Levantine compulsion to bicker and vie with each other, in the obduracy common to their profession, in the boredom of Travnik life, and in their own personal vanity and intolerance.

  Cologna’s attitude to human illness and health—if, in his case, one might speak of a single a
nd unvarying attitude—was as uncomplicated as it was futile and hopeless. Cologna looked upon life as “an active state constantly gravitating toward death and approaching it slowly and by degrees; and death is the final resolution of the long illness which we call life!” But these patients, whom we call people might live longer and with proportionately fewer distresses and pains if they followed proven medical advice and the golden rule of moderation in all things. Pains, as well as premature death, were merely natural results of breaking that law. Three doctors were indispensable to man, Cologna was want to say: mens hilaris, requis moderata, diaeta—a serene mind, moderate rest, and proper diet.

  Such were the principles on which Cologna treated his patients, and the patients were neither better off nor worse off for them; either they died when they wandered too far from the line of life and approached the line of death, or they improved, which is to say, threw off their pains and disorders and came back within the purview of the beneficial rules of Salerno—a process which Cologna made easier and expedited with an occasional Latin couplet from among those thousands of useful couplets which were so easy to memorize but so difficult to observe in practice.

  This, in brief, was the “Illyrian doctor,” the last of the quartet of doctors who, each in his own fashion, waged a hard and hopeless struggle against disease and death in the valley of Travnik.

  13

  Christmas, the holy day of all Christians, came to Travnik too, with its share of worries, memories, solemn and nostalgic thoughts. This year it was the occasion for renewed relations between the consuls and their families.

  Things were particularly lively at the Austrian Consulate. These were the days in which Frau von Mitterer went through her phase of goodness, piety, and family devotion. She scurried around, getting up presents and surprises for all. She locked herself in the room and decorated the Christmas tree; she practiced old Christmas carols on the harp. She even thought of going to the midnight Mass at the Church of Dolats, remembering Christmas Eves in the churches of Vienna, but Fra Ivo, to whom she had sent one of the Consulate clerks to inquire about it, had reacted so sharply and rudely that the clerk had not dared to repeat his answer to the Frau Consul; nevertheless, he managed to convince her that in a country like Bosnia such things had better be left alone. Frau von Mitterer was disappointed, but went on with her preparations at home.

  Christmas Eve was a great success. The whole of the small Austrian colony was gathered around the tree. The house was warm and brightly illuminated. Pale with excitement, Anna Maria gave each one his present, wrapped in fine paper, tied with gold string, and decorated with sprigs of juniper.

  Next day there was a luncheon to which Daville, his wife, and Desfosses were invited. Also present were the parish priest of Dolats, Fra Ivo Yankovich, and the young vicar from the monastery of Gucha Gora, Fra Julian Pashalich, deputizing for the Guardian, who was sick. He was that giant, irascible friar whom Desfosses had met in the inn at Kupres when he first arrived in Bosnia, and whom he later met again on his first visit to Gucha Gora.

  The big dining room was warm and aromatic with cakes and the scent of pine wood. Outside, a new carpet of fine powdery snow sent up a white glow. A reflection of this whiteness fell over the richly laden table and sparkled on the silver and the crystal. The two consuls wore their gala uniforms; Anna Maria and her daughter were in light fashionable dresses of embroidered muslin, with high waists and wide sleeves. Only Mme Daville struck a note of contrast in her black mourning dress, which made her look even thinner. The two friars, both tall and heavy men, wearing their best habits, completely covered the chairs they sat on and looked like two brown haystacks in the midst of a brightly hued group.

  The meal was sumptuous and good. Polish vodka, Hungarian wines, and Viennese sweets were served. All the food was well seasoned and spiced. Frau von Mitterer’s imagination was evident in everything, down to the tiniest details.

  The friars ate heartily and in silence, daunted occasionally by the unfamiliar dishes and the exquisite little spoons of Viennese silver which disappeared like children’s toys in their huge hands. Anna Maria often turned to them, encouraging them and pressing food on them, fluttering her sleeves, tossing her hair, and flashing her eyes, and they wiped their thick peasant mustaches and looked at this fair, vivacious woman with the same quiet wonder as they did at the unfamiliar food. Desfosses could not help noticing the natural dignity of these two simple men, their alertness, their discretion, and the politely unequivocal way in which they declined to eat and drink things they did not like or weren’t used to. And their awkwardness in manipulating the forks and knives and the gingerly manner in which they approached each dish were not in the least crude or laughable but rather dignified and touching.

  The conversation grew more animated and louder, and was carried on in several languages. At the end the Brothers firmly declined both the dessert and the Dalmatian fruits. Anna Maria was taken aback. But the thing was soon smoothed over with the arrival of coffee and tobacco, which the friars received with unconcealed satisfaction, as though it were a kind of reward for all they’d had to endure up to that point.

  The men withdrew for a smoke. It so happened that neither Daville nor Desfosses were smokers; but von Mitterer and Fra Julian more than made up for it by spouting fierce clouds, while Fra Ivo generously helped himself to snuff and mopped his whiskers and his pink double chin with an enormous blue kerchief.

  It was the first time that von Mitterer had invited his rival and his friends together and that the consuls had met in the presence of the friars. It seemed as if Christmas had ushered in a period of festive cease-fire, as if the death of Daville’s boy had mellowed or at least deferred the antagonism and combativeness of the two men. Von Mitterer was pleased to have set the stage for an observance of such generous sentiments.

  But at the same time the occasion gave everyone present an excellent chance to air his “politics” and display his personality in the most winsome light. Speaking blandly and unemphatically, von Mitterer sketched out, for Daville’s benefit, the extent of his influence with the Brothers and their flock, and the Brothers corroborated him by nodding and with occasional remarks. Partly from obstinacy, partly from the habit of duty, Daville put on the air of Napoleon’s representative, and this “imperial” attitude, which accorded so little with his true nature, made him appear stiff and gave a false coloring to his whole personality. The only one who spoke and behaved naturally and did not seem forced was Desfosses, but as he was the youngest he kept quiet most of the time.

  The Brothers, insofar as they talked at all, complained about the Turks, about fines and persecution, about the vagaries of history, their lot, and more or less about the world in general, with that strange and characteristic gloating that creeps into the voice of every Bosnian when he talks about grave and hopeless things.

  In company such as this, where everyone tried to say only what he desired to be known and spread further, and confined himself to hearing only what he needed and what the others tried to conceal, it was natural that conversation could not get going or take on a cordial, unstudied tone.

  Like a good and tactful host, von Mitterer did not allow the talk to veer to topics that might evoke a dispute. Only Fra Julian and Desfosses managed to draw apart and start a somewhat livelier discussion of their own, as old acquaintances.

  The Bosnian friar and the French youth had felt sympathy and respect for each other ever since their first meeting at Kupres. Subsequent meetings in Gucha Gora had only brought them closer. Being young, healthy, and cheerful, they set to talking, and even sparring in a friendly way, with obvious relish, innocent of second thoughts or personal vanity.

  Drawing a little apart and gazing through the steamy window at the bare trees that were dusted with fine snow, they talked of Bosnia and the Bosnians. Desfosses asked for facts and information about the Catholic population and the work of the friars, and then offered his own impressions and experiences up to that time, in a calm a
nd sincere voice.

  The friar could see right away that the “young Consul” hadn’t squandered his time in Travnik but had mustered a good deal of information about the land and the people, even about the native Catholics and the activities of the Brothers.

  They both agreed that life in Bosnia was uncommonly hard and that the people, regardless of their denomination, were poor and backward in every respect. In his attempt to explain and find reasons for this state of affairs, the friar was apt to put the whole blame on the Turks, maintaining that there could never be any improvement until these countries freed themselves from Turkish rule and replaced it with a Christian regime. Desfosses was not satisfied with this interpretation and looked for causes in the Christians themselves. Their subjection to the Turks, he said, had produced certain characteristics of behavior in the Christians, such as furtiveness, mistrust, mental turpitude, and fear of every innovation, all work and all movement. These habits, ingrained through centuries of unequal struggle and constant fighting for survival, had become second nature to the people of these parts and had hardened into permanent traits of character. Created under the pressure of necessity, they were today, and were likely to be in the future, great obstacles to progress, a bad legacy of a distressing past and a formidable defect that would have to be rooted out.