Domovina.

Bratska Sloga, Volume I, Issue 4, 26 June 1899, Page 3

Domovina.

Simon was a sailor. He had left home when he was no more than a child, and sailing from Spalatro he had visited nearly all the ports of the Mediterranean. He could tell famous stories about rows with the gondoliers in Venice, and about adventures with the Moors on the coast of Africa. He could chatter in three or four languages, and his face was welcomed in many a port. Some people said that Simon was a rogue and a vagabond. Others who knew him better could tell you that underneath all his roughness he had a tender heart. Now and then the captain of the ship he was sailing on would find him in the bow, gazing ahead over the waters with a far-away look in his eyes, and humming some sweet, sad melody that nearly always ended with the word “domovina” (home). Yes, it was a fact, that Simon the rover —Simon who had said, when he was only ten years old, that he was tired of home, —would keep sighing in all his wanderings foi’ the village he was born in, the place he always called home. Often his ship would touch at Spalatro, and he would hasten into the country, to see once again his father’s house ; but somehow, as soon as he saw the cottage, and heard his mother’s shrill voice above the grunting of the pigs and the clucking of the fowls, his love for home left him, and, instead, he longed for the salt smell of the sea and the sight of the foam curling around the vessel’s bows.

Two days after this you might find him in the bow again, humming wistfully his song about “ domovina.” Now, when Simon was about twentyfive years old, a strange thing happened to him. He was standing on one of the wharves at Trieste on a certain evening, after his day’s work was done, smoking his pipe and watching the waves lapping against the piles. He was waiting for his mates to go up the town with him to a certain wine shop he knew well. While he was so standing, a stranger walking on the wharf fell into conversation with Simon. He was tall, dressed in the costume of a merchant, and spoke Italian freely, but with a thick, German kind of accent. The talk drifted on to travelling, and the stranger began to speak of a land beyond the sea, with high, snowcovered mountains, and big blue lakes, and fine rolling pastures, and thousands of acres of corn, and fair harbours, and strong men and lovely maidens—a land where it was easy to get rich, and easier still to be happy. “ Yes,” said the stranger, u it’s a grand country, and I want to go there again before I die.” “ Come si chiema (jmel pttesc (what do they call that country) asked Simon. “ Nusilan,” said the stranger. Presently Simon went away with his friends, and made merry for half the night at the wine shop, so that for a time he forgot the words of the stranger. But some days afterwards, when the vessel was gliding along in the sunshine over the blue waters of the Adriatic, if you had listened to Simon humming on the prow, you would have found that his song was no more about “ domovina,” but about this strange country of “ Nusilan.” For it seemed to him that this wonderful country, with the blue lakes and the high mountains of snow, must be the home of his heart, and not that little village in Spalatro. Still, all the time, Simon was merry, and joked with his mates, and made himself the very life of the ship. No one guessed his strange thoughts about this far country. By-and-bye the vessel came to port in Spalatro, and Simon walked up the street. As he was passing a group of men, he suddenly stopped and pricked up his ears, for he had heard in their chatter that word of his heart, “Nusilan.” He waited, listening, and found that these

men were actually going to sail, on the very next day, for this great country. They had heard about it—almost the same story’ that Simon had heard, — and their hearts were full of hope. Simon did not stop long to think, but at once asked if he might go with them, and after they had explained how they were going they said that he could come. So Simon left his vessel, and next day sailed away with his friends to “Nusilan.” Now, “ Nusilan ” was his way of saying New Zealand. His friends .told him how they had received letters from their friends out there, and how they told that New Zealand was a free country, and you had only to work as hard as you do at home and you would make lots of money. And Simon often sat in the bow and thought of these things; then he would begin to hum his songs about “ Nusilan” and “ domovina,” and the tears would

start to his eyes. At last, one day they arrived in Auckland, and soon afterwards Simon went • away with his friends to work on the gumfields. They learned how to use the spear, ' and here and there they managed to strike some good patches of gum. But . Simon found the work very hard. He 1 missed the freedom of sea-life, and, more than that, his heart was heavy because , this dreary gum-land was not the country !of his dreams. Whqre were those high ' snow mountains and those fine blue ■ lakes that the stranger had told him of 'at Trieste. It was true that he was getting a fair amount of money, and . when he went to Auckland city he could dress pretty well and live like a prince, but he felt bitterly that this was not his home. While he worked for hours in ; the swamps, while he sat in his whare scraping gum, while he trudged through acres of barren country looking for likely ! patches, his thoughts would be far away ; in the Adriatic, and in that little old ■ village near Spalatro. His mates chaffed him about his low spirits, and said he was ■ home-sick. True, he was home-sick ; but ' he knew that his home-sickness was not ' for Dalmatia nor for his old vessel. It ; was a strange feeling that he could not understand. About a year after he arrived in New Zealand, Simon fell ill, and lay hot with fever for many weeks in his little whare in some barren country north of Auckland. His mates nursed him as best they could, and listened for hours to his ravings about the old days in the Mediterranean and the blue mountains of New Zealand, and ever and again they would catch the word, “domovina.” By this time they began to understand his thoughts, and they tried hard to soothe him by promising to take him back to Dalmatia when he got better. He was sent to the Auckland Hospital, and after a time the fever left him. He went back to his mates in the North, but he was too weak to work. He would lie for hours in the whare with his eyes open, thinking and dreaming. One day, when two of his chief friends, Ivan and Peter, came in,’they found him talking to himself, with a happy light on his face. He stopped talking when they came in, but .the light remained. Ivan whispered to Peter, £< surely he’s going to die soon.” For two or three days he lay there quietly. He said little, only lie seemed very thankful for every small thing his mates did for him. All his fretfulness and melancholy seemed to have left him, and his face was quite peaceful. Often they could hear him whispering “ domovina,” and they knew that the old thoughts were still wandering through his mind. Several times a day he would cross himself and sometimes he would

murmur a simple prayer. One morning, just after sunrise, when his mates were washing themselves outg side, he called them, “ Braci” (brothers). They hurried in and found him sitting up on his mattress, his eyes full of light,

and gazing away into something none of

them could see. He raised his hand and pointed, saying, “ Brothers, I have found it, ‘ domovina,’ the home-country, not Dalmatia, not Nusilan ; but look, I am going into it, into the light of the sun and the blue lakes and the snow mountains.” And he crossed himself and began to say strange prayers to Mother Mary and the saints. Then his mates, who knelt by, crossing themselves and sobbing like children, heard him say softly and quietly, “ Otce nas ” (“ Our Father, which art in heaven ”), and looking up they saw him stretch out his hands and smile like a holy angel, while he whispered one word, “ domovina.” Then he fell back, and his spirit had left him. They had the priest to bury him, and lamented around his grave; then they went back to their work. But the homecountry of their hearts is the place where Simon has gone.