The reconstruction of South-Eastern Europe

THE RECONSTRUCTION OF

Serbia and Bosnia and ought to find a good market here.

Fine sorts of tobacco are grown in many districts of Serbia, Montenegro, Macedonia, Hercegovina, so much so that Greater Serbia probably will be the chief tobacco producing country in the world. The administration of the State monopoly is greatly fostering the cultivation of the finer sorts of tobacco. Serbian cigarettes have already a world-wide reputation, and the quantity and quality of Serbian tobacco output were increasing steadily before the war.

But the real wealth of the Southern Slav State will consist in its mineral wealth, cattle, sheep and pig breeding, poultry farming and fruit growing. The mines of Serbia and Bosnia were renowned and exploited during the Roman rule. Neglected during the invasion of the barbarians, the mining industries were greatly fostered by rulers of medizeval Serbia. Wonderful tales were told by medizval travellers of the richness of the Balkan mines. As late as 1453 the Greek Kristoboulos asserted that gold and silver sprang from the earth like water, and ‘“‘ wherever you dug you found large deposits of the precious metals, in greater quantities than in the Indies.”

Kratovo, where Serbian kings minted silver and gold coins, Novo Brdo, Kopaonik and Rudnik where flourished Saxon and Ragusan Colonies in medizval Serbia, were completely ruined by the Turks. With the independence of Serbia the

244