Those warlike peoples longed to join in the struggle against their ancestral foes; and their rulers were nothing loth to do so.

Servia was then ruled by Prince Milan (1868-89), of that House of Obrenovitch which has been extinguished by the cowardly murders of June 1903 at Belgrade.

He had recently married Nathalie Kechko, a noble Russian lady, whose connections strengthened the hopes that he naturally entertained of armed Muscovite help in case of a war with Turkey.

Prince Nikita of Montenegro had married his second daughter to a Russian Grand Duke, cousin of the Czar Alexander II., and therefore cherished the same hopes.

It was clear that unless energetic steps were taken by the Powers to stop the spread of the conflagration it would soon wrap the whole of the Balkan Peninsula in flames.