Servia

Servia, a kingdom in the Balkan Peninsula bounded N. by Austria, W. by Bosnia, E. by Bulgaria and Roumania, and S. by Turkey, and having an area of about 18,76O square miles. The surface is for the most part mountainous, the highest elevation being Mt. Kopaonik in the S. (7,000 feet). Woods clothe the hillsides, and the valleys and low grounds beside the rivers Morava, Nishava, Drina, Save, and Danube, furnish excellent pastures, and yield crops or maize, wheat, flax, hemp, and tobacco. Fruit is abundant. The national drink slivovitza being distilled from plums. Iron is profltably worked at Maidanpek; coal and lignite are met with, but the mineral wealth remains unexplored. The climate is warm in summer, but very severe in winter on the uplands. Manufacturing industries scarcely exist. Belgrade is the capital, other towns being Nish, Semendria, Alexinath, Kragojevatz, Shabatz, and Vrania. Servia first appears as a distinct principality in the middle of the 12th century. Two hundred years later it was conquered by Turkcy, and nevr recovered freedom until the revolt under Kara-George in 1801. A troublous period ensued, but in 1829 the Porte recognised Alexander Milosch (I.) Obrenovitch as hereditary prince, but the country was the scene of perpetual disorders. In 1868 Michael Obrenovitch was murdered by the opposite faction, and was succeded by his cousin Midan, who was proclaimed king in 1882, having previonsly married Natalie Keschko, a Russian lady. An ill-advised war with Bulgaria might have ended in utter disaster, which was averted by a treaty in 1888. The Austrian sympathies of the king and the Russian proclivities of the queen led to a divorce in 1888, but next year the combmation of the Radical majority in the Skupshtina with the friends of the queen and the partisans of the Karageorgevitch aspirant compelled Milan to abdicate in favour of his son Alexander, a boy of fourteen. A triumvirate of Regents was instituted, but in 1893 the young king suddenly declared himself of age and displaced the Regents, who were supporting the government of a minority. Soon afterwards Milan was allowed to return, a reconciliation being effected with Queen Natalie. [SERBS.]