BIRTH & DEATH

One morning last week, two hours before dawn, the boom of a gun broke the almost rural silence of Tirana, the small capital perched in the mountains of the tiny Kingdom of Albania. Boom followed boom until 101 had shaken the sleeping town. A son and heir had just been born to King Zog I and his Hungarian-American consort, Queen Geraldine. The man-child was named Skander after the great Albanian patriot who in the 15th Century stood off the Turks during some 30 years of hard fighting.

Less than 50 miles across the narrow Straits of Otranto, at the Italian ports of Brindisi and Bari, gun crews were also active at the same hour. There, while warships, scores of other vessels, made ready to sail, heavy guns and men were loaded on transports. Three hundred and eighty-four warplanes stood by at airports.

Forty-eight hours later the bed-ridden Queen lying in Tirana's temporary Royal Palace could hear the roar of whole flights of planes overhead--planes that could not possibly be Albania's, since the country had only two. They dropped no bombs but leaflets fluttered down in the spring breeze announcing that "friendly" Italian troops were arriving that day to take over the country and "reestablish order, peace and justice." At four Albanian seaports, the nearest one (Durazzo) only 25 miles from Tirana, warships soon hove into sight, began bombarding. Troops were landed. A skirmish or so developed. The little Albanian army of 13,000 was quickly mobilized, and hardy mountaineer fighters brought out their ancient rifles, pistols, carved daggers.

But in a day's time heavily-armed Fascist legionnaires had overcome this petty resistance and pushed their way up the steep mountain grades to the Capital. In two days they had occupied all the important points of the country, with casualties of only 21 killed, 97 wounded. The Albanian Army vanished into the fastnesses of Albania's Dinaric Alps where, unless the Sons of the Eagle (as the Albanians call themselves) have changed since the Turks dealt with them for five centuries, they can be expected to put up a guerrilla warfare until Kingdom Come.

Foreign Minister Count Galeazzo Ciano, who was best man at Zog's wedding last year, arrived to form a "provisional Albanian Government" and II Duce, as quickly as he could spare the time from his Palazzo Venezia desk, was scheduled to announce in Tirana just what he intended to do with his new possession. Best guess was that it would become a protectorate under the sovereignty of His Imperial Majesty King Vittorio Emmanuele III of Italy.

Flight. Meanwhile, at the first approach of danger, 43-year-old King Zog loaded his 23-year-old wife and newly born son into an Albanian automobile converted into an ambulance and sent them, with escort, over a 160-mile stretch of rough road into neighboring Greece. Lodging in a primitive little inn at Fiorina, across the frontier. Her Majesty through her Hungarian grandmother, Countess D'Estrelle D'Ekna, released an appeal to the world: "I left my husband leading his troops--his poor insignificant little Army--into battle. What could Albania do against such armed might as that which ground down on us?"

Meanwhile King Zog switched his capital to Elbasan, a town 25 miles southeast of Tirana. King Zog did not long continue leading his "insignificant little Army" into battle. Only one day after the Queen's arrival, he joined her at Fiorina. With him went 115 of his court followers and ten heavy cases of valuables. Going first to Salonika and then to the seaside resort of Volos, the Albanian Royal Family soon received a hint that Greece, fearing for its own hide, could not offer them a permanent asylum. As soon as the Queen recovered from a fever they were expected to move on to Egypt, a Moslem land, which is cordial to titled visitors. Also expected to move soon to a less troubled neighborhood were Banker J. P. Morgan and his guest, the Archbishop of Canterbury, who, expecting no excitement, arrived at Athens on the Morgan yacht Corsair.

Pawn. Most primitive and out-of-the-way spot in Europe, more Oriental than Western, two-thirds of its 1,000,000 inhabitants of the Moslem faith, Albania does not add much developed wealth to Dictator Mussolini's Roman Empire. Principal exports (largely to Italy) are hides, cheese and tobacco. Albanian oil is at best of second-rate importance, probably not capable of supplying more than a tenth of Italy's peacetime needs.

Moreover, in King Zog II Duce already had as obliging a King as any normal dictator could want. A member of the Albanian Mati tribe, son of the hereditary chieftain of the Mati Valley, Achmed Zogu underwent the typical vicissitudes of a Balkan politician whose country must forever remain the pawn of power politics. Once before he was forced to flee the country. But he came back, was named President and then took the crown in 1928.

As to his kingship, opinions differ. Italians claimed he had been a tyrant, had misappropriated the State's funds. To others he seemed a reasonably well-educated man (he went to school at Constantinople) who--in a country with a peasant economy where the people are largely illiterate and have had independence for only 27 years--has done his best at reform. He had tried particularly to abolish the blood feud, one of the deep-rooted traditions of the country.

Back to Roost. If Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain is now alarmed over Italy's grab, he can have none but his own country in general to blame, and in particular his own halfbrother, the late Sir Austen. In 1926 II Duce was pressing for extended Ethiopian interests. To divert his attention British Foreign Secretary Sir Austen Chamberlain hinted that Albania was a more convenient outlet for Italian expansion and one, incidentally, less likely to interfere with British plans.

II Duce leaped at the suggestion, immediately sent a note to Albania insisting upon becoming the guarantor of Albania's independence. Once before when the Italians presented demands President Zogu appealed to Britain, got immediate results. This time, however, the British Minister at Tirana informed the President that "London expected Albania to reach an amicable agreement with Italy without undue delay." Sir Austen and II Duce met on a yacht off Livorno to consummate the deal. The Treaty of Tirana, which made Albania a virtual Italian economic protectorate, was duly signed on Nov. 27, 1926.

That the chickens of post-War political deals have a habit of coming home to roost was evident not only in what happened in Albania but also in the fate of Ethiopia three years ago. Last week Albania suddenly assumed importance. Across southern Albania, from Durazzo toward Salonika, lies the ancient overland route from Rome to Byzantium (now Istanbul). Italian forces could again advance along the old imperial highway, last used in the World War during the Salonika campaign, now partly supplemented by railroads, and could cut the last practical route by which the British and French might send assistance to an imperiled Yugoslavia.

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