brought one down on the English "nation" by presuming to act as a judge in a case between an Englishman and another foreigner. He had no right to exercise jurisdiction in such a case, but only among his own countrymen. In the conditions of life prevailing in Turkey, indignities had to be put up with. Once when the Grand Senior, who had heard of him, and wished to have a look at him, ordered him to be presented at Court, the future Sheriff of London had to put up with being marched into the presence by two guards, who held him by neck and arms. When he was at the proper distance he was forced to do ko-tow by knocking his head three times on the floor. Dudley seems to have taken this in the day's work. He knew the ways of Turkey and the language intimately. He could manage business in the parole proceedings of a Cadi's court, where counsel are not allowed, uncommonly well. He valued Turkish, because it was rich in terms of vituperation. In his later days in London, whenever he was irritated, he fell back on his Turkish for the relief of his feelings. Dudley North, to be candid, is not a man one much likes, but he has a deal to tell of Turkey, of the Turks, of their courts of justice (which, indeed, he rather admired for the simplicity and brevity of their procedure), and of the little English communities which worked more or less successfully, and devoted the evening to the social bowl. He was also one of those who make good and built up trade. For how you got there, and what was likely to happen to you on the way, those parts of Dr Covel's 'Diary' as have been printed for the Hakluyt Society may be confidently recommended. They have, so Mr Brent assures us, been extracted from masses of dissertation on sea-sickness, archæology, and improvements of the occasion. He was a learned man who went as chaplain to Constantinople, travelled, was employed and promoted, and rose to be Master of Christ Church, Cambridge. Wherever he was called, Dr Covel was no doubt equal to his place. On our page he appears only as narrator of a voyage to the Levant. In that capacity he is quite as good as Mr Terry, the chaplain who published his Voyage to East Indies' in 1655, though he had not the luck to see so much of the perils of the sea, as they were in those days. The fact that they were neither of them seafaring men is to their advantage in this connection. We escape ships' log-an indispensable thing in its proper place. When, like Dr Covel in 1670, you started out to reach the eastern Mediterranean, you went in a convoy. There were seven in his, under the protection of the Greenwich frigate, commanded by Captain Robinson. One was bound direct to Scanderoon. At the east (he says "the next ") end of Candia i.e., Crete-one of the seven, by name the Turkey Merchant, would separate from the rest, and the Greenwich would see her to her destination-Scanderoon. The six bound to Smyrna (and Constantinople also in the case of two of them) would go on together. One was to go on to Scanderoon from Smyrna. Dr Covel took his passage in the London Merchant, Captain John Hill. "A very able and long experienced seaman, a most careful and understanding commander, whose honest, sober, and discreet management of all his affairs I can never sufficiently commend, as I must never forget his singular respect and kindness to myself." merchant ships. He summoned them aboard the Greenwich. In those days, when the average rate of speed would be about two knots and a half an hour, captains thought nothing of taking boats and dropping in on one another for a visit or dinner-then a mid-day meal. "Saturday, October October 1st," notes Dr Covel, "the Admiral and Vice-Admiral (the captains of the Greenwich and of another frigate which had joined them) and several commanders came on board us, and dined with us, and on the 3rd we all dined on board the Turkey Merchant. When we thus treated one another, if the weather be fair and will permit, we seldom fail of some merry fellows in every ship's crew, who will entertain us with several diversions, as divers sorts of odd sports and gambols; sometimes with their homely drolls and farces, which in their corrupt language they nickname interlutes; sometimes they dance about the mainmast instead of a maypole, and they have variety of forecastle songs ridiculous enough." Passing over the doctor's sufferings from sea-sickness, which he cured by moderate but repeated doses of "purl (beer and wormwood), or old hock, sack, and wormwood, we can concentrate on the events of the voyage. Homeward bound ships you meet share up to you and pass the time of day. A homeward-bound Dutchman gave Captain Robinson the welcome news that the English squadron in the Straits, acting with Dutch warships, "had chased six Algiers menof-war ashore at Cape Spartel," and had sunk, fired, and destroyed them all, and released many English and Dutch prisoners. Captain Robinson did not signal his good news (there could be no better than on the making an end of a Barbary pirate) to the captains of the One wishes the doctor, had quoted one of these forecastle songs. The convoy escaped all serious perils, though they were in for a fight once. But the strangers they met turned out to be French warships, and not, as they feared, Algerines. The convoy formed line. Dr Covel came on deck, and was complimented by the captain on his spirit, which would greatly encourage the crew. When the alarm turned out to be false, the doctor makes no secret of his relief, and adds that they were all, in his opinion, glad to know they would turn in with a whole skin, though he saw no sign of any lack of courage. So little was time of any value that Captain Robinson took the whole convoy into Tunis because he had a message to deliver from the Duke of York to the Dey, who was then at peace with us. Some of the merchant captains protested, not because of the delay, but because they thought that the Tunisians would be tempted by the sight of so much booty to fall on them. Their anxiety proved groundless, and Dr Covel had a chance to visit the ruins of Carthage. No serious evil did befall them except at the island of Cervi in the Bay of Kolokythia on the east side of Maina, which is the southern point of the Morea. They stopped at that dangerous place to allow of head winds, which were hampering them, to blow over. Now Cervi was dangerous, being much haunted by Mainotes. These heroes of many towered Maina" were the most notorious kidnappers, wreckers, and cut-throats of all the Levant. Yet our friends landed in good numbers, armed, and with strict orders that nobody was to straggle from the beach. Of course, some of the passengers did straggle, and tempted sailors to go with them. It was equally a matter of course that they fell into an ambush of Mainotes. As they bolted back promptly, most of them escaped, but the Mainotes secured four of the sailors, whom they carried off for ransom, or to be sold to the Turks for galley slaves. The men brought their misfortune on themselves, but one wishes that they had been rescued. An attempt was made to free them, but the Mainotes had carried them off. Nothing remained but to make a subscription to ransom them. Fifteen hundred dollars were raised in the convoy by all ranks, but no Mainote came forward to take the money. It was deposited in the hands of the Consul at Smyrna, and the men, who had been rowing in the Turkish galleys, were redeemed after two years. Covel ends with a rather grotesque touch. When these interesting sufferers reached home they threatened to bring an action against their captain for two years' wages. They were, in the doctor's opinion, very ungrateful wretches, but they were very like one type of sailor. Dr Dr Covel The rest of the voyage contained little which would not be mere repetition. served his time in Constantinople, travelled, wrote, and studied the Eastern Church, then, as in the days of Archbishop Abbot, and the Lord Ambassador Roe, and in later times also, a subject of much interest to Anglican scholars, and that he was helped to increase knowledge by his position as chaplain is evidence that the Levant, like its daughter the East India, Company did more than promote the trade of merchandise. THE WINNING OF SHEILAH M'CAUGHEY. BY H. R. JUKES. its The decrepit cap, with salmon-fly, surmounted all, roguishly tilted, but only partly shading the ever-present twinkle in a pair of dark grey eyes. I SAW him first in charge of size. a hawker's barrow, away over in the wilds of Galway. My attention was drawn to him not so much by the quality of his persuasive blarney, as by the sight of a battered salmon-fly, stuck jauntily in the remains of what had once been a cap. He had the air of being an honest pedlar, with the glib assurance that his calling produces. Nevertheless I thought that, with all his air, the bulk of his livelihood must be made in other ways. The contents of his barrow could not have been worth more than half-a-crown in all, and the salmon-fly appealed to me. I, too, have a fly or two in my cap when I am in Galway, and I watched him interestedly. He wore a strange collection of clothes. Probably no garment had been his own originally; few, I should say, at second hand. Somebody's morning-coat, now green with age, adorned his great shoulders; a pair of khaki ridingbreeches from some war-time Q.M.S.'s store reached halfway down his calves, the buttons either loose or missing but somehow managing to support a pair of grey homespun socks which, in their turn, disappeared into a pair of cavernous brogues of unequal He grinned appreciatively at the landlady of my inn when she refused to buy, winked wickedly at me as I sat in the inn-porch, and from the pocket of his morning-coat, for all the world like any party conjurer, brought forth-a hare ! I laughed. My guess at his real calling had been correct. Arrah now, mavourneen," he began cheerfully, holding up the hare by a leg, three-an'sixpence, and as chape as you like! Divil a bit longer than an hour has it been dead, and sorra a mark on it at all, at all. 'Tis not so big, says you? Faith! 'tis as big as ever it'll be, I'm thinking. Oh but sure now, 'tis a morthial grand hare, it is indade! Three-an'-sixpence, Mrs Murphy! You'd better be after buying it for, I'm thinking, 'tis a change his honour there will be wanting from the everlasting stew you'll be after giving him.' I should have warned him, had I had the chance, that something had already upset the good lady that morning, and that she was in no mood for banter. Perhaps, too, she was rather dubious about my seeing where she made her commissariat purchases. His last remark nettled her. "'Tis some of the everlasting stew ye'll be after begging, ye spalpeen," she retorted angrily. "Bad luck to your impudence! 'Tis a poacher ye are, Mickey Houligan, and I would not touch your old hare for a fortune. Take the pig's face of ye away, and leave his honour alone! With this she flounced away indoors, the repentant Mickey calling after her dolefully, "Och now, my jewel, 'twas but teasing you I was. Sure, is it not myself that will be knowing what elegant fine stew ye can make? Arrah now, alannah, give me a bowl of that same stew, and I'll be letting ye have the old hare for half-acrown!" The banging of kitchen crockery was the only reply. He crossed over to me, his lips wrinkling up over his white teeth in a wry little smile of amusement. "By the powers now, but that's unfortunate," he exclaimed, "especially as the old lady asked me to be bringing her a hare. But, by gor, your honour," he entreated, altering his tone, "'tis something or other I must be selling, or 'tis little the reverend father will be finding in his collection at all, at all. Begging your honour's pardon, but would you be stepping this way, sorr! 'Tis something that I have here that will maybe be interesting your friends in London, I'm thinking. Sure, I'll throw it to your honour, and then you can be swearing, without fear of the confessional, you'll be afther catching it yourself!" He drew his cart nearer, rolled back the sheet of newspaper, in which presumably he wrapped his wares on the rare occasion of a sale, and disclosed to my startled gaze a beautiful fresh-run salmon of apparently some twelve or fourteen pounds' weight. With all her indignation, Mrs Murphy had kept her eye on us through the kitchen window. Her curiosity getting the better of her, she rejoined us, and examined the salmon like an expert. "Lord now, Mickey, where'd you be after getting the fine fish?" she exclaimed. Suddenly an obvious thought seemed to strike her, for she turned a startled gaze on the now smiling Mr Houligan. "God save us, ye great omadhoun, 'tis not meaning ye are to thry and sell the fine gentleman one of his own fish?" |