The traces of these nocturnal combats are plainly discernible the next morning. There is not a whole skin in the entire canine legion; some have lost eyes, others ears, some a collop of the little flesh that remains on their unfortunate bones, and all bear the scars of desperate conflicts. They keep an active look-out for dead horses and camels, and are even said to devour their defunct comrades; but there is no authenticated account of their making a meal of a human being, although a story is current in Galata of their having one night torn down a tipsy English sailor, and left nothing but his bones to tell the tale in the morning. Drunkards, however, must expect to go to the dogs. Mr Smith kept sober, and carried a lantern. Solely to these two precautions, perhaps, are we to-day indebted for the pleasure of reading his book, instead of mourning his interment in the ravenous stomachs of Mahomedan mongrels.
It can hardly have escaped the observation of any one who has travelled at all, that the presence of even a very few English settlers in a town or district, speedily entails the establishment of "the English shop." The keeper of this is not necessarily an Englishman; he may be of any nation--Pole, Jew, Frenchman, German; the essential is, that he should have a smattering of English and a trader's knowledge of the heterogeneous articles which, in foreign estimation, are indispensable to the existence of Englishmen. Foremost amongst these are beer and pickles, mustard and cayenne, Warren's blacking and Windsor soap, the pills of Professor Holloway, the kalydor of the world-renowned Rowland. Thanks to the extraordinary power of puffing, we dare to say that the paletot of Sheriff Nicoll by this time finds its nook in "the English shop." The growth of these philanthropical depots for the consolation of exiled Britons is often miraculously mushroom-like. Land an English regiment to occupy a menaced point on some distant foreign shore, and within the week "the shop" appears, though it be but a booth with a hamper of porter and a dozen pickle pots for sole stock in trade. In Constantinople, where English abound, either as residents or birds of passage, Stampa is a celebrity. The admirable establishment of Galignani is not more famed for books and newspapers--and especially for that far-famed _Messenger_, which reaches to the uttermost ends of the earth--than is the shop of Stampa as a rendezvous and receptacle for men and things English. There you may buy everything, from a Stilton to a cake of soap, from a solar lamp to a steel pen; and there obtain all manner of information, from the address of a Galata[4] merchant to the sailing hour of a steamer. Nay, should you be weary of kebobs and craving for a beefsteak, Stampa will provide it you. He did so at least for Mr Smith; but perhaps that gentleman was a favoured customer, as he seems indeed to have found means of rendering himself at more than one place during his ramble.