96 DINNER. — RETURN TO CORFU. 



willingly are we obliged, after in vain waiting in 

 the hope that he may yet appear, to console our- 

 selves with our Irish stew ; occasionally, however, 

 mistaking the howls of the jackals which we hear 

 as we pull along the shore, for the cries of our 

 lost dog. We attack our stew — such a stew ! 

 Whether it be from the length of time it has been 

 stewing over a slow fire, or from the experience 

 of the coxswain in the exact proportion of each 

 ingredient, together with the infallible seasoning 

 of a good appetite which the day's exercise has 

 procured for each of us, I really cannot say ; but 

 on all these occasions, the stew is unanimously 

 declared to be the very best we have ever tasted. 

 After quickly changing our wet clothes, and 

 putting on pea-jackets and cloaks, we demolish 

 a considerable portion of the said stew, and 

 having emptied several bottles of London porter, 

 we stretch ourselves along the thwarts or in the 

 bottom of the boats, and forget or doze away the 

 fatigues of the delightful day, until reminded by 

 the challenge of the sentry to the boat entering 

 the Ditch of Corfu, or the report of the evening 

 gun as at eight o'clock we pass the citadel, that 

 more than two hours have elapsed since we left 



