IN TURKEY AND JAPAN LETTER OP SALOPIENSIS. 131 



linger, and starve to death, instead of putting- them at once out of life, by the 

 easiest method, bears some degree of analogy to the custom of the Turks, in regard 

 to the same animals. At Constantinople, the dogs being considered as impure and 

 useless, are all wild, without masters, neglected, suffered to perish by famine, or 

 prey upon one another. Nevertheless, opulent persons, whose conscience gets the 

 better of their religious prejudices, are often impelled to compassion for these starv- 

 ing' outcasts, and give a meal to all which resort to their neighbourhood. A legacy 

 to these animals, is a common charitable bequest, among the Turks, on their death 

 bed. Some of them even build lying-in Hospitals near their houses, for the 

 accommodation of parturient bitches. The Turkish, like the Egyptian Dogs, have 

 a regular practice, going- their respective rounds like the London beggars, and 

 resisting 1 any intrusion from interlopers. 



Both the late and former Travellers in Japan, represent the dogs so extremely 

 numerous in that Country, that people can scarcely perambulate the streets of their 

 Cities, without the risk of falling over them. Whenever these dogs do any 

 mischief to the inhabitants, no one dares to punish them but the public executioner, 

 and it is said to be even necessary for him, to obtain an order to that end, from 

 a Magistrate. In the time of K&mpfer the traveller, the Japanese Emperor's 

 affection for dogs, not only induced him to provide for their sustenance whilst 

 living, but to decree them a burial and funeral rights, in the usual places on the 

 summits of mountains. This attention of the Monarch to the canine species, was 

 said to arise from a superstitious freak of one of his ancestors, who chanced to be 

 born under the sign of the Japonese Sirius, or Dog Star. A poor fellow whose dog 

 had died, as Mr. Daniel has related from Ktempfer, sweating' under its weight, in 

 climbing the Mountain of Interment, was overheard by his neighbour, to pray 

 very heartily for the Emperor, in the usual mild style of those, who are Em- 

 peror, or Priest-ridden. " Friend," said his neighbour, in the style also of com- 

 forters of a certain description, well known in most countries, " you have reason to 

 thank the Gods, that the ancestor of our Emperor was not born under the constel- 

 lation of the Horse, for in that case, what would have been your load !" 



We have introduced the Dalmatian Dog-, right or wrong, into the class of 

 Hounds, and to revert to their subject, as it regards our own country, we, in the 

 first place, desire to refer our Readers to a former part of this work, where, in the 

 article of feeding Hounds, a letter was quoted from the Sporting Magazine, bear- 

 ing heavily on the character of a Salopian Sportsman. Impartial justice demands 

 of us the acknowledgment, that in the same Magazine for the following- December, 

 a letter appeared, signed ' An Old Sportsman,' totally denying the charges of 

 cruelty and starvation advanced by Salopiensis. Those who feel any interest in 

 the business, will judge between the two Correspondents, and their judgment will 

 be guided more particularly, by the rejoinder, or the silence, of the Accuser. 

 A curious and rather uncommon interruption in the Field, has lately occurred 



