Chapter 20

SPORT IN TURKEY.

I will now endeavour to give my readers some idea of life at Constantinople. If the resident is a sportsman he can find plenty of amusement, game of all descriptions being plentiful. I may say that the shooting begins about September 1, when great flights of quails pass the environs of Constantinople, from the threatening winter of Russia to the warmer climate of Egypt, and afford capital amusement. But really to enjoy the sport it is necessary to go somewhat far, within ten miles of Constantinople. The fields during the quail season are filled with so-called sportsmen to such an extent that one has every chance of being mistaken for a quail, and potted accordingly. I have counted at St. Stephano, a place about nine miles from Stamboul, celebrated for _treaties_ and quails, both in due season, more than five hundred sportsmen accompanied by howling curs of every description. Such a sight is worth looking at, but for sport, well--it is better to leave gun and dogs at home.

I once ventured out among the motley crowd of quail-shooters; there happened to be a flight of quails, so the fire kept up very much resembled a field-day on Southsea Common. I was hit all over with (thank goodness!) very small shot, and made a rapid retreat to save my skin from perforation.

However, going some distance along the coast, away from the enemy, one may at times get capital sport during the months of September and October; for example, a single gun may bag a hundred and fifty to two hundred quails in a day.

After the quail comes the partridge shooting, which is very good, especially in the islands of the Turkish archipelago, where there are great numbers of red-legged partridges affording famous sport.

To properly enjoy the shooting in Turkey a yacht is necessary, as the best of it is to be found in the islands and near to the sea-coast, in places quite inaccessible to roads.

For example, the islands of Mitros, Lemnos, and Mytelene abound in partridges, and the shooting there is really capital.

Either by bringing a yacht from England, or by hiring one at Constantinople, the real sportsman may have great amusement while shooting, with Constantinople as headquarters. He will find in Asia Minor deer of all descriptions, wild boars and wolves. Then he will have capital sport with geese, ducks, woodcocks and partridges, and snipe.

Occasionally he must rough it somewhat while sleeping in villages some little distance from the sea-coast for a night or two, instead of retiring on board his floating home, and on this head I would give a word of advice to the sportsman. Always take up your quarters in a Turkish village, if possible, in preference to a Greek village. At the former you will find the traditional hospitality of the Oriental, even among the very poor people, practised in every sense of the word; whilst in the latter you will be _exploité_ (there is no English word that signifies as well what I mean) to the last degree, even to the pilfering of your cartridges.

I have seen on arriving at a Turkish village every one vie with the other, and doing their very utmost to make the sportsman and his party comfortable. I have seen 'harems,' such as they are, cleaned out and prepared as a sleeping apartment, all the inmates huddling together in some little corner. I have remarked one old woman arrive with a couple of eggs, another with what was perhaps her pet fowl, to be sacrificed at the altar of hospitality--in fact, only one idea seemed to animate them, namely, hospitality, and it is touching to see how they shrink from the proffered reward made by the sportsman on leaving these kind though poor and long-suffering people.

There are different kinds of deer to be found in Asia Minor, which strangely enough imitate the habits of the inhabitants, Greek, Turk, and Armenian, by not herding together.

First, there is the large red deer which generally inhabit the high mountains and are difficult to get, except when the winter snow drives them down into the lower grounds. I have been fortunate enough to kill several of these splendid animals during my sojourn in Turkey. I will give my readers an account of how I shot two of them. One day during the winter, when the mountains were covered with snow, I received news that three deer of the largest description were in a ravine at the foot of a mountain some six hours' distance from Ismidt. I immediately started off in pursuit. I must mention that all persons of high rank in Turkey have, or had at the time I write of, by their shooting firman, the right to call upon the villagers in the neighbourhood in which they are shooting to assist in driving or searching for game. In my case it was not necessary to take advantage of such an offer; every one was on the alert for my arrival. The people told me that that very morning they had seen the noble beasts I was after, grazing outside the wood. So, gathering the villagers, boys carrying horns, men (much against my will) carrying guns, accompanied by every available dog, from the grand shepherd's dog to the yapping cur of the village, off we started.

The ravine was thickly wooded, and extended far up the mountain, where it ended in a bare spot without trees. To this place I went alone, leaving the crowd behind me with directions not to move till I was in my place, which instruction they most strictly followed. After half an hour's walk I arrived at the place I have named. I had hardly time to regain my breath when I heard a row below me as if Bedlam had been let loose. I loaded my gun with buckshot in one barrel and ball in the other, and remained as quiet as a mouse. As the noise of the beaters and dogs approached me, I heard a crash in the bushes within about forty yards of me, and presently a magnificent stag as big as a cow came slowly out of the cover, looking behind him, evidently not expecting an enemy in front. As soon as he was well clear of the bushes, I fired at him with buckshot and killed him dead. I hardly had time to think, when, with a tremendous rush, two other large deer broke out of the wood straight at me at full gallop. I fired a bullet at the foremost one, which turned back into the woods apparently wounded, and so it proved, for it ran among the beaters, evidently having lost its head, and was soon despatched among dogs, men and guns. He was a stag also, and as I claimed to have shot him, I may say that I had the luck to shoot a brace of splendid stags right and left. There is not a sportsman in Europe who would not have been delighted at such a chance of red deer like these; such as are not seen anywhere except in Asia Minor. The largest one had nineteen points to his antlers, weighed when cleaned a hundred and fifteen okes, equal to three hundred and twenty pounds English measure, and certainly was the largest stag I have ever met with, either in Scotland or in Austria. During the sixteen years that I have passed in the East I have only succeeded in killing four of these splendid animals. This I attribute very much to the want of proper deerhounds, which unfortunately I have not been able to procure.

The crowd of beaters make so much noise that the deer slip away at the sides of the thick covers unseen, whereas dogs would drive them more in a straight line towards the shooters if they are properly posted. In addition to this, it is always a great advantage when the hounds give tongue, and so warn the sportsman of the whereabouts of the game. These hounds, called 'colpoys,' can be procured in Roumania and Hungary. There is another description of deer found near the sea-coast in some parts of Asia Minor, which I will describe. It is in fact the pure wild fallow deer that stocks the parks of Europe, and if I am rightly informed is only to be found wild in Asia Minor, and even there it is rare.

I understand that in India or in Africa, where there are hundreds of different sorts of deer, the real fallow is not to be found. While shooting at a place called Camaris, near to Gallipoli, two years since, I discovered several herds of these deer, beautiful creatures, wild as hawks, and accordingly laid myself out to shoot some of them if possible. I tried driving, stalking, and every manoeuvre to circumvent them, without success. At last one day I started with my beaters to a place where there were many tracks of fallow deer. I was posted at a sort of small mountain pen, having on one side of me a young friend of mine, and at the other a native (these fellows won't go out unless they are allowed to carry their guns).

Shortly after the beaters had begun to halloo, a fallow hind glided by between me and my young friend, like a ghost. Not a sound in the wood gave notice of its approach. It was even quieter in its movements than a hare would have been. I put up my gun to fire, but seeing my friend's head right in the way and in a line with its muzzle, I waited a second, but the deer was gone. I had scarcely got over my disappointment when I heard the branches breaking in the wood very near to me, and suddenly a deer sprang right over my head, taking a flying leap, like a hunter would do over a fence.

This unusual action on the part of the deer called for unusual action on my part. As he had taken a flying leap over my head, I took a flying shot at him a second before he landed on the other side of me. The result was that he rolled over like a rabbit, shot _from underneath_ through the heart. This deer proved to be a very fine specimen of the fallow, every point showing him to be of that species, except his antlers, which were quite straight. This I cannot account for; the natives, who had remarked this deer on several occasions feeding with the herd of fallow deer, called it the 'Cassic Boa,' which means 'straight-horned.' Some time after this I had some good sport with the fallow deer. Having got more accustomed to their habits, I found that it was of no use trying to approach them, their scent being too keen, their eyesight too sharp; the only way to get them is by very careful, in fact I may say scientific, driving.

Good boar shooting may be had by going some little distance from Constantinople. It usually is done either by beaters or with boarhounds; but I have had very good sport at boar while hunting for woodcocks and pheasants, in what may be called covert shooting--not exactly English covert shooting, in which almost every tree is known by the keepers, but in coverts of great extent, in which there are almost impassable thickets, made still more impassable by a well-known bramble called the 'wait a bit,' a thing that hooks on to your eyelids as you pass.

There it is that in these coverts spaniels, half-English, half country-bred dogs, do frequently the work of beaters, and it is a strange fact that while piggy starts at once from his lair at the approach of the boarhounds, he will not budge an inch for the little yapping spaniel, whom he treats with contempt.

I have known many instances when, on hearing a jolly row in the covert, I have crawled in on my hands and knees, and found a boar being bayed by my spaniels--in fact, I have killed more pigs in this way than in any other. The danger is that you may have your dogs killed by the boar; this has happened to me on one or two occasions, more especially with young dogs.

I had once a cunning old spaniel dog (poor 'Dick,' well known to most sportsmen out here), who has frequently come out of the wood with his mouth full of pig's hair, he evidently having torn the hair off the animal while laying in his lair. (Dick was never hurt by a pig.) I have often surrounded, with my brother sportsmen and myself, large bushes in which the piggies were securely hidden, driven them out, and shot them as one would do hares or rabbits.

I have heard a good deal of the danger of pig shooting, on account of the savage propensities of the animal; but I have found that, with very rare exceptions, the Anatolian wild boar always runs. It is true that they (she or he, the females are the most savage) have a nasty knack of giving a sort of jerk with their heads, when fighting or even passing an enemy, and that jerk means to a man the ripping up of his leg from his heel to his thigh, to a dog the tearing open of his entrails.

On one occasion I was out cock shooting, when some shepherds' dogs in a valley adjoining that in which I was walking started a large wild boar, a beast they call a '_solitaire_,' from the fact that he is always seen after a certain time of life alone. The animal made for a ridge dividing the valleys; on getting there he passed along the sky-line, about eighty yards from where I was. I changed my cartridges and fired a ball at the pig, who rushed away, apparently unshot; on going to the spot, however, where he had passed when I fired, I found some drops of blood. This blood I traced for about half a mile, till I came to a large clump of bushes into which my spaniels dashed, evidently close to their game. I heard a tremendous row in the bushes, had hardly time to prepare when the great beast with his eyes all bloodshot and foaming at the mouth rushed straight at me. I was on a narrow path, from which there was no escape, as the boar was tearing up it, followed by the dogs. I fired a ball straight in his face, at the distance of about two yards, in spite of which he rushed straight on, knocked me clean over, and while passing me made the usual dangerously effective jerk I have alluded to above, by which he cut my _boot from the ankle to the thigh_, drew a little blood just above and inside of the knee; after which the boar rushed headlong for about thirty yards and dropped dead. I found that my bullet had smashed through his forehead straight between the eyes and gone into his brain.

He was an enormous brute, weighing when cleaned twenty-one stone; carrying the finest tusks I have seen anywhere as belonging to a wild boar. I only had one man with me; we were what may be called eight miles from anywhere. Still I was determined not to leave my prize; so I sent my man for a country waggon, and sitting down on my now harmless beast, smoked cigarettes and waited quietly till the vehicle came.

Now, _apropos_ to wild boar attacking people, I am convinced that this animal had no intention of attacking me.

He was, though badly wounded by the first shot, running from the dogs, and I got in his way. _Voilà tout_! On only one other occasion I nearly came to grief while boar shooting. On my arriving at a Turkish village one night, I was told that there was an enormous boar in the neighbourhood, who for a long time had been the terror of the country, inasmuch as he, accompanied by a large party of the pig tribe, had rooted up the crops all round the village, destroyed gardens, and tradition even said had killed children and eaten them (this latter story I don't take in). However, the poor people prayed me with tears in their eyes to rid them of their enemy, which I promised to do if possible. So the next morning off we started in the following order: first, myself and friends, accompanied by the elders of the village armed with old-fashioned guns; then the young men with knives and big sticks, the women and children bringing up the rear as lookers-on. I and my two friends were escorted into the centre of a large wood, in which very original _seats in trees_ had been knocked up for us. The object of these seats was for our personal safety, but I as a sportsman saw at once that to be up a tree was not only advantageous in that respect, but also that we should be much more invisible, hidden among the branches of a tree, than by being stationed on the ground. So we mounted our trees, and the beaters went into the woods some half a mile from us. I never heard such a row as they made when they began the drive; they beat drums, fired guns, rang bells, and it was evident to me that no wild beast would hold to his lair under such a torrent of abuse. I found the words they were using were curses on the wild boar. I saw two or three fallow deer glide past me, with their usual ghostlike silence, and shortly afterwards the woods very near me seemed to shake with something coming. Suddenly some fifteen to twenty wild boar appeared among the bushes, coming straight towards me. The first of these was an enormous brute, evidently _the_ boar we wanted.

I heard shots on either side of me from my friends, but I kept my eye on the big boar. To my astonishment he came right under the tree where I was sitting, and stopped to listen.

He cocked his head on one side, looked all round him, but forgot to look up the tree he was quite close to, in which was his enemy.

Taking advantage of this I fired a ball and an S.S.G. cartridge into him, before he could make up his mind which way to go; he gave a tremendous grunt and rolled over. I had not time to be overjoyed at my luck before I found myself rolling on the ground alongside of my victim, who, not being dead, was by no means a pleasant companion. The fact is that the seat on which I had been perched, having been very carelessly put up, had given way, and down I came from a height of about twelve feet. The branches of the tree had broken my fall, but my gun had fallen out of my hand and I had sprained my ankle, so that I was in rather an awkward position. The boar was shot through the spine, and could not get along, though he made frantic efforts to get at me.

It was of no use my calling out for help; everybody was calling out, everybody was excited, firing at the lots of pigs that were running about in all directions. At the moment when I began to think affairs somewhat serious (I tried to get up and walk, but could not do so on account of my ankle), as the boar was crawling towards me, looking very mischievous, two great shepherd's dogs arrived on the scene, and went straight in for my enemy. Poor beast! He made a gallant fight; he could hardly move, but he could use his head, and he tore one of the dogs open in a frightful way; then two or three men came up, but they were afraid to go near to the boar. I made them hand me my gun that was lying on the ground near me, with which I soon put a stop to the battle. Then all the people began to muster round their dead enemy, and it was laughable to see and hear how they abused and kicked the body of the pig. How to get the carcass away was the next question. We sent for two waggons and four or five Christians (as the Turks won't touch pig), one to carry me, the others the boar; so, after being placed in the waggons, we made with piggy a triumphant return to the village. Luckily the village was on the sea-shore, and my yacht was lying close to the land, so I got on board comfortably; but it was several days before I could walk.

I believe that that pig was _nasty_, and would have given me the jerk if he could have done so. Five other boar were killed on that occasion, one of my friends killing two; but I had the honour of killing _the_ boar of the period in that part of the world. While referring to that neighbourhood, I would mention that it was within five miles of the place I have been writing about that poor Captain Selby, of H.M.S. 'Rapid,' was killed, some two years since. There are people who think that he was attacked and murdered by robbers. Such is not the case; his death was a most unfortunate occurrence brought on by a misunderstanding.

It is true that the man who shot poor Selby was an ignorant savage, but there was no premeditation. It was a word and a blow. The latter, though inexcusable to the last degree, was given by a ruffian whose class are in the habit of shooting and stabbing one another (let alone strangers, whom they detest) at the slightest provocation. They are not natives of Turkey, but come of strange tribes who live far away and are hired to guard the sheep in the winter months, returning to their homes in the summer. I went myself to the spot where the sad occurrence took place shortly afterwards, and found the people very penitent and very frightened. Let us hope that the punishment awarded to the principal actors in the sad affair will be a salutary warning for the future.

As brigandage may be considered as in some way connected with sporting, inasmuch as many refrain from going out shooting when they fear being robbed and murdered, I will say a few words about brigandage in Anatolia.

I have been for seventeen years an ardent lover of sport in Turkey, and have generally shot in Asia Minor. I have slept in villages that were supposed to be inhabited by brigands. I have been almost alone among an armed crowd of beaters, all of whom had the reputation of being robbers, but I have never been robbed or threatened with robbery. Perhaps there exists a sort of sympathy between brigands and sportsmen, for I cannot call to mind any instance of a sportsman being robbed. It is true that sometimes a fat financier, or rich _rentier_, who may have called himself a sportsman, has been carried off and ransom demanded for him, but a real sportsman never.

It is true that in some of the villages where dwell the peoples of a nation I am not supposed to love, you are liable to and probably will be _exploité_ to a considerable extent in the way of pilfering cartridges, &c., but it is their nature to. So, brother sportsmen, when you come out here take your abode in Turkish villages.