Barton County democrat. [volume] (Great Bend, Kan.) 1885-1915, 1889-10-31
DOGS IN coNsTAkTMoeLe.
Some of the Curiosities OF Everyday Liss
In the Orient.

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Some of the CurIosities OF Everyday LlHe
In the Orient.
Much of the business of Turkey is
done by combination. There are vast
numbers of guilds and trades unions
The different classes of merchants
have their own organizations, and the
porters have aguild, which is ruled
by a head. One of these porter guilds
has a general division daily of the
profits of its members. Each man has
his own stand and whether he has any
thing to do or not he gets his share of
the daily proceeds. If any member of
a guild is guilty of theft or an infrac-
ton of the public peace, I am told that
the head of the guild is. to- certain
extent, responsible for him. and that
the officials go to the head and force
him to make the wrong matter right.
Even the dogs of Constantinople
seem to have guilds, and the dogs of
this great city are one of the curiosi-
ties of the Orient. You find them by
the dozens on every block. and each
set of dogs has its own quarter When
stray dog from a neighboring street
gets outside of his domain. the dogs
who belong to that territory pounce
upon him and drive him out. They
know their own fellows. and they be-
lieve in close communion. The Con-
stantinople dog is of the yellow mon
grel variety, and the traveller who
visits COnstanstantinople and does not
belongs to the city. and he has no in
dividual home. The Turks never
think of letting the dogs come into
their houses. They consider them un-
clean animals. and though CONSTANT
nople has thousands of dogs no
man in Constantinople owns a dog.
They live upon the streets and they
sleep day and night in the most
thronged of the highways. They never
think of turning out for foot-passen-
gers. and from the number of three
legged dogs have seen many of them
must be cut up by the carriages. They
are of a harmless variety. and they
lack spirit, save when an outside dog
enters their precinct. They are the
LATEST animals on the face of the
earth. and Mark Twain. in speaking
of them. says he knew he was lazy I'M
til he met a Constantinople dog. and
then he felt that he was stean-engiue
in trousers compared to them. These
dogs are the scavengers of CONSTANT
nople. They eat every thing from a
COW horn to a cabbage, and from po-
tato skins to roast beef. They carry
on all the avocations of dog life on the
crowded thOroughfare. and common
sight is the mother sucking her pups.
They were originally of the long-tailed
variety, but many of their tails have
been shorn off by carriage-wheels. and
not a few Of them have skins battered
up like the face of prize-fghter after
mill. l have never heard one bark
in the daytime, but they make the
night hideous; and the first sound l
heard coming into Constantinople was
chorus of these yellow dogs on the
borders of Pera- There are no dog
laws here. and the dog pound is I'M
known. None of these dogs pay Ii
censes, and the mad dog is almost en-
tirely unknown in Turkey. 1t may be
that hydrophobia comes from over
feeding, but no one could call the Con-
stantinople dog overfed. The dog
whose ribs can not be counted is the
exception, and these dogs probably
weigh less per piece in proportion to
height and length than any other dogs
in the world Frank G. Carpenter, in
National Tribune.