Page:Travels & discoveries in the Levant (1865) Vol. 1.djvu/290

240 shoot them as Gordon Gumming did his lions, while they are drinking at a brook.

, August 24, 1803. time ago an Ionian at Cos having been maltreated by some sailors of a Turkish brig of war, applied to me for redress. The assault was an aggravated one; for one of the officers in command of the brig, on being appealed to, told the Ionian that he had better be quiet, or that on some future occasion the sailors might take his life. I sent a statement of the case to the Cairaacam of Cos, to which I got no answer. In the mean time H.M.S. "Sampson," commanded by Captain Lewis Jones, happened very conveniently to look in at Rhodes on her way up from Syria, and I was thus enabled to pay a visit to Cos unannounced. Great was the surprise and dismay of the Turkish officials at Cos at my sudden apparition in an English war steamer, for the Caimacam had purposely delayed answering my complaint till the Turkish brig whose sailors were accused had sailed for Samos; and she was actually getting under weigh at the very moment when we came in.

The case of the Ionian was examined before the Mejlis in the presence of Captain Jones and myself. My client's evidence was somewhat slender,