Chapter VIII: Part 8

We left Ano-Phanari about ten o’clock and descended westward, out of sight of the sea, into a small trough-like plain or valley surrounded on all sides by rocky and barren mountains. Passing some insignificant ruins in the little plain, we ascended the mountains northward by a steep rocky path that led into a narrow upland valley running north and south and enclosed by hills, the sides of which were shaggy with bushes of various sorts. This dale we traversed from end to end. Through a narrow opening or gorge in the mountains on its eastern side we obtained a striking glimpse of part of the promontory of Methana, mostly in shadow, but with gleams of sunshine resting on it here and there. At the northern end of the valley, ascending a ridge, we saw stretched out below us at some depth a wide open valley of roughly circular shape. Our path, which was again very rugged, did not descend into the valley, but skirted its eastern side, keeping up on the mountain, till it turned eastward through a gap in the hills. On passing through the gap a view of the sea with all its coasts and islands shining in the sun (for after a dull morning the day had brightened) suddenly burst upon us. Salamis was conspicuous to the north, and to the east of it appeared Mount Pentelicus with the marble quarries visible even at that distance as white patches on its side. Far below us lay Epidaurus, its little peninsula stretching out into the blue bay. We were at a great height above the sea, but now gradually descended to it in the direction of Epidaurus by a steep rugged path running obliquely down the bushy side of the mountain. Thus we came at last into a little maritime plain, traversed it from south to north, and passing some lemon-groves reached the modern village of Palaea Epidauros or Old Epidaurus about half-past two.

The village stands on the shore at the head of a deep narrow sheltered inlet formed by the peninsula of ancient Epidaurus on the south and a higher promontory, wooded with low green pines, on the north. Beside the village a little headland runs out into the water; it is crowned with a white-washed chapel of St. Nicholas, which stands in a large walled enclosure with two cypress-trees growing in front of it. The church seems to occupy the site of the sanctuary of Hera mentioned by Pausanias.

XXXI. METHANA.—Methana is still the name of the mountainous peninsula which runs far out into the sea from the coast of Troezen, forming a very conspicuous landmark in the Saronic Gulf. The isthmus which joins it to the mainland, about a thousand feet wide, was fortified in the Peloponnesian war by the Athenians, who established a fortified post on the peninsula, whence they ravaged the coasts of Troezen and Epidaurus. Remains of the wall across the isthmus may still be seen with the two castles on the opposite shores. These fortifications were renewed in the Middle Ages; and the Greeks attempted to make use of them in the War of Independence. The peninsula itself is a mountainous mass of grand and picturesque outline. In the heart of it the chief peak, the conical Mount Chelona, rises to a height of between two and three thousand feet. Most of the peninsula is of volcanic origin, the prevailing rock being a dark red or brown trachyte. The general character of the scenery is one of barren desolation, the whole region, with the exception of a few narrow strips on the coast, being occupied by the sharp mountain-ridges which radiate from Mount Chelona. Narrow gullies divide these ridges from each other. Water is scarce, and the air dry and hot. The inhabitants, however, contrive to cultivate patches of ground, supported by terraces, high up on the mountain sides. The contrast is great between this desolate and arid mountain-mass, and the rich and well-watered plain of Troezen which adjoins it on the south.

XXXII. NAUPLIA.—Nauplia, now a busy flourishing seaport, and one of the chief towns of Greece, occupies the northern side of a rocky peninsula which juts out westward into the Argolic Gulf, near the head of the gulf and on its eastern side. The northern side of the peninsula is flat, and here the narrow and not too savoury streets of Nauplia are crowded together. Thus the town looks across the harbour to the Argolic plain and has no sea-view. The southern side of the peninsula, at the back of the town, is a long and lofty rock called Itsh-Kaleh, which seems to have been the original citadel of Nauplia; for ancient walls, built in the polygonal style, may be seen in places serving as foundations for the mediaeval and modern fortifications. Other remains of antiquity exist in the shape of rock-cuttings, staircases, cisterns, and so forth. The steep southern slope of the rock is thickly overgrown with cactus. On the northern side of the peninsula, between it and the shore of the Argolic plain, stretches the harbour which gives Nauplia its commercial importance. Though spacious, it is very shallow; large steamers have to anchor far out.

An isthmus connects the peninsula with the mainland. Immediately on the landward, that is, eastern side of the isthmus, the massive and imposing rock of Palamidi, one of the strongest fortresses in Greece, towers up abruptly to a height of over seven hundred feet. The fortifications which crown its summit were built by the Venetians and Turks; they now serve as a prison. In their walls, as well as in the walls of Itsh-Kaleh, are built many Venetian inscriptions, some of them bearing the lion of St. Mark. Three sides of the mighty rock are precipitous, but on the south-eastern side it is accessible, being joined by a ridge to the hills. The ascent from Nauplia is by a long staircase at the north-western corner of the fortress; it begins close to the gate of the town. The name Palamidi is derived from Palamedes, the son of Nauplius. Palamedium was probably the ancient name of the fortress, though no classical writer mentions it. The prospect from the summit over the gulf and plain of Argos, with the background of mountains encircling the plain, is very fine. Nor is the view from the quay of Nauplia across the bay to the mountains of Argolis one to be easily forgotten, especially if seen by moonlight, when the sea is calm, the stars are shining, and the tall yard-arms of the lateen-rigged craft stand out like black wings against the sky, now blotting out and now disclosing a star as the boats heave on the gentle swell.

XXXIII. THE SPRINGS OF THE ERASINUS.—From Argos the road to Tegea goes south-west. At first it skirts the foot of the steep Larisa, and then runs through the southern part of the Argolic plain. On the right rise the mountains, of no great height, which bound the plain on the west. About three miles from Argos we quit the highway and strike westward towards the hills through a beautiful avenue of fine silver poplars, plane-trees, and oleanders. It soon brings us to the springs.

The spot is very picturesque. A rugged mountain here descends in precipices of yellowish limestone to the plain, and at its foot a body of clear sparkling water comes rushing impetuously in several streams from the rocks, partly issuing from a low cavern, partly welling up from the ground. Under the rocks the water forms a pellucid but shallow pool, where water-plants of a vivid green grow thickly; then flowing through the arches of a wall, which partially dams up the pool, it is diverted into several channels shaded by tall poplars, willows, and mulberries, and so turns in a short space a dozen mills—the Mills of Argos, as they are called. After watering the rice-fields, the channels unite once more into a river, which finds its way into the sea through swampy ground, among thick tangled beds of reeds and sedge, some three miles only from its source at the foot of the hills. This river, the modern Kephalari, is the Erasinus (‘the lovely river’) of antiquity. It is the only river of the Argolic plain which flows summer and winter alike; and the opinion both of the ancient and the modern Greeks that it is an outlet of the Stymphalian lake in Arcadia appears to be well founded.

In the face of the limestone cliff, a few feet above the springs of the river, are the mouths of two caves. A staircase leads up to them. Passing through the mouth of the larger we find ourselves in a lofty dimly-lighted cavern with an arched roof, like a Gothic cathedral, which extends into the mountain for a distance of two hundred feet or more. Water drips from the roof, forming long stalactites. Some light penetrates into the cave from its narrow mouth, but even at high noon it is but a dim twilight. Bats, the natural inhabitants of the gloomy cavern, whir past our heads, as if resenting the intrusion. Several branches open off the main cave. The longest of them, opening to the left, communicates at its inmost end with the upper air by means of a windowlike aperture. In another branch, also to the left, there is a low, narrow, pitch-dark opening, which, if explored with a light, reveals at its far end a crevice descending apparently into the bowels of the mountain. The smaller of the two caves, to the north, is walled off and forms a chapel of the Panagia Kephalariotissa. The worship of Pan, which Pausanias mentions, may have been held in this or the neighbouring cavern; for Pan, the shepherd’s god, loved to haunt caves, and in these two caves shepherds with their flocks still seek shelter from rain and storm. The chapel of the Panagia, in which there are some ancient blocks, may very well have succeeded to a shrine of Pan, or perhaps of Dionysus, who was also worshipped here. A festival is still held annually on the spot on the eighteenth of April; it may be nothing but a continuation, in a changed form, of the festival of Dionysus called Tyrbe, which Pausanias mentions.

In summer the place is now a favourite resort of holiday-makers from Argos, who take their pleasure in a white-washed summer-house or covered shed at the mouth of the cave. The whole scene—the rocky precipices, the shady caverns, the crystal stream, the tranquil pool, the verdure and shade of the trees—is at once so beautiful and agreeable, that if it had been near Athens it would probably have been renowned in song and legend. But Argos had no Sophocles to sing its praises in immortal verse.

XXXIV. THE LERNEAN MARSH.—Mount Pontinus, which rises above the village of Lerna, is a hill of no great height, but of broad massive outline. On its crest are seen from below against the sky the walls and towers of a mediaeval castle crowning the summit. The slope of the hill towards Lerna is on the whole even and uniform and tufted with low plants, but toward the south-east it is broken by some high lines of rocks. The carriage road from Argos skirts the foot of the hill and traverses the village. Beside the road rise the springs both of the Pontinus brook and the Amymone; and between the road and the sea is the Lernean marsh. In approaching Lerna from Argos and entering the pass between Mount Pontinus and the sea we first come to the rush-fringed spring of the Pontinus on the left side of the road. The stream is a mere brook of clear water bordered by rushes and tall grasses and almost choked with green water-plants. A great part of the water is diverted at the spring to turn a mill which stands on the shore. The whole course of the brook from its source to the sea is only a few hundred yards.

After passing the source of the Pontinus and traversing in a few minutes the village of Lerna we come to the springs of the Amymone, which rise beside the road at the southern end of the village, a few yards to the north of a white-washed chapel of St. John. The springs are copious and issue from under rocks, forming at once a shallow pool of beautifully clear water, from which the stream flows towards the sea in a bed fringed with reeds. Great beds of reeds, marking the site of the Lernean marsh, grow also beside the pool and in the narrow stretch of flat swampy ground between it and the sea. A fig-tree has rooted itself among the rocks from which the springs flow, and a few yards farther off are a mulberry-tree and a silver poplar.

Some eighty yards or so to the north-east of the springs but completely hidden by a screen of trees is the Alcyonian Lake described by Pausanias. It is a pool of still, dark, glassy water surrounded by great reeds and grasses and tall white poplars with silvery stems. Though distant only about thirty yards from the highroad and the village, the spot is as wild and lonely as if it lay in the depths of some pathless forest of the New World. I sought it for some time in vain, and when at last I came upon it, in the waning light of a winter afternoon, everything seemed to enhance the natural horror of the scene. The sky was dark save for one gleam of sunlit cloud which was reflected in the black water of the pool. The wind sighed among the reeds and rustled the thin leaves of the poplars. Altogether I could well imagine that superstitions might gather about this lonely pool in the marsh. Of such a spot in England tales of unhappy love, of murder and suicide, would be told. To the Greeks of old it seemed one of the ways to hell. The man who drove me from Argos said, like Pausanias, that the pool had never been fathomed and was bottomless.

XXXV. THE ANIGRAEAN ROAD.—South of Lerna the road skirts the shore for some distance. Leaving the village of Kiveri the path runs along the slope of Mount Zavitza, which falls steeply to the sea on the left. This is the district called Anigraea by Pausanias. The road is still, as it was in his days, very rugged and bad. Now and then we come to a little cove with a beach at the mouth of a narrow glen which cleaves the mountain-side; elsewhere the sea is bordered throughout by sheer cliffs, above which the path scrambles up hill and down dale. The sides of the mountains are chiefly clothed with lentisks and wild olives, with a patch of corn-field here and there. In about two hours and a half from Kiveri the path arrives opposite the Anavolo, the ancient Dine. It is an abundant source of fresh water rising in the sea, about a quarter of a mile from the narrow beach under the cliffs. The body of fresh water appears to be fully fifty feet in diameter. In calm weather it may be seen rising with such force as to form a convex surface, disturbing the sea for several hundred feet around. It is clearly the exit of a subterraneous river of some magnitude, and thus corresponds with the Dine of Pausanias. After clambering along the Anigraea for nearly three hours, we find that the mountain abruptly ceases, and the maritime plain of Thyrea stretches out before us to the south. This is what Pausanias describes as “a tract of country on the left, reaching down to the sea, where trees, especially olives, thrive well.” The plain is about five miles long, but nowhere more than half that in breadth; its soil is a rich loam; corn-fields and olive-groves cover its surface.

XXXVI. THE BATTLEFIELD OF SELLASIA.—At the present day the track from Arachova to Sparta follows the bed of the Kelephina river (the ancient Oenus) for some seven or eight miles. Path there is none. You ride in the stony bed of the river, crossing its scanty water backwards and forwards again and again. The scenery is picturesque, the river winding between high banks, which are generally green with shrubs and trees. Indeed many trees grow in the very bed of the stream, and the traveller in riding has sometimes to be careful not to be knocked off by their boughs. In front of us, as the valley widens, we get glimpses of the high, blue, snowy range of Taygetus. The point at which, quitting the bed of the stream, we ascend its western bank, and the whole magnificent range of Taygetus appears in full view across the valley of the Eurotas, was the scene of the battle of Sellasia.

XXXVII. SPARTA.—Ancient Sparta stood upon a broad stretch of fairly level ground, broken by a few low eminences, on the right bank of the Eurotas, where the river makes a bend to the south-east. Thus the city was bounded on the north and east by the wide gravelly bed of the river. Approaching from the north by the highroad from Tegea you cross the river by a new iron bridge, then traversing a flat strip of ground ascend through a hollow between two of the low eminences or hills which were included within the circuit of ancient Sparta. Leaving these eminences on the right and left you emerge to the south upon a level stretch of cornland, with olive-trees thickly dotted over it. When I saw it the wheat was breast high, and its waving surface, dappled with the shadows of multitudinous olive-trees, presented a rich and park-like aspect. This plain is about half a mile across; on the south it is terminated by the low broad-backed ridge, running east and west, on which stands the town of New Sparta.

This new town, which has sprung up since the War of Independence, is charming. The streets, crossing each other at right angles, are broad and pleasant. Many of the houses are surrounded by gardens, and the soft verdure of the trees peeping over the low walls is grateful and refreshing to the eyes. The gardens abound with orange-trees, which, when laden with fruit, remind one of the gardens of the Hesperides. In spring the air, even in the streets, is heavy with rich perfumes. On the south the town is bounded by the river of Magoula, which here flows from west to east, to fall into the Eurotas a little below the town, opposite the steep heights of Therapnae. Westward the plain extends three or four miles to the foot of the magnificent range of Taygetus, which rises abruptly with steep rocky sides to the height of nearly eight thousand feet. A conspicuous landmark to the west, viewed from Sparta, is the sharp conical hill of Mistra, leaning upon, but still sharply defined against, the Taygetus range. Though really a mountain over two thousand feet high, it is completely dwarfed by the immense wall of Taygetus rising at its back.

The country between Sparta and Taygetus offers points of the most picturesque beauty, especially if, instead of following the highroad, which is rather tame, you strike straight across for Mistra from the ruined theatre of Old Sparta. It was a bright evening in spring or early summer (towards the end of April, but summer is earlier in Greece than in England) when I took this walk, and the impression it made on me was ineffaceable. The orange-groves, the gardens fresh and green on all sides, men taking their ease in the warm evening air at a picturesque tavern under a great spreading tree, children playing in the green lanes, a group of Spartan maidens filling their pitchers at a spring that gurgled from a grey time-worn wall, a river (the Magoula) spanned by a quaint old bridge and winding through groves of orange-trees spangled with golden fruit, and towering above all the stupendous snow-clad range of Taygetus in the west, with the sunset sky above it—all this made up a picture or rather a succession of pictures, of which it is impossible to convey in words the effect. It was a dream of Arcadia, the Arcadia of poets, and of painters like the Poussins.

In this union of luxuriant verdure with grand mountain scenery the valley of Sparta recalls the more famed but not more beautiful Granada with its green spreading Vega, its lilac-tinted mountains basking under the bright sky of Spain, and the snowy range of the Sierra Nevada lying like a great white cloud on the southern horizon. But Taygetus towers above the spectator at Sparta as the Sierra Nevada certainly does not over the spectator at Granada. To see it on a bright day with all its superb outline—its sharp peaks and grand sweeping curves—clearly defined in the pellucid air, its long line of snowy summits glistering in the sun, and the deep purple shadows brooding on its lower slopes, is a sight not to be forgotten. A recent explorer of Greece has observed that of all Greek cities Sparta enjoys the most beautiful situation. So far as my experience goes, the observation is just.

XXXVIII. MISTRA.—The scenery of the district at the eastern foot of Mount Taygetus, to which Pausanias here conducts us, is well described by Vischer as follows: “ While in Therapne, Amyclae, and the round buildings of Vaphio and Marmalia we met with vestiges of a very ancient civilisation which flourished in the plain of the Eurotas before the Dorian invasion; on the other hand when we reach the first line of the rocky heights of Taygetus, we find ourselves in the Middle Ages—in the days of the Franks and the Byzantines. The first stage of Taygetus rises abruptly from the plain in bold cliffs broken by many gullies, from which the mountain torrents issue. Crowning with its picturesque ruins the summit of one of these heights, an hour’s ride to the west of Sparta, is the fortress of Mistra, built by William de Villehardouin in the middle of the thirteenth century. Below the castle, on the mountain-side, is spread the extensive town, once a place of much more importance, now half in ruins, with its numerous churches and monasteries falling into decay. Yet for the traveller, in spite of its decay, Mistra must remain in virtue of its situation one of the most enchanting spots which he can find in Greece or anywhere; and the prospect from the castle height, on the one side over the whole plain, on the other side up to the snowy peaks of Taygetus, across the fruitful levels and wooded slopes of the first step in the mountain staircase, needs only a view of the sea to be second to none.

“ The whole neighbourhood, too, is one of indescribable beauty. The way from New Sparta by the village of Magoula, which lies scattered among fruit-trees of every sort, is delightful enough. It passes through a plain watered by fresh brooks, where the drooping branches of the olive-trees and fig-trees often literally bar the way, and in riding one has to take heed not to be hung by the head among the boughs. But all this is almost forgotten when we ride from Mistra by Parori and Hagiannis along the foot of the mountains to Sklavochori. On this ride all the beauties of the Eurotas valley are crowded together; for here we have wild magnificence combined with the luxuriant loveliness of a rich southern vegetation. Parori, which lies close to Mistra and was formerly a suburb of it, is at the mouth of a dark and deep gorge, from which a stream comes brawling. This gorge is pointed out to travellers as the Caeadas, the gully into which the Spartans used to throw prisoners of war and afterwards malefactors; and certainly the Caeadas, as well as the Apothetae, where weakly children were exposed, is to be sought in one of the ravines of Mount Taygetus, of which hardly any appears so stern and awful as the one at Parori. At the mouth of the gorge, just above the village, there is a very lovely spot. From a Turkish fountain there pours a copious stream of water, which trickles through creeping plants of all sorts into a large basin, and before it stand some fine plane-trees.

“Farther on, the way winds through wood and thicket, where fruit-trees alternate with tall oaks, elms, and plane-trees, to the village of Hagiannis, hidden among groves of oranges, lemons, fig-trees, and olives. Amongst the woods dark cypresses rise singly like columns; many Judas-trees stood in full blossom, forming with their rosy red a pleasant contrast to the various shades of green, while the oleanders, growing as high as trees beside every rill, had not yet unfolded their buds. Wild vines climb to the very topmost boughs, and many other creepers, such as ivy, bindweed, and clematis, often weave trees and shrubs into an impenetrable thicket. In wealth of vegetation this district is unsurpassed in Greece, and no one who has set foot on Greek soil should fail to visit it. Yet it often happens that travellers, satisfied with having visited Sparta, turn back from it immediately, and then, full of the impressions left on them by the plains of Tripolitza, of Argolis, and of the neighbourhood of Athens, complain that there are no trees in Greece.”

The present writer, though he was not farther south than Parori, can confirm the general accuracy of this description. The view of the beautiful valley of Sparta from the steep hill of Mistra, crowded with monuments of the Middle Ages, and dominated by the towering mass of Mount Taygetus, which rises like a wall behind it, combines almost every element of natural beauty and historical association. Immediately below the Frankish castle, which crowns the summit of the hill, are the ruins of a spacious Byzantine palace, once the residence of the governor of the Morea, who ranked next after the emperor. Its great hall opened on the palace garden, from the terrace of which the wonderful view is to be had over the valley. Again, the fountain, described by Vischer, at the mouth of the tremendous gorge, is a scene not to be forgotten. The water gushes from many mouths in the face of a wall built against the rock. A stone seat encircles the trunk of the great spreading plane-tree which fronts the fountain. All this, with the gloomy gorge behind, makes up a picture such as is oftener seen in dreams than in reality. Once more, the village of Trypi, situated a little to the north of Mistra, at the entrance of the famed Langada pass over Mount Taygetus, is one of idyllic beauty. It is embowered among woods and orchards on the mountain-side; and entering it from the south you pass the mouth of a narrow glen carpeted with ferns and overarched with trees.

XXXIX. ON THE ROAD FROM SPARTA TO ARCADIA.—Pausanias now returns from Mount Taygetus to Sparta and sets off northward by the road which led to Megalopolis in Arcadia. As far as the Arcadian frontier the track follows the valley of the Eurotas, keeping on the right or west bank of the river and generally running close to the stream, the banks of which are fringed with oleanders, fig-trees, and planes. For the first three miles the valley is open and possesses that combination of charms which renders the vale of Sparta the most beautiful region of Greece. The river flows on the whole at the foot of the somewhat bare hills which rise on the eastern side of the valley, dipping their rocky declivities in many places in its water. But on the other side low rolling hills, covered with excellent soil and intersected by streams, stretch away to where the long range of Taygetus stands up against the western sky, its majestic snowy peaks contrasting finely with the dark woods of its lower slopes and the luxuriant vegetation of the valley. In this open part of the valley must have lain all the places and objects mentioned by Pausanias between Sparta and the image of Modesty; but no one has yet ventured to identify them. About three miles from Sparta the valley contracts and the scenery changes. We are no longer in a great open valley covered with luxuriant vegetation and enclosed by grand mountains. It is a narrow dale through which we are passing, hemmed in by low hills, at the foot of which the river flows between banks thickly wooded with willows, poplars, oleanders, and plane-trees. Well-tilled fields lie on the gentle lower slopes of the hills and occupy the stretches of flat land where the hills retire from the river. The bare upper declivities are dotted here and there with a few olives.

XL. CAPE MALEA.—The sides of Cape Malea, the south-eastern extremity of the Greek mainland and of Europe, are formed by dizzy crags, about a thousand feet high, of dark bare rock, seamed and scarred in places by cracks and fissures. At the extreme end of the cape there is a great natural recess in the cliff; and here in the face of the bluff, about two hundred and fifty feet above the sea, there is a tiny terrace sloping to the perpendicular edge of the precipice. Two chapels are built on the terrace, and close by, partly hewn in the rock, is the cell of a half-naked and nearly savage hermit. From the terrace you may clamber down, at the risk of your neck, to a cave opening on the foam of the great rollers which break here eternally. In the inmost corner of the cave is a heap of human bones. The sense of utter solitude and isolation from the world which the spot is fitted to evoke in the mind is broken by the sight of passing vessels. In fair weather steamers of all nations pass continually; and small Greek sailing-boats, with their reddish-brown or white lateen sails, skim along close under the cliffs. But the cape has a bad name for storms and heavy surf; at times even large steamers are unable to weather it for a week together. There was an ancient proverb, “When you have rounded Malea, forget your home.”

XLI. MONEMVASIA.—The ancient Minoa[8] is now Monemvasia, an island about half a mile long, close to the shore, with which it is connected by a long old stone bridge. The island is a lofty precipitous rock, resembling Gibraltar, or the Bass Rock and Dumbarton Rock in Scotland. The summit, crowned by the ruins of a mediaeval fortress and a mass of tumble-down roofless churches and houses overgrown with weeds, is now only a sheepwalk. From the summit the rock falls away in sheer and lofty precipices, especially on the north. The modern town lies huddled up at the foot of the cliffs on the southern side. Strong walls encircle it, which are connected with the ruined fortress on the top of the rock. Within the walls everything is fast falling to decay. Fine churches, high archways, great private houses, all deserted and in ruins, testify to the former prosperity and the present decline of the town. Trade has quite deserted it; the coasting steamers call only at rare intervals. From the town a zigzag path leads up the face of the rock to the old citadel on the summit.

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Footnote 8:

The reference is to Minoa on the eastern coast of Laconia, not to the
better known but less picturesque Minoa near Megara.

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In the Middle Ages Monemvasia was one of the chief places of the Levantine trade and one of the strongest fortresses in the Morea. It gave its name to Malmsey wine, which was grown in the Cyclades, especially Tenos, but was called after the port whence it was shipped to the west.

XLII. MAINA.—The great central peninsula of southern Greece, which Pausanias describes in detail, has been known since the Middle Ages by the name of Maina or Mani. The backbone of the peninsula is the great range of Taygetus, which runs south till it terminates in Taenarum, the modern Cape Matapan, the southern extremity of Greece. The scenery of the peninsula is wild and savage; the villages, hedged in by impenetrable thickets of cactus, cling like eagles’ eyries to the faces of apparently inaccessible cliffs, and are reached by stony and exceedingly toilsome footpaths—the only semblance of roads in these secluded highlands. Almost everywhere the surface is nothing but the naked rock. Wood there is none, but a few bushes and here and there some tufts of grass have rooted themselves in the crevices of the rocks, and furnish a scanty pasture to the sheep and goats. The miserable stony soil, wherever it exists, is carefully husbanded by means of terraces, and under the soft southern sky of Laconia yields a tolerable return. There are no springs or brooks; water is obtained only from cisterns, which are kept closed by their owners, and leave to draw from them has to be paid for.

The inhabitants, the Mainotes, Mainiotes, or Maniates, are a hardy and warlike race of mountaineers, who claim to be descended from the ancient Spartans. In the fastnesses of their rugged mountains they are said to have retained their primitive heathenism till the latter half of the ninth century; and the Turks never succeeded in subjugating them. As pirates they were greatly dreaded. They are still notorious for the relentless ferocity of their blood-feuds, which are so common that every family of importance has a tower in which to take refuge from the avengers of blood. In these towers persons implicated in a blood-feud have been known to live for many years without ever coming out. To this day many heads of families dare not quit their shelter except under a strong guard of armed retainers. A village will contain twenty to thirty of such strongholds. Each tower is surrounded by a few low huts, which serve as workshops and as the lodgings of the subordinate members of the household. Frequently tower and huts together are enclosed within a fortification wall strengthened with turrets and loopholed. Bitter feuds often rage between the towers of the same village.

XLIII. PHARAE AND THE MESSENIAN PLAIN.—The ancient Pharae, or Pherae, probably occupied the site of the modern Kalamata, an industrial town situated on the left bank of the broad stony bed of the Nedon, a mile from the sea. Telemachus, in search of his father, lodged for the night at Pharae on his way from Pylus to Sparta, and again on his return. It is a long day’s ride from Sparta to Kalamata, by the magnificent Langada pass over Mount Taygetus. Pausanias does not mention the name of the river on which Pharae stood, but from Strabo we learn that it was the Nedon. It is a torrent which issues from a rocky gorge in Mount Taygetus, about a mile to the north-east of a steep hill that rises at the back of the town. This hill is crowned with a mediaeval castle, built or occupied successively by Franks, Venetians, and Turks. The presence of ancient hewn stones in the walls, as well as the whole arrangement of the fortress, seem to show that a castle stood here in antiquity also. There are no other relics of antiquity in Kalamata.

The town, with its narrow winding streets and lively bazaar, lies in the great Messenian plain, near its south-eastern extremity. This plain, open to the south and sheltered from the north by mountains, is the warmest part of Greece, and on account of its wonderful fertility was known to the ancients as Makaria or the Happy Land. Its natural wealth and delightful climate were celebrated by Euripides in a lost play, of which some lines have been preserved by Strabo. Here at the present day groves of oranges, lemons, fig-trees, olives, and vineyards succeed each other, all fenced by gigantic hedges of prickly and fantastically-shaped cactuses and sword-like aloes, which, with the hot air, remind a traveller from northern Europe that he is in a sub-tropical climate.

XLIV. MESSENE.—From Kalamata, the probable site of the ancient Pharae, the road to Messene runs north-west across the fertile Messenian plain between hedges of huge fantastically-shaped cactuses and groves of fig-trees, olives, and vines. In front of us loom nearer and nearer the twin peaks of Ithome and Eva rising boldly and abruptly from a single base on the western side of the plain, and forming the natural citadel, as it were, of the whole country. As we near their base we quit the dusty highway and strike westward up the mountain-side by devious and rocky paths. This brings us in time to the monastery of Vourkano, where visitors to Messene generally spend the night.

The monastery is beautifully situated on the eastern slope of the mountain, about a quarter of an hour’s walk below the saddle which unites the twin peaks. The buildings, arranged in the form of a quadrangle round a little church, stand on a fine open terrace among cypresses, oaks, and wild olives, commanding an unimpeded view over the Messenian plain southward to the shining waters of the gulf and northward to where the plain ends at the foot of the hills. Ithome and its sister peak rise from the plain about midway between these northern hills and the gulf. Mount Eva, the lower of the two peaks, lies to the south or south-east of Ithome, with which it is connected by a ridge or saddle about half-way up the two mountains. The eastern wall of Messene stood and still stands in ruins on this saddle. The city itself lay on the western side, in the cup formed by the converging slopes of the two mountains. The site may be compared to an immense theatre, of which the back is formed by the saddle in question and the wings by Mount Ithome and Mount Eva. The wretched hamlet of Mavromati lies nearly in the middle of this theatre-like hollow; there are many remains of antiquity in its neighbourhood. But the site of the ancient city is now chiefly occupied by corn-fields, vineyards, and olive-groves.

The view from the top of Ithome is magnificent. The whole of the rich Messenian plain lies stretched out beneath us. To the south the full sweep of the Messenian gulf is seen, with the glorious snow-capped range of Taygetus bounding both plain and gulf on the east. High up on Taygetus is visible the gap through which the Langada pass runs. Over this pass, which forms the direct route between Sparta and Messenia, the Spartans must have often marched to attack their ancient foes; and it seems just possible that the gleam of their burnished arms in the sunshine, as the army defiled over the pass, may have been visible to the sentinels on Ithome. Farther to the north we see the mountains of Arcadia, with the Lycaean group conspicuous on the north-east. Westward the view is in general bounded by nearer and lower hills, but where they dip on the north-west and again on the south-west we catch glimpses of the Ionian or, as the ancients also called it, the Sicilian sea.

XLV. ON THE ROAD TO OLYMPIA.—The Erymanthus, descending from the lofty mountains of north-western Arcadia, flows between hills into the broad open valley of the Alpheus and joins that river on its northern bank. At its junction with the Alpheus it flows over gravel between abrupt cliffs of pudding-stone. Its water, seen at least from the southern side of the wide valley on a sunny day, is of a bright blue colour. After fording the river and climbing the farther bank, the path leads through open pastures, and then, to avoid a great bend of the river, ascends a pass or woody gorge, where fine oaks and pines, now singly now in clumps, are scattered in wild variety. When we have reached the summit and begin to descend again towards the Alpheus, a series of magnificent views of the river winding between wooded hills opens up before us. For beyond the meeting of its waters with the Erymanthus, the valley of the Alpheus assumes a softer and gayer aspect. Moderate heights rise on the right bank, their gentle slopes thickly wooded with trees and shrubs of the most varied sorts. Pine-trees, maples, planes, and tall lentisk bushes succeed each other, varied here and there by fields and green pastures. Across the Alpheus lie the beautiful wooded hills of Triphylia, where many a picturesque village is seen nestling among pine-woods, and many a height, crowned by church or ruins, stands out abruptly and precipitously above the river. The whole country, with its woods and streams, and the broad river flowing majestically through the middle of the landscape, is like a great park. The illusion, however, is broken by the path, which scrambles up hill and down dale, struggles through thickets, and splashes through streams and torrents, in a fashion which resembles anything rather than the trim well-kept walks and avenues of an English park. Such is the scenery and such the path by which Pausanias is now moving westward towards Olympia.

Dio Chrysostom has described how he lost his way in this charming country and fell in with an old dame of the Meg Merrilies type who professed to have the gift of second sight. He says: “Going on foot from Heraea to Pisa by the side of the Alpheus, I was able, up to a certain point, to make out the path. But by and by I found myself in a forest and on broken ground, with many tracks leading to sheepfolds and cattle-pens. And meeting with no one of whom I could ask the way I strayed from the path and wandered up and down. It was high noon; and seeing on a height a clump of oaks, as it might be a grove, I betook myself thither, in the hope that from thence I might spy some path or house. Here then I found stones piled carelessly together, and skins of sacrificed animals hanging up, with clubs and staves, the offerings, as I supposed, of shepherds; and a little way off, seated on the ground, was a tall and stalwart dame, somewhat advanced in years, in rustic attire, with long grey hair. Of her I asked what these things might be. She answered, very civilly, in a broad Doric accent, that the spot was sacred to Hercules, and as for herself, she had a son a shepherd and often minded the sheep herself; that by the grace of the Mother of the Gods she had the gift of second sight, and all the herdsmen and farmers of the neighbourhood came to ask her about their crops and cattle.”

XLVI. OLYMPIA.—Olympia lies on the right or north bank of the Alpheus, where the river meanders westward through a spacious valley enclosed by low wooded hills of soft and rounded forms, beyond which appear on the eastern horizon the loftier mountains of Arcadia. The soil of the valley, being alluvial, is fertile; corn-fields and vineyards stretch away in all directions. The whole aspect of the scene, without being grand or impressive, is rich, peaceful, and pleasing. The bed of the Alpheus is wide; but in summer the water is scanty and is divided into several streams running over a broad gravelly bed. The sacred precinct or Altis of Olympia lies between the river on the south and a low but steep hill, thickly wooded with pine-trees and shrubs, which rises on the north. This wooded hill is the ancient Mount Cronius. Immediately to the west of the precinct the Cladeus flows between steep sandy banks into the Alpheus from the north.

In the close hot climate of Olympia the need of a good supply of drinking water is especially felt. For months together rain hardly falls; between May and October a shower is a rarity. The great festival was always held in summer (July or August), when the weather at Olympia is cloudless and the heat intense. Hence the multitudes who flocked to witness the games must have been much distressed by the dust and the burning sun, against which the spreading shade of the plane-trees in the sacred precinct could have afforded only an imperfect protection. Indeed Lucian, doubtless with a strong touch of exaggeration, speaks of the spectators packed together and dying in swarms of thirst and of distemper contracted from the excessive drought. The water of the Alpheus is not good to drink, for even in the height of summer it holds in solution a quantity of chalky matter. The water of the Cladeus, on the other hand, is drinkable in its normal state; but even a little rain swells it and makes it run turbid for a long time. Hence it was necessary to sink wells and to bring water from a distance. This was done even in Greek times. Nine wells, some square, some round, some lined with the usual shell-limestone, others with plaques of terra-cotta, have been found at Olympia; and water was brought in aqueducts from the upper valley of the Cladeus. But in Roman times the supply was immensely improved and extended by the munificence of the wealthy sophist Herodes Atticus. Lucian tells us how the mountebank Peregrinus denounced Herodes and his aqueduct for pandering to the luxury and effeminacy of the day. It was the duty of the spectators, he said, to endure their thirst, and if need be to die of it. This doctrine proved unacceptable to his hearers, and the preacher had to run for his life pursued by a volley of stones.

XLVII. PHIDIAS’S IMAGE OF OLYMPIAN ZEUS.—The testimony of antiquity to the extraordinary beauty and majesty of the image is very strong. The Roman general Paulus Aemilius was deeply moved by the sight of it; he felt as if in the presence of the god himself, and declared that Phidias alone had succeeded in embodying the Homeric conception of Zeus. Cicero says that Phidias fashioned the image, not after any living model, but after that ideal beauty which he saw with the inward eye alone. Quintilian asserts that the beauty of the image served to strengthen religion, the majesty of the image equalling the majesty of the god. A poet declared that either the god must have come from heaven to earth to show Phidias his image, or that Phidias must have gone to heaven to behold it. The statue was reckoned one of the seven wonders of the world, and to die without having seen it was deemed a misfortune. The rhetorician Dio Chrysostom, a man of fine taste, extolled it in one of his speeches. He calls it “the most beautiful image on earth, and the dearest to the gods.” He represents Phidias speaking of his “peaceful and gentle Zeus, the overseer, as it were, of united and harmonious Greece, whom by the help of my art and of the wise and good city of Elis I set up, mild and august in an unconstrained attitude, the giver of life and breath and all good things, the common father and saviour of mankind.” And again in a fine passage he says: “Methinks that if one who is heavy laden in mind, who has drained the cup of misfortune and sorrow in life, and whom sweet sleep visits no more, were to stand before this image, he would forget all the griefs and troubles that are incident to the life of man.”

XLVIII. THE HERMES OF PRAXITELES.—Hermes is represented standing with the infant Dionysus on his left arm, and the weight of his body resting on his right foot. His form is the perfection of manly grace and vigour; the features of his oval face, under the curly hair that encircles his brow, are refined, strong, and beautiful; their expression is tender and slightly pensive. The profile is of the straight Greek type, with “the bar of Michael Angelo” over the eyebrows. The left arm of the god rests upon the stump of a tree, over which his mantle hangs loosely in rich folds, that contrast well with his nude body. His right arm is raised. The child Dionysus lays his right hand confidingly on the shoulder of Hermes; his gaze is fixed on the object, whatever it was, which Hermes held in his right hand, and his missing left arm must have been stretched out (as it appears in the restoration) towards the same object. As most of Hermes’s right arm is wanting, we cannot know for certain what he had in his right hand. Probably it was a bunch of grapes. In a wall-painting at Pompeii a satyr is represented holding the infant Dionysus on his left arm, while in his raised right hand he dangles a bunch of grapes, after which the child reaches. It is highly probable that this painting is an imitation, not necessarily at first hand, of the work of Praxiteles; and if so, it affords a strong ground for supposing that the missing right hand of the Hermes held a bunch of grapes. The only objection of any weight to this view is that in the statue Hermes is not looking at the child, as we should expect him to be, but is gazing past him into the distance with what has been described as a listening or dreamy look. Hence it has been suggested that Hermes held a pair of cymbals or castanets in his hand, to the sound of which both he and the child are listening; and a passage of Calpurnius has been quoted in which Silenus is represented holding the infant Dionysus on his arm and amusing him by shaking a rattle. This certainly would well explain the attitude and look of Hermes; but on the other hand cymbals or a rattle would not serve so well as a bunch of grapes to characterise the infant Dionysus. The same may be said of the suggestion that Hermes, as god of gain, held aloft a purse and was listening to the chinking of the money in it. In his left hand Hermes probably held his characteristic attribute, a herald’s staff; the round hole for it in the hand is still visible.

On his head he seems to have worn a metal wreath; the deep groove for fastening it on may be seen in the back part of the hair. Traces of dark red paint were perceived on the hair and on the sandal of the foot when the statue was found; the colour is supposed to have been laid on as ground for gilding. The back of the statue, which would not be seen well, is not carefully finished; it still shows the strokes of the chisel. Otherwise the technical finish is exquisite. The differences of texture between the delicate white skin of the god, the leather straps of the sandals, the woollen stuff of the cloak, and the curly hair of the head, are expressed in the most masterly way.

A late distinguished critic was of opinion that the Hermes is an early work of Praxiteles, executed before he had attained a full mastery of his art. Such a view, it would seem, can only be held by one who knows the statue solely from photographs and casts. But no reproductions afford an adequate idea of the beauty of the original. Engravings of it are often no better than caricatures. Again, the dead white colour and the mealy texture of casts give no conception of the soft, glossy, flesh-like, seemingly elastic surface of the original, which appears to glow with divine life. Looking at the original, it seems impossible to conceive that Praxiteles or any man ever attained to a greater mastery over stone than is exhibited in this astonishing work.

XLIX. LASION.—Pausanias has omitted to mention an ancient town that lay in the wild upper valley of the Peneus, in the heart of the Elean highlands, not far from the Arcadian frontier. This was Lasion, a place which, from its proximity to the Arcadian boundary, was the subject of border feuds, the Arcadians claiming possession of it, though in fact it appears to have belonged properly to Elis. It changed hands several times in the fifth, fourth, and third centuries B.C. The ruins of this secluded little town were discovered by G. F. Welcker in 1842 near Koumani, a village at the head waters of the Peneus. They may be visited on the way from Olympia to Psophis, though the visit necessitates a short detour to the west.