IASSY, the capital, is a large town with 40,000 inhabitants, situated on a height near the river Bachliu. GALACZ, or Galatz, at the confluence of the Pruth and Sereth with the Danube, may be considered as the port of both Moldavia and Wallachia. It is a large wooden-built town, and contains about 20,000 inhabitants. It carries on an extensive trade, chiefly in the raw produce of the principalities. Vessels of 300 tons come up to the quays.

THE KINGDOM OF HELLAS, OR GREECE.

FORMERLY the seat of civilization, learning, and song, Greece is in many respects one of the most celebrated countries of the world. Its ancient grandeur, however, and its military renown, its sages and heroes, its literature, arts and sciences, the accounts of which form the most splendid pages in the history of mankind; and its proficiency in every pursuit that dignifies the human faculties, which has excited the wonder and admiration of every succeding age and country, have long been engulfed in that torrent of barbarism which inundated Eastern Europe in the middle centuries, and obliterated the very landmarks of its ancestral greatness. No part of the globe, indeed, affords such a melancholy contrast between its ancient and modern condition, as Greece. Long swayed by the Moslem, and its inhabitants reduced to the worst forms of slavery, its spirit and enterprize suppressed, its literature gone, and its sages almost forgotten in the heart of their own country, ignorance and superstition have necessarily been the portion of the descendants of those who fell at Thermopylæ, and who in a thousand battles subdued the then known world, and planted colonies and spread civilization in the farthest off lands. Yet this Greece, so fallen and profaned by Infidel hordes, is not yet dead: the same fire which sped in the veins of its ancient heroes, the same intelligence, the same noble daring and manly devotion to liberty have but slept, and the day has come when its long sleep is over, and its people have again aroused themselves from their apathy, and already the barbarian incubus has been dispelled as a weight from the bosom of a dreamer on the return of consciousness and volition. The Turk has retired from the land of Ulysses, and once more history proclaims the restoration of Greece to her position as a nation.

The present limits of Greece, however, can bear no comparison to its ancient empire. Formerly Greece was everywhere, and the whole world its tributary. Greece of the present day is but a small province of its once mighty dominion; and as yet the Ottoman lords it over the fairest portions of the empire of Alexander.

Independent Greece is bounded on the north by the Turkish provinces of Albania and Thessaly, on the west by the Ionian Sea, on the south by the Mediterranean, and on the east by the Archipelago. It lies between 360 15′ and 39° 10′ north latitude, and between the meridians of 20° 40′ and 26° 30' east longitude, and comprises three distinct portions, viz: Hellas, or Greece Proper, the Morea,* and the Greek Islands of the Archipelago. The superficies of these several portions is estimated at 20,000 square miles.

So called from its fancied resemblance in form to the leaf of the morus, or mulberry-tree.

HELLAS, or Greece Proper, is a long tract of hilly country, extending about 185 miles from east to west, with a breadth no where exceeding 50 miles, between Thessaly and Albania, and the gulfs of Lepanto and Egina.

The MOREA, the ancient Peloponnesus, is a large peninsula, 137 miles in length by 135 in its greatest breadth, but of very irregular form, and connected with the mainland of Hellas by the Isthmus of Corinth.

The ISLANDS lie chiefly in the Archipelago, and before the restoration formed the Turkish Eyalet of Jezayrs. The largest, and those inhabited, are Hydra, Spezzia, Poros, Egina, Augistra, Salamis, Scopelos, Helidromia, Sciathos, Scyros, Syra, Tinos, Miconos, Cea, Thermia, Naxos, Paros and Antiparos, Siphnos, Seriphos, Cimolos, Milo, Polycandros, Sicinos, Ios, Amorgos, Santorin, Anaphe, Astypalea, and Euboea or Negropont.

The general aspect of the continental portion of Greece is characterized by a very singular distribution of its mountains, which are so disposed as to enclose large basins or circular hollows. The country is thus marked out into distinct districts, well adapted to become sinall communities, such as we find the states of ancient Greece to have been. Some of these basins terminate at the coast, and seem to have been formed by the retiring of the sea, as those of Athens, Argos, Laconia, Messenia, and Elis. Others are completely surrounded by their mountain ramparts, except at one point, where the accumulated waters of the basins have forced for themselves an outlet; such are those of Boeotia and Arcadia. Central Hellas is a rugged district, being occupied almost entirely by the branches and declivities of mounts Eta, Helicon, and Parnassus. East and south of this are Boeotia and Attica. Boeotia is entirely enclosed by highlands, and is divided centrally by a low range of hills. The Lake of Topolias, which occupies the bottom of the larger division, receives all the waters of the district, which it sends off by subterraneous passages to the sea, on the north-east. The country is very fertile, but subject to fogs and marshy exhalations. Attica, to the south-east, is comparatively arid and barren, but is peculiarly distinguished for the beauty and serenity of its climate. In general, Western Hellas has a physical character, different from that of the eastern provinces. It consists of long valleys opening to the south, and rising towards the mountains of the north.

The Isthmus of Corinth, which connects Hellas with the Morea, lies between the gulfs of Lepanto and Egina. Towards the north it is occupied by high rocky hills, which indicate a strong military position; but in the south, where its breadth is about four miles, the surface is not more than 200 feet above the level of the sea.

The Morea consists of an elevated central plateau or valley, and of five separate maritime regions, formed by the exterior declivities of the mountains, and divided by their spurs or branches. The central valley of Arcadia, so famed in pastoral poetry, is high and cold, often covered with fogs, and subject to malaria. Most of its waters are carried off by the single channel of the river Roufia; but it has sometimes suffered from partial inundations. The coast regions are generally well watered and fertile; partly broken by rugged hills, but usually level. They are distinguished by the names of Argolis, which stretches in a semicircle round the Gulf of Nauplia; Laconia, around the Gulf of Lolokythi; Messenía, occupying the south-west; Elis on the west coast, and Achaia on the north. The two latter are hilly, with small river valleys, but rather dry.

The Cyclades, and the other islands in the Archipelago, are almost all

IASSY, the capital, is a large town with 40,000 inhabitants, situated on a height near the river Bachliu. GALACZ, or Galatz, at the confluence of the Pruth and Sereth with the Danube, may be considered as the port of both Moldavia and Wallachia. It is a large wooden-built town, and contains about 20,000 inhabitants. It carries on an extensive trade, chiefly in the raw produce of the principalities. Vessels of 300 tons come up to the quays.

THE KINGDOM OF HELLAS, OR GREECE.

FORMERLY the seat of civilization, learning, and song, Greece is in many respects one of the most celebrated countries of the world. Its ancient grandeur, however, and its military renown, its sages and heroes, its literature, arts and sciences, the accounts of which form the most splendid pages in the history of mankind; and its proficiency in every pursuit that dignifies the human faculties, which has excited the wonder and admiration of every succeding age and country, have long been engulfed in that torrent of barbarism which inundated Eastern Europe in the middle centuries, and obliterated the very landmarks of its ancestral greatness. No part of the globe, indeed, affords such a melancholy contrast between its ancient and modern condition, as Greece. Long swayed by the Moslem, and its inhabitants reduced to the worst forms of slavery, its spirit and enterprize suppressed, its literature gone, and its sages almost forgotten in the heart of their own country, ignorance and superstition have necessarily been the portion of the descendants of those who fell at Thermopylæ, and who in a thousand battles subdued the then known world, and planted colonies and spread civilization in the farthest off lands. Yet this Greece, so fallen and profaned by Infidel hordes, is not yet dead: the same fire which sped in the veins of its ancient heroes, the same intelligence, the same noble daring and manly devotion to liberty have but slept, and the day has come when its long sleep is over, and its people have again aroused themselves from their apathy, and already the barbarian incubus has been dispelled as a weight from the bosom of a dreamer on the return of consciousness and volition. The Turk has retired from the land of Ulysses, and once more history proclaims the restoration of Greece to her position as a nation.

The present limits of Greece, however, can bear no comparison to its ancient empire. Formerly Greece was everywhere, and the whole world its tributary. Greece of the present day is but a small province of its once mighty dominion; and as yet the Ottoman lords it over the fairest portions of the empire of Alexander.

Independent Greece is bounded on the north by the Turkish provinces of Albania and Thessaly, on the west by the Ionian Sea, on the south by the Mediterranean, and on the east by the Archipelago. It lies between 36° 15′ and 39° 10' north latitude, and between the meridians of 20° 40′ and 26° 30' east longitude, and comprises three distinct portions, viz: Hellas, or Greece Proper, the Morea,* and the Greek Islands of the Archipelago. The superficies of these several portions is estimated at 20,000 square miles.

*So called from its fancied resemblance in form to the leaf of the morus, or mulberry-tree.

HELLAS, or Greece Proper, is a long tract of hilly country, extending about 185 miles from east to west, with a breadth no where exceeding 50 miles, between Thessaly and Albania, and the gulfs of Lepanto and Egina.

The MOREA, the ancient Peloponnesus, is a large peninsula, 137 miles in length by 135 in its greatest breadth, but of very irregular form, and connected with the mainland of Hellas by the Isthmus of Corinth.

The ISLANDS lie chiefly in the Archipelago, and before the restoration formed the Turkish Eyalet of Jezayrs. The largest, and those inhabited, are Hydra, Spezzia, Poros, Egina, Augistra, Salamis, Scopelos, Helidromia, Sciathos, Scyros, Syra, Tinos, Miconos, Cea, Thermia, Naxos, Paros and Antiparos, Šiphnos, Seriphos, Cimolos, Milo, Polycandros, Sicinos, Ios, Amorgos, Santorin, Anaphe, Astypalea, and Euboea or Negropont.

The general aspect of the continental portion of Greece is characterized by a very singular distribution of its mountains, which are so disposed as to enclose large basins or circular hollows. The country is thus marked out into distinct districts, well adapted to become small communities, such as we find the states of ancient Greece to have been. Some of these basins terminate at the coast, and seem to have been formed by the retiring of the sea, as those of Athens, Argos, Laconia, Messenia, and Elis. Others are completely surrounded by their mountain ramparts, except at one point, where the accumulated waters of the basins have forced for themselves an outlet; such are those of Baotia and Arcadia. Central Hellas is a rugged district, being occupied almost entirely by the branches and declivities of mounts Eta, Helicon, and Parnassus. East and south of this are Bootia and Attica. Boeotia is entirely enclosed by highlands, and is divided centrally by a low range of hills. The Lake of Topolias, which occupies the bottom of the larger division, receives all the waters of the district, which it sends off by subterraneous passages to the sea, on the north-east. The country is very fertile, but subject to fogs and marshy exhalations. Attica, to the south-east, is comparatively arid and barren, but is peculiarly distinguished for the beauty and serenity of its climate. In general, Western Hellas has a physical character, different from that of the eastern provinces. It consists of long valleys opening to the south, and rising towards the mountains of the north.

The Isthmus of Corinth, which connects Hellas with the Morea, lies between the gulfs of Lepanto and Egina. Towards the north it is occupied by high rocky hills, which indicate a strong military position; but in the south, where its breadth is about four miles, the surface is not more than 200 feet above the level of the sea.

The Morea consists of an elevated central plateau or valley, and of five separate maritime regions, formed by the exterior declivities of the mountains, and divided by their spurs or branches. The central valley of Arcadia, so famed in pastoral poetry, is high and cold, often covered with fogs, and subject to malaria. Most of its waters are carried off by the single channel of the river Roufia; but it has sometimes suffered from partial inundations. The coast regions are generally well watered and fertile; partly broken by rugged hills, but usually level. They are distinguished by the names of Argolis, which stretches in a semicircle round the Gulf of Nauplia; Laconia, around the Gulf of Lolokythi; Messenía, occupying the south-west; Elis on the west coast, and Achaia on the north. The two latter are hilly, with small river valleys, but rather dry.

The Cyclades, and the other islands in the Archipelago, are almost all

steep and rocky. Euboea is traversed throughout its whole length by a ridge of hills, and is separated from the mainland of Eastern Hellas by a very long channel or strait, so narrow at the middle as to be spanned by a bridge.

The mountains which cover so large a portion of the country are partly wooded and partly naked; the woods abound most on the west side. The low country, susceptible of tillage, probably does not amount to two-fifth parts of the surface, and not more than a twelfth part of it is under cultivation. Its want of enclosures, the thinness of its population, the ruinous condition of its cottages, commingled with the crumbling remains of noble structures, give it a deserted, desolate and melancholy appearance, and towards the end of summer the whole seems parched. Yet Greece contains, in the highest degree, every feature essential to the finest features of landscape, and travellers of taste have found a scarcity of phrase in which to express its majesty. It is a combination of towering mountains and sheltered plains, and its rich and ever changing scenes, that makes Greece surpass every other country in picturesque beauty. "Under the influence of so many sublime objects, the human mind becomes gifted as by inspiration, and is by nature filled with poetical ideas." Greece, consequently, became the native country of taste, science and eloquence, the chosen sanctuary of the muses, the model of all that is graceful and grand in sentiment or action

The most common cultivated products are wheat, barley, maize and rye; oats in small quantities; rice in marshy spots; millet peas, beans, tares, sesamum, anise, cotton and tobacco; and notwithstanding the most wretched system of agriculture, the produce is large. The olive is cultivated throughout Greece, but the vine is planted on a very limited scale. The Corinthian grape or currant is almost peculiar to the Morea and the Ionian Islands. It succeeds best in plains near the sea, with a western exposure, and prefers a dry and light soil. Madder grows wild in abundance, and the mulberry has become an object of increasing importance, and the product of silk is considerable. The almond, date, melons, oranges and other southern fruits grow in the open fields, and form a considerable part of the subsistence of the inhabitants. Culinary vegetables are in great variety, and the forests produce the oak, the cork tree, pine, ash, aloe, wild olive, chestnut, various dye-woods and plants, and a vast variety of flowers and aromatic herbs.

The wild animals are the bear, wolf, lynx, boar, stag, roebuck, goat, badger, marten, fox, weasel, jackal, &c. Wolves are very numerous, and dogs of a fierce and powerful breed are kept to guard the flocks. Of birds there are very large vultures, various species of falcons and owls, the cuckoo, ducks, geese, turkies, storks, and a vast abundance of game and small species. Greece is eminently a pastoral country, and the management of sheep is better understood than any other branch of rural economy. As in Spain, the flocks migrate, at the approach of winter, from the mountains to the low valleys near the sea. Goats are also numerous, and are shorn along with the sheep. Beeves are not very numerous. Buffaloes are the common beasts of burden, especially in the Morea, and when unfit for labor are killed for food. The horse is here an inferior animal, but sure-footed; nor are asses and mules so active and vigorous as in Spain.

The Grecians still pay great attention to their bees, and the honey of Hymettus still maintains its ancient pre-eminence, and is there produced in abundance. Silk worms also receive great care, and silk is produced in