their sides effectually preventing them from being surrounded, which the formidable numbers of the Persians would have rendered an overwhelming danger. Near this natural stadium are six small tumuli which some contend to have been raised to the Athenians. The river near Marathon flows by this stadium which must have increased the strength of the Athenian position. Higher up on the mountain, at the bottom of which stand these six Tumuli, is the small Greek village of Bpávva (Vranna), in which there are only nine cottages, and one little church. It now contains no Turks, who, in Greece, seldom chuse villages for their residence. We arrived there at six, and went to the Papas' house and were there put into a wretched naked room, whose only furniture consisted of two mats. Here, however, they made us up two comfortable beds and a good supper of eggs and milk. In the evening it was moonlight, but being the first quarter, we could not see the plain below us by its light. As Pausanias relates that martial clamours are frequently heard on the plain at night, I asked the Papa whether he had ever witnessed them. He told me that " "the first of May (o. s.) this year, he had heard a very "loud neighing of horses at night on the plain close "to the spot where, he was told, a great battle had "once been fought, and as very few horses were kept "in the neighbourhood, he could not but attribute it

on

"to supernatural causes. That three years ago a

66

shepherd from a neighbouring village tending his "flock on the same spot had been so alarmed by

66

66

hearing there loud shouts of men and neighing of horses, that he left his sheep in the night and ran "back to his village; and that eighteen years ago

66

thirty-six Turks who lived in the village (of Vranna) "had been so frightened by seeing a little man on "horseback galloping along the impracticable moun"tain (behind, and more distant from the plain, as well as higher, than, Vranna) near the small church, that they left the village, and never could be persuaded "to return. He had no doubt, he added, that this

66

66

66

was the apparition of St. George, to whom the "church was dedicated.". After questioning him about these curious legends of superstition, in which he seemed to place implicit confidence, we lay down, and being pretty well tired with our day's exertions, slept soundly till morning.

Tuesday, May 24th.-Early in the morning we yielded to the repeated calls of Mustapha, and at half past six took leave of the hospitable Papas, and left Vranna. I could not consent to leave Marathon without once more riding over the station of the Athenians, which is now marked only by the pacifick labours of the husbandman. I felt here all the justice of Johnson's observation,-"That man is little to be "envied, whose patriotism would not gain force upon

the plain of Marathon." We had nominally five hours ride to Mendeli, of which three lay by the side of the sea. The only coins which I could find at Marathon, were a few of copper, which I bought of a peasant who was watering a large herd of oxen at a

well, near the field of battle, and these were totally uninteresting. We first crossed the marsh so fatal to the Persians, and for two hours proceeded along a rich and delightful plain, whose olive trees and thick corn overhung the Saronicus Sinus, and then passing a small village and a thick wood, travelled for three hours among mountains diversified by all the various beauties that nature has so prodigally lavished on this lovely land. Heights towering majestically above the high level of our road, and covered with eternal snow; precipices, on which even to look was danger, though it was impossible to avoid looking from the loveliness of the valley below, clothed in every species of variegated verdure, and down which the small stream from the mountain was stealing in glittering silence; formed in their combination a scene which the most insensible could not pass unnoticed. Even Mustapha cried "guzel," (pretty.) The road was here too covered with the mica which appears to indicate that the earth was as rich below as above. It was so overgrown with shrubs and trees as to be in some places nearly imperviable to our horses. At half-past eleven we reached the convent of Mendeli, which is concealed by the surrounding trees till one is close to it. It is a very extensive building, being the largest Greek establishment of the kind in this part of the country. They received us very hospitably, and showed us into a very small room, furnished with neat divans round three sides à la Turque, where Mustapha told me all English travellers stopt, and he began enumerating

to me, Mr. North, Mr. Gell, &c. We had no need of this recommendation to induce us to stay, as we were so tired from the terrible heat, that we immediately lay down on the sophas and slept till halfpast three.

After regaling on eggs and an excellent sweetmeat (not unlike a good pancake) for the manufacture of which the convent is famous (indeed Mustapha said that if we did not eat of this, we might as well not have come to Mendeli,) we set off for the quarries, which were more distant than I expected from the report which was given us. For half an hour we mounted on horseback a slight ascent at the bottom of the mountain, pushing our way through a profusion of heath and wild shrubs, till the rise became so steep that we were forced to alight, though Signor Lusieri afterwards told us that he always continues riding to the top. For three quarters of an hour, we had a very laborious walk up the mountain to the caverns. On the path we saw lying several masses of marble that bore marks of the chissel, and indeed by the side of it was one immense rough hewn block intended to have formed part of a column, and the mountain was covered with stones of so curious a nature and colour, that I lamented excessively not being a mineralogist. The first quarry (which I should think to be 120 feet in length, and ninety in height) is in the open air. It is hewn completely perpendicular. Time and exposure to the air has rendered the marble of the same yellowish colour as the columns of the

temples which have been built from it, but wherever it is broken, it discovers a delicate white. The inner quarry, excavated by nature, is enormously extensive and deep. Within, it is very cold, and a well of water in it is of a temperature nearly frozen. The water that drops from the top forms incrustations of marble that are strikingly beautiful. Within its recess is a deep hole, which our guide, who had brought candles on purpose, wanted us to descend, stating as an inducement that all travellers, and even an English lady, had done so. But as it was necessary to crawl down on the hands and knees, for no one object (it containing nothing to see) but to write one's name at the bottom, we were lazy enough to decline the exploit. These magnificent and gigantick caverns defy the utmost efforts of destruction, for, without the aid of gunpowder which the Turks cannot afford to waste, all the resources of the Ottoman empire, would be insufficient to destroy them. While the temples, their offspring, are daily receiving some new injury from wanton barbarism, the parents stand, and will stand for ever, defying the desolation that surrounds them. After stopping here an hour and a half, we descended the mountain, and gallopped over the rich and beautiful plain before Athens, (a distance of three hours nominally) to the city which we reached by sun-set. Before passing Anchesmus, we rode through a small village an hour's distance from the city, in which we saw a very extensive manufacture of oil. In galloping I lost my hat, which I left poor Mustapha, who