which enter the sea at the foot of Mount Aigaleos, and which formerly separated the Eleusinian from the Athenian territory.

As the plague was at this time raging at Corinth, and was erroneously supposed to have made its appearance at Thebes, an Arnaut guard was stationed at this spot to prevent any communication between these two places and Athens. A passage was accordingly refused to our earnest solicitations, as a bill of health with which we were provided was written in the Italian language, and was unintelligible to the guards, who advised us to return to Kondoŭra; but we could not readily acquiesce in the disappointment of receding from Athens, to which we had made such a near approach. And as I was confident that there was no danger of infection to be apprehended from any of our party, I directed my Greeks to proceed unobserved with the baggage horses, while I amused the vigilance of the guard ; and when I thought that they had reached a sufficient distance, I rode off full speed, and left the Arnauts in such a state of amazement, that they did not attempt to stop me.

I turned the corner of a projecting rock, and made the best of my way over the worst of roads, by the monastery of Daphne down the mystic gap, and passing through the olive groves, arrived at the gates of Athens before the sun had gone down. The distance from Kondoŭra had occupied eight hours. We had now to encounter new difficulties; the Turkish guard pointed out to us a cave near the Pnyx, where they said that we must pass ten days before.permission would be given us to enter the town. I sent a messenger to the English agent, Mr. Speridion Logotheti, whom. I had known on my former tour, requesting that he would extricate us from our present difficulty. He soon made his appearance in person, when immediately embracing him, I said that if I must perform quarantine it would be necessary for him to keep me company, as we had come in contact with each other. On this the prudent Archon, convinced that my convenience had become identified with his own, and considering the validity of my bill of health, sent to the Voivode, and with the help of a small bribe, I again obtained admission within the walls of this venerable city, after an absence of more than three years and a half.

CHAPTER X.

Monument of Lysikrates. Convent of Missionaries-view from it. Acropolis of Athens. Dispute with the Disdar. Theatre of Herodes Atticus. A portico. Another theatre. Monument of Thrasyllos. Tripodial columns. Cave in the east end of the Acropolis rock-another with niches. Ancient steps cut in the rock. Makrai Petrai. Cave of Pan. Turkish burying-place. Walls of the Acropolis. Walls of the town.

THE

HE Dipylon, or Thriasiai Pylai was the gate formerly entered by those coming from Eleusis: this was the largest gate of the town, of which Livy says, "Porta ea velut in ore urbis posita, major aliquanto patentiorque quam cæteræ est."1 The name of the modern gate is Gyphtò or Aigypto Porta. The Eleusinian or sacred gate was also sometimes entered by those coming from Eleusis, but there are reasons for supposing that this was the same as the Dipylon. I took up my abode in the same house I had occupied on my former tour. The name of my hostess was Mina, an old widow, who made our residence less comfortable than it would otherwise have been, by her reiterated lamentations for the death of her son, the late English consul, who had been dead several years. She is an archontess, and boasts of the antiquity of her family. Her daughter Theodora, or Todorula, dresses with elegance, and converses with propriety; but I found to my surprise, that she could neither read nor write.

1 B. 31. c. 24.

Many of the Greek and Turkish females in the inferior and the middle classes, and some even in the higher ranks, are brought up without any species of intellectual cultivation. As they are too ignorant to write, and love is fertile in expedients, those who are under the influence of that passion, carry on their correspondence by hieroglyphics composed of fruits and flowers. Each flower and each fruit has some particular associated signification, and they form a combination of words and sentences, according to their relative positions in the little baskets in which they are conveyed to those for whom they are designed.1

As my lodging was in a low and confined situation, I soon quitted it, in order to remove to more airy apartments, which I hired at the convent of the capuchin missionaries. This convent is situated at the south-east extremity of the town, near the arch of Hadrian, in the Tripod street of the ancients, now denominated Kandēla, and which, with the neighbouring church of Panagia Kandēla, takes its name from the lantern of Demosthenes, sometimes called Kandela, although Phanāri is the more common appellation, both of these words signifying lantern.

The choragic monument of Lysikrates, which is partly immured in the south-east angle of the convent is so well known, and has been so fully described by Stuart, that little can be added to what has been already published upon that subject. Stuart is however not perfectly correct in calling the columns Corinthian, as they exhibit some deviations from that order. The division of the capital from the column by a cavity instead of an astragal, offends the eye; Stuart supposes that this annular channel was filled with bronze. The figures which decorate the frieze are sculptured in half relief, though they are not all of the same proportions; their general composition, which

The method of this erotic correspondence has been described in glowing colours by Lady Wortley Montague, in her Letters on Turkey. Observations on the same custom by M. Hammer may also be consulted. Classical Journal, No. 17, March, 1814, p. 208, London. On a similar custom at Paris, see l'Hermite de la Chaussée d'Antin.