Quarrel with the Landlord.--AEgina.--Sicyon.--Corinth.--A
distinguished Reception.--Desolation of Corinth.--The
Acropolis.--View from the Acropolis.--Lechaeum and Cenchreae.--Kaka
Scala.--Arrival at Athens.
IN the morning Demetrius had a roaring quarrel with the keeper of the
locanda, in which he tried to keep back part of the money we gave him to
pay for us. He did this, however, on principle, for we had given twice
as much as our lodging was worth, and no man ought to have more. His
character was at stake in preventing any one from cheating us too much;
and, in order to do this, he stopped our funds in transitu.
We started early, and for some time our road lay along the shore. It was
not necessary, surrounded by such magnificent scenery, to draw upon
historical recollections for the sake of giving interest to the road;
still it did not diminish that interest to know that, many centuries
ago, great cities stood here, whose sites are now desolate or occupied
as the miserable gathering-places of a starving population. Directly
opposite Parnassus, and at the foot of a hill crowned with the ruins of
an acropolis, in perfect desolation now, stood the ancient AEgira; once
numbering a population of ten thousand inhabitants, and in the second
century containing three hiera, a temple, and another sacred edifice.
Farther on, and toward the head of the Gulf of Corinth, the miserable
village of Basilico stands on the site of the ancient Sicyon, boasting
as high an antiquity as any city in Greece, and long celebrated as the
first of her schools of painting. In five hours we came in sight of the
Acropolis of Corinth, and, shortly after, of Corinth itself.
The reader need not fear my plunging him deeply into antiquities. Greece
has been explored, and examined, and written upon, till the subject is
almost threadbare; and I do not flatter myself that I discovered in it
anything new. Still no man from such a distant country as mine can find
himself crossing the plain of Corinth, and ascending to the ancient
city, without a strange and indescribable feeling. We have no old
monuments, no classical associations; and our history hardly goes beyond
the memory of that venerable personage, "the oldest inhabitant." Corinth
is so old that its early records are blended with the history of the
heathen gods. The Corinthians say that it was called after the son of
Jupiter, and its early sovereigns were heroes of the Grecian mythology.
It was the friend of Sparta and the rival of Athens; the first city to
build war-galleys and send forth colonies, which became great empires.
It was the assembling-place of their delegates, who elected Philip, and
afterward Alexander the Great, to conduct the war against the Persians.
In painting, sculpture, and architecture surpassing all the achievements
of Greece, or which the genius of man has ever since accomplished.
Conquered by the then barbarous Romans, her walls were razed to the
ground, her men put to the sword, her women and children sold into
captivity, and the historian who records her fall writes that he saw the
finest pictures thrown wantonly on the ground, and Roman soldiers
playing on them at draughts and dice. For many years deserted, Corinth
was again peopled; rose rapidly from its ruins; and, when St. Paul
abode there "a year and six months"--to the Christian the most
interesting period in her history--she was again a populous city, and
the Corinthians a luxurious people.
Its situation in the early ages of the world could not fail to make it a
great commercial emporium. In the inexperienced navigation of early
times it was considered difficult and dangerous to go around the point
of the Peloponnesus, and there was a proverb, "Before the mariner
doubles Cape Malea, he should forget all he holds dearest in the world."
Standing on the isthmus commanding the Adriatic and AEgean Seas;
receiving in one hand the riches of Asia and in the other those of
Europe; distributing them to every quarter of the then known world,
wealth followed commerce, and then came luxury and extravagance to such
an extent that it became a proverb, "It is not for every man to go to
Corinth."
As travellers having regard to supper and lodging, we should have been
glad to see some vestige of its ancient luxury; but times are changed;
the ruined city stands where stood Corinth of old, but it has fallen
once more; the sailor no longer hugs the well-known coasts, but launches
fearlessly into the trackless ocean, and Corinth can never again be what
she has been.
Our servant had talked so much of the hotel at Corinth, that perhaps the
idea of bed and lodging was rather too prominent in our reveries as we
approached the fallen city. He rode on before to announce our coming,
and, working our way up the hill through narrow streets, stared at by
all the men, followed by a large representation from the juvenile
portion of the modern Corinthians, and barked at by the dogs, we turned
into a large enclosure, something like a barnyard, on which opened a
ruined balcony forming the entrance to the hotel. Demetrius was standing
before it with our host, as unpromising a looking scoundrel as ever took
a traveller in. He had been a notorious captain of brigands, and when
his lawless band was broken up and half of its number hanged, he could
not overcome his disposition to prey upon travellers, but got a couple
of mattresses and bedsteads, and set up a hotel at Corinth. Demetrius
had made a bargain for us at a price that made him hang his head when he
told it, and we were so indignant at the extortion that we at first
refused to dismount. Our host stood aloof, being used to such scenes,
and perfectly sure that, after storming a little, we should be glad to
take the only beds between Padras and Athens. In the end, however, we
got the better both of him and Demetrius; for, as he had fixed separate
prices for dinner, beds, and breakfast, we went to a little Greek
coffee-house, and raised half Corinth to get us something to eat, and
paid him only for our lodging.
We had a fine afternoon before us, and our first movement was to the
ruins of a temple, the only monument of antiquity in Corinth. The city
has been so often sacked and plundered, that not a column of the
Corinthian order exists in the place from which it derives its name.
Seven columns of the old temple are still standing, fluted and of the
Doric order, though wanting in height the usual proportion to the
diameter; built probably before that order had attained its perfection,
and long before the Corinthian order was invented; though when it was
built, by whom, or to what god it was consecrated, antiquaries cannot
agree in deciding. Contrasted with these solitary columns of an unknown
antiquity are ruins of yesterday. Houses fallen, burned, and black with
smoke, as if the wretched inmates had fled before the blaze of their
dwellings; and high above the ruined city, now as in the days when the
Persian and Roman invaded it, still towers the Acropolis, a sharp and
naked rock, rising abruptly a thousand feet from the earth, inaccessible
and impregnable under the science of ancient war; and in all times of
invasion and public distress, from her earliest history down to the
bloody days of the late revolution, the refuge of the inhabitants.
[Illustration: Corinth.]
It was late in the afternoon when we set out for the Acropolis. About a
mile from the city we came to the foot of the hill, and ascended by a
steep and difficult path, with many turnings and windings, to the first
gate. Having been in the saddle since early in the morning, we stopped
several times to rest, and each time lingered and looked out with
admiration upon the wild and beautiful scenery around us; and we thought
of the frequently recurring times when hostile armies had drawn up
before the city at our feet, and the inhabitants, in terror and
confusion, had hurried up this path and taken refuge within the gate
before us.
Inside the gate were the ruins of a city, and here, too, we saw the
tokens of ruthless war; the fire-brand was hardly yet extinguished, and
the houses were in ruins. Within a few years it has been the stronghold
and refuge of infidels and Christians, taken and retaken, destroyed,
rebuilt, and destroyed again, and the ruins of Turkish mosques and
Christian churches are mingled together in undistinguishable confusion.
This enclosure is abundantly supplied with water, issuing from the rock,
and is capable of containing several thousand people. The fountain of
Pyrene, which supplies the Acropolis, called the most salubrious in
Greece, is celebrated as that at which Pegasus was drinking when taken
by Bellerophon. Ascending among ruined and deserted habitations, we came
to a second gate flanked by towers. A wall about two miles in
circumference encloses the whole summit of the rock, including two
principal points which still rise above the rest. One is crowned with a
tower and the other with a mosque, now in ruins; probably erected where
once stood a heathen temple. Some have mistaken it for a Christian
church, but all agree that it is a place built and consecrated to divine
use, and that, for unknown ages men have gone up to this cloud-capped
point to worship their Creator. It was a sublime idea to erect on this
lofty pinnacle an altar to the Almighty. Above us were only the
unclouded heavens; the sun was setting with that brilliancy which
attends his departing glory nowhere but in the East; and the sky was
glowing with a lurid red, as of some great conflagration. The scene
around and below was wondrously beautiful. Mountains and rivers, seas
and islands, rocks, forests, and plains, thrown together in perfect
wantonness, and yet in the most perfect harmony, and every feature in
the expanded landscape consecrated by the richest associations. On one
side the Saronic Gulf, with its little islands, and AEgina and Salamis,
stretching off to "Sunium's marble height," with the ruins of its temple
looking out mournfully upon the sea; on the other, the Gulf of Corinth
or Lepanto, bounded by the dark and dreary mountains of Cytheron, where
Acteon, gazing at the goddess, was changed into a stag, and hunted to
death by his own hounds; and where Bacchus, with his train of satyrs and
frantic bacchantes, celebrated his orgies. Beyond were Helicon, sacred
to Apollo and the Muses, and Parnassus, covered with snow. Behind us
towered a range of mountains stretching away to Argos and the ancient
Sparta, and in front was the dim outline of the temple of the Acropolis
at Athens. The shades of evening gathered thick around us while we
remained on the top of the Acropolis, and it was dark long before we
reached our locanda.
The next morning we breakfasted at the coffee-house, and left Corinth
wonderfully pleased at having outwitted Demetrius and our brigand host,
who gazed after us with a surly scowl as we rode away, and probably
longed for the good old days when, at the head of his hanged companions,
he could have stopped us at the first mountain-pass and levied
contributions at his own rate. I probably condemn myself when I say that
we left this ancient city with such a trifle uppermost in our thoughts,
but so it was; we bought a loaf of bread as we passed through the
market-place, and descended to the plain of Corinth. We had still the
same horses which we rode from Padras; they were miserable animals, and
I did not mount mine the whole day. Indeed, this is the true way to
travel in Greece; the country is mountainous, and the road or narrow
horse-path so rough and precipitous that the traveller is often obliged
to dismount and walk. The exercise of clambering up the mountains and
the purity of the air brace every nerve in the body, and not a single
feature of the scenery escapes the eye.
But, as yet, there are other things beside scenery; on each side of the
road and within site of each other are the ruins of the ancient cities
of Lechaeum and Cenchreae, the ports of Corinth on the Corinthian and
Saronic Gulfs; the former once connected with it by two long walls, and
the road to the latter once lined with temples and sepulchres, the ruins
of which may still be seen. The isthmus connecting the Peloponnesus with
the continent is about six miles wide, and Corinth owed her commercial
greatness to the profits of her merchants in transporting merchandise
across it. Entire vessels were sometimes carried from one sea and
launched into the other. The project of a canal across suggested itself
both to the Greeks and Romans, and there yet exist traces of a ditch
commenced for that purpose.
On the death of Leonidas, and in apprehension of a Persian invasion, the
Peloponnesians built a wall across the isthmus from Lechaeum to Cenchreae.
This wall was at one time fortified with a hundred and fifty towers; it
was often destroyed and as often rebuilt; and in one place, about three
miles from Corinth, vestiges of it may still be seen. Here were
celebrated those Isthmian games so familiar to every tyro in Grecian
literature and history; toward Mount Oneus stands on an eminence an
ancient mound, supposed to be the tomb of Melicertes, their founder, and
near it is at this day a grove of the sacred pine, with garlands of the
leaves of which the victors were crowned.
In about three hours from Corinth we crossed the isthmus, and came to
the village of Kalamaki on the shore of the Saronic Gulf, containing a
few miserable buildings, fit only for the miserable people who occupied
them. Directly on the shore was a large coffee-house enclosed by mud
walls, and having branches of trees for a roof; and in front was a
little flotilla of Greek caiques.
Next to the Greek's love for his native mountains is his passion for the
waters that roll at their feet; and many of the proprietors of the
rakish little boats in the harbour talked to us of the superior
advantage of the sea over a mountainous road, and tried to make us
abandon our horses and go by water to Athens; but we clung to the land,
and have reason to congratulate ourselves upon having done so, for our
road was one of the most beautiful it was ever my fortune to travel
over. For some distance I walked along the shore, on the edge of a plain
running from the foot of Mount Geranion. The plain was intersected by
mountain torrents, the channel-beds of which were at that time dry. We
passed the little village of Caridi, supposed to be the Sidus of
antiquity, while a ruined church and a few old blocks of marble mark the
site of ancient Crommyon, celebrated as the haunt of a wild boar
destroyed by Theseus.
At the other end of the plain we came to the foot of Mount Geranion,
stretching out boldly to the edge of the gulf, and followed the road
along its southern side close to and sometimes overhanging the sea. From
time immemorial this has been called the Kaka Scala, or bad way. It is
narrow, steep, and rugged, and wild to sublimity. Sometimes we were
completely hemmed in by impending mountains, and then rose upon a lofty
eminence commanding an almost boundless view. On the summit of the range
the road runs directly along the mountain's brink, overhanging the sea,
and so narrow that two horsemen can scarcely pass abreast; where a
stumble would plunge the traveller several hundred yards into the waters
beneath. Indeed, the horse of one of my companions stumbled and fell,
and put him in such peril that both dismounted and accompanied me on
foot. In the olden time this wild and rugged road was famous as the
haunt of the robber Sciron, who plundered the luckless travellers, and
then threw them from this precipice. The fabulous account is, that
Theseus, three thousand years before, on his first visit to Athens,
encountered the famous robber, and tossed him from the same precipice
whence he had thrown so many better men. According to Ovid, the earth
and the sea refused to receive the bones of Sciron, which continued for
some time suspended in the open air, until they were changed into large
rocks, whose points still appear at the foot of the precipice; and to
this day, say the sailors, knock the bottoms out of the Greek vessels.
In later days this road was so infested by corsairs and pirates, that
even the Turks feared to travel on it; at one place, that looks as
though it might be intended as a jumping-off point into another world,
Ino, with her son Melicertes in her arms (so say the Greek poets), threw
herself into the sea to escape the fury of her husband; and we know
that in later days St. Paul travelled on this road to preach the gospel
to the Corinthians.
But, independently of all associations, and in spite of its difficulties
and dangers, if a man were by accident placed on the lofty height
without knowing where he was, he would be struck with the view which it
commands, as one of the most beautiful that mortal eyes ever beheld. It
was my fortune to pass over it a second time on foot, and I often seated
myself on some wild point, and waited the coming up of my muleteers,
looking out upon the sea, calm and glistening as if plated with silver,
and studded with islands in continuous clusters stretching away into the
AEgean.
During the greater part of the passage of the Kaka Scala my companions
walked with me; and, as we always kept in advance, when we seated
ourselves on some rude rock overhanging the sea to wait for our beasts
and attendants, few things could be more picturesque than their
approach.
On the summit of the pass we fell into the ancient paved way that leads
from Attica into the Peloponnesus, and walked over the same pavement
which the Greeks travelled, perhaps, three thousand years ago. A ruined
wall and gate mark the ancient boundary; and near this an early
traveller observed a large block of white marble projecting over the
precipice, and almost ready to fall into the sea, which bore an
inscription, now illegible. Here it is supposed stood the Stele erected
by Theseus, bearing on one side the inscription, "Here is Peloponnesus,
not Ionia;" and on the other the equally pithy notification, "Here is
not Peloponnesus, but Ionia." It would be a pretty place of residence
for a man in misfortune; for, besides the extraordinary beauty of the
scenery, by a single step he might avoid the service of civil process,
and set the sheriff of Attica or the Peloponnesus at defiance.
Descending, we saw before us a beautiful plain, extending from the foot
of the mountain to the sea, and afar off, on an eminence commanding the
plain, was the little town of Megara.
It is unfortunate for the reader that every ruined village on the road
stands on the site of an ancient city. The ruined town before us was the
birthplace of Euclid, and the representative of that Megara which is
distinguished in history more than two thousand years ago; which sent
forth its armies in the Persian and Peloponnesian wars; alternately the
ally and enemy of Corinth and Athens; containing numerous temples, and
the largest public houses in Greece; and though exposed, with her other
cities, to the violence of a fierce democracy, as is recorded by the
historian, "the Megareans retained their independence and lived in
peace." As a high compliment, the people offered to Alexander the Great
the freedom of their city. When we approached it its appearance was a
speaking comment upon human pride.
It had been demolished and burned by Greeks and Turks, and now presented
little more than a mass of blackened ruins. A few apartments had been
cleared out and patched up, and occasionally I saw a solitary figure
stalking amid the desolation.
I had not mounted my horse all day; had kicked out a pair of Greek shoes
on my walk, and was almost barefoot when I entered the city. A little
below the town was a large building enclosed by a high wall, with a
Bavarian soldier lounging at the gate. We entered, and found a good
coffee-room below, and a comfortable bed chamber above, where we found
good quilts and mattresses, and slept like princes.
Early in the morning we set out for Athens, our road for some time lying
along the sea. About half way to the Piraeus, a ruined village, with a
starving population, stands on the site of the ancient Eleusis, famed
throughout all Greece for the celebration of the mysterious rites of
Ceres. The magnificent temple of the goddess has disappeared, and the
colossal statue made by the immortal Phidias now adorns the vestibule of
the University at Cambridge. We lingered a little while in the village,
and soon after entered the Via Sacra, by which, centuries ago, the
priests and people moved in solemn religious processions from Athens to
the great temple of Ceres. At first we passed underneath the cliff along
the shore, then rose by a steep ascent among the mountains, barren and
stony, and wearing an aspect of desolation equal to that of the Roman
Campagna; then we passed through a long defile, upon the side of which,
deeply cut in the rock, are seen the marks of chariot-wheels; perhaps of
those used in the sacred processions. We passed the ruined monastery of
Daphne, in a beautifully picturesque situation, and in a few minutes saw
the rich plain of Attica; and our muleteers and Demetrius, with a burst
of enthusiasm, perhaps because the journey was ended, clapped their
hands and cried out, "Atinae! Atinae!"
The reader, perhaps, trembles at the name of Athens, but let him take
courage. I promise to let him off easily. A single remark, however,
before reaching it. The plain of Attica lies between two parallel ranges
of mountains, and extends from the sea many miles back into the
interior. On the border of the sea stands the Piraeus, now, as in former
times, the harbour of the city, and toward the east, on a little
eminence, Athens itself, like the other cities in Greece, presenting a
miserable appearance, the effects of protracted and relentless wars. But
high above the ruins of the modern city towers the Acropolis, holding up
to the skies the ruined temples of other days, and proclaiming what
Athens was. We wound around the temple of Theseus, the most beautiful
and perfect specimen of architecture that time has spared; and in
striking contrast with this monument of the magnificence of past days,
here, in the entrance to the city, our horses were struggling and
sinking up to their saddle-girths in the mud.
We did in Athens what we should have done in Boston or Philadelphia;
rode up to the best hotel, and, not being able to obtain accommodations
there, rode to another; where, being again refused admittance, we were
obliged to distribute ourselves into three parcels. Dr. Willet went to
Mr. Hill's (of whom more anon). M. found entrance at a new hotel in the
suburbs, and I betook myself to the Hotel de France. The garcon was
rather bothered when I threw him a pair of old boots which I had hanging
at my saddle-bow, and told him to take care of my baggage; he asked me
when the rest would come up; and hardly knew what to make of me when I
told him that was all I travelled with.
I was still standing in the court of the hotel, almost barefoot, and
thinking of the prosperous condition of the owner of a dozen shirts, and
other things conforming, when Mr. Hill came over and introduced himself;
and telling me that his house was the house of every American, asked me
to waive ceremony and bring my luggage over at once. This was again
hitting my sore point; everybody seemed to take a special interest in
my luggage, and I was obliged to tell my story more than once. I
declined Mr. Hill's kind invitation, but called upon him early the next
day, dined with him, and, during the whole of my stay in Athens, was in
the habit, to a great extent, of making his house my home; and this, I
believe, is the case with all the Americans who go there; besides which,
some borrow his money, and others his clothes.