There is in the city a conduit erected by Theagenes, of whom I
mentioned before that he married his daughter to Cylon an Athenian.
This Theagenes when he was king erected this conduit, well worth seeing
for its size and beauty and the number of its pillars. And the water
that flows into is called after the Sithnidian Nymphs, who, according
to the Megarian tradition, are natives, and one of them bare a son
to Zeus, whose name was Megarus, and who escaped Deucalion’s flood
by getting to the top of Mount Gerania (_Cranemountain_), which was
not the original name of the mountain, but was so called because he
followed in his swimming the flight of some cranes by their cry. And
not far from this conduit is an ancient temple, and there are some
statues in it of Roman Emperors, and an image of Artemis in brass
by the name of Saviour. The story goes that some men in the army of
Mardonius who had overrun Megaris wished to return to Thebes to join
Mardonius, but by the contrivance of Artemis wandered about all night,
and lost their way, and got into the mountainous part of the country,
and, endeavouring to ascertain if the enemy’s army was about, shot some
arrows, and the rock shot at returned a groan, and they shot again and
again furiously. And at last their arrows were expended in shooting
at their supposed foes. And when day dawned, and the Megarians really
did attack them, (well armed against men badly armed and now _minus_
ammunition), they slew most of them. And this is why they put up an
image to Artemis the Saviour. Here too are images of the so-called 12
gods, the production of Praxiteles. He also made an Artemis of the
Strongylii. And next, as you enter the sacred enclosure of Zeus called
the Olympieum, there is a temple well worth seeing: the statue of Zeus
is not finished in consequence of the war between the Peloponnesians
and the Athenians, in which the Athenians every year by land and by
sea injured the Megarians both publicly and privately, ravaging their
territory, and bringing them individually to the greatest poverty.
And the head of this statue of Zeus is of ivory and gold, but the
other parts are of clay and earthenware: and they say it was made by
Theocosmus a native, assisted by Phidias. And above the head of Zeus
are the Seasons and the Fates: it is plain to all that Fate is his
servant, and that he orders the Seasons as is meet. In the back part of
the temple there are some wooden figures only half finished: Theocosmus
intended to finish them when he had adorned the statue of Zeus with
ivory and gold. And in the temple there is the brazen ram of a trireme,
which was they say taken at Salamis, in the sea fight against the
Athenians. The Athenians do not deny that there was for some time a
defection on the part of Salamis to the Megarians, but Solon they say
by his elegiac verses stirred the Athenians up, and they fought for
it, and eventually retook it. But the Megarians say that some of their
exiles, called Doryclei, mixed themselves among the inhabitants and
betrayed Salamis to the Athenians. And next to the enclosure of Zeus,
as you ascend the Acropolis still called the Carian from Car the son
of Phoroneus, is the temple of Nyctelian Dionysus, and the temple of
Aphrodite the Procuress, and the Oracle of Night, and a roofless
temple of dusty Zeus. And statues of Æsculapius and Hygiea, both the
work of Bryaxis. Here too is the sacred Hall of Demeter: which they say
was erected by Car when he was king.