the world:- but in the matter of produce the difference is not inconsiderable: for, although this portion of Greece was never naturally fertile, and even nature was assisted by the ingenuity of an industrious population very inadequate to the support of the redundancy of inhabitants, we still have reason to believe that all was effected which man could accomplish in combating with the sterility of the land. The case is now widely different; and Attica, like other parts of the vast Turkish empire, exhibits with the neglect of agriculture the miseries universally consequent on inattention to this first of useful studies. The climate is still, Mr. Dodwell assures us, the first in Greece; and he adds that the extreme dryness of it has greatly contributed to the admirable preservation of the Athenian edifices, for where they have escaped the unhallowed violence of Christians, Turks, and Goths, they appear as fresh as if they had been lately finished.' Another modern traveller has observed, in poetical language, "the colouring of Claude is just and accurate as referable to Greece in her remote and lovely scenes. His luminous and unsullied purity of atmosphere, his delicate and undisturbed breadth of air, reveal to the eye the most fascinating hues in tender unison with each other." * This latter traveller, however, met with some rainy and much windy weather at Athens in the month of April: but the general character of the air is undoubtedly pure and dry. Mr. Dodwell says that the heat of the Athenian summer is mitigated by the regularity of the wind; which, rising about ten o'clock in the forenoon, blows with refreshing strength during a great part of the day. Thus has this same writer, with much apparent probability, inferred that the battle of Salamis commenced soon after ten in the forenoon, since Plutarch has told us that Themistocles waited for the rising of this wind. The olives and honey of Attica are still, according to Mr. D., the best in the world: but the provisions of the Greek continent in general are very inferior to those of the islands, especially the wine, which is usually impregnated with rosin. Dr. Chelli, a Roman physician, settled at Athens, assured the author to whom we have just made reference, that this custom is to be attributed to the knavery of the Greeks, who used the rosin to prevent the discovery of the quantity of water with which the wine is adulterated: but this is not, we believe, by any means a general opinion, nor is it mentioned by Mr. Dodwell.

* Travels in Italy, Greece, &c., by H. W. Williams, Esq., lately published, vol. ii. p. 339.

Corn becomes ripe in Attica nearly a month sooner than in the Morea, or in Crete; and this circumstance is attributed by the present author to the quantity of nitre with which the soil is impregnated. Instead of being threshed, the grain is trodden out by horses, the principal treading floors being the temple of Jupiter Olympius, that of Theseus, and the Pnyx. The antiquity of this custom, so indicative of simple and unimproved husbandry, equals, if it does not transcend, that of any with which we are acquainted, as the most antient sacred and profane records will testify. The bread is bad, and, if the wheat be not cleaned of the darnel (lolium) which grows with it, is apt to create giddiness and pains in the head in the person who eats it: but, even when this precaution has been taken, it is still very indifferent, usually gritty, and frequently vitiated by a mixture of bean-flour. Little mention is made of animal food by Mr. Dodwell: but from other quarters we learn that the market affords no great variety, and only meat of an inferior quality, as must necessarily be the case where the soil is both sterile and unimproved by art. The prices, however, are very moderate, and probably lower to natives than strangers; and the former consume much fish, the supplies of which might be greatly improved by a very little additional industry.

The modern Athenians appear to retain the same quadruple division of classes by which they were distinguished in early ages; viz. cultivators, craftsmen, military, and priests. The Albanians cultivate the land; the Greeks engage in commerce, and mechanical arts; the Turks garrison the city, and smoke; the priests do nothing.' This is rather a more concise and epigrammatic style of description than we could have desired. The dolce far niente of the priests is surely not their exclusive privilege, or at least the Turks themselves trespass very much on the rights of the holy fathers, if such be exclusively their own. Mr. Williams states that there are nearly 200 consecrated buildings in the town, for a population (we believe) of about 14,000, and describes the priests as in "good personal condition;" while Mr. Dodwell also asserts that they are the fattest and stoutest among the people, and that their appearance demonstrates that they are well fed :' but neither traveller informs us whence flows the milk and honey which supports them; for we presume, to borrow an expression from the Romish church, that they are, at Athens at least, mostly secular clergy.

In some of the Grecian islands the population is divided between the Greek patriarchal church, and that of Rome; amongst whom the most violent and indecent controversies frequently

arise,

arise. When their dissensions, become very furious, the Turks make both parties pay a fine, and then leave them to settle the difference as well as they can. "Fra due littiganti, il terzo gode."

The Greeks hold in abomination the numerous statues and paintings resembling life, which are seen in the churches of other countries.

I sometimes endeavoured to persuade them that there was no more harm in good paintings, than in the vile daubs which disgrace the churches of Greece, and which are purposely executed without effect of light and shade, in order that they may resemble nothing human or divine. But they affirm that this very circumstance constitutes their merit, as they have no appearance of reality; while, on the contrary, those in Catholic churches are such exact representations of life, that they appear to be breathing realities. "The bolder forms of sculpture in brass or in marble, which peopled the temples of antiquity, are offensive to the fancy or conscience of the Christian Greeks; and a smooth surface of colour has ever been esteemed a more decent and harmless mode of imitation. Your scandalous figures stand quite out from the canvass, they are as bad as a group of statues!" It was thus, says Gibbon, that the ignorance and bigotry of a Greek priest applauded the pictures of Titian, which he had ordered, but refused to accept!'

To this account of the absurdities of a single class of the population, may be appended another charge that is more universally applicable :

The Greeks, following the example of their ancestors, are fond of hyperbolical expressions, and frequently follow the oriental custom of saying the contrary to what they mean. They make some compensation however for this defect, by their sincere hospitality, and natural and unaffected civility. Very different is the false and complimentary style of phraseology that is used insome parts of Italy, where, on entering a house, the traveller is frequently offered the house itself, and every thing it contains; and at length, when he has obtained the bare necessaries of life, is obliged to pay four times their value, or to suffer insult and menace! A ludicrous instance of this disgusting and impudent hypocrisy was recounted to me by an English traveller, who visited the Lucrine Lake near Naples, and meeting a man upon its banks, asked him to whom it belonged? the answer was, To your Excellency. The fact is, the man was the proprietor of the lake, and made a complimentary gift of it to the traveller; who, encouraged by such extreme civility, begged that he might have a few oysters taken out of it, for which he would willingly pay; this little civility was however instantly refused!'

The "Græculus esuriens" retains in this respect also some resemblance to his predecessors in their less glorious days. It is singular that the common language used in Attica should be more vitiated than that of vitiated than that of any other part of Greece:

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but,

but, notwithstanding some contrary testimony, this statement appears to rest on good authority. Meursius, who is cited to support it, was no mean judge; and the lapse of nearly two centuries and a half is not likely to have altered the case. The music is universally bad, and peculiarly harsh to the ear of a foreigner; yet the effect produced by it on those who practise it, and their followers, is so strong that a Greek can seldom sing without dancing at the same time, and the rest of the company present can never resist the temptation of joining the party, as if actuated by a natural impulse; and when they all sing together the din is horrible.' The Romaic songs of the amatory cast, printed in Lord Byron's poems, and translated by him, convey a more favourable idea of this species of poetry than the reader will derive from Mr. Dodwell's relation: the Castalian spring made him fastidious, if not poetical. To the erotic expressions of the Greek ladies, preserved in Juvenal and Martial, Mr. D. adds the more modern terms of endearment, xv μov - παπια μου. my goose my duck.' We must not quarrel with the latter, because it is a good and true term of affection, for which we have a precedent in our own tongue: but to call a fair lady a goose seems any thing but complimentary, and impugns her powers of ratiocination as well as her beauty. Mr. D., however, assures us that it is the stately walk, slow and heavy, a great object of admiration in a Greek lover, which has caused the engrafting of this word in amatory poetry. The following expressions are therefore synonymous: incedit regina, she walks like a goose. The size of the bird, as lovers delight in diminutives, is perhaps the most solid objection to the inoculation of our own poetry with the comparison.

"Malbrouk" is the only Frank tune which Mr. Dodwell heard in Greece. In the islands of the Archipelago, he thought the native music was more tolerable: but Greek music in general seems to have been such a source of annoyance to him, that in any future visit he will probably follow the example of Ulysses; who, for all that we can tell, may not have been more delightfully serenaded. The improvisatori were rare, and inferior to those of Italy in every respect; a circumstance which we should consider as affording some consolation to a traveller wearied with a people screaming not merely " ab ovo usque ad mala," but " from morn to noon, from noon to dewy

eve."

Mr. D. thinks that the dances have probably varied little from their original models: but, after the description given of them, we hardly know how to assent to this idea, unless

on

:

on the supposition that the more elegant combinations of the dance have perished, and the most uncouth have been retained for it must be allowed that the latter have generally some character which takes us retrospectively to older days. Still the Athenian, whose praise it was, according to Pericles,

σε Τον άυλον ἄνδρα ἔπι πλειστ ̓ εἴδη, και μελα χαρίζων μαλις ἄν ευραπελως τὸ σῶμα αὐταρκες παρέχεσθαι.”

Thucyd. lib. ii. c.41.

may be presumed to have aimed at something more graceful in combination, as well as in execution, (for the latter has of course degenerated,) than dancing round a large circle, jumping first with one foot, and then with the other, without any pretensions to grace, elegance, or activity.' Such is the Romaika. The dances of an ambiguous or indecent character are chiefly practised by sailors," pressa cum jam portum tetigere carina." Dull and disgusting as they are, described to be, they sometimes make the gravity of the Turk to relax, and discompose the set order of his features. The following is a picture of a different cast:

• I had the satisfaction, while at Athens, of seeing the curious and interesting ceremonies attendant on an Albanian marriage. The Nuuon, or bride, arrived from the country, riding on horseback; the Nuupaywyos, or Пapoxos, walked before her, and a female, the Nuupevтpia, on each side: the bride, covered with the KaλvπTpa, or veil, was accompanied by a Papas, and a great crowd of Albanians, of both sexes, in gala dresses. The procession entered the gates of Athens with the sound of drums and fifes; and when it reached the bridegroom's house, the happy fair was welcomed by other Albanian women, dancing the Eupros, and singing the Evao, or marriage songs. υμεναίοι, The nuptial bed, or Κλινη νυμφιδίη, which was brought on horseback from the village, formed a conspicuous feature in the festivity of the procession. When the bride alighted from her horse, her veil was taken off : and she was conducted to the presence of her husband. The Tapos, or nuptial feast, ensued; when all the elderly ladies were affectionately busy in presenting the new-married pair with pomegranates and other fruits, hoping that she might imitate the fertility of those trees, and bless her husband with a numerous progeny.'

Female beauty is rare at Athens, and the natives have a tendency, like the Africans, to estimate this quality by its weight. We have understood that the straight nose and forehead are rarely to be seen, and certainly not more frequently than in other countries; yet art is the copyist of nature, and a peculiar outline of feature could never have been

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