PAGE 92. Monastic Zitza! from thy shady brow. The convent and village of Zitza are four hours' journey from Joannina, or Yanina, the capital of the Pachalick. In the valley the river Kalamas (once the Acheron) flows, and, not far from Zitza, forms a fine cataract. The situation is perhaps the finest in Greece, though the approach to Delvinachi and parts of Acarnania and Etolia may contest the palm. Delphi, Parnassus, and, in Attica, even Cape Colonna and Port Raphti, are very inferior; as also every scene in Ionia, or the Troad: I am almost inclined to add the approach to Constantinople; but, from the different features of the last, a comparison can hardly be made. PAGE 94. Here dwells the caloyer, nor rude is he. The Greek monks are so called. PAGE 94. Nature's volcanic amphitheatre. The Chimariot mountains appear to have been volcanic. And Laos wide and fierce came roaring by. The river Laos was full at the time the author passed it; and, immediately above Tepaleen, was to the eye as wide as the Thames at Westminster; at least in the opinion of the author and his fellow-traveller. In the summer it must be much narrower. It certainly is the finest river in the Levant; neither Achelous, Alpheus, Acheron, Scamander, nor Cayster, approached it in breadth or beauty. PAGE 102. And fellow-countrymen have stood aloof. Alluding to the wreckers of Cornwall. PAGE 104. The feast was done, the red wine circling fast. The Albanian Mussulmans do not abstain from wine, and, indeed, very few of the others. PAGE 104. Each Palikar his sabre from him cast. Palikar, shortened when addressed to a single person, from Пaλikapı, a general name for a soldier amongst the Greeks and Albanese, who speak Romaic: it means, properly, "a lad.” PAGE 104. While thus in concert they this lay half sang, half screamed. As a specimen of the Albanian or Arnaout dialect of the Illyric, I here insert two of their most popular choral songs, which are generally chanted in dancing by men or women indiscriminately. The first words are merely a kind of chorus without meaning, like some in our own and all other languages. 1. Bo, Bo, Bo, Bo, Bo, Bo, 2. Naciarura na civin 4. Caliriote me surme Ede vete tunde tunde. 7. Caliriote me surme Ti mi put e poi mi le. 8. Se ti puta citi mora Si mi ri ni veti udo gia. 9. Va le ni il che cadale Celo more, more celo. 10. Plu hari ti tirete Plu huron cia pra seti. 1. Lo, Lo, I come, I come; be thou silent. 2. I come, I run; open the door that I may enter. 3. Open the door by halves, that I may take my turban. 4. Caliriotes with the dark eyes, open the gate that I may enter. 5. Lo, Lo, I hear thee, my soul. 6. An Arnaout girl, in costly garb, walks with graceful pride. 7. Caliriot maid of the dark eyes, give me a kiss. 8. If I have kissed thee, what hast thou gained? My soul is consumed with fire. 9. Dance lightly, more gently, and gently still. 10. Make not so much dust to destroy your embroidered hose. * The Albanese, particularly the women, are frequently termed "Caliriotes," for what reason I inquired in vain. The last stanza would puzzle a commentator; the men have certainly buskins of the most beautiful texture, but the ladies (to whom the above is supposed to be addressed) have nothing under their little yellow boots and slippers but a well-turned and sometimes very white ankle. The Arnaout girls are much handsomer than the Greeks, and their dress is far more picturesque. They preserve their shape much longer also, from being always in the open air. It is to be observed, that the Arnaout is not a written language: the words of this song, therefore, as well as the one which follows, are spelt according to their pronunciation. They are copied by one who speaks and understands the dialect perfectly, and who is a native of Athens. 1. Ndi sefda tinde ulavossa Vettimi upri vi lofsa. 2. Ah vaisisso mi privi lofse Si mi rini mi la vosse. 3. Uti tasa roba stua Sitti eve tulati dua. 4. Roba stinori ssidua Qu mi sini vetti dua. 5. Qurmini dua civileni Roba ti siarmi tildi eni. 1. I am wounded by thy love, and have loved but to scorch myself. 2. Thou hast consumed me! Ah, maid! thou hast struck me to the heart. 3. I have said I wish no dowry, but thine eyes and eyelashes. 4. The accursed dowry I want not, but thee only. 5. Give me thy charms, and let the portion feed the flames. 6. Utara pisa vaisisso me simi rin ti hapti 6. I have loved thee, maid, with a sincere soul, but Eti mi bire a piste si gui dendroi tiltati. thou hast left me like a withered tree. 7. Udi vura udorini udiri cicova cilti mora 7. If I have placed my hand on thy bosom, what have Udorini talti hollua u ede caimoni mora. I gained my hand is withdrawn, but retains the flame. I believe the two last stanzas, as they are in a different measure, ought to belong to another ballad. An idea something similar to the thought in the last lines was expressed by Socrates, whose arm having come in contact with one of his "TOKONTIOL," Critobulus or Cleobulus, the philosopher complained of a shooting pain as far as his shoulder for some days after, and therefore very properly resolved to teach his disciples in future without touching them. Drummer. PAGE 105. Tambourgi! Tambourgi! thy 'larum afar. PAGE 105. Chimariot, Illyrian, and dark Suliote! These stanzas are partly taken from different Albanese songs, as far as I was able to make them out by the exposition of the Albanese in Romaic and Italian. PAGE 107. Remember the moment when Previsa fell. It was taken by storm from the French. When his Delhis came dashing in blood o'er the banks. Horsemen, answering to our forlorn hope. PAGE 107. Sword-bearer. Selictar! unsheathe then our chief's scimitar. PAGE 107. I. Fair Greece! sad relic of departed worth. Before I say anything about a city of which everybody, traveller or not, has thought it necessary to say something, I will request Miss Owenson, when she next borrows an Athenian heroine for her four volumes, to have the goodness to marry her to somebody more of a gentleman than a Disdar Aga (who by the by is not an Aga), the most impolite of petty officers, the greatest patron of larceny Athens ever saw (except Lord E.), and the unworthy occupant of the Acropolis, on a handsome annual stipend of 150 piastres (eight pounds sterling), out of which he has only to pay his garrison, the most ill-regulated corps in the ill-regulated Ottoman Empire. I speak it tenderly, seeing I was once the cause of the husband of "Ida of Athens" nearly suffering the bastinado; and because the said "Disdar" is a turbulent husband, and beats his wife; so that I exhort and beseech Miss Owenson to sue for a separate maintenance in behalf of “ Ida." Having premised thus much, on a matter of such import to the readers of romances, I may now leave Ida, to mention her birth-place. Setting aside the magic of the name, and all those associations which it would be pedantic and superfluous to recapitulate, the very situation of Athens would render it the favourite of all who have eyes for art or nature. The climate, to me at least, appeared a perpetual spring; during eight months I never passed a day without being as many hours on horseback: rain is extremely rare, snow never lies in the plains, and a cloudy day is an agreeable rarity. In Spain, Portugal, and every part of the East which I visited, except Ionia and Attica, I perceived no such superiority of climate to our own; and at Constantinople, where I passed May, June, and part of July (1810), you might "damn the climate, and complain of spleen," five days out of seven. The air of the Morea is heavy and unwholesome, but the moment you pass the Isthmus in the direction of Megara, the change is strikingly perceptible. But I fear Hesiod will still be found correct in his description of a Bœotian winter. We found at Lavadia an "esprit fort" in a Greek bishop, of all free-thinkers! This worthy hypocrite rallied his own religion with great intrepidity (but not before his flock), and talked of a mass as a “coglioneria." It was impossible to think better of him for this; but, for a Boeotian, he was brisk with all his absurdity. This phenomenon (with the exception indeed of Thebes, the remains of Charonea, the plain of Platea, Orchomenus, Livadia, and its nominal cave of Trophonius) was the only remarkable thing we saw before we passed Mount Cithæron. The fountain of Dirce turns a mill: at least my companion (who, resolving to be at once cleanly and classical, bathed in it) pronounced it to be the fountain of Dirce, and anybody who thinks it worth while may contradict him. At Castri we drank of half a dozen streamlets, some not of the purest, before we decided to our satisfaction which was the true Castalian, and even that had a villanous twang, probably from the snow, though it did not throw us into an epic fever, like poor Dr. Chandler. From Fort Phyle, of which large remains still exist, the Plain of Athens, Pentelicus, Hymettus, the Egean, and the Acropolis, burst upon the eye at once; in my opinion, a more glorious prospect than even Cintra or Istambol. Not the view from the Troad, with Ida, the Hellespont, and the more distant Mount Athos, can equal it, though so superior in extent. I heard much of the beauty of Arcadia, but excepting the view from the Monastery of Megaspelion (which is inferior to Zitza in a command of country), and the descent from the mountains on the way from Tripolitza to Argos, Arcadia has little to recommend it beyond the name. "Sternitur, et dulces moriens reminiscitur Argos." Virgil could have put this into the mouth of none but an Argive, and (with reverence be it spoken) it does not deserve the epithet. And if the Polynices of Statius, "In mediis audit duo litora campis," did actually hear both shores in crossing the Isthmus of Corinth, he had better ears than have ever been worn in such a journey since. "Athens," says a celebrated topographer, "is still the most polished city of Greece." Perhaps it may of Greece, but not of the Greeks; for Joannina in Epirus is universally allowed, amongst themselves, to be superior in the wealth, |