sect. 1); Ritter von Xylander, who, in 1835, published 'Die Sprache der Albanesen,' a work containing a grammar and vocabulary; and Albanesische Studien' (Vienna, 1854), by J. G. de Hahn, Austrian consul in Albania; a very learned dissertation. Except a few officials sent from Constantinople, there are no Ottomans (i.e. Turks by race) in Albania; and although the Mahommedan Albanians now comprehend full half the nation, they are all the descendants of renegades who have apostatized from Christianity during the last four centuries, either to avoid persecution or to open to themselves a career. Their new faith, however, sits very loosely on most of them, and they often confound together Christian and Mahommedan, and even heathen, rites and names. Equally feared and hated by both Greeks and Ottomans, natives of Albania are to be found as mercenary soldiers in all parts of the Turkish Empire. The aggregate number of the race probably does not in all exceed a million and a half. They are divided in their own land into four principal tribes : 1. The Ghegs, who occupy all the north of Albania, and whose chief town is Scodra. The river Skumbi (the ancient Genusus), which falls into the Adriatic 6 hours' ride S. of Durazzo, and the lake of Ochirda, form the southern frontier of Ghegeria, as the country of the Ghegs is called. They are the most powerful, numerous, and characteristic of all the Albanian tribes. The Christians of this tribe, including the majority of the rural population in the plains, and all the mountaineers, belong to the Latin, and not like the Christians of Southern Albania, to the Greek Church. They are divided into various clans, the Mirditi, Clementi, Hotti, &c., some of whom, and especially the Mirditi, are still virtually independent, and governed by their native chieftains. 2. The Toskes, who dwell chiefly inland, extending from Delvino to Elbassan. Berat is their capital, and the river Skumbi their northern frontier. 3. The Liapes, who occupy Khimara and the maritime country to the southward and westward of the Toskes, reaching nearly as far as Delvino. 4. The Tjames, who are the most southernly of all the Albanian tribes. Their territory begins near Delvino, and they occupy the maritime country of southern Epirus, as far inland as the Greek districts about Joannina. The Suliots were therefore Tjames. The genuine Skipetar are generally of the middle stature, and of lighter complexion than the Greeks; very spare and muscular, and particularly slight round the waist. They shave their hair on the fore part of the head, but suffer it to flow in profusion from the crown, oπidev кoμÓWVтes, as Homer calls it. The lower classes are filthily dirty, often wearing the same coarse woollen shirt and kilt till they fall to pieces. The dress of the soldiery and higher orders is very graceful, and, as we have already seen, has been adopted since the Revolution as the national costume of Greece. The peasant women of Albania, like those of Greece, are generally handsome and well formed when young, but hard fare, exposure, and the field labour which they undergo, soon nip their beauty in its bud. The unmarried girls carry their whole fortune on their heads, in coins of many ages and countries, braided in their hair, or fastened in rows on their caps. This is a prevailing fashion, and, as it has been judiciously observed, enables a lover to reckon up the dowry as well as the charms of his fair one before he declares his affections. "Fierce are Albania's children, yet they lack Not virtues, were those virtues more mature. Than they in doubtful time of troublous need: Nationality, a passion at all times stronger in mountaineers than in inhabitants of the plains, is their strongest characteristic. No foreign country or new scenes can take from them the remembrance and the love of their mountains, their friends, and their villages. They are perpetually making invidious comparisons between their native place and everything about them in other countries. They consider all men, whether Moslems or Christians, as cowards, if opposed to their own countrymen; and justly pride themselves on their established fame as the best soldiers in the Ottoman Empire. All of them are warriors, and equally capable of using the sword and the long gun; and as they all carry arms, it is not easy to distinguish the soldier from the peasant. Their arms are not worn for parade, every district having been for years engaged in defensive war against bands of robbers, or in alliance with them in rebellion against the Porte. The recesses of Metzovo, and of the hills of Agrapha, which command the passes from Etolia and Thessaly into Epirus, were the favourite haunts of these formidable bands of banditti, who had spies throughout the country to give notice of the approach of any one they could plunder. They lived in caves or in the open air during the summer, returning to the towns in winter. Treachery is a vice rarely found among the Albanians. Those who have once "eaten your bread," and even those who are hired into your service, are capable of the most devoted attachment. Lord Byron says, "No nation is so detested or dreaded by their neighbours as the Albanese; the Greeks hardly regard them as Christians, or the Turks as Moslems; in fact they are a mixture of both, and sometimes neither. Their habits are predatory; all are armed; and the red-shawled Arnaouts the Montenegrins, Chimariots, and Guegues, are treacherous; the others differ somewhat in garb, and essentially in character. As far as my own experience goes, I can speak favourably. I was attended by two, an infidel and a Mussulman, to Constantinople and every other part of Turkey which came within my observation; and more faithful in peril or indefatigable in service are rarely to be found. The Infidel was named Basilius, the Moslem, Dervish Tihiri; the former a man of middle age, and the latter about my own. Basilius was strictly charged by Ali Pasha in person to attend us; and Dervish was one of fifty who accompanied us through the forest of Acarnania to the banks of Achelous, and onward to Mesolonghi in Etolia. There I took him into my own service, and never had occasion to repent it till the moment of my departure. 66 When, in 1810, after the departure of my friend Mr. Hobhouse for England, I was seized with a severe fever in the Morea, these men saved my life by frightening away my physician, whose throat they threatened to cut if I was not cured within a given time. To this consolatory assurance of posthumous retribution, and a resolute refusal of Dr. Romanell's prescriptions, I attributed my recovery. I had left my last remaining English servant at Athens; my dragoman was as ill as myself, and, my poor Arnaouts nursed me with an attention which would have done honour to civilization. They had a variety of adventures; for the Moslem Dervish, being a remarkably handsome man, was always squabbling with the husbands of Athens, insomuch that four of the principal Turks paid me a visit of remonstrance at the convent, on the subject of his having taken a woman from the bath-whom he had lawfully bought, however—a thing quite contrary to etiquette. Basilius also was extremely gallant amongst his own persuasion, and had the greatest veneration for the Church, mixed with the highest contempt of churchmen, whom he cuffed upon occasion in a most heterodox manner. Yet he never passed a church without crossing himself; and I remember the risk he ran in entering St. Sophia, in Stamboul, because it had once been a place of his worship. On remonstrating with him on his inconsistent proceedings, he invariably answered, Our church is holy, our priests are thieves;' and then he crossed himself as usual, and boxed the ears of the first papas' who refused to assist in any required operation, as was always found to be necessary where a priest had any influence with the Khodjà Bashi of his village. Indeed a more abandoned race of miscreants cannot exist than in the lower orders of the Greek clergy. (?) "When preparations were made for my return, my Albanians were summoned to receive their pay. Basilius took his with an awkward show of regret at my intended departure, and marched away to his quarters with his bag of piastres. I sent for Dervish, but for some time he was not to be found; at last he entered, just as Signor Logotheti, father to the ci-devant Anglo-consul of Athens, and some other of my Greek acquaintances, paid me a visit. Dervish took the money, but on a sudden dashed it to the ground; and clasping his hands, which he raised to his forehead, rushed out of the room, weeping bitterly. From that moment to the hour of my embarkation he continued his lamentations, and all our efforts to console him only produced this answer, 'M' àpive,' 'He leaves me.' Signor Logotheti, who never wept before for anything less than the loss of a para (about the fourth of a farthing), melted; the padre of the convent, my attendants, my visitors wept also-and I verily believe that even Sterne's 'foolish fat scullion' would have left her 'fish-kettle,' to sympathize with the unaffected and unexpected sorrow of this barbarian." 3. The Wallachs (Bλáxoi, Romouni). Amidst the innumerable emigrations of different races which characterize the history of Eastern Europe, from the decline of the Roman Empire until the conquest of Constantinople by the Turks, the Wallachs formed to themselves a national existence and a peculiar dialect in the country which they still occupy on the northern bank of the Danube. They grew out of the Roman colonies, which spread the language and civilization of Italy in those regions by amalgamating themselves with a portion of the ancient Dacian population. As early as the twelfth century a portion of the Wallachian race had settled in Thessaly, which, from their occupancy, is often styled in Byzantine history Great Wallachia. The remains of this Wallachian colony still exist in that part of the chain of Pindus which separates Epirus from Thessaly, where they now inhabit the towns of Metzovo and Kalarytes, and some large villages. Their whole number, however, in this district is stated by Mr. Finlay not to exceed 50,000 souls. (For the description of Wallachia and Moldavia see HANDBOOK FOR TURKEY.) Like their countrymen north of the Danube, the Wallachs of Pindus belong to the Greek Church, and have preserved their own language, a debased Latin strongly resembling Italian, but spotted with foreign terms and idioms, and still call themselves Romouni, Romans (in German Romaner). In Slavonic, Wallach, or Vlak, signifies [Greece.] D a Roman or Italian, being akin to the epithet of Welsh or Velsh, given by the Anglo-Saxons to the Italianized provincials of Britain, and by the Germans to the Italians. Besides keeping flocks and cattle in their native mountains, the Wallachs are to be found in nomade encampments throughout Northern Greece, whence their name is often applied by the Greeks, indiscriminately of race, to denote any wandering shepherds. They perform, moreover, a great part of the carrying trade between Thessaly and Albania, for which occupation Metzovo, situated near the Zygos pass, is a convenient position. The Wallachs have more peaceable habits and more industry than the Albanians; and if they are endowed with less native acuteness and desire for information than the Greeks, they possess at least equal steadiness and perseverance. SECTION I. IONIAN ISLANDS. SPECIAL INTRODUCTORY INFORMATION. 1. Historical Sketch and actual Condition, &c.-2. Climate, Soil, &c.3. Packets.-4. Money.-5. Shops, Servants, &c.-6. Inns and Accommodation for Travellers. 1. HISTORICAL SKETCH AND ACTUAL CONDITION, &c. THE Ionian Islands lie along the coast of Epirus, Acarnania, and the Peloponnesus, between the parallels of 36° and 40° N. lat., and 19° and 23° E. long. The principal islands, with their area and population, are as follows: Besides the above seven islands, there are a number of others of minor importance, Fano, Merlera, Salmatrakí, Antipaxo, Meganisi, Calamos, Petalà, Cerigotto, &c., dependent on them, and together with them constituting the Ionian Islands. Under the Venetian régime, Butrinto, Parga, Prevesa, Vonitza, and one or two other stations on the coast of the mainland, were annexed to the Ionian Islands, and, equally with them, were governed by a Proconsul, styled Provveditore Generale. An outline of the history of each of the islands will be given under its separate head, for in former times they were connected by no common bond of union, but formed separate states, often distinct in race and polity. Like the rest of Greece, they passed under the Roman sway, and in the decline of the Empire were partitioned out among various Latin princes, and desolated by the ravages of corsairs, Christian as well as Mahommedan. After many vicissitudes, the inhabitants of Corcyra, or Corfu, placed themselves in A.D. 1386 under the sovereignity of Venice; and the other islands of the Ionian Sea successively fell during the next two centuries under the dominion of that modern Carthage. The Greek possessions of the Republic were systematically governed by corruption and tyranny. In each island, the executive was composed entirely of natives of Venice, presided over by needy and rapacious Provveditori, sent out to enrich themselves, after the |