dour or for costly decorations; little chapels are as numerous in this as in the neighbouring islands, and indeed in most parts of Greece. into two nearly equal portions, connected by a narrow isthmus. On the southern side of this great gulf, local tradition exhibits in a small creek Ithaca is divided into four districts, the port of Phorcys, now called by the Bathy, Aetos, Anoge, and Exoge; Batù, Ithacans 'Aecía, probably because it is 'Aeròs, 'Avwyn, 'Ecwyn, i.e., Deep Bay, on the right hand of the entrance to Eagle's Cliff, Highland, Outland. The the port of Bathy; and a little way first at the southern, and the last at up Mount St. Stephen above the harthe northern extremity of the island, bour, the grotto of the Nymphs, in have each a fertile valley, but the which the sleeping Ulysses was derocky mountains of the two midland posited by the Phæacians (Od., xiii. districts admit of little cultivation, 116). The only entrance to this cave Currant-grapes form the staple com- is a narrow opening to the N.W., admodity of the Ithacans. A small mitting but little day. At the southern quantity of oil and wine is also ex- extremity there is a natural aperture, ported, the latter being reputed the but one more practicable for gods than best in the Ionian Islands. The pro- for men. The vault within is lighted duce in grain suffices only for three up by delicate gleams of a bluish hue, months' consumption; and even that and is hung with stalactites, expandquantity is raised by great toil and ing here and there into what Homer industry. But the natives are enabled calls webs of stone, where the Nymphs to supply themselves from abroad, may be fancied to have woven their partly by their profits in the currant threads whose colour was like the trade, and still more by the activity in purple of the ocean (Od., xiii. 108). maritime affairs which forms so re- It is highly probable that these are markable a feature in this little people. the very localities alluded to by Homer The sight of the modern capital of indeed, this seems the only point Ithaca must always excite admiration. exactly corresponding to the poet's Bathy contains about 2500 inhabitants, data:-1. In admitting unobserved of and extends in one narrow stripe of a rugged walk over woods and cliffs white houses round the southern ex-(Od., xiv. 1) to the station of Eumous tremity of the horseshoe port or "deep" at the extremity of the island nearest (Babu), whence it derives its name. Peloponnesus (Ód., xv. 36); 2. In being Large ships can moor in perfect safety directly in front of Neritos, and so close to the doors of their owners. Here exactly adapted to the speech of the are the dwellings of the chief proprie disguised Pallas, when she proves to tors and merchants, and several Greek Ulysses that he is in Ithaca by pointchurches. ing to the mountain (Od., xiii. 345). The beauty of the scene is enhanced It may here be remarked that a late by a small island, crowned with build-resident in the winter of 1850 came ings, in the middle of the harbour, in a single day from Ithaca to Corand by several insulated houses scat-cyra in one of the coasting boats of tered over the rising ground behind the island, which are very like ancient the town, and surrounded with trees galleys both in appearance and in mode and gardens. of navigation; so there is nothing wonThe whole prospect derives a sin-derful in his predecessor Ulysses having gular aspect of seclusion from the accomplished in a single night--parmountains which hang over it on ticularly with the aid of Athene-the every side. It has no view of the voyage from Corcyra to Ithaca (Od., open sea, because the creek on which xiii. 81). it is built is an inlet of the wide and deep gulf, which, branching out into arms and bays sheltered by lofty hills and projecting cliffs, and running up into the heart of the island, divides it We have hitherto taken it for granted that this is the Ithaca alluded to by Homer. "Of that fact," says Sir George Bowen, "we have ample testimony in its relative position to Zacyn 'Αλλ' άγε τοι δείξω Ιθάκης ἕδος, ὄφρα πεποίθης.* thus, Cephallenia, Leucadia, and the | he had never visited in preference to neighbouring mainland of Greece, as one well known to him? And what will at once be seen by a mere glance is there in Ithaca—a mere rugged and at the catalogue of ships in the Iliad, barren rock-to justify such preferor at the picture-like sketch of the sur- ence? Again, no one can pass from rounding scenery in Virgil (En., iii. the description of Phæacia, or of the 270 et seq.). More detailed proofs may country of the Cyclops and Lotusbe drawn from numerous passages in eaters, to that of Ithaca, without feelthe Odyssey, and from the internal ing that he has exchanged a land features of the island; to every sceptic of dreams for real and practical life. I would say, like Athene to Ulysses, This difference must originate in the mind of the poet, not in the minds of his hearers or readers. With Ithaca he was so well acquainted that he was not obliged to draw upon his fancy for the main features of its scenery. One has ceased, in the minds of some comgreat reason why the modern Ithaca mentators, to bear any resemblance at all to the Ithaca of the Odyssey,' is, perhaps, the fact that certain other scholars have proposed it as too minute a portrait of the poetic island, professing to have seen the very mill in which Ulysses ground his corn, and the very chamber in which Penelope "Wouldst thou thy breast from faithless doubts set free, O come, and view thy Ithaca with me." "There is something," says Dr. Wordsworth, "very fascinating in thus being brought into immediate contact with Homeric scenery and characters, and in reading with our own eyes the origin of which his poem is a transcript." The same accomplished writer argues that the author of the Odyssey' must have been really acquainted with Ithaca from the leading idea and moral of his poem, namely, the paramount love of country, which all the dangers of sea and land and all the witcheries of fairy islands cannot uproot from the breast of his hero. It is impossible to doubt that the poet had travelled in different regions of the world; is it probable that he would have laid the scene of a long poem in a country which Od., xiii. 344. The arguments on the sceptical side of the question have been collected and arranged in a very subtle and elaborate manner by Professor Völker in his 'Geographia Homerica;' but they have been successfully confuted in a pamphlet by Rühle von Lilienstern, Ueber das Homerische Ithaca,' The fondness with which Homer evidently dwells on the scenery of Ithaca gave rise to a report that he was a native of the island, and we accordingly find it enumerated among the seven cities which disputed the honour of having given birth to the poet: • Επτὰ πόλεις μάρναντο σοφὴν διὰ ῥίζαν Ομήρου, Σμύρνα, Χίος, Κολοφών, Ιθάκη, Πύλος, "Αργος, ̓Αθῆναι. But his biographer accounts for his perfect knowledge of the island by his having been detained there in the course of his travels by a severe disorder of the eyes, when he is said to have been kindly entertained by Mentor, one of the principal inhabitants, whom he has made so prominent a character in the Odyssey-(Vit. Hom.' 7.) wove her web. "The traveller who discovers everything leads all the world to suspect that he has, in reality, found nothing.' "From a poet we cannot, of course, expect the rigid accuracy of the landsurveyor; but to pretend that Homer was not well acquainted with Ithaca, because one or two fastidious commentators may find some difficulty in arranging his localities on their classical atlas, is almost as unreasonable as it would be to deny Shakspeare all personal knowledge of Windsor Forest, because of a similar difficulty in identifying Herne the Hunter's oak. Moreover, there have been discovered in the island a great number of coins and medals-those picture-books of antiquity-bearing the head of Ulysses with a pileus or conical cap, and the legend Ιθακῶν ;—the reverse generally exhibiting a cockman emblem of the hero's vigilance,-Athene, his tutelar deity-or Argus, his faithful dog. "Again, its own inhabitants have never ceased to apply to this island its classical name of Ithaca. Every * See Dr. Wordsworth's 'Greece,' p. 273 peasant is well acquainted with the the agora, Jupiter sends down sud name of Ulysses, and looks on him as the hero of his country; although of course as few of them can be found who know his story accurately, as peasants in Scotland who are precisely informed of the history of Robert Bruce or of William Wallace."* The principal excursions to be made in Ithaca are:-1. To the Castle of Ulysses. 2. To the Fountain of Arethusa. 3. To the so-called School of Homer. 1. On the sides and summit of the rocky hill of Aetos, which rises to the height of 1200 ft. above the sea on the narrow isthmus connecting the two divisions of the island, and about 4 m. from the town of Bathy, are situated the ancient remains called by the Ithacans "the old Castle of Ulysses." Every ruin whatsoever is known among the Greek peasants as máλαidν káσтρov, just as among the lower orders in Ireland as an "ould forth" (old fort). Among the thick underwood which covers the sides of the hill may be traced several lines of enclosure, testifying to the highest antiquity in the rude structure of massive stones which compose them. They furnish a specimen of what are called Cyclopean remains. The situation of several gates is distinctly marked among the ruins of the Castle of Ulysses; there are also the remains of two large subterranean cisterns and some appearances of a tower. There can be little doubt that this is the place to which Cicero alludes in praising the patriotism of Ulysses,-"how the wisest of men preferred even to immortality that Ithaca, which is fixed, like a bird's nest, among the most rugged of rocks." The name too of Aetos -i.e. the Eagle's Cliff-recalls the remarkable scene in the 'Odyssey (ii. 146) where, during the debate in For other arguments to the same effect, we refer to Mure's Journal of a Tour in Greece,' and to Sir George Bowen's Ithaca in 1850,' which we have chiefly followed in this account of the island. denly from the mountain-top a pair of eagles, which hover with ominous flight over the wondering crowd. If more substantial proofs are wanting, such trifling coincidences would alone afford a strong presumption that the Ithaca of Homer was something more than the creature of his own fancy, as some have supposed it. "Though the grand outline of a fable," says Sir W. Gell, "may be easily imgined, yet the consistent adaptation of minute incidents to a long and elaborate falsehood is a task of the most arduous and complicated nature." The view from the Castle of Ulysses is most interesting and magnificent. On one side, you look down on the winding strait, separating Ithaca from Cephalonia, whose rugged mountains rise abruptly from the water; and, at the distance of about 10 m., may be clearly distinguished the ruins of the ancient city of Same or Samos, whence came four-and-twenty of the suitors of Penelope (Apollodorus, quoted by Strabo, x. 2). On the other side, the great port of Ithaca, with all its rocks and creeks, lies immediately below your feet. To the E. the eye ranges over clusters of "Summer isles of Eden lying in dark purple spheres of sea" to the mountains of Acarnania, rising ridge above ridge. To the S., the horizon is bounded by the high peaks of the Peloponnesus, crowned with snow the greater part of the year, and glit tering in the glorious sunshine. To the N., Leucadia ends in the bold white headland called Sappho's Leap "the lover's refuge, and the Lesbian's grave." At the base of the "castled crag' of Ulysses have been discovered numerous tombs, several marbles with sepulchral inscriptions, and many bronze figures, vases, and lacrymalia, as well as gold rings and other ornaments, many of them of delicate and beautiful workmanship. Here was the ancient cemetery of Ithaca. In the Greek islands the tombs generally lined the shore of the sea, that high same feeling doubtless which placed the graves of the ancient Romans along the sides of their streets and roads, as is proved by the ruins of Pompeii, and by the often-recurring inscription, "Siste, Viator"-"Stop, wayfarer." Among the rocks to the westward of the modern town may also be traced some ancient sepulchres hewn out of the solid stone. One of them is surmounted by a rude female figure, and of course is popularly called "the Grave of Penelope." The excursion to the Castle of Ulysses may be extended to the Convent of Kathara, on the western side of Neritos, and about 1 hr. over a good road from Bathy. This point, being higher above the sea, commands a still more magnificent prospect than that from the hill of Aetos. The village of Anoge is only 20 minutes beyond the Convent; and hence the traveller may reach, by a bridle-path, the socalled "School of Homer," through Marrona and Fikes, and then return to Bathy by Stamos,-in all a circuit of about 25 m. The summit of Mount Neritos, 2350 ft. above the sea-level, may be reached easily from the village of Anoge. way of their surviving friends, from the | Ulysses as challenging Eumæus "to throw him over the great rock" if he finds that he is speaking false (Od., xiv. 398); and there is every reason to believe that the little plain hard by was the swineherd's station (Od., xiii. 407). At the present day we may observe that the Greek herdsmen always make their encampments near wells and springs; and such a source and such shelter as are found on this spot must have ever been valuable and celebrated in so thirsty a soil. It is literally river of water in a dry place, the shadow of a great rock in a weary land." The description given by Homer of Eumæus' station* is curiously like some cottages near this spot at present. Their position is "a place of open prospect' (περισκέπτῳ xp); each hut is "surrounded with a circular court" (avλn πeplopoμos); enclosed by a rude wall of loose stones, crowned with chevaux-de-frise of prickly plants (¿xépdw), and a thick palisade of stakes. Similar are the rude encampments of the shepherds in all parts of Greece. These wigwams, when erected for only temporary shelter by wandering tribes of Wallachians-those Scythians of the present day—“quorum plaustra vagas ritè trahunt domos "-consist of merely a few poles thatched with straw or green boughs, and the wild inmates, crouching round their fires, forcibly call to mind some of those whom 2. Near the S.E. extremity of the island, and about 5 m. from Bathy, rises a beautiful white cliff, fronting the sea. From its foot, a narrow glen clothed with the evergreen and aromatic shrubs of Greece descends by a rapid slope to the shore, framing, as in a picture, between its leafy precipices glorious prospects of the sea and of the Acarnanian Mountains. In a recess on this declivity is a natural and never failing reservoir, which the tradition of the islanders identifies with Homer's fountain of Arethusa. They also have never ceased to call the cliff Korax, i. e. the Raven-rock, and the ravens which may often be seen soaring around it, as if it were their favourite hannt, speak home to the conviction with greater force than whole pages of quotation and argument. This then is probably the very precipice to which the poet refers when he represents "Dall' alte selve irsuti manda La divisa dal mondo ultima Irlanda.”† On approaching hamlets and sheepfolds in all parts of Greece, the stranger is certain to find a somewhat disagreeable coincidence with Homer in being assailed, as fiercely as was Ulysses, by a pack of dogs. The number and ferocity of these descendants of the famous Molossian * Od., xiv. 5-12. These shepherds' huts are now called Kaλußta, a word used by Plutarch (Pompey, 73); and a diminutive of κaλußn, often found in the ancient writers.-Cf. Batrachomyomachia, 30; Herod. v. 16; Thucyd. 1 133. + Tasso, 'Gerusalemme Liberata,' Canto sheepfold would, like Ulysses, be in considerable danger of being torn to pieces; but on the public path, or at a distance from the objects of their care, these dogs seldom come to close quarters, and the lifting a stone in a threatening way, or even the act of stooping to pick one up, has usually the effect of keeping them off. Hence the humorous allusion of Aristophanes (Equites, 1028). breed, resembling in appearance a cross between an English mastiff and sheepdog, is one of the peculiarities of the country which first attracts the attention of the traveller; and is also among the features of modern Greek life that supply the most curious illustrations of classical antiquity. Their masters are at first generally remiss in calling them off, which they imagine cows their spirit, and makes them useless against wolves and robbers; and yet whoever shoots. Λέγε δῆτ'· ἐγὼ δὲ πρῶτα λήψομαι λίθον, or seriously injures them is almost Ινα μή μ' δ χρησμὸς ὁ περὶ τοῦ κυρὸς sure to get into a dangerous collision δάκῃ. man with the natives. This sometimes It has been observed too-with perhappens now-a-days to English shoot-haps as much of satire as of truthing parties, as it formerly did to Her- that a dog is never seen within the cules at Sparta.* The usual weapons walls of Greek churches, owing to of defence, therefore, are the large the terror inspired by the frequent loose stones, with which the rocky bowing of the congregation in the soil of Greece is everywhere strewed. course of their devotions, which the These are generally as large as a animal mistakes for stooping to lift can throw with one hand-up stones. A stranger finding himliterally the Homeric xepuádiov, or self in the same predicament as handful," and "sharp and jagged ' Ulysses when set upon by the dogs (ORPIÓELS) like those hurled by the of his own swineherd, should imitate heroes of the Tale of Troy divine.' the example of the king of Ithaca, Colonel Mure 'observes that it was and craftily (kepdoσúvn) sit down on a personal familiarity with this com- the ground, dropping all weapons of mon feature of Hellenic nature and defence (σкÂπтρоν dè оi Ĕкπeσe Xelpós) Hellenic manners that first conveyed until rescued by the Eumæus of to his mind a clear and vivid im- the fold with "loud cries" and "thick pression of that often-recurring in-showers of stones."* It is confidently cident of Homer's battles, when the combatants resort to the arms of offence which their native soil so abundantly supplies. Even in more civilized ages this weapon does not seem to have fallen altogether into disuse among the Greek military; † and Sir Walter Scott tells us that in one of Montrose's battles, the Highlanders, when their ammunition had failed, drove back the Covenanters with volleys of stones. A solitary stranger suddenly entering a Greek asserted by eye-witnesses that the dogs will form a circle round the person who thus disarms their wrath and suspicion, and renew their attack only when he moves again. 3. The so-called School of Homer is situated near the village of Exoge in the northern division of the island. It consists of the substructions of some ancient buildings, perhaps a temple, and of several steps and niches cut in the rock. It is a sweet and pleasant spot, overgrown with rich festoons of ivy and other graceful creepers. Not very far off, and clinging to the side of Neritos, is the beautiful little village of Leuce, which, peeping out from the midst of wild Od., xiv. 29-36. This passage explains Aristot. Rhet. ii. 3. öri de mрos TOUS TAĦELYOU μένους παύεται ἡ ὀργὴ καὶ οἱ κύνες δηλοῦσιν [ οὐ δάκνοντες τοὺς καθίζοντας. |