VIEW FROM HYMETTUS.

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we are sketching an outline of the prominent features of this interesting scene, it would be unjust both to Milton and to Athens to omit it. It suggests to the mind but one cause of regret, namely, that its Author, instead of being called back, as he was, by the civil calamities of his country, from Italy into England, had not been prevailed upon by the more peaceful appeals of Nature to retain and execute his original intention of passing onward into Greece.

"Look once more, ere we leave this specular mount,
Westward, much nearer by south-west behold;
Where on the Ægæan shore a City stands,
Built nobly; pure the air, and light the soil;
ATHENS, the eye of Greece, mother of arts
And eloquence, native to famous wits,

Or hospitable, in her sweet recess,

City or suburban, studious walks and shades.
See there the olive grove of ACADEME,
Plato's retirement, where the Attic bird

Trills her thick-warbled notes the summer long;
There flowery hill HYMETTUS, with the sound

Of bees' industrious murmur, oft invites

To studious musing; there Ilissus rolls

His whispering stream: within the walls then view

The schools of ancient sages; his who bred
Great Alexander to subdue the world,
Lyceum there, and painted STOA next."

Remaining in the same position on the heights of Hymettus, let him now cast a glance eastward: immediately beneath him extends the MESOGEA Or INTERIOR Of Attica, sprinkled over with numerous villages: to the north-east he will see the cape CYNOSURA, which projects into the sea from the northern extremity of the plain of Marathon: further to the south-east are the lofty summits of CARYSTUS, concealing in their recesses their rich streaked veins of cipollino, and the GERESTIAN promontory, in the island of Euboea: beyond it to the south-east are the rocky cliffs of ANDROS and TENOS, and the cluster of the Cyclades grouped around their central islet of DELOS; and in a line between that spot and himself, he will pursue with his eye the range of hills which proceed onward from the mountain on which he stands, and run in a southerly direction over the silver mines of LAUREUM, sinking into the sea at the SUNIAN promontory.

Where Rivers discharge themselves into the Ocean, there Cities are built,

harbours are formed, and commerce flourishes. Here, at Sunium, where this Stream of Hills, which we have now followed for three hundred miles, falls into the sea, stands an object not unworthy to mark the close of its career. The solitary and beautiful TEMPLE, once dedicated to Minerva, which crowns the summit of the Sunian Cape, is the goal of their long and continuous course, which connects the central heights of PINDUS with the last promontory of ATTICA.

IF Lucian, in his dialogue which derives its title from their Contemplations, had desired to direct the attention of Mercury and Charon to the portion of Greece which is called the PELOPONNESUS, he would probably have adopted an expedient similar to that which he has employed in order to give them a more extensive prospect than this of which we now speak. The wish of one of those two personages whom we have mentioned was not merely to be presented with a view, as he expresses it, of cities and of mountains, but to behold the inhabitants of the former, and to learn what were their occupations and their conversation. For this purpose he chose an eminence to which he and his companion ascended, and which commanded a sight of all the objects which he desired to contemplate.

Our present design is not of so extensive a nature as that which was entertained by the philosopher of Samosata. From the imaginary summit where they stood he exhibited to his two spectators a comprehensive

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panorama, which embraced Ionia and Lydia on the east, Sicily and Italy on the west, and stretched from the Danube, southward, to the shores of Crete. Our view is limited to the district which lies nearly in the centre of these points. He showed to Mercury and Charon a prospect, from an ideal summit, of the known world: we would exhibit to the spectator, from a real mount, a view of the Peninsula of Greece.

The spot which Lucian would probably have selected for this purpose is the summit of a mountain on the western frontier of ARCADIA. Its peaked and isolated summit is crowned with a ruined castle; its slopes are sprinkled over with groups of cottages and sheepfolds, and thinly clad with low forests of oaks and of mountain pines. It rises on the west side of Mount LYCEUS, the hill sacred of old to Pan and the King of the Gods. It is now called Zakkouka.

From this point the spectator beholds the map of the Peloponnesus unrolled, as it were, before his eyes. Looking northward, he sees the lofty range of the Arcadian hills, which, commencing with the heights of the woody ERYMANTHUS, run in an easterly direction to the central