Chap. III.

GRECIAN.

43

The walls around the Piraeus were constructed with the stone brought from the quarriesclose at hand, mentioned by Xenophon .

When the writer visited the Piraeus in 1818, there was nothing left to indicate its formerimportance; its temples, porticoes, theatre, arsenals, and other magnificent structures,having all disappeared; the two lions, 10 feet high, of admirable sculpture, which weretaken away by Morosini, now adorn the arsenal at Venice . At the mouth of the porttwo ruined piers are to be seen, which were united by a chain, stretched across for itsdefence; the deepest water is at the mouth of the inner port, the Aphrodisus of the• old Pirzeus. It seems difficult to understand how, in the time of Constantine, 200 shipscould have found anchorage here, or that it ever could have contained the whole ofthe Athenian navy, which at one period was said to consist of 300 ships of three banks ofoars, the whole length of the harbour, from the outer mouth to the innermost recess, beingnot more than a mile and a quarter.

The ground of the peninsula called Munychia is both high and rocky, and not capable ofbeing applied to cultivation; its shores are indented with four small natural bays. Thewalls which fortified it may be traced in various places nearly all round, particularly acrossthe neck between the port of Munychia and the Pirzeus. The old harbour of Munychia isof a circular form, and there are the remains of several walls running into the sea, and partsof the piers on each side of the mouth, which reduced the entrance to this port, and madeit much less than that of the Pirzeus. The walls which surrounded it are traceable on theeastern side of the harbour, and the whole extent of them appears to have been about fourmiles.

Between Munychia and Phalerum, and at the top of the cliff, between these two ports,is an excavation made in the rock, decorated with a pilaster on each side, rather rudely cut,which probably served for the sentinel placed there to reconnoitre. The port of Pha-lerum is smaller than that of Munychia, and is in its form elliptical; at its verynarrow mouth are the remains of the two stone piers that formed its entrance; on thenorth-east side of this port the land is high and rocky, and beyond is the bay of Phalerum,two miles or more in length, terminated by the low promontory of Colias, where wasobtained the clay from which the most beautiful pottery was made. From one point ofthis bay, which lies south-south-west from Athens , the sea may be computed at a littlemore than twenty stadia distant from the city ; and Pausanias , who lived in the secondcentury, gives us an account of two roads which led from thence to the ports, one toPhalerum, and the other to the Pirzeus: on the side of the latter, in his time, remained apart of the walls erected by Conon , and the sepulchral monuments of Menander and Euri­ pides , that of the latter being a cenotaph or mound of earth without his ashes.

These ports were united to Athens by the long walls, traces of which on the right of thepresent road, which conducts from Athens to the Pirzeus, may still be seen. The walls ofAthens , when in its prosperity, together with those which connected the Pirzeus, were inlength 195 stadia, or 24 miles and 2i furlongs; those enclosing the Pirzeus andMunychia comprising of this quantity 60 stadia, the long walLs which joined the Piraeus tothe city on the north side 40 stadia, and on the south side 35 stadia; and the exterior citywall, which joined the ends of the two long walls, was 43 stadia ; the middle or interiorwall between the long walls was 17 stadia. The circuit of the city wall alone, withoutthe long walls, was computed at 60 stadia or 7 miles and a half, the portions towardsIiymettus and Pentelicus were constructed of brick.

Thucydides informs us, that when the Athenians raised their walls after their de-struction by the Persians , they used so much haste, that they united stones of various kindsand dimensions, many columns taken from tombs, and whatever came first to hand.

The breadth of the walls about the Pirzeus was sufficient to allow two carriages to passupon it, and although so thick, they were entirely built of squared stone throughout, andcramped with iron run with lead.

Eleusis . The site of the ancient town, with its walls, was a short distance north-eastfrom the port, where are the remains of three ruined moles : two of these formed theport, which was an oval; the other, which nearly divided it, seems rather to havebeen a landing-place ; attached to this is a modern one, which springs from it nearlyat right angles. The sacred way from Athens is still discernible, as is the road fromMegara.

A ridge of the Icarian range of mountains separates Eleusis from the plain of Athens .Eleusis is situated in the Thriasian plain, where Ceres first gave her instructions inagriculture; the citadel stands on a low rocky hill, about 300 yards from the sea;on the declivity which faces the south-east is formed a terrace, and on this wasfounded her celebrated temple, which was backed by the Acropolis. Around thebase, and along the margin of the Bay of Salamis , were numerous villas and residencesof the inhabitants, together forming a picture of a very imposing kind. The propyleaor entrance to the Acropolis equalled in beauty that at Athens . A little beyond theSacred V ay are some remains of tombs, and at about a mile distant, near the river Cephissus,