308 Professor Link's Contributions to the 



were afterwards shewn me by Viviani ; and they were precisely 

 similar to the fir-cones I had brought with me from Etna. 



Further to the east we meet with the Greek fir (Pinus mari- 

 timd), a tree of inconsiderable height, but having a beautiful 

 crown, and long light-green needle-shaped leaves, which, by 

 their peculiar tint, at once distinguish this species from all the 

 other firs. I found it in a wild state in no other country but 

 Greece. It enlivens exceedingly the gloomy mountains of that 

 country, and is particularly abundant in ancient Attica. From 

 the Acropolis, there is visible in the distance, on the sacred path 

 leading to E leu sis, a wood composed of the Pinus maritima. 

 Also on Hymettus, and on the promontory of Sunium, we find 

 woods of this cheerful looking tree. When we leave the hilly 

 plain of Megara, the road suddenly ascends towards the Isth- 

 mus ; a wood of these firs is then entered, rocks appear to the 

 right, and the mountains round which the path winds become 

 more lofty and more precipitous. The narrow arm of the sea, 

 with its bay, is almost completely shut up by the now deserted 

 island of Salamis, which there elevates its innumerable mountain 

 summits. A precipice overhanging the sea is now to be passed, 

 and might cause giddiness in the traveller, were it not for a 

 friendly thicket of mastick, which protects him from danger, 

 and permits him to enjoy undisturbed the extreme loveliness of 

 the scene. Traces are still perceptible of walls, and of tracks of 

 wheels on the rock. Here, in remote antiquity, was the abode 

 of the robber Pityokampos, who bound his victims between two 

 fir trees bent together, and thus cruelly murdered them. This he 

 might easily do with the small Greek fir, but it would have been 

 impossible with our species. 



In the Morea the tree is not abundant, and is almost confined 

 to the northern coast. It ornaments the valleys of Epidauros 

 and the mountains of ^Egina. At the foot of the lofty Cyllene, 

 towards the sea, it is found in perfection ; and it grows with a 

 beautiful and wide- spreading cro\rn on the rugged banks of the 

 river Xylocastro, which descends with violence from the moun- 

 tains. On the southern coast of the Morea it is rare, and on the 

 western coast we meet with the Aleppo fir (Pinus halepensis). 



The three firs we have now enumerated, viz. the pinaster, 

 the Aleppo fir, and the Greek sea-fir, characterise three regions 



