80 PROCEEDINGS OF THE REGENTS. 



Spence. It was designed and executed by a Greek lady of rare liter- 

 ary accomplisliments, Miss Elizabeth B. Contaxaki, assisted by six 

 Greek gentlemen, resident in Athens. It contains sketches of the 

 principal ruins in that city, and views of the most famous historical 

 places there and in other parts of Greece, correctly drawn and deli- 

 cately colored, together with the passage, from the classic authors, 

 in which the objects and places are described or referred to, transla- 

 tions of the passages, and extracts from English and French writers 

 on the same subjects. The book is adorned with exquisitely drawn 

 vignettes, and emblematic devices, and with specimens of the wild 

 flowers which grow in the places described, carefully preserved, 

 pressed, and attached to the leaves. The volume is bound in blue 

 velvet, and tastefully decorated with silver. It is put in an elegantly 

 and richly carved case, made of olive wood, from the olive groves near 

 Athens, where stood, in ancient times, the academic groves of Plato's 

 school. The body of the case is made of the trunk of the tree, and 

 the ornamental portions, of the root, which is of darker and richer 

 color. This beautiful gift, t*herefore, combines a great variety of 

 objects, possessing, from their associations with the loftiest achieve- 

 ments of Hellenic genius, a deep and singular interest, and forming 

 a most appropriate memorial of the country from which European 

 art, education, philosophy, and letters took their rise. 



Miss Contaxaki, the tasteful designer of this memorial_, is a native 

 of the island of Crete. At the time of the outbreak of the Greek 

 revolution, her father was a landed proprietor there, and, in common 

 with the great body of the Hellenic race, lost most of his property by 

 the rapacity and tyranny of the Turks. His family was dispersed, 

 and his daughter Elizabeth became an inmate in the family of the 

 Eev. Dr. John H. Hill, the American missionary, who established 

 himself in Athens, at the close of the war, for the benevolent and 

 enlightened purpose of aiding the Greeks to reconstruct the shattered 

 edifice of civilization, by establishing the school, which still continues 

 to dispense the blessings of education among the children of its first 

 pupils in that illustrious capital. Kesiding with Dr. Hill for many 

 years, and educated chiefly under his superintendence and care, Eliza- 

 beth became known to many American travellers in the East, by 

 whom she has often been mentioned with a cordial appreciation of her 

 accomplishments and merits. Their personal relations have naturally 

 inspired her with a warm interest in the United States, heightened 

 by the sympathies of the citizens of America in the regeneration of 

 her country, and the substantial aid furnished by them to Greece in 



