III. THE LEAF. 59 



ing the M&naliau range in spring. And then, lastly, yon 

 have the laurel and vine region, full of sweetness and 

 Elysian beauty. 



28. Now as Mercury is the ruling power of the hill en- 

 chantment, so Daphne of the leafy peace. She is, in her 

 first life, the daughter of the mountain river, the mist of 

 it filling the valley ; the Sun, pursuing, and effacing it, 

 from dell to dell, is, literally, Apollo pursuing Daphne, 

 and adverse to her ; (not, as in the earlier tradition, the 

 Sun pursuing only his own light). Daphne, thus hunted, 

 cries to her mother, the Earth, which opens, and receives 

 her, causing the laurel to spring up in her stead. That 

 is to say, wherever the rocks protect the mist from the 

 sunbeam, and suffer it to water the earth, there the laurel 

 and other richest vegetation fill the hollows, giving a better 

 glory to the sun itself. For sunshine, on the torrent spray, 



nalian range which separates the Orchomenia from the valleys of Helisson 

 and Methydrium. is clothed also with large forests of the same trees ; 

 the road across this ridge from Lavidhi to Alonistena is now impractica- 

 ble on account of the snow. 



I am detained all day at Levidhi by a heavy fall of snow, which before 

 the evening has covered the ground to half a foot in depth, although 

 the village is not much elevated above the plain, nor in a more lofty sit- 

 uation than Tripolitza. 



March 4th. Yesterday afternoon and during the night the snow fell 

 in such quantities as to cover all the plains and adjacent mountains ; and 

 the country exhibited this morning as fine a snow-scene as Norway could 

 supply. As the day advanced and the sun appeared, the snow melted 

 rapidly, but the sky was soon overcast again, and the snow began to fall 



