20 DESCRIPTION OF JANINA. 



countless minarets of its mosques, the fort, resting 

 on the cahn lake, with the bold snow-tipped 

 Pindus in the background, strike a traveller with 

 astonishment and surprise that a place of such 

 seeming importance should exist in a country 

 wild, uninhabited, and apparently deserted, like 

 Albania. I was never more agreeably surprised 

 in my life than with Janina, and I wonder much 

 that so few persons take the trouble to visit it 

 from the Ionian Islands. 



Janina is said to be one thousand feet above 

 the level of the sea. The weather is very cold in 

 winter, and the residents say not disagreeable or 

 unhealthy in summer ; but the English consul, 

 Mr. Saunders, who resides generally at Prevesa, 

 but who is obliged to pass a portion of his time in 

 Janina, has a country house in a village in the 

 mountains, a much more agreeable residence 

 during the hot season. 



The population is said to be only twenty 

 thousand, but in the time of Ali Pasha it was 

 estimated at fifty thousand. The main cause of 

 this diminution is the constant emigration which 

 takes place to Greece, Servia, and Bosnia, and 

 other more settled governments. Even now there 



