RUINS OF THE PLAIN OF TROY. 54? 



the peasants said they found the medals they offered to us, and most 

 frequently after heavy rains. Many had been discovered in con- 

 sequence of the recent excavations made there of the Turks, who 

 were removing the materials of the old foundations .or the purpose 

 of constructing works at the Dardanelles. As these medals, bear- 

 ing indisputable legends to designate the people by whom they 

 were fabricated, have also, in the circumstances of their discovery, 

 a peculiar connection with the ruins here, they mRy be considered 

 as indicating, with tolerable certainty, the situation of the city to 

 which they belonged. Had we observed, in our route from Tchi- 

 black, precisely the line of direction mentioned by Strabo, and 

 continued a due course from east to west, instead of turning to. 

 wards the south in the Simo'isian Plain to visit the village of Cal. 

 lifat, we should have terminated the distance he has mentioned, 

 of thirty stadia, (as separating the city from the village of the Jli- 

 entians) by the discovery of these ruins. They may have been the 

 same which Kauffer noticed in his map, by the title of Ville de 

 Constantine ; but evidently appear to be the remains of New Fli. 

 um j whether we regard the testimony afforded by their situation, 

 as accordant with the text of Strabo ; or the discovery there made 

 of medals of the city. Once in possession of this importantp int 

 a light breaks in upon the dark labyrinth of Troas ; we stand 

 with Strabo upon the very spot whence he deduced his observations 

 concerning other objects in the district; looking down upon the 

 Simoisian Plain, and viewing the junction of the two rivers (one 

 flowing towards Sigeum, and the other towards Rhaeteum, pre. 

 cisely as described by him) in front of the Iliensian city ; being 

 guided, at the same time, to Callicolone, the village of the Hi -ans, 

 and the sepulchres of jEsyetes, Batieia, and Ilus, by ths clue ho 

 has afforded. From the natural or artificial elevation of the 

 territory on which the city stood, (an insulated object in the plain) 

 we beheld almost every landmark to which that author has alluded. 

 The splended spectacle presented towards the west by the snow, 

 clad top of Samothrace, towering behind Imbrus, would baffle 

 every attempt of delineation : it rose with indescribable gran- 

 deur, to a height beyond all 1 had seen for a long tiiie ; ami while 

 its aethereal summit shone with inconceivible brightness in a sky 

 without a cloud, seemed, notwithstanding its remote situation, as 

 its vastness would overwhelm all Troas, should an earthquake heave 

 it from its base. Nearer to the eye appeared the mouth of Hj 



