A RIDE ACROSS THE PELOPONNESE. 207 



walked up and down with leathern bags of milk 

 under their left arm. At a signal, one of these, a 

 rosy -cheeked maiden who alone, we noticed, was 

 correct enough to use the definite article in her cry 

 (TO yaXa) came running up to us, and tilting up her 

 bag poured out a glass of delicious fresh milk, holding 

 herself overpaid with a couple of lepta (=ld.) 



We had intended to start for Epidaurus at six 

 o'clock, but our horses did not appear till after 

 seven, and it was not till half-past that we at last 

 rode out of Nauplia. 



Passing again through the Venetian gateway, by 

 which we had come in the night before, we turned 

 sharp to the right and began to ascend the mountain 

 pass behind the town. The road was very stony, 

 and the country, when once we had got out of the 

 plain, exceedingly wild and barren. The dry chalky 

 soil seemed to produce nothing but rough grass and 

 a few stinted shrubs. When, however, we had 

 reached the summit of the pass and began to de- 

 scend on the other side, we seemed to have come into 

 a totally different zone of vegetation. The rich 

 brown earth produced in luxuriant abundance lau- 

 restinus, oleanders, figs, vines, and olives. Here and 

 there stretched fields of waving barley, while about 

 our feet the ground was gay with flowers. The most 

 conspicuous was a splendid red poppy with a black 

 cross in the centre, which seems on the east side of 

 Greece to take the place of the scarlet anemone which 



