Notices of Ancient and Modern Greece. 253 



and power of its builders : this wall has at different times been re- 

 paired ; and last by the Venetians, whose army of thirty thousand 

 men, were incessantly employed upon it for fifteen days and nights. 

 The remains of the Isthmian town are very visible, and considera- 

 ble ; an extensive platform of stone, and blocks of enormous fluted 

 columns, mark the site of the temple of Neptune ; the benches of 

 the theater are in front, and to the right, the Stadium remains perfect 

 in figure, though its marbles have disappeared. But as much as man 

 has done to embellish and improve this spot, all his exertions are noth- 

 ing in comparison to what has been done for it by the hand of na- 

 ture ', it would be difficult to describe the rich, extensive, and varied 

 prospect from the Aero Corinthus, so as to give you a tolerable idea 

 of it ; that from the house in which I am living, though less grand 

 and extensive, is one of the most interesting imaginable. The house 

 is situated on a little elevation at the foot of the mountain, which ter- 

 minates the Isthmus on the Peloponessian side ; to the right you 

 have the ever tranquil Egean, spread out like a lake ; you see Egina, 

 Salamina, and Attica, closing it in on that side, and the eye, glancing 

 along " dun Cithaeron" and Geranion, rests, with rapture, on the lofty 

 peaks of Parnassus, which are seen in front beyond the Corinthian 

 Gulf, which stretches away to the left, and is shut in by the elevated 

 plateau of Sicyon, and the higher hills of the Peloponessus : the 

 mountain of the Acro-Corinthus forms not the least striking part of 

 this picture, it stands solitary, separated from the rest of the chain, 

 and its vast, black, rocky surface, rising to a great height, crowned by 

 extensive walls and battlements, all strongly depicted against the ho- 

 rizon of the west, forms, at sunset, one of the most striking objects in 

 nature. Then, it has been the scene of so many spirit-stirring actions, 

 that the heart burns within one at the bare sight of its ramparts. As 

 a military position however, the fortress of Corinth is by no means of 

 that consequence, that the immense extent of its fortifications would 

 make one suppose it had been considered by its builders ; the circuit 

 of the walls is so great that three thousand men would hardly suffice 

 it for a garrison, and it is evident from the magazines, caverns, cis- 

 terns, &c. that it had been calculated for tens of thousands. It is a 

 question somewhat curious, why such immense cisterns should have 

 been made in a place abounding with water, nor is it less curious that 

 at so elevated a point, on the summit of a rocky mountain, entirely 

 disconnected with others, there should be so much spring water : 

 there are about three hundred ancient wells, and more than half of 

 them still filled with the coldest and purest water. 



