98 Notes of a Journey in Greece, 



of some weeks in Constantinople, and a quarantine of twenty- 

 four clays in the Isle of Syra. 



I arrived in Greece about the end of July. What a differ- 

 ence between the coasts of Attica or of the Peloponnesus and those 

 which I had just passed ! The shores of Asia Minor, of the 

 Bosphorus, and of the Dardanelles are filled with gardens, which 

 present to the eye of the traveller a vigorous vegetation, as varied 

 as the nations which inhabit them. Those of modern Greece 

 were naked under the burning July sun ; the little vegetation 

 which had flourished there had been completely withered up ; 

 and before I perceived some signs of habitation, I thought I was 

 landing on a rock abandoned at once by man and nature. I saw 

 nothing above the surface but some remains of the o-iffantic mo- 

 numents of the ancient Greeks. 



I landed at the Piraeeus, and proceeded, soon after landing, to 

 Athens. The road which led to the city was new; on the. right 

 and left were planted, at a considerable distance from each other, 

 plane trees, poplars, alders, and some walnut trees. It was rather 

 difficult to distinguish these trees at first, as they were generally 

 in bad condition, and the greater part of their imperfect heads 

 was without foliage. 



The road also passes through a forest of olive trees ; it is the 

 only thing in the neighbourhood of Athens, useful to the inha- 

 bitants, that has not been entirely destroyed by the stolid ferocity 

 of the Turks and Egyptians. This forest made no better im- 

 pression on my imagination than the first aspect of the country. 

 Those who have seen forests of olive trees know that their livid 

 hue entirely changes the character of the landscape. 



I arrived at Athens ; and the first thing that struck my sight, 

 that delighted me, was, not so much the imposing aspect of the 

 Acropolis, and of the Temple of Theseus, as the finding of a 

 date tree, nearly 50 ft. high, growing in the middle of the Via 

 d'Hermes. This date tree had continued to grow, and had not 

 been injured by any one ; besides this specimen, I saw five or six 

 others in the different districts of the city, also several cypresses, 

 but these were all. 



It must be confessed that Athens, for a celebrated city, pre- 

 sents but a denuded aspect ; this cannot be said, however, of some 

 places, situated at a little distance from the city, such as the vil- 

 lage of Marupi, that of Kephyssia, Angello-Kibi, &c. In these 

 places we meet with a tolerably vigorous vegetation. At Ke- 

 physsia several foreign ambassadors have country houses ; the 

 Russian ambassador particularly has a large establishment ; and 

 there is there a magnificent group of plane trees (Platanus orien- 

 talis), planted, no doubt, by some Turk. There are also a con- 

 siderable number of mulberry trees, some fruit trees, pear, apple, 

 and plum trees. Close by is a very old plantation of olive trees ; 



