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could have been raised over the dead. The size and grandeur of the tumuli found 

 in this locality excite astonishing ideas of the wealth and power of the people by 

 whom they were erected, for the labour must have been prodigious and the expen- 

 diture enormous. The highest specimens of Hellenic art have been discovered in 

 these tumuli — such as sculpture, metal, alabaster and Etruscan vases, glass vessels, 

 remarkable for their lightness, carved ivory, coins, peculiarly pleasing on account of 

 their sharpness and finish, and trinkets, executed with a skill that would vie with 

 that of our best workmen. All originals were forwarded to the Hermitage, at St. 

 Petersburgh, duplicates being preserved in the Museum at Kertch, and these might 

 have been with ease secured to England on the investment of the place by the 

 Allies; but with the exceptiou of some bas-reliefs, which, in connexion with other 

 two officers, I transmitted to the British Museum, the whole of these rare treasures 

 were barbarously made away with. The local tradition is, that these tumuli were 

 raised over the remains, and to perpetuate the memory, of the kings or rulers who 

 held sway over the colonists, and that the earth Avas heaped upon them annually on 

 the anniversary of the decease of the prince, and for a period of years correspond- 

 ing to the rank or respect in which its tenant was held, or had reigned ; and to 

 this day successive layers of earth, which were laid on in each succeeding year, can 

 be traced in their coating of sea-shell or charcoal having been first put down. I 

 have counted as many as 30 layers in a scarp made in one of those mounds, about 

 two-thirds from its base. They are to be seen of all sizes, varying from 10 to 300 

 feet in circumference, and in height from 5 to 150 feet, and are usually oomposedof 

 surface soil and rubble masonry. Herodotus' reference to these sepulchres is the 

 earliest account which history has recorded of this mode of burial; and I would 

 particularly draw your attention to his description of the mode adopted by the 

 Scythians to perpetuate the memory of their deceased princes, for you will hereafter 

 see that one of my excavations corresponded exactly with the description given by 

 him. " The tombs of the Scythian kings," he states, " are seen in the land Gberri, 

 at the extreme point to which the Borysthenes is navigable. Here, in the event 

 of a king's decease, after embalming the body, they convey it to some neighbouring 

 Scythian nation. The people receive the royal corpse, and convey it to another 

 province of his dominions-, and when they have paraded it through all the provinc- 

 es, they dig a deep square fosse, and place the body in the grave on a bed of grass. 

 In the vacant space around the body in the fosse they now lay one of the king's 

 concubines, whom they strangle for the purpose, his cup-bearer, his cook, his groom, 

 his page, his messenger, fifty of his slaves, some horses, and samples of all his 

 things. Having so done, all fall to work, throwing up an immense mound, striving 

 and vying with each other who shall do the most. The Greeks, who always respect- 

 ed the religion of the countries they had subjugated, and who, in process of time, 

 imbibed, to a certain extent, their customs and observances, appear to have adopt- 

 ed this Scythian mode of burial. Instead, however, of placing their magistrates 

 or rulers in a "deep square foese" dug in the earth, they built tombs, and over 

 these raised the conical hill. But I examined several without meeting with any 

 success. All, or nearly all, of these tumuli have been already explored. Not far 

 from Mons Mithridates I came upon a portion of an aqueduct which probably 

 conveyed water to the Acropolis. It was formed of concave tiles ; one of these, with 

 a Greek name thereon, I have brought with me. On one occasion I arrived at the 

 place where five stone tombs were found adjoining, neither of which contained any 

 relic, but in a spot contiguous a large ornamented earthenware jug and five glass 



