GO: 



THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



familiar with the custom obtaining in an- 

 cient days of burying the dead immediately 



outside the town gates and by the side of 

 the highroad. The Cerameicus is really a 

 street of tombs and it is the only ancient 

 cemetery now extant in Greece. 



It will he recalled that it was here that 

 Pericles delivered his famous oration 

 over those Athenians who were killed in the 

 first year of the Peloponnesian War. 1 lis 

 ringing- phrases come down to us through 

 the ages with that freshness and beauty 

 and strength which seem to characterize 

 all that was best and greatest in ancient 

 Greece. 



Lowell says in one of his essays that he 

 was the last of the great readers. I 

 think most of us are haunted by reg'rets 

 over the hooks we can never read or re- 

 read, but I know of nothing that will 

 more richly repay the reader than that 

 chapter of Thucydides in which he sets 

 forth Pericles' words to the bereaved 

 families gathered around him in this spot. 

 In it he draws a comparison between 

 Sparta and Athens which, with a fine pre- 

 vision, seems intended to describe the 

 France and Germany of our time.. 



Among- the Greeks special honor was 

 done to the memory of a soldier when his 

 body was allowed to lie where he fell. 

 To those of lesser glory was reserved 

 sepulture at home, amid familiar sounds 

 and scenes. It is difficult to write what 

 has been said above without recalling the 

 lines of the soldier-poet, Rupert Brooke, 

 whose body lies buried on the little Greek 

 island of Skyros — a piece of ground 

 "that is forever England." 



There are few more touching things 

 than some of the old-time memorials still 

 standing in this cemetery. Among these 

 are steles erected at the public cost to two 

 ambassadors of Corcyra who died at 

 Athens in the fourth century B. C. 



Some of the family groups are of a 

 simple, homely character ; in one of these 

 is sculptured a mastiff ; near by, and per- 

 haps the most beautiful of all, is a patri- 

 cian lady at her toilet, taking from a cas- 

 ket held by a female slave some article of 

 personal adornment (see page 57/). Ex- 

 quisite pitchers in marble, of the shape in 

 which water was brought for the mar- 

 riage bath, marked the grave of Athenian 

 maidens "untimely lost." 



Prom the cemetery in ancient days led 

 a long road to the garden called the Acad- 

 emy ; it owes its name to the hero Acade- 

 mus. Here Plato loved to wander. 



There is a ridiculous little railway link- 

 ing Athens with a small country town to 

 the north called kephisia, famous from 

 classic times for its gushing streams and 

 fountains and for its coolness, even in 

 the midst of an Attic summer. The rail- 

 way, which was committed in recent years 

 by a Greek company, wanders along in an 

 irregular fashion for some miles; one of 

 the stations between Athens and Kephisia 

 is a point of departure for the climb to 

 the summit of Mount Pentelikon, from 

 which there is a view of the entire .Attic 

 plain as well as the field of Marathon. 



Leaving the railway at this station, our 

 path led us by a gentle incline through 

 olive groves and patches of pine forest to 

 the very foot of the mountain. 



where "the mountains look on 

 marathon" 



Here for perhaps a half hour we climbed 

 slowly over an ancient causeway leading 

 to one of the quarries whence in ancient 

 days marble had been taken for the build- 

 ing of Athens. At several points we saw 

 huge drums of marble, ready to be let 

 down the causeway, where they had been 

 left by workmen who "downed tools" 

 more than twenty centuries ago. 



As we went higher, the plain revealed 

 itself in all its loveliness. The Saronic 

 Gulf glittered like a silver shield under 

 the warm sun ; Salami s, ^Egina, Poros, 

 and Hydra seemed but a little distance 

 away ; to the north the symmetrical form 

 of the mountains of Eubcea swam into 

 view. A short, rough scramble up a bar- 

 ren slope and we were at the top. 



"The mountains look on Marathon and 

 Marathon looks on the sea," sings Byron 

 in one of his most deeply inspired chants. 

 We have our first glimpse of the plain 

 from this summit, 4,000 feet above the 

 blue waters of the Eubcean Sea. 



In the far distance the soft outlines of 

 the hills of Eubcea are silhouetted against 

 the azure sky. From the valley there 

 mounted to our ears the "mellow lin-lan- 

 lone of far-off bells" ; in our nostrils was 

 the scent of wild thyme. Immediately 

 below were other ancient quarries from 



