486 PELOPONNESUS. 
CHAP, inviting aspect exhibited by the Argive terri- 
tory to the earliest settlers in this country. No 
labour was necessary, as amidst the forests and 
unbroken soil of the North of Europe and of 
America: the colonies, upon their arrival, found 
an open field, with a rich impalpable soil, already 
prepared by Providence to yield an abundant 
harvest to the first adventurer who should scatter 
seed upon its surface. We cannot therefore 
wonder, that within a district not containing 
more square miles than the most considerable 
of our English parishes, there should have 
been established, in the earliest periods of its 
history, four capital cities, Argos, Mycenae, Tiryns, 
.and Nauplia, each contending with the other for 
superiority ; or that every roaming colony who 
chanced to explore the Argolic Gulph endea- 
voured to fortify a position upon some rock 
near to the plain, and struggle for its posses- 
sion. This is all that seems necessary to 
illustrate the first dawnings of government, not 
only within this district, but in every part of 
the Hellenian territories : and the fables trans- 
mitted from one generation to another, eon- 
cern i n g ^e contest between Neptune and 
between j uno f or the country, as between Neptune and 
S J 
Minerva for Attica, may be regarded as so 
many records of those physical revolutions, in 
