80 THEBES. 
CHAP. Athens, in being well watered'; and to this cir- 
^ cumstance, in former times, might be attributed 
the number and beauty of its gardens ^ and the 
plantations now decorating its suburbs. At 
present, however, we must consider the remains 
of this city as almost unknown : the travellers 
who have passed through it, and who possessed 
abilities for the undertaking, wanting the leisure 
or the liberty of exploring it, rather teach us to 
despair of reaping any information upon the 
spot, than to expect discoveries among the ruins. 
One of the earliest writers by whom it is men- 
tioned in modern times % with the true gallantry 
of a Frenchman, supplies the absence of literary 
intelligence, by a lively encomium upon the ex- 
Femaiein- traordiuary charms of its living beauties; and 
especially of its Jewesses, which, in his opinion, 
he says, " valent Men des pier res et des tombeaux." 
We could neither dispute nor confirm the accu- 
racy of his observations respecting the Theban 
this must be an error; for he also states, that they passed thenig^t, 
after leaving Livadia, at a place called Megalo-molci, before they 
reached Thebes, where they arrived at noon. See TVlieler's Journey 
into Greece, />jo. 330, 331, 333. Lond. 1682. 
(1) 'H Ss •TToy.ti [Tut 'Affi^valcoii) %7)^a, ■^ra.ru, oIk iSvh^o:. Diceporchi Status 
GrcEciee, p. 9- ap. Gcog. Vet. torn. II. Oxon. 1803. 
(2) Ka^i;Sg«j -jrata, xXu^a n xa) 'yttiXo(pes' Ktivtvftccvx i^ovra -irXuaret tZi 
5» rn 'EA.A.a3< -xiXxui. Dicaarch. ibid. p. 15. 
(S) Voyage du Sieur Z>M ZrfJjV, p. 330. Pam, 1654. 
