138 MOUNT HELICON. 
CHAP, high above the other, on the right hand. The 
i ' - lower part stretches into the level plain : and 
above the upper part, a small white edifice 
appears rising among thick embowering trees, 
as such buildings are often seen in Swisserland, 
commanding every beauty and advantage of 
situation : it is called the Monastery of Fanaja, 
or the {all holy) Virgin. 
There is every reason to believe that this 
Aicra. village of Zagara occupies the site of the antient 
AscRA,the place of i/e^zWs nativity'. Its distance 
from Thespia accords very accurately with 
that mentioned hy Slrabo\ oHoi'iy stadia; either 
supposing Thespia to have stood where Fhria 
now is, or where JVheler places it, at Neocorio ; 
and its situation cannot have been remote from 
either of those places, on account of its distance 
from Leuctra. The site of Zas-ara also corre- 
sponds with the account given of Ascra, in a 
fragment of the poems of Hegesinous, preserved 
by Pausan{as\ Its fertility is mentioned by 
(1) Besiodi "E^ya, v. 639, 640. p. 172. (Vid. Dissertat. de Vit. 
Script, et ^tat. Hesiodi, in edit. Robinson.) Oion. 1757. 
(-; Avi^DvirK tuv Giff'^rtuTi eVov riTrapaxoira, rraciovi. Slrabon. Geog. 
lib. ix. p. 594. ed. Oxon. 
(3) ^ f 'EXixun/ij 'i^si ffoia ^t^scKoivTcc. VId. Faiisnn. Bceot. 
c. 59. p. 765. cd. Kuhnii. 
