ground is covered in some
places with anemones and cyclamen; waterfalls are met with at the head
of half the valleys, pouring their refreshing waters over marble rocks.
If the great mountain itself, which towers up so grandly above the
enchanting scenery below, had been carved into the form of a statue of
Alexander the Great, according to the project of Lysippus, though a
wonderful effort of human labour, it could hardly have added to the
beauty of the scene, which is so much increased by the appearance of the
monasteries, whose lofty towers and rounded domes appear almost like the
palaces we read of in a fairy tale.

The next morning, at an early hour, mules were waiting in the court to
carry me across the hills to the harbour below the monastery of
Xeropotamo, where the Greek brig was lying which was to convey me and my
treasures from these peaceful shores. Emptying out my girdle, I
calculated how much, or rather how little money would suffice to pay the
expenses of my voyage to the Asiatic castle of the Dardanelles, feeling
assured that from thence I could get credit for a passage in the
magnificent steamer _The Stamboul_, which ran between Smyrna and
Constantinople. With the reservation of this sum, I gave the agoumenos
all my remaining gold, and in return he provided me with an old wooden
chest, in which I stowed away several goodly folios; for the
saddle-bags, although distended to their utmost limits, did not suffice
to carry all the great manuscripts and ponderous volumes that were now
added to my store. Turning out the corn from the nosebags of the mules,
I put one or two smaller books in each; and, after all, an extra mule
was sent for to convey the surplus tomes over the rough and craggy ridge
which we were to pass in our journey to the other sea. Although the
stories of the agoumenos were too windy and too long, I was sorry to
part from him, and I took an affectionate leave also of Pater Joasaph
and the two cats. Unfortunately, in the hurry of departure, I left on
the divan the MS. of Justin, which I had been trying to decipher, and
forgot it when I came away. It was a small thick octavo, on charta
bombycina, and was probably kicked into the nearest corner as soon as I
evacuated the monastery.

Our ride was a very rough one. We had first to ascend the hill, in some
places through deep ravines, and in others through most glorious forests
of gigantic trees, mostly planes, with a thick underwood of those
arom