fiance far, nor yield unless to gold.

Monastic Zitza! from thy shady brow,
Thou small, but favour'd spot of holy ground!
Where'er we gaze, above, around, below,
What rainbow tints, what magic charms are found;
Rock, river, forest, mountain, all abound;
And bluest skies that harmonize the whole.
Beneath, the distant torrent's rushing sound
Tells where the volumed cataract doth roll
Between those hanging rocks that shock yet please the soul.

In the course of this journey the poet happened to be alone with his
guides, when they lost their way during a tremendous thunderstorm,
and he has commemorated the circumstance in the spirited stanzas
beginning--

Chill and mink is the nightly blast.

CHAPTER XI

Halt at Zitza--The River Acheron--Greek Wine--A Greek Chariot--
Arrival at Tepellene--The Vizier's Palace

The travellers, on their arrival at Zitza, went to the monastery to
solicit accommodation; and after some parley with one of the monks,
through a small grating in a door plated with iron, on which marks of
violence were visible, and which, before the country had been
tranquillised under the vigorous dominion of Ali Pasha, had been
frequently battered in vain by the robbers who then infested the
neighbourhood. The prior, a meek and lowly man, entertained them in
a warm chamber with grapes and a pleasant white wine, not trodden out
by the feet, as he informed them, but expressed by the hand. To this
gentle and kind host Byron alludes in his description of "Monastic
Zitza."

Amid the grove that crowns yon tufted hill,
Which, were it not for many a mountain nigh
Rising in lofty ranks, and loftier still,
Might well itself be deem'd of dignity;
The convent's white walls glisten fair on high:
Here dwells the caloyer, nor rude is he,
Nor niggard of his cheer; the passer-by
Is welcome still; nor heedless will he flee
From hence, if he delight kind Nature's sheen to see.

Having halted a night at Zitza, the travellers proceeded on their
journey next morning, by a road which led through the vineyards
around the villages, and the view from a barren hill, which they were
obliged to cross, is described with some of the most forcible touches
of the poet's pencil.

Dusky and huge, enlarging on the sight,
Nature's volcanic amphitheatre,
Chimera's Alps, extend from left to right;
Beneath, a living valley seems to stir.
Flocks play, tree