When I expressed to Dhemetri the great benefits I
conceived that roads would confer upon the community, he asked
contemptuously: 'What good would roads be to them, when they have no
carriages?' Inns, too, there are none, or almost none; after leaving
Napoli we found none until we returned to Athens. In their stead, each
village has its _khan_, a house rather larger than ordinary, and
containing one large unfurnished room for guests. Here a fire is made on
the hearth, (the smoke escaping, or intended to escape, through a hole
in the roof, for chimneys do not exist,) and the traveler pitches his
tent metaphorically in this apartment. The beds, which he carries with
him, are spread on the floor, to do double duty as seats during the
evening and beds by night. Thus the accommodations are reduced to their
lowest terms--shelter and fire; to which add a lamb from the flock, eggs
in abundance, or sometimes a chicken, loaf of bread, or string of figs.
Wine, too, flavored with resin in true classic style, and tasting like
weak spirits of turpentine, is to be had every where. But for any
entertainment beyond this, the host is no-way responsible. If you do not
choose to sleep on the bare floor, you must bring beds and bedding with
you. If you wish the luxury of a knife and fork, you must furnish them
yourself. Kettles, plates, saucepans, cups, coffee, sugar, salt,
candles, all came from that mysterious basket which rode on the
pack-horse with the baggage. Were I visiting Greece again, I would
eschew all these vanities--carry nothing but a _Reisesack_, or
travel-bag, as the Germans are wont to call every variety of knapsack--a
shawl, and a copy of _Pausanias_, and live among the Greeks as the
Greeks do; but I was inexperienced then.

So we set out with great pomp and circumstance, each on his
beast--_alogon_, the Unreasonable Thing, is the word for horse--while a
fifth, with two drivers, carried our goods. A ride of about three
hours--passing the silent and deserted Tiryus--brought us to the village
of Charvati, the modern representative of the 'rich Mycenae.' Here,
while Dehmetri prepared our breakfast, we followed a villager, who led
us by rapid strides up the rocky hill toward the angle formed by two
mountains. As we rose over one elevation after another, he plucked his
hands full of dry grass and brush, and then leading us into a hole in
the side of the hill, informed us in good classic Greek that it was the
tomb of Agamemnon. I