Greece, a sub-peninsula of the peninsula of the Balkans, was even more completely protected by transverse mountain barriers in the north than was Thracia or Macedonia. Greek culture was thus able to develop itself without fear of being stifled at its birth by successive invasions of barbarians. Mounts Olympus, Pelion, and Ossa, towards the north and east of Thessaly, constituted the first line of formidable obstacles towards Macedonia. A second barrier, the steep range of the Othrys, runs along what is the present political boundary of Greece. To the south of the Gulf of Lamia a fresh obstacle awaits us, for the range of the Œta closes the passage, and there is but the narrow pass of the Thermopylæ between it and the sea. Having crossed the mountains of the Locri and descended into the basin of Thebæ, there still remain to be crossed the Parnes or the spurs of the Cithæron before we reach the plains of Attica. The “isthmus” beyond these is again defended by transverse barriers, outlying ramparts, as it were, of the mountain citadel of the Peloponnesus, that acropolis of all Greece. Hellas has frequently been compared to a series of chambers, the doors of which were strongly bolted; it was difficult to get in, but more difficult to get out again, owing to their stout defenders. Michelet likens Greece to a trap having three compartments. You entered, and found yourself taken first in Macedonia, then in Thessaly, then between the Thermopylæ and the isthmus. But the difficulties increase beyond the isthmus, and Lacedæmonia remained impregnable for a long time.
At an epoch when the navigation even of a land-locked sea like the Ægean was attended with danger, Greece found herself sufficiently protected against the invasions of oriental nations; but, at the same time, no other country held out such inducements to the pacific expeditions of merchants. Gulfs and harbours facilitated access to her Ægean coasts, and the numerous outlying islands were available as stations or as places of refuge. Greece, therefore, was favourably placed for entering into commercial intercourse with the more highly civilised peoples who dwelt on the opposite coasts of Asia Minor. The colonists and voyagers of Eastern Ionia not only supplied their Achæan and Pelasgian kinsmen with foreign commodities and merchandise, but they also imparted to them the myths, the poetry, the sciences, and the arts of their native country. Indeed, the geographical configuration of Greece points towards the east, whence she has received her first enlightenment. Her peninsulas and outlying islands extend in that direction; the harbours on her eastern coasts are most commodious, and afford the best shelter; and the mountain-surrounded plains there offer the best sites for populous cities. Greece, at the same time, does not share the disadvantage of Turkey, which is almost cut off from the western world by a mountain region difficult to cross. The Ionian Sea, to the west of the Peloponnesus, it is true, is, comparatively speaking, a desert; but farther north the Gulf of Corinth almost cuts in two the Greek peninsula, and the sight of the distant mountains of Italy, which are visible from the Ionian Islands, must have incited to an exploration of the western seas. The Acarnanians, who knew how to build vaults long before the Romans, were thus brought early into contact with the Italians, to whom they imparted their {38} knowledge, and at a subsequent period the Greeks became the civilisers of the whole western world of the Mediterranean.
The most distinctive feature of Hellas, as far as concerns the relief of the ground, consists in the large number of small basins, separated one from the other by rocks or mountain ramparts. The features of the ground thus favoured the division of the Greek people into a multitude of independent republics. Every town had its river, its amphitheatre of hills or mountains, its acropolis, its fields, pastures, and forests, and nearly all of them had, likewise, access to the sea. All the elements required by a free community were thus to be found within each of these small districts, and the neighbourhood of other towns, equally favoured, kept alive perpetual emulation, too frequently degenerating into strife and battle. The islands of the Ægean Sea, likewise, had constituted themselves into miniature republics. Local institutions thus developed themselves freely, and even the smallest island of the Archipelago has its great representatives in history.
But whilst there thus exists the greatest diversity, owing to the configuration of the ground and the multitude of islands, the sea acts as a binding element, washes every coast, and penetrates far inland. These gulfs and numerous harbours have made the maritime inhabitants of Greece a nation of sailors—amphibiæ, as Strabo called them. From the most remote times the passion for travel has always been strong amongst them. When the inhabitants of a town grew too numerous to support themselves upon the produce of their land, they swarmed out like bees, explored the coasts of the Mediterranean, and, when they had found a site which recalled their native home, they built themselves a new city. It was thus Greek cities arose in hundreds of places, from the Mæotis Palus to beyond the columns of Hercules—from Tanais and Panticapæum to Gades and Tingis, the modern Tangier. Thanks to those numerous colonies, some of them more powerful and renowned than the mother towns which gave birth to them, the veritable Greece, the Greece of science and art and republican independence, in the end overflowed its ancient cradle, and sporadically occupied the whole circumference of the Mediterranean. The Greeks held the same position relatively to the world of the ancients which is occupied at the present time by the Anglo-Saxons with reference to the entire earth. There exists, indeed, a remarkable analogy between Greece, with its archipelago, and the British Islands, at the other extremity of the continent. Similar geographical advantages have brought about similar results, as far as commerce is concerned, and between the Ægean and the British seas time and space have effected a sort of harmony.
The admiration with which travellers behold Greece is due, above all, to the memories attaching to every one of its ruins, to the smallest amongst its rivulets, and the most insignificant rock in its seas. Scenery in Provence or Spain, though it may surpass in grace or boldness of outline anything to be seen in Greece, is appreciated only by a few. The mass go past it without emotion, for names like Marathon, Leuctra, or Platææ are not connected with it, and the rustle of bygone ages is not heard. But even if glorious memories were not associated with the {39} coasts of Greece, their beauty would nevertheless entitle them to our admiration. In the gulfs of Athens or of Argos the artist is charmed not only with the azure blue of the waters, the transparency of the sky, the ever-changing perspective along the shores, and the boldness of the promontories, but also with the pure and graceful profile of the mountains, which consist of layers of limestone or of marble. We almost fancy we look upon architectural piles; and the temples with which many a summit is adorned appear to epitomize them.
It is verdure and the sparkling water of rivulets which we miss most on the shores of Greece. Nearly all the mountains near the coast have been despoiled of their large trees. There remain only bushes, mastic, strawberry, and juniper trees, and evergreen oaks; even the carpet of odoriferous herbs which clothes the declivities, and upon which the goat browses, has in many instances been reduced to a few miserable patches. Torrents of rain have carried away the mould, and the naked rock appears on the surface. From a distance we only see greyish declivities, dotted here and there with a few wretched shrubs. Even in the days of Strabo most mountains along the coasts had been robbed of their forests, and one of our modern authors says that “Greece is a skeleton only of what it used to be !” By a sort of irony, geographical names derived from trees abound throughout Hellas and Turkey: Caryæ is the “town of walnut-trees,” Valanidia that of the Valonia oaks, Kyparissi that of cypresses, Platanos or Plataniki that of plane-trees. Everywhere we meet with localities whose appellation is justified by nothing. Forests at the present day are confined almost entirely to the interior and to the Ionian coast. The Œta Mountains, some of the mountains of Ætolia, the hills of Acarnania, and Arcadia, Elis, Triphylia, and the slopes of the Taygetus, in the Peloponnesus, still retain their forests. And it is only in these forest districts, visited solely by herdsmen, that savage animals, such as the wolf, the fox, and the jackal, are now met with. The chamois, it is said, still haunts the recesses of the Pindus and Œta Mountains; but the wild boar of the Erymanthus, which must have been a distinct species if we are to judge by antique sculptures, exists no more in Greece, and the lion, still mentioned by Aristotle, has not been seen for two thousand years. Amongst the smaller animals there is a turtle, common in some parts of the Peloponnesus, which the natives look upon with the same aversion as do many western nations upon the toad and the salamander.
Greece is a small country, but the variety of its climate is nevertheless great. Striking differences in the climate of different localities are produced by the contrasts between mountains and plains, woodlands and sterile valleys, coasts having a northern or southern aspect. But even leaving out of sight these local differences, it may safely be asserted that the varieties of climate which we meet with in traversing Greece from north to south are scarcely exceeded in any other region. The mountains of Ætolia, in the north, whose slopes are covered with beech-trees, remind us of the temperate zone of Europe, whilst the peninsulas and islands towards the east and south, with their thickets of fig and olive trees, their plantations of oranges and lemons, their aloe hedges and rare palm-trees, belong to the sub-tropical zone. But even neighbouring districts occasionally {40} differ strikingly as regards climate. In the ancient lake basin of Bœotia the winters are cold, the summers scorching, whilst the temperature of the eastern shore of Eubœa is equable, owing to the moderating influence of sea breezes. Within a narrow compass Greece presents us with the climates of a large portion of the earth, and there can be no doubt that this diversity of climate, and the contrasts of every kind springing from it, must have favourably influenced the intellectual development of the Hellenes. A spirit of inquiry was called forth amongst them which reacted upon their commercial tastes and industrial proclivities.
The diversity of the climate of the land, however, is compensated for, in Greece, by a uniformity in the climate of the maritime districts. As in a mountain valley, the winds of the Ægean Sea blow alternately in contrary directions. During nearly the whole of summer the atmospheric currents of Eastern Europe are attracted towards the African deserts. The winds from the north of the Archipelago and Macedonia then speed the navigator on his voyage to the south, and on many occasions the conquering tribes of the northern shores of that sea have availed themselves of them in their improvised attacks upon the inhabitants of the more southern districts of Asia Minor and of Greece. These regular northerly currents, known as etesian or annual winds, cease on the termination of the hot season, when the sun stands above the southern tropic. They are, moreover, interrupted every night, when the cool sea air is attracted by the heated surface of the land. When the sun has set the wind gradually subsides; there is a calm, lasting a few moments; and then the air begins to move in an inverse direction—“the land begins to blow,” as the sailors say. Nor is this regular wind without its counter-current, known as the embates, or propitious south-easterly breeze of which the poets sing. General winds and breezes, moreover, are deflected from their original directions in consequence of the configuration of the coast and the direction of mountain chains. The Gulf of Corinth, for instance, is shut in by high mountains on the north and the south, and the winds alternately enter it from the east or west—a phenomenon likened by Strabo to the breathing of an animal.
The rains, like the winds, deviate in many places from the average, and whilst the water pours down into some mountain valleys as into a funnel, elsewhere the clouds drift past without parting with a drop of their humid burden. Contrasts in the amount of precipitation are thus added to those resulting from differences of configuration and variety of climate. As a rule, rain is more abundant on the western shores of Greece than on the eastern, and this fact accounts for the smiling aspect of the hills of Elis, as compared with the barren declivities of Argolis and Attica. Thunder-storms, driven before the winds of the Mediterranean, likewise recur with greater regularity in the western portion of the peninsula. In Elis and Acarnania the roll of thunder may be heard in spring daily, for whole weeks, in the afternoon. No sites more apposite could have been found for temples dedicated to Jupiter, the god of lightning.