Such was the condition in which the poet found the country as he approached Athens; and although the spirit he invoked has reanimated the dejected race he then beheld around him, the traveller who even now revisits the country will still look in vain for that lofty mien which characterises the children of liberty. The fetters of the Greeks have been struck off, but the blains and excoriated marks of slavery are still conspicuous upon them; the sinister eye, the fawning voice, the skulking, crouching, base demeanour, time and many conflicts only can efface.
The first view of the city was fleeting and unsatisfactory; as the travellers descended from the mountains the windings of the road among the hills shut it out. Having passed the village of Casha, they at last entered upon the slope, and thence into the plain of Attica but the intervening heights and the trees kept the town concealed, till a turn of the path brought it full again before them; the Acropolis crowned with the ruins of the Parthenon—the Museum hill—and the Monument of Philopappus—
Ancient of Days—august Athena! where,
Where are thy men of might? thy grand in soul?
Gone—glimmering through the dreams of things that were:
First in the race that led to glory’s goal,
They won, and pass’d away:—is this the whole?
A schoolboy’s tale, the wonder of an hour!
The warrior’s weapon, and the sophist’s stole
Are sought in vain, and o’er each mouldering tower,
Dim with the mist of years, gray flits the shade of power.
CHAPTER XVII
Athens—Byron’s Character of the modern Athenians—Visit to Eleusis—Visit to the Caverns at Vary and Keratéa—Lost in the Labyrinths of the latter
It has been justly remarked, that were there no other vestiges of the ancient world in existence than those to be seen at Athens, they are still sufficient of themselves to justify the admiration entertained for the genius of Greece. It is not, however, so much on account of their magnificence as of their exquisite beauty, that the fragments obtain such idolatrous homage from the pilgrims to the shattered shrines of antiquity. But Lord Byron had no feeling for art, perhaps it would be more correct to say he affected none: still, Athens was to him a text, a theme; and when the first rush of curiosity has been satisfied, where else can the palled fancy find such a topic.
To the mere antiquary, this celebrated city cannot but long continue interesting, and to the classic enthusiast, just liberated from the cloisters of his college, the scenery and the ruins may for a season inspire delight. Philosophy may there point her moral apophthegms with stronger emphasis, virtue receive new incitements to perseverance, by reflecting on the honour which still attends the memory of the ancient great, and patriotism there more pathetically deplore the inevitable effects of individual corruption on public glory; but to the man who seeks a solace from misfortune, or is “a-weary of the sun”; how wretched, how solitary, how empty is Athens!
Yet to the remnants of thy splendour past
Shall pilgrims, pensive, but unwearied throng;
Long shall the voyager, with th’ Ionian blast,
Hail the bright clime of battle and of song;
Long shall thy annals and immortal tongue
Fill with thy fame the youth of many a shore;
Boast of the aged! lesson of the young!
Which sages venerate and bards adore,
As Pallas and the Muse unveil their awful lore!
Of the existing race of Athenians Byron has observed, that they are remarkable for their cunning: “Among the various foreigners resident in Athens there was never a difference of opinion in their estimate of the Greek character, though on all other topics they disputed with great acrimony. M. Fauvel, the French consul, who has passed thirty years at Athens, frequently declared in my hearing, that the Greeks do not deserve to be emancipated, reasoning on the ground of their national and individual depravity—while he forgot that such depravity is to be attributed to causes which can only be removed by the measures he reprobates.
“M. Roque, a French merchant of respectability long settled in Athens, asserted with the most amusing gravity, ‘Sir, they are the same canaille that existed in the days of Themistocles.’ The ancients banished Themistocles; the moderns cheat Monsieur Roque: thus great men have ever been treated.