Tuesday, February 24th, 1880.
To her Mother.
We reached here on Saturday. We found no post left here for England till to-day; I hope you will not have thought it very long before you heard. We had a splendid passage here.... I lay on the deck nearly all day, and saw the wild, blue, beautiful Albanian shore, such a land of bare wild mountain-land. The name of the people means “Highlander.” Then we floated past the islands and into the narrow sea between Corfu and Albania, where the Venetians and Turks had their last sea fight, and the Turks tried no more to advance into Europe. It was a glorious light as we floated into Corfu about half past. When we had passed thro’ 13 miles of this forest country with the mountains in view, and here and there, but very far between, a village or two, we came out on a cliff over the sea, along which we drove three miles. The road had been made by the English soldiers, but it is now all going gradually to pieces; the arches which support the bridges over the little streams (which, by the way, are now quite dry) are all cracking, their keystones protruding; the well-built walls supporting the road on the slope of the hills are crumbling gradually down, taking the road with them. Great hollows are appearing in the road, and large stones in thousands rolling down upon it. The driver said, “Il governo non fa niente per la strada.” And there it is crumbling to decay. It does seem a pity.
We are going on board the Greek boat to-day en route for Athens. We hear the “roughness” only consists in the want of good food; that the boat and arrangements are good. There is at any rate much less open sea, and the scenery is finer. An English lady who sat by me last night said she had been both ways and much preferred ours, but the gentlemen here make a great talking about the food. I daresay it will do for us. I am doing very little drawing and no good with it; but it is possible I may later, and this sea could not be attempted without emerald green.
CONDITION OF PATRAS
Athens,
February 28th, 1880.
To Miranda.
Patras, their new commercial city, is nearly as pathetic and nearly as interesting as modern Athens; and one feels that from there actual safety, as well as education, and even the possibility of seeing the beauty, must spread gradually. The difficulties of travel are quite extraordinary, quite independently of the question of safety. There are no hotels, no lodgings, no beds, hardly any food, no relays of horses, no posts, no accurate guide-books, no trustworthy people to give information. And somehow one feels it will all come gradually from this little town, springing up, as it were, yesterday, with its little throb of life, which must permeate the whole before it can be healthy or alive. Even from a tourist’s point of view, mountains and woods and defiles and rivers are no use because you can’t get at them; and what of the life of the people, their education, their power of using the good things that the earth brings forth?
Hôtel des Étrangers, Athens,