CHARIOTEER—DELPHI
Of course we visited the Castalian spring, which still gushes forth from a cleft in the rock, as it did in the days when suppliants came thither first of all to purify themselves. After a long journey one is not loath to rest beside this ancient fount after washing and drinking deep of its unfailing supply, for the water is good and the chance to drink fresh water in Greece is rare enough to be embraced wherever met. The cleft from which the spring emerges is truly wonderful. It is narrow and dark enough for a colossal chimney, running far back into the bowels of the mountain heights behind. An old stone trough hewn out of the side of the cliff was once filled by this spring, but the flow has now been diverted and it runs off in a babbling stream over the pebbles. Not the least inspiring thing at Delphi is to stand here and reflect, as one enjoys the Castalian water, how many of the great in bygone ages stood on this very spot and listened to the same murmur of this brook which goes on forever.
Hard by the spring, under two great plane trees that we fondly believed were direct descendants of those planted on the spot by Agamemnon, we sat down to lunch, a stone khan across the way affording shelter and fire for our coffee. And in the afternoon we rambled among the ruins below on the grassy slopes of the lower glen, where are to be seen a ruined gymnasium, a temple of Athena Pronoia, and a fascinating circular “tholos,” all of which, though sadly shattered, still present much beauty of detail. If the site were devoid of every ruined temple it would still be well worth a visit, not merely from the importance it once enjoyed as Apollo’s chief sanctuary, but also for the grandeur and impressiveness of its setting, so typical of Greece at her best. Fortunate indeed are those who may tarry here awhile, now that local lodging has been robbed of its ancient hardships. To-day, as in the days of the priests, Delphi is in touch with the uttermost parts of the earth by means of the telegraph, the incongruous wires of which accompany the climber all the way from Itea, so that details of arrival, departure, or stay may be arranged readily enough from afar. Long sojourn, however, was not to be our portion, and we were forced to depart, though with reluctant steps, down along the rough side of the mountain, through the vast and silent olive groves, back into the world of men, to sordid Itea and our ship.
CHAPTER IX. MYCENÆ AND THE
PLAIN OF ARGOS
We journeyed down to Mycenæ from Athens by train. The moment the railroad leaves Corinth it branches southward into the Peloponnesus and into a country which, for legendary interest, has few equals in the world. Old Corinth herself, mother of colonies, might claim a preëminent interest from the purely historical point of view, but she must forever subordinate herself to the half-mythical charm that surrounds ruined and desolate Mycenæ, the famous capital of Atreus and his two celebrated sons, Menelaus and Agamemnon. As for Corinth herself, the ancient site has lately been explored under the auspices of the American school at Athens, and these excavations, with the steep climb to the isolated and lofty Acrocorinth, furnish the attractions of the place to-day. The train runs fairly close to the mountain, so that even from the car window the fortifications on its top may be distinguished; but evidently they are Venetian battlements rather than old Greek remains that are thus visible. As a purely natural phenomenon the Acrocorinth is immensely impressive, resembling not a little the Messenian Acropolis at Ithome. It is a precipitous rock, high enough to deserve the name of a mountain, and sufficiently isolated to be a conspicuous feature of the landscape for miles as you approach Corinth from the sea or from Athens by train. Circumstances have never permitted us to ascend it, but the view from the summit over the tumbling surface of the mountainous Peloponnesus is said to be indescribably fine, giving the same effect as that produced by a relief map, while the prospect northward across the Gulf of Corinth is of course no less magnificent.
Fate ordained that we should stick to the line of the railway and proceed directly to the site of Mycenæ, in which interest had been whetted by the remarkable display of Mycenæan relics in the museum at Athens, as well as by the consciousness that we were about to visit the home of the conqueror of Troy and of his murderous queen. The train did some steep climbing as it rounded the shoulder of the Acrocorinth, and for two hours or so it was a steady up-grade, winding around long valleys in spacious curves, the old road from Sparta generally visible below. At every station the mail car threw off bundles of newspapers, which the crowds gathered on the platform instantly snatched and purchased with avidity. The love of news is by no means confined to Athenians, but has spread to their countrymen; and every morning the same scene is enacted at every railroad station in Hellas on the arrival of the Athens train. At every stop the air was vocal with demands for this or that morning daily, and each, having secured the journal of his choice, retired precipitately to the shade of a near-by tree, while those who could not read gathered near and heard the news of the world retailed by the more learned, at second-hand. The peasant costumes were most interesting, for we were now in the country of the shepherds, far from the madding crowd and dressed for work. The dress of each was substantially the same,—a heavy capote of wool, if it was at all chilly, the tight drawers gartered below the knee, the heavy leather wallet on the front of the belt, the curious tufted shoes whose pompons at the toe, if large denoted newly bought gear, or if sheared small meant that the footwear was old. For the custom is to cut down these odd bits of adornment as they become frayed, a process that is repeated until the tuft is entirely removed, when it is time to buy new shoes.
The landscape was most striking now. The plains were small and separated from one another by walls of rugged hills, whose barriers were not to be despised in days when communication was primitive and slow, and which bore an important part in keeping the several ancient states so long apart, instead of allowing them permanently to unite. The neighboring peaks began to be increasingly redolent of mythology, chiefly relating to various heroic exploits of Herakles. Indeed the train stopped at Nemea itself, and the site of the struggle with the Nemean lion was indicated to us from afar, while a distant summit was said to be near the lake where were slain the Stymphalian birds. Shortly beyond the grade began to drop sharply, until, rushing through a pass of incredible narrowness,—the site of a bloody modern battle between the Greek patriots and the Turks,—the train dashed out into the broad plain of Argos, once famous as the breeder of horses. The narrow and rather sterile valleys hemmed in by bare hills of gray rock gave place to this immense level tract of sandy soil leading down to the sea, which gleamed in the distance under the noonday sun. On either side of the broad expanse of plain towered the mountain wall, always gray and bare of trees, though in the old days it was doubtless well wooded. With the departure of trees came the drouth, and to-day the rivers of the Argolid are mere sandy channels, devoid of water save in the season of the melting mountain snows.
The train halted at Phychtia, the station for Mycenæ, and there we found waiting a respectable carriage that had seen better days in some city, but which was now relegated to the task of conveying the curious to various points in the Argolic plain. It was there in response to the inevitable telegraph, which we had the forethought to employ. Otherwise we should have had to go over to the site of Mycenæ on foot, a task which the heat of the day rather than the distance would have made arduous. Mycenæ to-day is absolutely deserted and desolate, lying perhaps two miles eastward from the railway, on the spurs of two imposing mountain peaks. Toward this point the road rises steadily, and before long we had passed through a starveling village of peasant huts and came suddenly upon a two-story structure bearing the portentous sign, “Grand Hotel of Helen and Menelaus!” To outward view it was in keeping with the rest of the hamlet, which was chiefly remarkable for its children and dogs. It proved, on closer inspection, to be a queer little inn, boasting a few sleeping rooms in its upper story, to be reached only by an outside stairway. On the ground floor—which was a ground floor in the most literal sense of that overworked expression—was a broad room, used partly as a dining-room and partly as a store and office. The actual eating-place was separated from the remainder of the apartment by a grill-work of laths, or pickets, with a wicket gate, through which not only the guests and the proprietor, but sundry dogs, chickens, and cats passed from the main hall to the table. This, being the only available hotel in the region, and bearing so resounding and sonorous a title, proved irresistible. Lunch, consisting of very excellent broiled chickens, and sundry modest concomitants, was promptly served by a tall slip of a girl, the daughter of the house, and probably named Helen, too. During the meal various hens, perhaps the ancestors of our pièces de résistance, clucked contentedly in and out, and a mournful hound sneaked repeatedly through the gate, only to be as repeatedly thrust into the outer darkness of the office by the cook and waitress. In former times, before the “Grand Hotel of Helen and Menelaus” sprang into being, it was necessary to carry one’s food and eat it under the shadow of the famous Lion Gate on the site of the old town itself—a place replete with thrills. Nevertheless it seems well that the vicinity now has a place of public entertainment, and doubly well that it has been so sonorously named.