The library is in a room over the porch of the church: it contains about 1500 volumes, half of which are manuscripts, mostly on paper, and all theological. I met with four copies of the Gospels and two of the Epistles, all the others being books of the church service and the usual folios of the fathers. There was, however, a Russian or Bulgarian manuscript of the four Gospels with an illumination at the commencement of each Gospel. It is written in capital letters, and seemed to be of considerable antiquity. I was disappointed at not finding manuscripts of greater age in so very ancient a monastery as this is; but perhaps it has undergone more squeezing than that inflicted upon it by the three hills. I slept here in peace and comfort.
On the sea-shore not far from Sphigmenou are the ruins of the monastery of St. Basil, opposite a small rocky island in the sea, which I left at this point, and striking up the country arrived in an hour's time at the monastery of
KILIANTARI,
or a thousand lions. This is a large building, of which the ground plan resembles the shape of an open fan. It stands in a valley, and contained, when I entered its hospitable gates, about fifty monks. They preserve in the sacristy a superb chalice, of a kind of bloodstone set in gold, about a foot high and eight inches wide, the gift of one of the Byzantine emperors. This monastery was founded by Simeon, Prince of Servia, I could not make out at what time. In the library they had no great number of books, and what there were were all Russian or Bulgarian: I saw none which seemed to be of great antiquity. On inquiring, however, whether they had not some Greek manuscripts, the Agoumenos said they had one, which he went and brought me out of the sacristy; and this, to my admiration and surprise, was not only the finest manuscript on Mount Athos, but the finest that I had met with in any Greek monastery with the single exception of the golden manuscript of the New Testament at Mount Sinai. It was a 4to. Evangelistarium, written in golden letters on fine white vellum. The characters were a kind of semi-uncial, rather round in their forms, of large size, and beautifully executed, but often joined together and having many contractions and abbreviations, in these respects resembling the Mount Sinai MS. This magnificent volume was given to the monastery by the Emperor Andronicus Comnenus about the year 1184; it is consequently not an early MS., but its imperial origin renders it interesting to the admirers of literary treasures, while the very rare occurrence of a Greek MS. written in letters of gold would make it a most desirable and important acquisition to any royal library; for besides the two above-mentioned there are not, I believe, more than seven or eight MSS. of this description in existence, and of these several are merely fragments, and only one is on white vellum: this is in the library of the Holy Synod at Moscow. Five of the others are on blue or purple vellum, viz., Codex Cottonianus, in the British Museum, Titus C. 15, a fragment of the Gospels; an octavo Evangelistarium at Vienna; a fragment of the books of Genesis and St. Luke in silver letters at Vienna; the Codex Turicensis of part of the Psalms; and six leaves of the Gospels of St. Matthew in silver letters with the initials in gold in the Vatican. There may possibly be others, but I have never heard of them. Latin MSS. in golden letters are much less scarce, but Greek MSS., even those which merely contain two or three pages written in gold letters, are of such rarity that hardly a dozen are to be met with; of these there are three in the library at Parham. I think the Codex Ebnerianus has one or two pages written in gold, and the tables of a gospel at Jerusalem are in gold on deep purple vellum. At this moment I do not remember any more, although doubtless there must be a few of these partially ornamented volumes scattered through the great libraries of Europe.
From Kiliantari, which is the last monastery on the N.E. side of the promontory, we struck across the peninsula, and two hours' riding brought us to
ZOGRAPHOU,
through plains of rich green grass dotted over with gigantic single trees, the scenery being like that of an English park, only finer and more luxuriant as well as more extensive. This monastery was founded in the reign of Leo Sophos, by three nobles of Constantinople who became monks; and the local tradition is that it was destroyed by the "Pope of Rome." How that happened I know not, but it was rebuilt in the year 1502 by Stephanus, Waywode of Moldavia. It is a large fortified building of very imposing appearance, situated on a steep hill surrounded with trees and gardens overlooking a deep valley which opens on the gulf of Monte Santo. The MSS. here are Bulgarian, and not of early date; they had no Greek MSS. whatever.
From Zographou, following the valley, we arrived at a lower plain on the sea coast, and there we discovered that we had lost our way; we therefore retraced our steps, and turning up among the hills to our left we came in three hours to
CASTAMONETA,
which, had we taken the right road, we might have reached in one. This is a very poor monastery, but it is of great age and its architecture is picturesque: it was originally founded by Constantine the Great. It has no library nor anything particularly well worth mentioning, excepting the original deed of the Emperor Manuel Paleologus, with the sign manual of that potentate written in very large letters in red ink at the bottom of the deed, by which he granted to the monastery the lands which it still retains. The poor monks were much edified by the sight of the patriarchal letter, and when I went away rang the bells of the church tower to do me honour.