But there the excavations stop; the owner had no means to pump out the water that flooded his diggings, the Government had no more, and as no one is allowed to dig unless for the Greek museum, whatever remains under ground and water is likely to remain there another generation.
We then climbed up the zigzag road to the theatre. It is, as I have said, of late times, probably Roman, and was never complete. Fragments of unfinished ornament lie still where the stage should have been, but it had clearly never been carried up above the seven ranges of seats now existing. It was just outside the wall of the inner city, on the brow of the hill, and overlooked the spacious harbor and looked out to sea. There is no record of any sculpture having been found there. It was purchased and excavated by the King of Bavaria.
Less than half a mile beyond, going with the sea at our backs, was the field where the statue was found. The Greeks have entertained a great deal of indignation at the rape, which they affect to call robbery; but the civilized world may thank the French captain who, coming to get it, and finding it already half-embarked on board a Turkish vessel, destined for Constantinople, made the most legitimate use that was ever made of force majeure, and took it away from the Turk to transfer it to the hold of his own ship. Otherwise, no one knows what vile uses it might have gone to, or what oblivion and destruction. All the world knows it now, but Greek genius would have forever lacked one of its greatest triumphs in modern times if it had disappeared in the slums of Stamboul.
STREET IN CASTRO.
As I have said, there is now no trace of any construction of any kind to be seen at the locality. The wall in which was the niche was gone, and the field of the present owner has encroached considerably on the space beyond, the débris being piled up in huge masses like walls, and two or three terraces above runs the citadel wall, a mass of Hellenic masonry built of blocks of lava. The Pelasgic walls, of which some authors speak, do not exist anywhere in the island. Brest took up a stone, and as we stood on the wall of débris above, cast it into the field, and said, “There stood the Venus!” In the illustration I have put a white cross on the spot.
There cannot remain the slightest doubt that the statue had been concealed, and to my mind, the circumstances indicated for its concealment are these: The niche, judging from its character, had been built in Roman times; as the rubbly nature of the masonry indicated, probably covered with stucco, as it would have been if intended for ornament, and was designed as a shelter for an altar, or for the statue of some divinity—Terminus, Hermes, Pan or Faunus, the more Roman companion of him. Here the inscription and the Hermes found furnish a plausible clew, and agree with the indication of the masonry in pointing out the epoch of this conjunction of circumstances as subsequent to the second century before Christ; how long after we cannot in any wise indicate.
THE SITE OF OLD MELOS, FROM THE PORT. (WHITE CROSS SHOWS WHERE THE “VENUS” WAS FOUND.)
Now as to the epoch of the statue there can be no doubt that it was of the immediately post-Phidian epoch; and all the most authoritative opinions attribute it to the Attic school, and probably of the time and school of Scopas—and some of the weightiest authorities have accepted Scopas himself as the author.