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"Dans un intervalle de six à sept ans, l'inscription peut-elle pas estre détachée, ou par un scrupule des Turcs, ou par l'injure du temps. Je luy citerois encore vingt changemens plus considérables dans la masse de nos Bâtimens de Paris. Falloit-il pour cela donner le titre d'Imposteur à La Guilletiere?” At this distance of time, being appealed to for the probability of the existence of such an inscription, any impartial traveller, who has witnessed the frequent instances of forgeries exhibited under the name of reliques by the Eastern Christians, would surely say it was highly probable that the Monks of Athens, who made use of the Parthenon as a Church, before it became a Mosque, had left a legend of this nature in the temple; which they had been accustomed to exhibit as the real inscription observed by St. Paul. It was exactly the sort of imposition which would have been characteristic of the priests of that age and country, and of their ignorant followers: and such, perhaps, was the inscription read by Guilletiere and his companions; but which had disappeared when Spon was at Athens, having been removed by some traveller, or destroyed by the Turks. The most curious part of Spon's answer to Guillet, is that in which he undertakes to prove that the famous Eleusinian fragment was in reality the Statue of Eleusinian Ceres, and not one

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ADVERTISEMENT TO PRESENT EDITION.

of the Cariatides, as Guillet maintained that it was'. Here he musters all his erudition, and quite overwhelms his antagonist; and had the author of the present work been aware of the powerful authority upon which this point rested, when he published his "Testimonies concerning the Statue of Ceres," he would never have ventured to undertake the discussion. It is, however, highly satisfactory to him to find, after so many years have elapsed since he ushered his little treatise before the public, that all he has said upon the subject is supported by the superior judgment of so great a scholar; with whose judgment the opinions of posterity will hereafter probably coincide.

(1) "J'ay quelque chose à débiter de plus curieux touchant la réflexion d'architecture que fait M. Guillet sur une statue de Ceres que j'ay décrite et que je donne en taille-douce, lorsque je parle des mazures d'Eleusis. A l'entendre parler, j'y ay commis une effroyable faute, ayant pris pour une statue ce qui est une Cariatide. Voyons si ce nouveau Vitruve ne se trompe point luy-mesme, et si j'en dois moins croire à mes yeux qu'à ses raisonnemens." Réponse à la Critique du Voyage de Grèce, p. 137. à Lyon, 1679.

CAMBRIDGE,
September 2, 1816.

PREFACE

TO THE

SECOND SECTION OF PART THE SECOND.

THIS addition to the SECOND PART of these Travels, will enable the Reader to form a tolerable estimate of the probable compass of the entire Work; and it may serve to prove, that the author, if he should live to complete his undertaking, will not have exceeded his original estimate, in the account of a journey through forty-five degrees of longitude, and nearly forty degrees of latitude. In his endeavour to concentrate the subject, he may have omitted observations which a particular class of Readers would have preferred to those which have been inserted. He has sometimes, for example, sacrificed statistical notices, that he might introduce historical information, where Antient History is pre-eminently interesting; and again, on the other hand, he has purposely omitted much that he had written on the subject of Antiquities, that he might insert a few remarks upon the Egyptian and Grecian scenery, and upon the

manners of the people. General observations, as applied to the inhabitants of Greece, cannot well be made; it would be a vain undertaking to characterize in one view such a various population. Throughout every part of the country, there may be observed, not only a ditference of morals and of habits, but also peculiarities of religion and of language. In the mixed society of one island, the Italian character seems to predominate, in another, Turks or Albanians have introduced their distinctions of manners and customs. Perhaps this may be one of the causes which, added to the fine climate of the country, and to its diversified landscape, communicate such a high degree of cheerfulness during a journey or a voyage in Greece: for whether the traveller be upon its continent, or visiting its islands, a succession of new objects is continually presenting itself1; and in places which are contiguous in situation, he may witness a more striking change, both as to natural and to moral objects, than would be found in other countries, for example in Russia, if he were to traverse a very considerable portion of the globe. After all, an author, in the

(1)

"Where'er we tread, 'tis haunted, holy ground,
And one vast realm of wonder spreads around."
Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, p. 105. Lond. 1805.

arrangement of his materials, cannot be supposed capable of making any exact calculation, as to what his Readers may deem it proper for him to omit, or to insert: but so far as experience has enabled the writer of these Travels to determine, he has endeavoured to obviate former objections; first, by disposing into the form of Notes all extraneous matter, and all citations; and secondly, by compressing even these, as much as possible, both by diminishing the size of the type, and by the omission of Latin interpretations of Greek authors, which are often erroneous. With regard, however, to the numerous additions made to his Work in the form of Notes, it may be proper to state once for all, that they are exclusively his own, with the exception of the extracts made from the Manuscript Journals of his Friends: and when these occur, the name of the traveller has always been added, to whom the author is indebted for the passage inserted. He has been induced to mention this circumstance, that no person may be made responsible for any of those errors and imperfections which belong solely to himself.

In addition to the Manuscript Journal of Mr. WALPOLE, this part of the Work will be found

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