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hundred and sixty triremes, and engaged his fleet of six hundred. The Milesians had eighty ships, and formed the wing toward the east. Next to them were the Prienèans with twelve, and Myusians with three. The island was afterwards seized b Alexander; and, while he besieged Miletus, was the station of the Greek admiral, who blocked up the port. The Milesians, when he was about to storm the city, tried to escape, some in skiffs, some swimming on their bucklers, but were intercepted; only three hundred getting to a steep islet, which they resolved to defend. This probably was one by Lade. Two, near Miletus, called Camelidæ, The Camels, were among the less considerable. A single one, it is likely the northernmost hillock, was called Asteria from Asterius, whose skeleton, remarkable for its size, was shewn there. He reigned, it is related, before the Ionic migration. By the Tragiæ, probably mud banks and shoals formed by the river, were other islets, the stations of robbers.

66

Nature," says Pliny, "has taken islands from the sea, and joined them to the continent; from Miletus Dromiscos, and Perne; and Hybanda, once an island of Ionia, is now two hundred stadia, twenty-five miles, from the coast." Nature in this district was the Mæander, and the islands. here specified are perhaps the rocks of Osebashá. The river has been, as it were, the parent of its own bed.

The bay, on which Myûs was once seated, changed into a lake, when the Mæander, by lodging slime at the mouth, had cut off the ingress of the salt water. The mountains were an obstacle, or the whole recess would have been filled and converted into a plain. Their rills also supplied the fresh water, which generated the gnats. The land grew, asit

were, daily, and was continually removing the sea farther from the lake. The mouth of the Mæander was then seen between Miletus and Priene; and this city had a wide plain before it. Afterwards it approached within ten stadia, or a mile and a quarter of Miletus; and the bays above that city were rendered firm ground. The traveller, who shall ride along the foot of Mount Latmus, eastward from Miletus, will, I doubt not, discover the site of Heraclea; and the rivulet may direct him even now to the cave of Endymion. Pyrrha has been mentioned as within land. The space between Priene and Miletus was added, in no long time, to the continent. The ports of this city ceased to be navigable; and, by degrees, Lade and Astera, and the islets near them, were encircled with soil. Before this happened, the water-course of Priene entered the sea, separate from the Mæander.

Miletus, deprived by the Mæander of the principal advantages of its situation, experienced, with the cities its neighbours, a gradual decay, which will end in total extinction, as it were, by a natural death, after a lingering illness. The progress of the changes, as might be expected, were unattended to in the barbarous ages, as not sudden; or unnoticed, as not important. But we are informed, that a place by the shore, where the river entered the sea in the year 866, was called The Gardens; and, that the Greek emperor, Manuel, about the middle of the twelfth century, finding that region well watered and beautiful to the eye, resolved to refresh his army there, and to forget the toils of war in the pleasures of the chace.+

From the alterations already effected, we may infer that

+ Cedrenus, p. 566. Hist. Byzant. t. 8.

Cinnamus, p. 82.

the Mæander will still continue to incroach; that the recent earth, now soft, will harden, and the present marshes be dry. The shore will in time protrude so far, that the promontories, which now shelter it, will be seen inland. It will unite with Samos, and in a series of years extend to remoter islands, if the soil, while fresh and yielding, be not carried away by some current setting without the mountains. If this happen, it will be distributed along the coast, or wafted elsewhere in the tide, and form new plains. Some barren rock of the adjacent deep may be enriched with a fertile domain, and other cities rise and flourish from the bounty of the Mæander.

CHAP. LIV.

We enter Caria-At Ghauzocleu-Booths of the TurcomansIasus-Remains of the city-The sepulchres-Inscriptions— Iasian marbles at Scio-Journey continued.

In a preceding chapter we conducted the reader from the promontory Posidium, and the temple of Apollo Didyméus, to the confines of Ionia and Caria. We shall now pursue our journey over the Carian mountains.

We ascended the lofty mountain Grius, and descended by a difficult winding track. About five in the evening we arrived at Ghauzocleu, a village fronting a pleasant bay, which is land-locked. The situation is romantic, amid naked rocks, pine and olive-trees, the latter then laden with black fruit. Under the trees were several wells, and women passing to and fro with their faces muffled. Some children, who

were gathered about a fire, on seeing us, ran away. The aga entertained us very hospitably. We sat on a carpet after the Turkish fashion cross-legged, the table a large salver, on which the dishes were placed one at a time, and removed in quick succession. We had been exposed this day, without any shelter, to the sun. An accidental fire had scorched the bushes by the way, and destroyed their leaves, and the ground was bare and parched.

We were on horseback again at seven in the morning, and after a few minutes in a beautiful plain covered with vines. Some houses were dispersed in it. We then passed over huge mountains, branches of Grius, clothed with pines; and by immense precipices. The fire had laid waste large tracts. At ten minutes past ten we had in view several fine bays, and a plain full of booths, with the Turcomans sitting by the doors, under sheds resembling porticoes; or by shady trees, surrounded with flocks of goats. We turned to the right, and riding by a well in the plain, and then along the shore, arrived at Iasus, now called Assyn-kalesi.

ence.

The Iasians were a colony of Argives, and afterwards of Milesians. Their city covered a rocky islet lying near the continent, to which it is now united by a small isthmus, and was only ten stadia, or a mile and a quarter in circumferIt had a port, and was maintained by the sea, which abounded in fish; its territory being rough and barren. Several stories were current, of their eagerness to purchase that article, and one is recorded. A citharist or harper was displaying his skill, and the Iasians were very attentive, until a sale of fish was announced by the sound of a bell. Immediately they all hurried away, except one person, who was hard of hearing." Sir," says the artist to him, "I am indeed in

and for your

finitely obliged to you for the honour you do me, and for love of harmony. Every body besides left me on the ringing of the bell."-" How!" he replied, " has the bell rung? then, sir, your servant.”*

The north side of the rock of Iasus is abrupt and inaccessible. The summit is occupied by a mean but extensive fortress. At the foot is a small portion of flat ground. On that and on the acclivities, the houess once stood, within a narrow compass, bounded to the sea by the city-wall, which was regular, solid, and handsome, like that of Ephesus. This, which has been repaired in many places, now incloses rubbish, with remnants of ordinary buildings, and a few pieces of marble. Single pinks, with jonquils, grew among the thickets of mastic; and we sprung some large covies of partridges, which feed on the berries. In the side of the rock is the theatre, fronting 60 east of north, with many rows of seats remaining, but covered with soil or enveloped in bushes. On the left wing is an inscription in very large, and wellformed characters, ranging in a long line, and recording certain donations to Bacchus and the people. Beneath, near the bottom, are several stones ipscribed, but not legible. By the isthmus is the vaulted substruction of a considerable edifice; and on a jamb of the door-way are decrees engraved in a fair character, but damaged, and black with smoke; the entrance, which is lessened by a pile of stones, serving as a chimney to a few Greeks, who inhabit the ruin. Opposite to the isthmus is a flat point running out into the sea, with a small square fort at the extremity.

The sepulchres of the Iasians on the continent are very

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