admitting, perhaps, this easy explanation, that CHA P. "every soldier is not a Cæsar."

L CASSIVS LONGIN

PRO COS

TIMPI MVNIVIT

IX.

notions of

It is, however, a valuable inscription; because the geographical position of Tempe was not before so completely ascertained: for a long time it remained a matter of doubt and disputation. Pococke was entirely ignorant of its Former situation': not that he neglected to make the TEMPE. distinction between the Valley and the Defile, but that he knew of neither, as applicable to, Tempe. This has been satisfactorily proved by a writer, who has published the most ingenious. dissertation upon the subject that has yet appeared; and who, without visiting Greece. himself, accurately ascertained the situation of the place; and moreover shewed, that Pococke actually passed through Tempe, without knowing where he was?. In his observations upon

(1) See Pococke's Description of the East, vol. II. Part II. c. 7., p. 152. Lond. 1745.

A

(2) See "Miscellaneous Sk iches, or Hints for Essays," (addressed by a Father to his Daughter,) written by Arthur Browne, Esq. Fellow of Trinity College, Dublin. Lond. 1798. They are contained in a work, } little known, the result of thoughts which occurred in a long and

46

solitary

CHAP. the site of Tempe, this author says',

IX.

"How are we disappointed, by finding that scarcely any modern traveller has paid a visit to Thessaly; while Boeotia and Phocis have had numerous describers. The country of Achilles; the region of the battle of Pharsalia; the favourite scenes of poetic creation, should have claimed a little more attention. The consequence is, that the site of Tempe is controverted, or unknown; and Busching, a geographer of the first name and character, says of it," On la cherche aujourd'hui, et on ne la reconnait plus." Cellarius had before expressed his difficulties on the subject of Tempe; confessing that he was puzzled by Catullus, in the epithet he gives it, of "Phthiotica Tempe." But this difficulty seems easily removed, in the recollection that there were several places with the same name of Tempe; and there might have been one of them in Phthiotis. Thus Ovid' speaks of CrCNEÏA

solitary journey into a remote and unfrequented quarter of Ireland, where conversation was not to be expected, and the mind was left to itself." The reader who is fortunate enough to procure a copy of it, will be thankful for the amusement it is calculated to afford, and for the information, upon various topics, which it contains.

(1) Ibid. p. 118.

(2) See the 12mo edit. of Buscking, printed at Lausanne, 1780. tom. VIII.

(s) Ovidii Metam. lib. vii. ver. 371. tom. II. p. 489. Amst. 1727.

TEMPE; which was a place in Boeotia, from the fable of Cycnus: but the Tempe usually meant by the Poets was in THESSALY; and both Horace and Ovid distinguish it from the others, by calling it THESSALA TEMPE. And in Virgil's fourth Georgic' we have PENEIA TEMPE. Theocritus also speaks of ΚΑΤΑ ΠΕΝΕΙΩ, ΚΑΛΑ

TEMIIE.

CHAP.

IX.

tions given

by antient

The descriptions given of TEMPE by Pliny, Descripby Elian', and by Livy, all concur in repre- of Tempe senting it as a narrow, beautiful, wooded, rocky authors. glen, with a sounding river flowing through the bottom, between steep and lofty banks, along which there was a narrow difficult pass. Catullus describes it as surrounded by superimpending woods'. According to Herodotus, it was an entrance (ioßon) from Lower Macedonia into Thessaly, by the Peneüs, and between

(4) Ibid. lib. ii. ver. 227. Horat. lib. i. od. vii.

(5)

"Pastor Aristæus fugiens Peneia Tempe."

(6) Hist. Nat. lib. iv. c. 8. tom. I. p. 212. L. Bat. 1635. (7) Hist. Var. lib. iii. c. 1.

(8) Hist. lib. liv. c. 6. tom. III. p. 684. Paris, 1738.

Tempe, quæ sylvæ cingunt superimpendentes."

Catulli Carm, lxiii. ver. 285. p. 311. edit. Burmanni, Patav. 1737.

IX.

6

CHAP. Olympus and Ossa'; where the Greeks, before they fixed upon Thermopyla, first intended to arrest the progress of the Persian army. We may now therefore observe with what surprising precision the author, before cited, fixes upon the real spot; being guided only by the clue suggested to his classic mind from the hints and allusions of the antient historians". "From the descriptions of the Poets we can derive no great light. The Zephyris agitata Tempe' of Horace, and the 'frigida Tempe' of Virgil; the epithets umbrosa, opaca, virentia, are constantly bestowed upon this oft-sung dale; but woods will perish, and barbarism will destroy. These are bad landmarks: we must look for others. The mountain will still raise its head, and the river will not cease to flow. Olympus. (though a modern might not choose it for one of the steps of his ladder to heaven) is yet a mile high; and the rapid Penëus is well known to

(1) Ες τὰ Τέμπεα ἐς τὴν ἐσβολὴν, ἅπερ ἀπὸ Μακεδονίης τῆς κάτω ἐς Θεσσα λίην φέρει παρὰ Πηνεῖὸν ποταμὸν, μεταξὺ δὲ Οὐλύμπου τοῦ οὔριος ἰόντα καὶ τῆς Όσσης. Herodoti Hist. lib. vii. c. 173. p. 438. ed. Gronovii.

(2) Browne's Miscell. Sketches, vol. I. p. 118. Lond. 1798.

(3) See the complete fulfilment of his prediction, in the circumstance before related of the destruction of the woods for the manufactory and fabrics of Ampelûkið.

(4) See the account of its elevation (in a preceding Note by Mr. Walpole), as ascertained by the Antients.

IX.

Turkish Greece by the name of Salampria'. That CHAP. the Peneus rolled through the middle of it, I have repeatedly said, and am confirmed in the assertion by Pliny, Strabo, and Ovid; but the two first-mentioned authors have thrown such lights on one of the methods of investigation I mentioned, namely, its bearing to particular objects, that I marvel how it could have been mistaken it appeared to them that TEMPE was directly between Ossa and Olympus. The FACT

and

IS, THE VALE IS ACTUALLY FORMED BY SOME OF THE HEIGHTS OF OLYMPUS TO THE WEST, AND OSSA TO THE EAST. How then Pococke Pococke and Busching could possibly have departed Busching. from these mountains, to look for it elsewhere, cannot easily be explained." And that they did so, as it has been observed by this writer, is not less remarkable than that one of them, Pococke, should have selected for his TEMPE, first, a plain, according to his own description",

(5) See the preceding description of Larissa. It is pronounced Salambrïa; but in all probability it is written Eaλaμμægía; the Greeks sounding their μ like our B. In a modern Greek Play, called Pamela, founded upon Richardson's Novel, Lord Bondfield's name is printed ΜΠΟΝΦΙΑ.

(6) See Pococke's Observations upon Greece, Vol. II. Part II, chap. 7, p. 152.

Lond. 1745.