The partridges are bigger than the English, of a different colour and species, with red legs. The olive groves furnish doves, fieldfares, thrushes, quails, snipes, and the like, in abundance. A variety of excellent wines are produced in the country, or imported from the islands. The fruits are of an exquisite flavour. Among those of the gourd kind, the water-melon, which grows to a great size, is not only highly palatable, but so innocent as to be allowed to the sick in fevers. The figs are deservedly famous. The rich clusters of grapes are as wholesome as beautiful. Many on the stalk are found converted by the sun into raisins. We were shewn one species which had no stones. Large and heavy bunches are hung on strings, and preserved in the shops for sale in the winter. Lemons and oranges, with citrons, are in plenty. The sherbets made with the juice of the two former, newly gathered, in water, sweetened with white honey, are as cooling as grateful to the taste. Coffee is brought from Arabia. We partook almost daily of eatables unknown to us before. It is the general custom to sleep after dinner; and this indulgence is recommended as conducing, and even necessary, to health in that climate.

ances.

Our situation was not, however, without grievWe were much infested by a minute fly, which irritates by its puncture, and, settling on the white wall, eludes the angry pursuer with surprising activity. But this species, and the other insects which annoyed us, were petty offenders compared with the musquittoes, or large gnats, which tormented us most exceedingly by their loud noise, and by repeated attacks on our skin, where naked or lightly

clothed, perforating it with their acute proboscis, and sucking our blood, till they were full. A small fiery tumour then ensues, which will not soon subside, unless the patient has been, as it were, naturalized by residence; but the pain is much allayed by lemonjuice. At night they raged furiously about our beds, assaulting the gauze veil, our defence, which, thin as it was, augmented the violent heat to a degree almost intolerable. Their fondness of foreign food is generally but too visible, in the swollen and distorted features of persons newly arrived.

CHAP. XX.

OF THE ADJACENT COUNTRY—THE RIVER MELES-THE INNER BAY-OLD SMYRNA-ANCIENT SEPULCHRES-ORIGIN OF OLD SMYRNA-STORY OF HOMER-OF ANOTHER POET OF SMYRNA-THE AQUEDUCTS-THE CAVE OF HOMERTHE RIVER-GOD.

SMYRNA has on the south-east f a fine plain, in which are villages, and the houses of the principal factors, who reside in the country in the summer. Norlecui and Hadjelar are toward the east. On the north side is Bujaw, distinguished by tall cypresstrees; and about a league from the sea Bonavre. In the way to this village, not far from the road, is a pool or two, now called the baths of Diana, the water clear and warm, a steam arising from it in winter. The fragments of a marble edifice near it have been removed. Some arches and foundations of buildings have been discovered in digging. In the middle of the plain are several small canals, which

f Pococke.

North-east. R.

communicate with aqueducts behind the castle-hill. The bed of a torrent, which after rains falls into the river Meles, is on the south of the plain; and beyond, or toward the feet of the mountains, is a village called Sedicui. Wild animals abound; and especially jackals, which are heard nightly, howling on the hills or in the plain. When one begins, the rest join as it were in full cry. Chameleons and lizards are commonly seen about the rubbish of old buildings, basking in the sun; and several kinds of snakes are found, some of a great length, which frequently are discovered by their musky smell.

neans.

The Meles was anciently the boast of the SmyrThis most beautiful water, as it has been stiled, flowed by the city-wall, and had its sources not remote. The clear stream is shallow in summer, not covering the rocky bed, but winding in the deep valley behind the castle, and murmuring among the evergreens. It receives many rills from the sides; and, after turning an over-shot mill or two, approaches the gardens without the town, where it is branched out by small canals, and divided and subdivided into lesser currents, until it is absorbed, or reaches the sea, at the end of the Frank street, in ditches, unlike a river: but in winter, after heavy rains on the mountains, or the melting of snow, it swells into a torrent, rapid and deep, often not fordable, or with danger.

On the north of Smyrna the sea enters a recess, in which is the road where ships careen. This inner bay is called by the English sailors, Peg's hole. The Meles, when full, pursues its way thither, instead of losing itself in the gardens. There also the first Smyrna was situated.

Old Smyrna was about twenty stadia, or two miles and a half, from the present city, and on the other side of the river. It is described as near the sea, with the clear stream of the Meles running by, and existed in the second century. Perhaps some vestiges might be discovered, even now, in tracing the river toward the bay. This is less wide than it was anciently, and has been removed from the site, by a large accession of low land, formed of soil washed from the mountains near, or of mud and slime brought down by the torrents.

Pococke has described several very ancient sepulchres on the side of the hill, more to the west than Bonavre, and near the corner of the bay, which, I should suppose, are relics of old Smyrna. The plainest sort consists, as he relates, of a raised ground in a circular form, of stones hewn out, or laid in a rough manner. In these are generally two graves, sunk in the earth, made of hewn stone, and covered over with a large stone. The others are circular mounts, from twenty to sixty feet in diameter, walled round, as high as their tops, with large rusticated stones; and have within, under ground, a room, which in some is divided into two apartments. The walls are all of good workmanship, constructed with a kind of brown bastard granite, the produce of the country, wrought very smooth; the joinings as fine as in polished marble. Some of the English had opened one of the former sort, and found an urn in it. I visited an old Turkish cemetery of considerable extent by Bonavre; and regret that I was not then apprised of these curious remains.

b P. 93.

The Smyrneans were originally of Ephesus, but had seceded, and, after dispossessing the Leleges, founded the city above mentioned. They were expelled in turn by the Æolians of Cyme, and retired to Colophon; but a party, pretending to be fugitives, obtained readmission, and, while the people were celebrating a feast of Bacchus without the walls, shut the gates. A general war was likely to follow between Eolia and Ionia, but it was at length agreed, that the town should deliver up all the effects of the late inhabitants, who were to be distributed among the Æolian cities. The territory of Smyrna had supplied corn for exportation, and the place was then become a considerable emporium. The Lydians destroyed this city, and the Smyrneans subsisted four hundred years as villagers, before they settled on mount Pagus.

It was the Æolian Smyrna which claimed the glory of producing Homer. Critheis, his mother, it is related, going in company with other women out of the town, to observe a festival, was delivered of him near the Meles, and named him Melesigenes. This story is dated ten years after the building of Smyrna, and one hundred and fifty-eight after the war of Troy. We may regret that the pleas of all the cities, which disputed the honour of his birth, are not on record. The place and time are equally unascertained; and it has been observed, that the poet has mentioned neither the Meles nor Smyrna i.

The history of Homer, it is remarkable, is scarcely more obscure than that of another poet of Smyrna, who has likewise written on the Trojan war.

i Strabo, p. 554.

This