as the Massaliotic and Sinopic, insomuch that, as different cities contended for the honor of Homer's birth, different countries have some reason to contend for the true edition of his works. Of the several reviews, however, that were made of the poems of Homer, the greatest honor seems due to Egypt, if we may judge from that universal approbation which the performance of Aristarchus received; and if it be not his edition that we have at present, we know not to whom it ought to be ascribed. is time to return from this digression.

But it

Besides the school of Homer, the Scions pretend to show his dwelling house, where they tell us he composed most of his poems. The reader will naturally suppose it is in a ruinous condition, when he considers that Homer lived almost a thousand years before the Christian era. When Leo Allatius went to visit this house, he tells us he found nothing but a few stones mouldering away with age, over which he and his companions wept for satisfaction. These stones are to be seen in the North part of the island, near Volisso, which Thucydides and the author of Homer's life call Bolissus. Volisso is situated in the midst of the Arvisian fields, from whence the nectar of the ancients, as before observed, and perhaps this liquor might not a little elevate the poet's genius, for it is thought he was no enemy to a cheerful glass.*

Some of the medals struck in honor of Homer by the ancient inhabitants of this island, are still to be found in the collections of the curious; one in particular, where he is represented sitting on a chair, with a scroll or volume open in his hand, and reading intently, which, by the way, is a pretty good proof that he was not always blind, if it were necessary to prove what every line of

*It is inferred from Homer's praises of wine, his copious goblets, and pleasing description of banquets, that he loved good cheer and good company; and the same observation was made in Horace's time, as he himself tells us:

Ludibus arguitur viņi vinosus Homerus. Epist. XIX. Lib. 1.

Homer in praise of wine profuse,
No doubt loved well the balmy juice,

his works sufficiently demonstrates. The reverse of this medal is a sphinx, the symbol of Scio.

I shall conclude my account of Scio with a few observations on the persons and mannners of its present inhabitants. The natives are generally tall, well shaped men, but of no very agreeable aspect; the women, however, are extremely beautiful, and their charms are set off by the distinguishing neatness of their dress. Besides all this, they have wit, vivacity, and good humor to recommend them; but they are sensible of their beauty and of their amiable qualifications, and are not destitute of that vanity to which the fair sex are so exceedingly addicted. The manners of the Scions are not much different from those of the Genoese, who formerly had the government of the island; but they have retained nothing of the Italian jealousy, for the women here enjoy their full liberty, both in the city and country. They spend much of their time in conversation or play, in singing and gazing at their doors and windows, especially in the evenings; and a stranger may stop and address himself to any of them without offence: they will even chat and laugh with him as freely as if they had been acquainted many years. Their very nuns allow themselves more than ordinary liberties;* they purchase a chamber on being admitted into the house, go abroad when they think fit, and leave the convent at pleasure. Their usual employment is embroidering in gold, silver, or silk, in which the Greek women are very skilful; and they work exceeding pretty flowers upon their purses, handkerchiefs, pockets, and things of the like nature.

Learning is quite out of repute in Scio, a general ignorance prevailing over the whole island, though the natives have naturally a sharp wit, and are very cunning, not to say over reaching, in their dealings. They are apt to drink to excess, and are much

* They did the same, it seems, when M. Thevenot was at Scio, for that grave gentleman tells us, that he went into one of their nunneries, where he saw both Christians and Turks, and having entered the chamber of one of the sisters, he found her kind, as he himself expresses it, even beyond the bounds of Christian charity.

given to their pleasures. On Sundays and holidays, in the evening, both men and women get together and dance in a ring, which they frequently continue till morning, as well in the city as villages; and if a stranger has a mind to partake of the diversion, he is readily admitted. In short, they lead merry lives, as Greeks generally do; and if they are slaves, they seem to be happy in this respect, that they know nothing of the matter: but to say the truth, their slavery is little more than nominal, there being no part of Turkey where the Greeks enjoy greater lib

erties.

Having satisfied our curiosity at Scio, and the weather continuing favorable, we sailed from thence the 10th of October, for the island of Samos, and the wind being North West, the fairest that could blow for our purpose, we came to an anchor the next day at noon in the port of Vati. The town of Vati stands at the foot of a hill, near a mile from the harbor, and consists of about three hundred houses, and six or seven chapels, all very mean buildings, though this is one of the most considerable places in the island. The port is the best and safest in the whole country, and is capable of receiving a numerous fleet; and on the Western shore it was anciently a large town, as we may judge from the extensive ruins that are scattered there, though no traces of magnificence appear amongst them. The port of Seitan, which in the Turkish language signifies the devil, lies on the Western part of the island; and that of Tigani on the South, which was the port to the ancient city of Samos; but neither of these is so secure as that of Vati.

The island of Samos is about an hundred miles in circumference, stretching from East to West, and is separated on the East from the continent of Asia by a very narrow straight, called the Little Boghag, and on the West from the largest of the isles called Fourni, by a channel about ten miles broad, called the Great Boghas. All ships bound from Constantinople to Syria or Egpyt, after touching at Scio, pass through one of these straights, as do also the vessels coming from those countries to Constanti

nople, for which reason they used to be much infested by the

corsairs.

The Little Boghas is narrowest just over against a high mountain in Natolia called Mycale by the ancients, and at present the mountain of Samson, from an adjacent village of the same name, which probably was built on the ruins of Priene, the birth place of Bias,* one of the seven Grecian sages. This mountain is covered with tall pines, chestnut trees, and several other sorts, and is full of game, as Strabo has described it; and a little to the North of it, towards Scalanova, is a village called Tchangli, whose situation agrees exactly with that which Strabo assigns to Panionium, famous for being the place where the deputies of the cities of Ionia used to assemble, to consult about their most weighty affairs.

In the middle of this straight, towards its Southern mouth, is an ancient chapel built upon a rock; and between this rock and the island of Samos lies the little isle which Strabo calls Natheci, and which helps us to determine the situation of Neptune's

* We know very little of this philosopher, but we have an account of a stratagem of his, whereby he obliged Halyattes, king of Lydia, to raise the siege of Priene, his native city. The place was hard pressed with famine, upon which he caused two mules to be fattened, and contrived a way that they should pass into the enemy's camp. The good condition they were in, astonished the king, who thereupon sent deputies into the city, upon pretence of offering terms of peace, but in reality to observe the state of the town and people. Bias, guessing their errand, ordered the granaries to be filled with heaps of sand, and those heaps to be covered over with corn. When the deputies returned, and reported to the king what great plenty of provisions they had seen in the city, he hesitated no longer, but concluded a treaty, and raised the siege.-By a like artifice, Thrasybulus is said to have caused Halyattes to raise the siege of Miletus, a city not far from Priene.Both these accounts are to be found in the second volume of M. Rollin's Ancient History, but which of them is the true one, (for they seem to be the same story somewhat differently told) I leave to the reader's judgment.-One of the precepts that Bias particularly taught and recommended was, to do all the good we can, and ascribe all the glory of it to the gods: The city of Priene was so famous for the justice practised there in the time of this philosopher, that Justitia Prienenfis became a proverb.

G

Cape, that took its name from a temple dedicated to that deity. On the Samian shore, in the North East part of the same straight, is a road for ships called the Galley port, about which the ruins of an ancient town are to be discerned, and of two temples, as one may conjecture from the columns that lie scattered in different places; the one having been built on an eminence, the other in a bottom. The ruins of the town consist chiefly of bricks, mixed with some pieces of white marble, and fragments of jasper columns. At the point of the port, where the channel is narrowest, are foundations of an ancient marble tower, from whence the people of the country pretend there used to be a chain over to the Continent, to prevent any ships passing through the straight, adding, that several huge iron rings for that purpose are still to be seen on the opposite coast of Asia. There is another port between Vati and the little Boghas, behind a rock called Prasonesi; and at a little distance from the shore are three or four small rocks, the chief of which is called Didascalo, where, according to a tradition among the natives, was formerly the college or school of the country.

After we had visited the Eastern parts of the island, we set out for the Southern coast, and had a pleasant journey to Chora, about fifteen miles from Vati. In our way thither we made some stay at a handsome village called Metelinos, which took its name from the island of Metelin, having been rebuilt by a colony sent from that country after Sultan Selim had given Samos to the Captain Bashaw Ochiali. The spring of Metelinous, which forms a considerable stream running Eastward from the village, is the best in the whole island, and is undoubtedly that which was conveyed to the city of Samos by a wonderful canal cut through a mountain, as mentioned by Herodotus.

Near this spring, in the wall of the church of Metelinos, is fixed an ancient bas-relief of marble, of excellent workmanship, which was found in the last century by a Greek priest, as he was digging up a field. It is above two feet long, and fifteen or sixteen inches high, but the heads are very much battered. It contains seven figures, and represents a sick man of quality implo