A few raise horses and mules, enough for the transport of goods, but the majority are shepherds, proud of their occupation, and devoted to it with an intense love. The Karagouni enthusiast is unwilling to leave for a moment the sound and the sight of his flocks. He sleeps always in the open air, in the snow or in the rain, with one eye and one ear open, ready to start upon the least sinister sound or motion. The tinkling of the sheep-bells is his lullaby, and if it dies away upon his ear, he mechanically changes his place, though half asleep, and goes to lie where he can hear it more distinctly. Unlike the genuine Acarnanian, he has no warlike tastes, nor from his gigantic size, his broad breast, and his Herculean shoulders is it to be inferred that he is a dangerous foe. He is a bearer of burdens rather than of arms. The Karagouni woman is hardly inferior to the man in strength, in endurance, and in ability to meet privation. Her industry is incessant, and as she returns from the fountain, bearing on one shoulder the bag of washed clothing, and on the other a barrel of water, she plies the distaff upon the way, to lose no time. M. Heuzey saw a young bride already busily at work in her weaving, on the morning after her marriage. The dowry of a Karagouni bride, indeed, is all in the stuffs woven by her own hand, and her honor lies in her skill as a weaver.

The Kargounis are very careful to preserve their purity of blood. No daughter of the tribe can marry any Greek, however tempting or high his position. A Greek woman may by marriage be adopted into the Karagounis, but the counterpart to this is not tolerated. The marriage customs of the people quite distinctly show their descent from Roman ancestors. The man buys his wife by a bargain like that of the coemptio; the scarlet wool, and the apple planted upon the roof of the bridegroom's house, recall the Roman marriages, in which the wool was the sign of domestic labors, and the apple of love and maternity; the anointing of the threshold when the bride descends shows that she is now uxor or unxor; and the rush for morsels of the bride-cake is only the former confarreatio, slightly varied. The first joy of the marriage festival is all pagan, and the religious rites come in only after the bride has been conducted to her husband's house, has passed a night

there, and has been recognized as a wife. On the following day the priest comes to give the nuptial benediction and recite the prayers, and the feasting commences again, to last for two days longer. The woman is virtually a slave in the house of her husband; until a child is born to her, she must be dumb in his presence, must obey every order, and must never presume to address him directly.

These wandering Wallachs are permitted in the country on account of the revenue which their taxed flocks bring. But the feeling between them and the Acarnanian peasant is anything but kind and cordial. They are hateful to the sight of the owners of the lands, who naturally dread the incursions which their unmanageable flocks may make from the public domain upon private estates. In the popular imagination, these vagabonds are infidels, compelled to this migratory life for the punishment of some former crime. The conduct of the Karagounis helps somewhat to justify this charge. They are cunning to seize every chance of pilfering from the fields of their civilized neighbors, and are by no means heedful that the shepherds shall deliver the sheep from the temptation of the green wheat. The Greeks are proverbially "artful"; but the Greek race of Acarnania is no match for these experts in deception, who are perpetually on the watch, who move by night as well as by day, and whose stratagem is ruled by an infinite patience. The Karagounis have the advantage of their Greek neighbors, too, in their solid union and their common interest. They have no divisions, and obey their chiefs implicitly. The Greeks, on the contrary, have no unity. Each family has its own interests, and there are bitter rivalries in every village and neighborhood. The contempt which they put upon the nomad race does not prevent this race from thriving after its manner, any more than the contempt for the Jews in other lands hinders them from getting gold and influence.

These few notes may serve to give an idea of the present condition of the outlying province of the Grecian kingdom, so visible and yet so unknown," so near and yet so far." But a traveller in this province is surprised to find that here the remains of the ancient civilization are more abundant and better preserved than in any other part of the classic land. Every

where the grand ruins show the traces of the strong, active, and able race which once built cities and led a crowded life where are now these thick forests and neglected plains. The mould of ages has here rather protected than destroyed the monuments of early times; and in these woods the gateways and turrets of castles are still standing, as strong as when they were first fixed in their places. From Argos Amphilochicon, where the whole line of the ancient wall is visible, and where M. Heuzey measured the front of the four great towers, each nearly twenty feet square, to Eniades at the mouth of the Acheloüs, where the Cyclopean walls still testify to the strength of the Macedonian fortifications, the whole country is diversified by the sites and relics of ancient cities. Along the valley of the Bjakos (the ancient Inachos, as M. Heuzey believes) is a line of fortresses, some of which have walls six feet in thickness, and have witnessed the strifes of twenty centuries. The long contest of the Ambracians with the Amphilochians, so splendidly described by Thucydides, can be studied on the spot from its monuments. In the southern Valtos, near the small village of Karavassaras, now the capital of the province, are the Cyclopean walls of a once considerable city, which M. Heuzey decides to be the ancient Limnæa. Here there is a striking refutation of the oft-repeated charge that the Greeks did not understand the use of the arch. Vaults and doorways, which evidently are earlier than the Roman invasion, show a knowledge of this kind of structure as positive as that left in the great sewer or the triumphal monuments of the city of the kings and the Cæsars. The Grecian arch is less finished, and often lacks the keystone; but its shape is the same, its curve is as regular, and it has resisted as successfully the shocks and decay of time.

In the defile of Xerokambos is another curious ruin, which proves that the Greeks occasionally made use of cement in their constructions. In most instances, their stones were bound by no artificial tie, and were so nicely chiselled and squared that mere juxtaposition was quite sufficient. But in the cistern of the fortress of Peleginriatza, the stones are all joined by a very hard cement, making the reservoir perfectly water-tight. On the external surface of the wall of this cistern, not only are

the blocks beautifully bevelled, but there are projecting blocks from each separate course, arranged in the form of steps, by which one could ascend from the ground to the top. On the top of the cistern was a roof of tiles, as the fragments scattered around still conclusively show.

Stratos, the greatest city of Acarnania, according to Thucydides, justifies its former renown in the remains of its towers, its temples, and its theatres. A double line of fortified wall guarded the inner enclosure; and the fluted columns of more than one house of the gods bear evidence that the people were religious. M. Heuzey gives two funeral inscriptions which he found on this site. From the ruins in the defile of Aetos we can easily understand how Agesilaus could find such difficulties in driving back the handful of mountaineers which defended the pass against him. In the region of Vonitza, in the northwest angle of Acarnania, mediæval ruins are profusely mingled with Hellenic remains, and modern villages, often bearing the names of Greek saints, use the ancient walls and materials. We shall not attempt even to condense M. Heuzey's researches in Agios Vasilios, which he decides to be the site of Thyrrheon, where the Acarnanian League was sometimes accustomed to meet; or in Agios Hilias, which he believes to be the site of the Heracleia of Acarnania, while he supposes the chapel where he found painted tiles to be on the spot of an ancient temple of Apollo; or in Agios Petros, the successor to Anactorion, the commercial port of the province, near which was fought the battle of Actium; or in Kandila, the ancient Alyzia, sacred to Hercules, whose honor is attested in the beautiful bas-reliefs still remaining; or in the long valley of Dragamesti, rich at once in present possessions and in ancient monuments; or in Palæo-mani, and Matropolis; or in Eniades and the surrounding region, in the description of which so many interesting questions of architecture are discussed. In his account of ancient monuments, M. Heuzey shows himself to be a sharp observer, a sagacious judge, and a critic without prejudice.

The volume from which we have drawn most of these details is one of those fruits of travel which have done much in these latter years to give France its eminent place in works of this kind. It is a region almost unknown to modern geographers

and tourists which the perseverance of this scholar has opened. What M. Langlois has done for Cilicia and the Cydnus, M. Heuzey has done for Acarnania and the Acheloüs. Archæologists now, in visiting Greece, will not be content to omit from their survey a part which is so rich in historical monuments, and so free from the ordinary annoyances of Grecian travel. Some particulars M. Heuzey has neglected to give, which we should have been glad to know. He has not even estimated

the numbers of the Acarnanian people, or the value of their trade, or the character of their worship. There are many things yet to be learned in that hospitable land, by one who can master the dialect and will mingle freely with the people. We have yet to find confirmation of the averment of Pliny, that there are mines of iron under the soil, or of the later conjecture, that copper is in the rocks, and coal in the hills. The curious windings of the Acheloüs, the father of waters in ancient Hellas, are yet to be minutely described, as is also that singular structure of coast, by which the land slopes inward, and the highest mountains are nearest to the sea.

ART. VIII.

1. Select Remains of the REV. JOHN MASON. 12mo. pp. 252.

2. The Sisters: a Memoir of Elizabeth H., Abbie A., and Sarah F. Dickerman. By REV. ISRAEL F. WARREN. 16mo. pp. 283.

3. The Christian Minister's Affectionate Advice to a Married Couple. By REV. JAMES DEAN, A. M. Including a Letter from the REV. HENRY VENN, A. M. With Select Poems. 16mo. pp. 128.

4. The Wicket Gate: Short Narratives of the Turning of Sinners to God. With Words of Counsel and Warning.

16mo. pp. 258.

5. The Hidden Life; and the Life of Glory. By REV. HUBBARD WINSLOW, D. D., Author of "Intellectual Philosophy," "Moral Philosophy," "Christian Doctrines," etc. 16mo. pp. 254.