John Stephens - Incidents of Travel in Greece, Turkey, Russia, and Poland, Vol. 1 (of 2)

Early the next morning I started for the field of Marathon. I engaged a servant at the hotel to accompany me, but he disappointed me, and I set out alone with my muleteer. Our road lay along the base of Mount Hymettus, on the borders of the plain of Attica, shaded by thick groves of olives. At noon I was on the summit of a lofty mountain, at the base of which, still and quiet as if it had never resounded with the shock of war, the great battle-ground of the Greeks and Persians extended to the sea. The descent was one of the finest things I met with in Greece; wild, rugged, and, in fact, the most magnificent kind of mountain scenery. At the foot of the mountain we came to a ruined convent, occupied by an old white-bearded monk. I stopped there and lunched, the old man laying before me his simple store of bread and olives, and looking on with pleasure at my voracious appetite.

Mound of Marathon.

This over, I hurried to the battle-field. Toward the centre is a large mound of earth, erected over the Athenians who fell in the battle. I made directly for this mound, ascended it, and threw the reins loose over my horse's neck; and, sitting on the top, read the account of the battle in Herodotus.

After all, is not our reverence misplaced, or, rather does not our respect for deeds hallowed by time render us comparatively unjust? The Greek revolution teems with instances of as desperate courage, as great love of country, as patriotic devotion, as animated the men of Marathon, and yet the actors in these scenes are not known beyond the boundaries of their native land. Thousands whose names were never heard of, and whose bones, perhaps, never received burial, were as worthy of an eternal monument as they upon whose grave I sat. Still that mound is a hallowed sepulchre; and the shepherd who looks at it from his mountain home, the husbandman who drives his plough to its base, and the sailor who hails it as a landmark from the deck of his caique, are all reminded of the glory of their ancestors. But away with the mouldering relics of the past. Give me the green grave of Marco Bozzaris. I put Herodotus in my pocket, gathered a few blades of grass as a memorial, descended the mound, betook myself to my saddle, and swept the plain on a gallop, from the mountain to the sea.

It is about two miles in width, and bounded by rocky heights enclosing it at either extremity. Toward the shore the ground is marshy, and at the place where the Persians escaped to their ships are some unknown ruins; in several places the field is cultivated, and toward evening, on my way to the village of Marathon, I saw a Greek ploughing; and when I told him that I was an American, he greeted me as the friend of Greece. It is the last time I shall recur to this feeling; but it was music to my heart to hear a ploughman on immortal Marathon sound in my ears the praises of my country.

I intended to pass the night at the village of Marathon; but every khan was so cluttered up with goats, chickens, and children, that I rode back to the monastery at the foot of the mountain. It was nearly dark when I reached it. The old monk was on a little eminence at the door of his chapel, clapping two boards together to call his flock to vespers. With his long white beard, his black cap and long black gown, his picturesque position and primitive occupation, he seemed a guardian spirit hovering on the borders of Marathon in memory of its ancient glory. He came down to the monastery to receive me, and, giving me a paternal welcome, and spreading a mat on the floor, returned to his chapel. I followed, and saw his little flock assemble. The ploughman came up from the plain and the shepherd came down from the mountain; the old monk led the way to the altar, and all kneeled down and prostrated themselves on the rocky floor. I looked at them with deep interest. I had seen much of Greek devotion in cities and villages, but it was a spectacle of extraordinary interest to see these wild and lawless men assembled on this lonely mountain to worship in all sincerity, according to the best light they had, the god of their fathers. I could not follow them in their long and repeated kneelings and prostrations; but my young Greek, as if to make amends for me, and, at the same time, to show how they did things in Athens, led the van. The service over, several of them descended with us to the monastery; the old monk spread his mat, and again brought out his frugal store of bread and olives. I contributed what I had brought from Athens, and we made our evening meal. If I had judged from appearances, I should have felt rather uneasy at sleeping among such companions; but the simple fact of having seen them at their devotions gave me confidence. Though I had read and heard that the Italian bandit went to the altar to pray forgiveness for the crimes he intended to commit, and, before washing the stains from his hands, hung up the bloody poniard upon a pillar of the church, and asked pardon for murder, I always felt a certain degree of confidence in him who practised the duties of his religion, whatever that religion might be. I leaned on my elbow, and, by the blaze of the fire, read Herodotus, while my muleteer, as I judged from the frequent repetition of the word Americanos, entertained them with long stories about me. By degrees the blaze of the fire died away, the Greeks stretched themselves out for sleep, the old monk handed me a bench about four inches high for a pillow, and, wrapping myself in my cloak, in a few moments I was wandering in the land of dreams.

Before daylight my companions were in motion. I intended to return by the marble quarries on the Pentelican Mountain; and crying "Cavallo" in the ear of my still sleeping muleteer, in a few minutes I bade farewell for ever to the good old monk of Marathon. Almost from the door of the monastery we commenced ascending the mountain. It was just peep of day, the weather raw and cold, the top of the mountain covered with clouds, and in an hour I found myself in the midst of them. The road was so steep and dangerous that I could not ride; a false step of my horse might have thrown me over a precipice several hundred feet deep; and the air was so keen and penetrating, that, notwithstanding the violent exercise of walking, I was perfectly chilled. The mist was so dense, too, that, when my guide was a few paces in advance, I could not see him, and I was literally groping my way through the clouds. I had no idea where I was nor of the scene around me, but I felt that I was in a measure lifted above the earth. The cold blasts drove furiously along the sides of the mountain, whistled against the precipices, and bellowed in the hollows of the rocks, sometimes driving so furiously that my horse staggered and fell back. I was almost bewildered in struggling blindly against them; but, just before reaching the top of the mountain, the thick clouds were lifted as if by an invisible hand, and I saw once more the glorious sun pouring his morning beams upon a rich valley extending a great distance to the foot of the Pentelican Mountain. About half way down we came to a beautiful stream, on the banks of which we took out our bread and olives. Our appetites were stimulated by the mountain air, and we divided till our last morsel was gone.

At the foot of the mountain, lying between it and Mount Pentelicus, was a large monastery, occupied by a fraternity of monks. We entered and walked through it, but found no one to receive us. In a field near by we saw one of the monks, from whom we obtained a direction to the quarries. Moving on to the foot of the mountain, which rises with a peaked summit into the clouds, we commenced ascending, and soon came upon the strata of beautiful white marble for which Mount Pentelicus has been celebrated thousands of years. Excavations appear to have been made along the whole route, and on the roadside were blocks, and marks caused by the friction of the heavy masses transported to Athens. The great quarries are toward the summit. The surface has been cut perpendicularly smooth, perhaps eighty or a hundred feet high, and one hundred and fifty or two hundred feet in width, and excavations have been made within to an unknown extent. Whole cities might have been built with the materials taken away, and yet by comparison with what is left, there is nothing gone. In front are entrances to a large chamber, in one corner of which, on the right, is a chapel with the painted figure of the Virgin to receive the Greeks' prayers. Within are vast humid caverns, over which the wide roof awfully extends, adorned with hollow tubes like icicles, while a small transparent petrifying stream trickles down the rock. On one side are small chambers communicating with subterraneous avenues, used, no doubt, as places of refuge during the revolution, or as the haunts of robbers. Bones of animals and stones blackened with smoke showed that but lately some part had been occupied as a habitation. The great excavations around, blocks of marble lying as they fell, perhaps, two thousand years ago, and the appearances of having been once a scene of immense industry and labour, stand in striking contrast with the desolation and solitude now existing. Probably the hammer and chisel will never be heard there more, great temples will no more be raised, and modern genius will never, like the Greeks of old, make the rude blocks of marble speak.