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

It was to him, then, that, on our return from our visit to the widow and daughters of Marco Bozzaris, we were indebted for a turnout that seemed to astonish even the people of Missilonghi. The horses were miserable little animals, hidden under enormous saddles made of great clumps of wood over an old carpet or towcloth, and covering the whole back from the shoulders to the tail; the luggage was perched on the tops of these saddles, and with desperate exertions and the help of the citizens of Missilonghi we were perched on the top of the luggage. The little animals had a knowing look as they peered from under the superincumbent mass, and, supported on either side by the by-standers till we got a little steady in our seats, we put forth from Missilonghi. The only gentleman of our party was our servant, who followed on a European saddle which he had brought for his own use, smoking his pipe with great complacency, perfectly satisfied with our appearance and with himself.

It was four o'clock when we crossed the broken walls of Missilonghi. For three hours our road lay over a plain extending to the sea. I have no doubt, if my Greek had been there, he would have given an interest to the road by referring to scenes and incidents connected with the siege of Missilonghi; but Demetrius—as he now chose to call himself—knew nothing of Greece, ancient or modern; he had no sympathy of feeling with the Greeks; had never travelled on this side of the Gulf of Corinth before; and so he lagged behind and smoked his pipe.

It was nearly dark when we reached the miserable little village of Bokara. We had barely light enough to look around for the best khan in which to pass the night. Any of the wretched tenants would have been glad to receive us for the little remuneration we might leave with them in the morning. The khans were all alike, one room, mud floor and walls, and we selected one where the chickens had already gone to roost, and prepared to measure off the dirt floor according to our dimensions. Before we were arranged a Greek of a better class, followed by half a dozen villagers, came over, and, with many regrets for the wretched state of the country, invited us to his house. Though dressed in the Greek costume, it was evident that he had acquired his manners in a school beyond the bounds of his miserable little village, in which his house now rose like the Leaning Tower of Pisa, higher than everything else, but rather rickety. In a few minutes we heard the death notes of some chickens, and at about nine o'clock sat down to a not unwelcome meal. Several Greeks dropped in during the evening, and one, a particular friend of our host's, supped with us. Both talked French, and had that perfect ease of manner and savoir faire which I always remarked with admiration in all Greeks who had travelled. They talked much of their travels; of time spent in Italy and Germany, and particularly of a long residence at Bucharest. They talked, too, of Greece; of her long and bitter servitude, her revolution, and her independence; and from their enthusiasm I could not but think that they had fought and bled in her cause. I certainly was not lying in wait to entrap them, but I afterward gathered from their conversation that they had taken occasion to be on their travels at the time when the bravest of their countrymen were pouring out their blood like water to emancipate their native land. A few years before I might have felt indignation and contempt for men who had left their country in her hour of utmost need, and returned to enjoy the privileges purchased with other men's blood; but I had already learned to take the world as I found it, and listened quietly while our host told us that, confiding in the permanency of the government secured by the three great powers, England, France, and Russia, he had returned to Greece, and taken a lease of a large tract of land for fifty years, paying a thousand drachms, a drachm being one sixth of a dollar, and one tenth of the annual fruits, at the end of which time one half of the land under cultivation was to belong to his heirs in fee.

As our host could not conveniently accommodate us all, M. and Demetrius returned to the khan at which we had first stopped and where, to judge from the early hour at which they came over to us the next morning, they had not spent the night as well as we did. At daylight we took our coffee, and again perched our luggage on the backs of the horses, and ourselves on top of the luggage. Our host wished us to remain with him, and promised the next day to accompany us to Padras; but this was not a sufficient inducement; and taking leave of him, probably for ever, we started for Lepanto.

We rode about an hour on the plain; the mountains towered on our left, and the rich soil was broken into rough sandy gullies running down to the sea. Our guides had some apprehensions that we should not be able to cross the torrents that were running down from the mountain; and when we came to the first, and had to walk up along the bank, looking out for a place to ford, we fully participated in their apprehensions. Bridges were a species of architecture entirely unknown in that part of modern Greece; indeed, no bridges could have stood against the mountain torrents. There would have been some excitement in encountering these rapid streams if we had been well mounted; but, from the manner in which we were hitched on our horses, we did not feel any great confidence in our seats. Still nothing could be wilder or more picturesque than our process in crossing them, except that it might have added somewhat to the effect to see one of us floating down stream, clinging to the tail of his horse. But we got over or through them all. A range of mountains then formed on our right, cutting us off from the sea, and we entered a valley lying between the two parallel ranges. At first the road, which was exceedingly difficult for a man or a sure-footed horse, lay along a beautiful stream, and the whole of the valley extending to the Gulf of Lepanto is one of the loveliest regions of country I ever saw. The ground was rich and verdant, and, even at that early season of the year, blooming with wild flowers of every hue, but wholly uncultivated, the olive-trees having all been cut down by the Turks, and without a single habitation on the whole route. My Scotch companion, who had a good eye for the picturesque and beautiful in natural scenery, was in raptures with this valley. I have since travelled in Switzerland, not, however, in all the districts frequented by tourists; but in what I saw, beautiful as it is, I do not know a place where the wildness of mountain scenery is so delightfully contrasted with the softness of a rich valley.

At the end of the valley, directly opposite Padras, and on the borders of the gulf, is a wild road called Scala Cativa, running along the sides of a rocky, mountainous precipice overlooking the sea. It is a wild and almost fearful road; in some places I thought it like the perpendicular sides of the Palisades; and when the wind blows in a particular direction it is impossible to make headway against it. Our host told us that we should find difficulty that day; and there was just rudeness enough to make us look well to our movements. Directly at our feet was the Gulf of Corinth; opposite a range of mountains; and in the distance the island of Zante. On the other side of the valley is an extraordinary mountain, very high, and wanting a large piece in the middle, as if cut out with a chisel, leaving two straight parallel sides, and called by the unpoetical name of the armchair. In the wildest pan of the Scala, where a very slight struggle would have precipitated us several hundred feet into the sea, an enormous shepherd's dog came bounding and barking toward us; and we were much relieved when his master, who was hanging with his flock of goats on an almost inaccessible height, called him away. At the foot of the mountain we entered a rich plain, where the shepherds were pasturing their flocks down to the shore of the sea, and in about two hours arrived at Lepanto.