My fate had been very unfortunate; twelve days I had patiently endured being shut up in the lazaretto at AEgina, in order to be able to see the classic country, and now I was so anxious to leave it that I had neither rest nor peace.

Athens, the capital of the former State of Attica, is said to have been founded in the year 1300, fourteen hundred years before Christ, by Cecrops, from whom it then took the name of Cecropia, which in after-times was retained only by the castle:  under Eriktonius the town was named “Athens.”  The original town stood upon a rock in the centre of a plain, which was afterwards covered with buildings; the upper part was called the “Acropolis,” the lower the “Katopolis;” only a part of the fortress, the famous Acropolis, remains on the mountain, where the principal works of art of Athens stand.  The principal feature was the temple of Minerva, or the Parthenon; even its ruins excite the astonishment of the world.  The building is said to have been 215 feet long, ninety-seven feet broad, and seventy feet high; here stood the statue of Minerva, by Phidias.  This masterly work was executed in gold and ivory; its height was forty-six feet, and it is said to have weighed more than 2000 pounds.  Fifty-five columns of the entrance to the temple still remain, as well as parts of enormous blocks of marble which rest upon them, and belonged to the arches and roof.

This temple was destroyed by the Persians, and was again restored with greater beauty by Pericles, about 440 years after the birth of Christ.

There are some fine remains of the temples of Minerva and Neptune, and the extent of the amphitheatre can still be seen; there is but little of the theatre of Bacchus remaining.

Outside the Acropolis stands the temple of Theseus and that of Jupiter Olympus; the one on the north, the other on the south side.  The former is in the Doric style, and is surrounded by thirty-six fine columns.  On the metope are represented the deeds of Theseus in beautiful reliefs.  The interior of the temple is full of fine sculptures, epitaphs, and other works in stone, most of which belong to the other temples, but are collected here.  Outside the temple stand several marble seats which have been brought from the neighbouring Areopagus, the former place of assembly for the patricians.  Of the Areopagus itself nothing more is to be seen than a chamber cut out of the rock, to which similarly cut steps lead.

Of the temple of Jupiter Olympus so much of the foundation-walls still remain as to show what its size was; there are also sixteen beautiful columns, fifty-eight feet in height.  This temple, which was completed by Hadrian, is said to have exceeded in beauty and magnificence all the buildings of Athens.  The exterior was decorated by one hundred and twenty fluted columns six feet in diameter and fifty-nine in height.  The gold and ivory statue of Jupiter was, like that of Minerva, the production of the masterly hand of Phidias.  All the temples and buildings were of pure white marble.