Along its coast are many deep bays. Long and narrow promontories run out into the sea. Thus a great length is given to the sea-coast, which abounds in commodious harbors. The tideless waters are safe for navigators. Scattered within easy distance of the shore are numerous islands of great fertility and beauty. So high and rugged are the mountains that communication between different places is commonly easier by water than by land. A branch of the Alps at the forty-second parallel of latitude turns to the south-east, and descends to _Toenarum_, the southern promontory. On either side, lateral branches are sent off, at short intervals, to the east and the west. From these in turn, branches, especially on the east, are thrown out in the same direction as the main ridge; that is, from north to south. Little room is left for plains of much extent. _Thessaly_, with its single river, the _Peneus_, was such a plain. There were no navigable rivers. Most of the streams were nothing more than winter-torrents, whose beds were nearly or quite dry in the summer. They often groped their way to the sea through underground channels, either beneath lakes or in passages which the streams themselves bored through limestone. The physical features of the country fitted it for the development of small states, distinct from one another, yet, owing especially to the relations of the land to the sea, full of life and movement. THE GRECIAN STATES.--The territory of Greece included (1) Northern Greece, comprising all north of the Malian (Zeitoum) and Ambracian (Arta) gulfs; (2) Central Greece, extending thence to the Gulf of Corinth; (3) the peninsula of Peloponnesus (Morea) to the south of the isthmus. The country was occupied, in the flourishing days of Greece, by not less than seventeen states.