But returning, as he inevitably will, again and again to the Acropolis, the scholar will gradually become conscious, if dimly, of another and an earlier Athens. On his plan of the Acropolis he will find marked certain fragments of very early masonry, which, he is told, are ‘Pelasgian.’ As he passes to the south of the Parthenon he comes upon deep-sunk pits railed in, and within them he can see traces of these ‘Pelasgian’ walls and other masonry about which his guide-book is not over-explicit. To the south of the Propylaea, to his considerable satisfaction, he comes on a solid piece of this ‘Pelasgian’ wall, still above ground. East of the Erechtheion he will see a rock-hewn stairway which once, he learns, led down from the palace of the ancient prehistoric kings, the ‘strong house of Erechtheus.’ South of the Erechtheion he can make out with some effort the ground plan of an early temple; he is told that there exist bases of columns belonging to a yet earlier structure, and these he probably fails to find. With all his efforts he can frame but a hazy picture of this earlier Acropolis, this citadel before the Persian wars. Probably he might drop the whole question as of merely antiquarian interest—a matter to be noted rather than realized—but that his next experience brings sudden revelation. Skilfully sunk out of sight—to avoid interfering with his realization of Periklean Athens—is the small Acropolis Museum. Entering it, he finds himself in a moment actually within that other and earlier Athens dimly discerned, and instantly he knows it, not as a world of ground-plans and fragmentary Pelasgic fortifications, but as a kingdom of art and of humanity vivid with colour and beauty. As he passes in eager excitement through the ante-rooms he will glance, as he goes, at the great blue lion and the bull, at the tangle of rampant many-coloured snakes, at the long-winged birds with their prey still in beak and talon; he will pause to smile back at the three kindly ‘Blue-beards,’ he will be glad when he sees that the familiar Calf-Carrier has found his feet and his name, he will note the long rows of solemn votive terra-cottas, and, at last, he will stand in the presence of those Maiden-images, who, amid all that coloured architectural splendour, were consecrate to the worship of the Maiden. The Persian harried them, Perikles left them to lie beneath his feet, yet their antique loveliness is untouched and still sovran. They are alive, waiting still, in hushed, intent expectancy—but not for us. We go out from their presence as from a sanctuary, and henceforth every stone of the Pelasgian fortress where they dwelt is, for us, sacred.