Attica, had been to some extent dismantled, or allowed to fall into decay, at the end of the Peloponnesian War, but that its solid structure made it a matter of very little labor for the exiles to render it strong and easily defensible. This is one of the numerous instances in which a single glance at the locality sets right an historical statement that has eluded suspicion for ages. The fort of Phyle, like that of Eleutheræ, of which I shall speak, and like those of Messene and of Orchomenus, is built of square blocks of stone, carefully cut, and laid together without a particle of rubble or cement, but so well fitted as to be able to resist the wear of ages better than almost any other building. I was informed by M. Émile Burnouf, that in the case of a fort at Megara, which I did not see, there are even polygonal blocks, of which the irregular and varying angles are fitted with such precision that it is difficult, as in the case of the Parthenon, to detect the joinings of the stones. The blocks are by no means so colossal in these buildings as in the great ruins about Mycenæ; but the fitting is closer, and the sites on which we find them very lofty, and with precipitous ascents. This style of building is specially mentioned by Thucydides (I. 93) as being employed in the building of the walls of the Peiræus in the days of Themistocles, apparently in contrast to the rude and hurried construction of the city walls. But he speaks of the great stones being not only cut square, but fastened with clamps of iron soldered with lead. I am not aware that any traces of this are found in the remaining hill-forts. The walls of the Peiræus have, unfortunately, long since almost totally disappeared. The way from Athens to Phyle leads north-west through the rich fields of the old deme of Acharnæ; and we wonder at first why they should be so noted as charcoal-burners. But as we approach Mount Parnes, we find that the valley is bounded by tracts of hillside fit for nothing but pine forest. A vast deal of wooding still remains; it is clear that these forests were the largest and most convenient to supply Athens with firewood or charcoal. As usual, there are many glens and river-courses through the rugged country through which we ascend—here and there a village, in one secluded nook a little monastery, hidden from the world, if not from its cares. There is the usual Greek vegetation beside the path; not perhaps luxuriant to our Northern eyes, but full of colors of its own—the glowing anemone, the blood-red poppy, the delicate cistus on a rocky surface, with foliage rather gray and silvery than green. The pine-trees sound, as the breeze sweeps up the valleys, and lavish their vigorous fragrance through the air.