Here, again, we feel the want of some stronger government—some despotic assertion of a law of gravitation to a common centre—to counteract the strong centrifugal forces acting all through Greek society. The old _autonomy_ of the Greeks—that old assertion of local independence which was at once their greatness and their ruin—this strong instinct has lasted undiminished to the present day. They seem even now to hate pulling together, as we say. They seem always ready to assert their individual rights and claims against those of the community or the public. The old Greeks had as a safeguard their divisions into little cities and territories; so that their passion for autonomy was expended on their city interests, in which the individual could forget himself. But as the old Greeks were often too selfish for this, and asserted their personal autonomy against their own city, so the modern Greek, who has not this safety-valve, finds it difficult to rise to the height of acting in the interests of the nation at large; and though he converses much and brilliantly about Hellenic unity, he generally allows smaller interests to outweigh this splendid general conception. I will here add a most annoying example of this particularist feeling, which obtrudes itself upon every visitor to Athens. The most trying thing in the streets is the want of shade, and the consequent glare of the houses and roadway. Yet along every street there are planted pepper-trees of graceful growth and of delicious scent. But why are they all so wretchedly small and bare? Because each inhabitant chooses to hack away the growing branches in front of his own door. The Prime Minister, who deplored this curious Vandalism, said he was powerless to check it. Until, however, the Athenians learn to control themselves, and let their trees grow, Athens will be an ugly and disagreeable city.