The sanctuary of Amphiaraus, described by Pausanias, lies in a pleasant little glen, neither wide nor deep, among low hills partially wooded with pine. The place, now called Mavrodhilisi, is distant about four miles south-east of Skala Oropou; Pausanias has greatly understated the distance. The path to it first goes through corn-fields near the sea, then turns inland and ascends through woods. A brook flows through the glen and finds its way between banks fringed by plane-trees and oleanders to the sea, which is more than a mile off. The clumps of trees and shrubs which tuft the sides of the glen and in which the nightingale warbles, the stretch of green meadow at the bottom, the stillness and seclusion of the place, and its sheltered and sunny aspect, all fitted it to be the resort of invalids, who thronged thither to consult the healing god. So sheltered indeed is the spot that even on a May morning the heat in the airless glen, with the Greek sun beating down out of a cloudless sky, is apt to be felt by a northerner as somewhat overpowering. But to a Greek it was no doubt agreeable. The oracle, we know, was open only in summer; and Livy speaks of “the ancient temple delightfully situated among springs and brooks”. The ruins of the sanctuary, excavated some years ago by the Greek Archaeological Society, lie on the narrow strip of flat ground on the northern or left bank of the stream. III. RHAMNUS.—Rhamnus is one of the loneliest and most secluded, but at the same time most picturesque and verdant spots in all Attica. It lies on the north-east coast of Attica, about six and a half miles north of Kato-Souli, the village which occupies the site of the ancient Tricorythus. The distance agrees well with the sixty Greek furlongs (nearly seven miles) at which Pausanias estimates it. The road from Kato-Souli first goes north-east across the northern portion of the Marathonian plain, which it quits by a pass leading northward through the hills. The pass soon opens into an upland valley, three miles long from south to north by one mile wide, enclosed on both sides by wild and barren hills. The upper slopes of these hills are scantily wooded with firs; their lower slopes are overgrown with myrtle, lentisk, and many sorts of thorny shrubs, especially the one called rhamnus, which gave the district its ancient name. The soil of the valley is partly under cultivation, but most of it is covered with dense underwood and oaks of the valanidia species. On a low flat ridge which runs across the valley from east to west there are some ancient ruins, consisting of walls and foundations of houses. There are now no permanent inhabitations in the whole valley. A few dirty hamlets, tenanted from time to time by peasants for the purpose of looking after their fields, lie at its eastern edge. The general aspect of the country is lonesome and desolate.