He here, however, first displayed that love of letters, and veneration for men distinguished in them, which characterized him during his short but brilliant career; for, amidst the general destruction, he ordered the house in which the lyric poet Pindar was born to be held as sacred as a temple, and, at the same time, sought out and provided for all the descendants of the family of the bard of Thebes. The history of this city is a remarkable one. Although not ranking so high as Sparta or Athens, it was raised to an equal importance by the courage, talents, and high moral character of one man. Epaminondas is, perhaps, the noblest specimen Greece has handed down to us of the _hero_, in all senses: and to his career was bounded the glory of his native city; it rose with him, and with him expired. TROY. A.C. 1184. The next siege we meet with is the most celebrated in history or fiction, not so much on its own account, as from its good fortune in having the greatest poet the world has produced as its chronicler. If Homer had not placed this great siege in the regions of fable by his introduction of immortals into the action, it would still be a myth, as is all we know of Greece at the period at which it took place. Hypercritics have, indeed, endeavoured to make over the whole of it to the muses who preside over fiction; but we cannot accede to their decision. There is a vital reality in the characters of Homer, which proves that they did exist and act; a blind old bard might sing the deeds of heroes, and perhaps clothe those deeds with some of the splendour of his genius; but we have no faith in his having created the men, any more than he did the immortals, who belonged to the mythology of his country long before he was born. There is nothing in the “song of Troy divine” that is dissonant with the character of the age; so far to the contrary, we believe the poet has given a more faithful picture of the heroes, and the events connected with them, than any historian has done. Achilles is as perfect from the hands of Homer, as Alexander from the pen of Quintus Curtius or Arian. If we disperse the mist of diablerie which surrounds Macbeth, we shall find him a human character, acted upon by human passions, independently of the witches; and so with Homer’s heroes: they are all most essentially real men, notwithstanding the gorgeous mythology that attends them, and act as they would have done without immortal intervention. We have as perfect faith in the history of the siege of Troy, as in most of the pages of what has been termed the “great lie.” Independently of the work of genius for ever associated with it, the siege of Troy is a memorable epoch in human annals.