ÆGINA, on the other hand, lost its fame only with its political existence. Its situation near the great commercial road, which had taken this course chiefly in consequence of the danger of doubling the promontory of Malea, the renown of its mythical history, and the peculiar vigour of the inhabitants, had carried their activity to such a height, as to give their island an importance in the history of Greece which will ever be remarkable. Though at Rhodes the amalgamation of the different nations produced an uniform and consistent whole, this does not seem to have been the case at CYRENE, which was corrupted by Ægyptian and Libyan influence. We have only to notice the character of Pheretime, who from a Doric lady became an eastern sultana. It is remarkable that another Doric female, viz. Artemisia (whose father was of Halicarnassus, her mother of Crete(1896)), obtained a similar situation. In the mother-country, however, there is after the fabulous times hardly any instance of women being at the head either of Doric or other cities.(1897) We have already spoken as much as our object required of the Doric town of CROTON(1898) in Italy; and several times touched on the decay of the Doric discipline and manners at TARENTUM. Their climate, which was very different from that of Greece,(1899) and the manners of the native tribes, must have had a very considerable share in changing the characters of these two cities; as the Tarentines did not subjugate only and slaughter the inhabitants (like the Carbinates), but received them within the limits of their large city, and gave them the rights of citizenship, by which means those words which we call Roman, but which were probably common to all the Siculians,(1900) were introduced into the Tarentine dialect. In the MESSENIAN state, as restored by Epaminondas, the ancient national manners were (according to Pausanias(1901)) still retained; and the dialect remained up to the time of that author the purest Doric that was spoken in Peloponnesus. The reason of this either was, that the Helots who remained in the country, and doubtless formed the larger part of the new nation, had obtained the Doric character, or that the exiles had during their long banishment really preserved their ancient language, as we know to have been the case with the Naupactians in more ancient times.(1902) This the Messenians, who dwelt among the Euesperitæ of Libya, might have done, as they resided among Dorians; but it was less easy for the Messenians of Sicily,(1903) and wholly impossible for those of Rhegium. In the people of Rhegium in general there appears to have been little of the Doric character;(1904) nor probably in real truth among the later Messenians, however they might have endeavoured to bring back the ancient times.