To render still clearer the point we have been insisting on in the foregoing chapter, it may be useful to take a rapid survey of the geography of the country, and enter somewhat more at length into its peculiar configuration and productions.[167] Considered as a whole, the most remarkable feature in the aspect of Greece consists in the great variety of forms which its surface assumes in the territories of the numerous little states into which the country was anciently divided. Of these no two resemble each other, whether in physical structure, climate or productions; so that it may be said that in general the atmosphere of Greece is mild,[168] but not in every part, for within its narrow boundaries are found nearly all grades of temperature. The inhabitants of Elis and the valley of the Eurotas are exposed to a degree of heat little inferior to that of Egypt, while the settlers about Olympos, Pindos and Dodona, with the rough goat-herds of Parnassos, Doris and the Arcadian mountains experience the rigours of an almost Scandinavian winter. In this extraordinary country the palm tree and the myrtle flourish within sight of the pine, the larch, and the silver fir of the north. In several of the islands and on parts of the continent certain tropical birds, as the peacock and the golden pheasant, have long been naturalised, while in other districts snipes and woodcocks[169] appear early; storms of sleet and hail are frequent, and the summits of mountains are capped with eternal snow.[170] A no very elevated range of hills separates the marsh miasmata and wit-withering fogs of Bœotia,[171] the home of gluttony and stupidity, from the bland transparent cheerful atmosphere and sweet wholesome soil of Attica, where, as a dwelling-place for man, earth has reached her highest culminating point of excellence, and where, accordingly, her noblest fruits, wisdom and beauty, have ripened most kindly. Footnote 167: Cf. Hermann, Pol. Ant. § 6. Müll. Dor. ii. 425. Footnote 168: Varro gave the preference to the soil and climate of Italy, where everything good was produced in perfection. He thought no barley to be compared with the Campanian, no wheat with the Apulian, no rye with the Falernian, no oil with the Venafran. The whole country was so thickly planted with trees that it seemed to be an orchard. Not even Phrygia itself abounded more in vineyards; nor was Argos so fertile as parts of Italy, though it was said to produce from ten to fifteen pipes the juger. De Re Rustica, i. 2. p. 46. b. Footnote 169: “Woodcocks and snipes, I am informed, visited the neighbourhood of Attica during the winter in considerable quantities. I heard the curlew and the red shank cry along the marsh to the right of the Piræus.” Sibth. in Walp. Mem. i. 76. Footnote 170: Cramer, Desc. of Greece, i. 8. Footnote 171: