It was owing to such piratical descents that the early inhabitants of Greece, for the most part, erected their towns and villages at some distance from the sea-coast, in situations difficult of access. Thucyd. § 7. Similar reasons have elsewhere led in modern times to similar results. Thus, in Alicuda, the remotest and most exposed of the Lipari islands, the dwellings of their simple natives and their priests are perched high in the hills among rocks and steep acclivities, through fear of the Barbary corsairs, who, from time to time, land there, and carry away into captivity whomsoever they are able to seize and subdue. Further, to guard against these incursions, a sentinel is stationed on the Monte della Guardia, in the principal isle, where he keeps watch day and night. Spallanzani, Travels in the Two Sicilies, iv. 140, sqq. We have here a picture which carries back the imagination to the most barbarous ages of Grecian history. Footnote 1504: Æginetica, p. 76. ----- Having been restored to their country, after the Peloponnesian war, they resumed their plundering habits, and obtained from the Spartan Ephori permission to infest the Attic coasts, which they frequently did in times of profound peace. Their taste for piracy was lasting. In the age of Demosthenes their island was a nest of pirates, and a fair for the sale of their plunder, which it continued for many centuries after.[1505] ----- Footnote 1505: Demosth. de Nicostrat. § 3. ----- Reverting, however, to the trade of Ægina: its ancient traffic with Arcadia was marked by many curious circumstances. In the first place we must infer from it, as the historian of the island remarks, the existence of previous traffic elsewhere.[1506] For, if their merchandise consisted merely of raw materials, these must still have been procured from other lands; and, if of manufactured goods, then, in addition to the existence of a foreign trade to supply them with the raw articles, we must suppose in them the existence of considerable skill. Again, as Pompos, the Cypselid, probably reigned at Orchomenos, they must have been able to perform long voyages by sea, and long journeys by land; though we can account for their taking the dangerous route round capes Skylleion and Malea, and the mountainous roads from Eleia to Arcadia, in preference to the shorter way from Corinthia or Argolis, only by supposing them to have been driven to it by the rivalry of the Argives and Corinthians. It must be admitted to be honourable to their ingenuity thus to have opened up a road into Arcadia, which would seem to be shut out by nature from all commerce. ----- Footnote 1506: Æginetica, p. 77. -----