this old fortress--founded 1556 years before the advent of the Saviour--under the fire of the Venetians, commanded by Morosini, are so well known, that I have thought it unnecessary to repeat them; but it is impossible to recall them without a shudder, as the reflection is forced on one, of what must have been their fate whose wickedness caused an explosion which could scatter, as a horse's hoof may the sands of the sea-shore, the giant masses which for ever bear witness to the power of that mighty agent we have evoked from the earth for our mutual destruction." At the west end of the Acropolis, by which alone it was accessible, stood the Propylaea, its gate as well as its defence. Through this gate the periodical processions of the Panathenaic jubilee were wont to move, and the marks of chariot wheels are still visible on the stone floor of its entrance. It was of the Doric order, and its right wing was supported by six fluted columns, each five feet in diameter, twenty-nine in height, and seven in their intercolumniation. Of the Propylaea itself Mr. Cook gives no individual drawing, the only sketch he had opportunity of making, being in its relation to the Acropolis generally; "it will, however," he says, "serve in some degree to show what has been done. Here perhaps the chief work has been accomplished; all the now detached columns were built up with solid brickwork, batteries were erected on the spot occupied by the Temple of 'Victory without wings,' and on the square which answered to it on the opposite side of the flight of marble steps; the whole of which were deeply buried (not until they had severely suffered), beneath the ruins of the fortification which crumbled away under the Venetian guns. These walls have been removed, the batteries destroyed, and the material of which they were composed taken away; the steps exhumed, and the five grand entrances, by which the fortress was originally entered, opened, although not yet rendered passable. It would be, I imagine, impossible to conceive an approach more magnificent than this must have been. The whole is on such a superb scale, the design, in its union of simplicity and grandeur is so perfect, the material so exquisite, and the view which one has from it of the Parthenon and the Erechtheum so beautiful, that no interest less intense than that which belongs to these temples would be sufficient to entice the stranger from its contemplation." [Illustration: THE PARTHENON.]