Hughes being laid up again at Livadia and the General impracticable, Parker and I made excursions thence to the Cave of Trophonius, Orchomenus, and Topolias, the point from which one visits the five emissaries of the Lake Copais. These last struck me as perhaps the most astonishing work of antiquity known to me. Two are still running, but the first, third, and fifth are quite dry. At the entrances the mountain has been cut to a face of thirty or forty feet high at the mouth and not a tool-mark visible, so they look like the work of nature. I wanted to go to the other side of the ridge to see the exits, but our guide assured me that it was too dangerous, because of the pirates who lie in the mountain in the daytime and would probably catch us. Poor Stackelberg's misfortune was too recent a warning to be neglected, so I gave it up. All this country, broadly speaking, is quite uncultivated, and inhabited by immense herds attended by whole families living in huts and wandering, according to the pasture and season, in parties of perhaps twenty with horses and mules. They are not Turcomans, such as I saw in Asia, but are called Vlaki and speak Greek. One can imagine nothing more picturesque than they are and the mountains they live in. Our quarters during our three nights out had been of the roughest, and when Parker and I got back to Livadia our whole evening was spent in the bath, ridding ourselves of the fleas and dirt we had been living in. Hughes was found to be better, and the General (thank goodness!) tired out and gone off to Salona. He was an odious individual--got drunk every day of our absence--and we were well rid of him. We had brought with us from Athens letters of introduction to the principal Greek merchants, primates of Livadia, Messrs. Logotheti. On the first day of our arrival they had come very civilly to call upon us. Now that we were back from our excursion we returned the visit. The Greeks appear to possess great wealth and influence here, whereas the Turks are but few in the place, and those there are speak Greek and to some extent have Greek manners. When we came into the Logothetis' house we found some actually arguing a point--a thing not to be thought of among Turks elsewhere: the affectation of pride among Orientals, so stupefying to themselves and so exasperating to others, would forbid it. When we came in they rose to go, leaving Signor Nicola to attend to his foreign guests. Our host gave us a striking instance of the devices used by well-to-do Greeks to conceal their wealth from the rapacious Government. He at once led us out of the room he had received us in at the head of the first landing, which was reserved for the reception of Turks and was very simple, into his own apartments, which were exceedingly splendid. There in one corner of the room was the beautiful Logothetina, wife of a Logotheti nephew, in bed. Her father went up to her when he came in and she kissed his hand.