Arrived in Prevesa, I was made aware that we were off the beaten track by being informed that a letter which I had hastily written to send back to Athens would not even start for six days. This impression was deepened by the information that the British Consul at Prevesa had, during the seventeen years of his sojourn there, never thought of going to Joannina, two days into the interior. This was our goal. The excitement of visiting a country absolutely devoid of tourists is so rare that one may be pardoned for giving way to it. Of course one cannot travel here without an escort. Two mounted men accompanied us everywhere in Turkey, and when we again came over the Greek frontier we were met by a sergeant and six privates. Our first day was nearly all spent in skirting the gulf and plain of Ambrakia. One need not be impatient to get away from that beautiful region. The first object which drew our attention was the ruins of Nikopolis, about an hour out from Prevesa. The city was founded by Augustus as a magnificent trophy of his victory at Actium, at the foot of the hill on which he had pitched his tent before the battle. On sailing into Prevesa the day before, we had passed over the very waters once enlivened by that combat, and over which Antony, forgetting for once to be a soldier, followed the wanton queen in flight and left the world to Augustus. The ruins of Nikopolis, spread out over several square miles, look imposing in the distance; but, like most Roman ruins near at hand, vulgar in comparison with Greek. The theatre is massive, and the aqueduct inspires respect for the practical sense of the conquerors of the world. The thought that St. Paul spent a winter here gives a peculiar interest to the ruins. By pressing your way up through a part of the square miles of breast-high thistles about the theatre, you may reach the top of the hill from which Augustus looked down and saw his enemy apparently strong. The whole world for which he was about to grapple affords few scenes of greater beauty than that which lay before his eye. The road over which our carriage proceeded was a testimonial that the Turks have been misrepresented by the traveller who said: "It is a favorite idea with all barbarous princes that the badness of the roads adds considerably to the natural strength of their dominions. The Turks and Persians are undoubtedly of this opinion; the public highways are, therefore, neglected, and particularly so toward the frontiers."