DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.5074#0370
352
MODERN ATHENS.
the Monuments without any kind of jar in the mind.
Thus, had the Venetian tower, built when the Acropolis
was refortified by the Eepublic of Venice, been a highly
ornamented campanile, however beautiful in its own
place, it would here have been an eyesore and an
impertinence: as it is, it carries its own mark of
venerable respectability, and produces no discord in the
mind. The very interesting and beautiful old Byzan-
tine Cathedral of Athens would be more beautiful any-
where else; and one experiences a sort of mental wrench
when one descends from the Parthenon, and entering
the new and yet unfinished Cathedral, one feels oneself
filled with admiration of the light arcades, the groups of
daintily-carved columns, the upspringing domes, and
the delicate poetry-in-stone of this fine specimen of the
Byzantine grand-daughter of the ancient Doric.
The houses of the citizens are solid, substantial and
neat, with a certain degree of handsomeness about
them derived from the good stone employed in their
building; they are plainly ornamented, but are rather
staring; there is a great fashion for gardens in the
squares, and avenues of trees in the streets, but they
are always so laden with dust, that it seems a waste and
a cruelty to plant them. For the dust at Athens is
something indescribable — stifling — and intolerable;
on a calm day it lies thickly upon one's tables and chairs,
and penetrates even into one's bed—when there is a
breeze it filters through the closed windows and fills
one's hands, one's mouth, and one's hair, till one feels
„ half suffocated. The fragile pepper trees best resist its
disfiguring appearance, but the unfortunate oleanders,
of stiffer growth, are really transmogrified into white
and grey heaps which look most melancholy.
The Temple of Theseus, which stands on a slight
rise at the foot of the Acropolis, is singularly graceful
MODERN ATHENS.
the Monuments without any kind of jar in the mind.
Thus, had the Venetian tower, built when the Acropolis
was refortified by the Eepublic of Venice, been a highly
ornamented campanile, however beautiful in its own
place, it would here have been an eyesore and an
impertinence: as it is, it carries its own mark of
venerable respectability, and produces no discord in the
mind. The very interesting and beautiful old Byzan-
tine Cathedral of Athens would be more beautiful any-
where else; and one experiences a sort of mental wrench
when one descends from the Parthenon, and entering
the new and yet unfinished Cathedral, one feels oneself
filled with admiration of the light arcades, the groups of
daintily-carved columns, the upspringing domes, and
the delicate poetry-in-stone of this fine specimen of the
Byzantine grand-daughter of the ancient Doric.
The houses of the citizens are solid, substantial and
neat, with a certain degree of handsomeness about
them derived from the good stone employed in their
building; they are plainly ornamented, but are rather
staring; there is a great fashion for gardens in the
squares, and avenues of trees in the streets, but they
are always so laden with dust, that it seems a waste and
a cruelty to plant them. For the dust at Athens is
something indescribable — stifling — and intolerable;
on a calm day it lies thickly upon one's tables and chairs,
and penetrates even into one's bed—when there is a
breeze it filters through the closed windows and fills
one's hands, one's mouth, and one's hair, till one feels
„ half suffocated. The fragile pepper trees best resist its
disfiguring appearance, but the unfortunate oleanders,
of stiffer growth, are really transmogrified into white
and grey heaps which look most melancholy.
The Temple of Theseus, which stands on a slight
rise at the foot of the Acropolis, is singularly graceful