ich can be
distinctly traced. Considerable remains of the terrace-wall at the
foot of the slope exist--huge stones twelve or fourteen feet in length
by eight or ten in breadth. The chord of the semicircle is near the
top of the hill, formed by the perpendicular face of the excavated
rock, and is about four hundred feet in length by twenty in depth.
Projecting from it at the centre, and hewn out of the same rock, is
the bema or stone platform from which the great orators from the time
of Themistocles and Aristides, and perhaps of Solon, down to the
age of Demosthenes and the Attic Ten, addressed the mass of their
fellow-citizens. It is a massive cubic block, with a linear edge of
eleven feet, standing upon a graduated base of nearly equal height,
and is mounted on either side by a flight of nine stone steps.
From its connection with the most celebrated efforts of some of
the greatest orators our race has yet seen, it is one of the most
interesting relics in the world, and its solid structure will cause it
to endure as long as the world itself shall stand, unless, as there is
some reason to apprehend will be the case, it is knocked to pieces and
carried off in the carpet-bags of travelers. No traces of the Agora,
which occupied the shallow valley between the Pnyx and the Acropolis,
remain. It was the heart of the city, and was adorned with numerous
public buildings, porticoes, temples and statues. It was often
thronged with citizens gathered for purposes of trade, discussion, or
to hear and tell some new thing.

[Illustration: PORCH OF THE CARYATIDES.]

Half a mile or more to the south-east, on the banks of the Ilissus,
stood a magnificent structure dedicated to Olympian Zeus--one of
the four largest temples of Greece, ranking with that of Demeter at
Eleusis and that of Diana at Ephesus. Its foundations remain, and
sixteen of the huge Corinthian columns belonging to its majestic
triple colonnade. One of these is fallen. Breaking up into the
numerous disks of which it was composed--six and a half feet in
diameter by two or more in thickness--and stretching out to a length
of over sixty feet, it gives an impressive conception of the size of
these columns, said to be the largest standing in Europe. The level
area of the temple is now used as a training-ground for soldiers.
Close by, and almost in the bed of the stream, which is dry the larger
part of the year, issues from beneath a ledge of rock the copious
fountain of sw