The Troad.

A visit to the Troad will equally delight the traveller whether , like myself , what he most cares for is natural beauty , or whether he takes a strong interest in spots haunted by great memories , and bearing deep vestiges of the life of remote generations . Had even Hecuba been no more to me than

I to Hecuba , the Plain of Troy would still have been , in my eyes , a scene of rare loveliness , and I should have been content to gaze on the grand features of its vast surroundings , irrespectively of the historical or fabulous associations its very name

conjures up . The Plain of Troy is intersected from east to west by several mountain ridges of moderate height , formed by the spurs of Mount Ida , and enclosing valleys , through which flow three principal streams—the Doumbrek , or " Simois ; " the

Kemar , or " Thymbrius ; " and the Mendere , or " Scamander , "—all these classical names must be understood to rest on hypothesis—the former two flowing into the old or new bed of the last-named , as all other outlet to the sea is precluded b y a swelling ridge , which runs along the coast from Ujek , above Beshika Bay , to the Sigsaum Promontory , at the entrance of

the Hellespont . The lowlands in the plain and the valleys being thus shut in on all sides but one , are swampy , and , owing to the want of good drainage and culture , unhealthy and desolate . But the verdure of the fields and pastures , and the crops

growing here and there where patches of the soil have been but scratched , give evidence of unsurpassed fertility , and the brushwood on the hills , and the park-like groves of oak on the mountain slopes , conjure up to the imagination the dense forests b

y which the uplands must in primitive times have been mantled , feeding the moisture , checking the rush of the waters , and tempering the extremes of heat and cold in one of the most genial and salubrious climates on earth ' s surface , At every step as we

rode the freshness , the vastuess , the homeliness , the wildness of the region we traversed , delighted us by their unceasing variety , while , when we drew rein on the summit of any of the ridges , on any of the sites to which tradition attaches peculiar

importance , the panorama of land and sea which stretched before us , the great landmarks which dotted the horizon around us , called forth expressions of such rapture as

could hardly be expected of men at our time of life , and schooled to rein in any feeling which might tempt us to make fools of ourselves . East of us rose Ida , with her long diadem-like snowy crest of Mount

Garganus , enthroned as queen of the region , stretching forth , as her arms , woody slopes , some of which reach far down towards the sea , while the main cluster centres round the masses of Karadagh and Mount Dedeh , in the rear of that locality of Balidagh and

Bounarbashi , where , if Troy was not , it seems , at least , so natural to wish that Troy had been , West of us lay the coast , flanked all along by its high land , beyond which g leamed the blue waves of the open iEgeau Seawith its islands rising loftily here and

, there ; next to us , Tenedos , the ubiquitous , obtruding everywhere on the landscape ; further off , Leninos , vast and mountainous ; and more towards the north , where the waters contract themselves at the entrance of the Hellespontthe low ledge of Imbros

, , over which Neptune looked down upon Troy from the superior height of rocky Samothrace . North of us , across the plain , was the Hellespont , its deep-blue surface

all studded with white sails , and the sky lightly streaked by the vanishing smokewreaths from the funnel of many a steamer . Beyond that strait , on the European side , the coast of Thrace stretched low , bleak , and forbidding ; and far away , dimly perceptible in the thin haze of the seathe

, grand pyramid of Mount Athos , at 80 miles distance from us as the crow flies . Nothing in the world could be more enjoyable than the weather that befriended us throughout the trip . Nothing more fresh and vivid than the blossoms and

young foliage on every tree ; nothing more joyous than the music of lark and nightingale , alternating with the notes of frog and owl in that perpetual succession of sun and moonlight ; nothing more peaceful than the herds and flocks lowing and bleating iu

those levels , than the lowly stork-haunted habitations , and the peasants themselves , forgetting , as it were , all difference of race and creed , living in harmony and security with wide-open cottage doors , neutralizing , by their innocence , the baneful influence of their vile Government ; the Greek , by mere thrift and good courage , insensibly , and yet irresistibly , ousting the more indolent and