Upon the white horizon Athos' peak Weltered in burning haze; all airs were dead; The sicale slept among the tamarisk's hair; The birds sat dumb and drooping.

I did not want to go back to Persia, even if I could go there, which looked very doubtful after the battle of Salamis, and as I had come into the country with the Persians, it might have been unsafe to show myself with the Greeks; so, remembering what I had seen of the wild regions of Mount Athos, I made my way there, with the intention of dwelling in its rocky fastnesses until the country should become safe for the ordinary wayfarer.

This anger was worthy of Alexander, of him who could not bear the adulation of that architect {29} who promised to transform Mount Athos into a statue of him; but he looked upon the man from that time as a base flatterer, and never employed him afterwards.

The mountains kindle as the car draws near, Athos and Tmolus red with fires appear; 250 Oeagrian Hæmus (then a single name)

Nor how th'halfe-horsy people, Centaures hight, Fought with the bloudie Lapithaes at bord; Nor how the East with tyranous despight Burnt th'Attick towres, and people slew with sword; Nor how Mount Athos through exceeding might 45 Was digged downe; nor yron bands abord The Pontick sea by their huge navy cast, My volume shall renowne, so long since past.

Athens, ii. Athos, Mount, v. Atin, i.; ii. Atlas, ii. Atropos, iii.

" A fanatical Puritan, nephew of Lord de Winterwhom he slew at Newcastleand a trusted lieutenant of Cromwell's did the work of the headsman, and upon Athos, waiting in concealment beneath the scaffold, fell drops of the king's blood.

Aramis was returning to his convent, Athos and Porthos to their estates.

"What more ridiculous," as [440]Lactantius urges, than to hear how Xerxes whipped the Hellespont, threatened the Mountain Athos, and the like.

Whether Mount Athos, Pelion, Olympus, Ossa, Caucasus, Atlas, be so high as Pliny, Solinus, Mela relate, above clouds, meteors, ubi nec aurae nec venti spirant (insomuch that they that ascend die suddenly very often, the air is so subtile,) 1250 paces high, according to that measure of Dicearchus, or 78 miles perpendicularly high, as Jacobus Mazonius, sec.

There are some in the church painted later by a monk from Mount Athos, but decidedly inferior to those in the little chapel.

"Athos, Olympus, Ætna, Atlas, made These hills seem things of lesser dignity.

In October 1911 I arrived as a pilgrim at the monastery of Novy Afon, or, to translate the Russian into more recognisable terms, New Athos, and I obtained the hospitality of the monks.

He went to a gorgeous little chapel at the base of the landing-stage, there to hold a service in memory of the visit to New Athos of their highnesses the late Tsar, Alexander the Third, and his queen, on that day 1888.

Here at New Athos breathes a true Christianity.

Each day at New Athos is beautiful in itself, and if a monk's life were made into a book of such days one would not turn over two pages at once.

And yet but a week ago, rhododendrons at New Athos, wild roses and mallow in full bloom at Gudaout, acres of saffron hollyhocks, and evening primroses at Sotchi!

I walked more miles in the cold fortnight that took me to Batoum than in a whole month before New Athos.

IV HOW THE OLD PILGRIM REACHED BETHLEHEM At New Athos monastery in one of the common hostels there were some hundred peasant men and women, mostly pilgrims.

And on the way, moved by the glow of intercourse, I told my companion the story of Zenobia, and also that of the old pilgrim whom I met at New Athos.

His army was not unsuccessful, but off Mount Athos the Persian fleet was overtaken by a storm, which destroyed three hundred ships and twenty thousand men.

The Great King, in the hope of escaping "the unseen atmospheric enemies which howl around that formidable promontory," had caused Mount Athos to be cut through, but, as the historian observes, "the work of destruction to his fleet was only transferred to the opposite side of the intervening Thracian sea."

For I may tell you, your great grandfather had such a wonderful amuleta monk from Mount Athos had given him that amuletand that monk said to him, 'I give thee this, O Boyar, in return for thy hospitality.

CANTACUZE`NUS, JOHN, emperor of the East; an able statesman, who acting as regent for the heir, had himself crowned king, but was driven to resign at length; retired to a monastery on Mount Athos, where he wrote a history of his time; died in 1411, 100 years old.

So King Agamemnon ordered beacon fires laid on the tops of Mount Ida, Mount Athos, Mount Cithæron, and on intervening eminences.