making wooden spoons. Pococke found them employed in drying figs, walnuts, and grapes, and learned that they made a little wine and brandy for their own use, which, I hope, occasionally enabled them to forget their cares. To complete their misery, no women were ever permitted to enter their territories.
Leaving this haunt of hypochondriacal drones, he proceeded along the shores of the Gulf of Contessa, and took the road to Salonica. The road along the northern shores of the Thermaic Gulf was beset with too many dangers to be attempted, and he therefore embarked for Caritza in Thessaly, and, arriving next day, took up his quarters for the night at the foot of Mount Ossa. Next morning he proceeded to the banks of the Peneus, which constitute the Vale of Tempé, celebrated by ancient poets as the most beautiful spot in Greece; but either the valley had lost its charms, or our traveller all taste for the picturesque, for he passes it over with still greater coolness than the poetical scenes of Cyprus. However, his mind was at this time so full of the battle of Pharsalia, Cæsar, and Pompey, that it would have been wonderful indeed if he had paused a moment to admire the pastoral scenes of Tempé. Having then reached the blood-stained spot where the greater tyrant triumphed over the lesser, and paved the way for the glorious Ides of March, our traveller examined with attention the various positions said to have been occupied by the contending armies. From thence he descended towards the Maliac Bay through Phthiotis, the native country of Achilles, which was situated in the Thessalian Thebes, the inhabitants of which, according to Strabo, obtained the name of ants on account of their industrious habits.
On his arrival at Zeiton, which appears to occupy the site of the ancient Lamia, he took lodgings in a caravansary, where, in order to enjoy a cooler air, and escape the vermin which usually abound in such places, he spread out his carpet in an open gallery,
