IV.
Mytilene, May 30, 1852.
I have now been here long enough to be able to give you some account of this place, and of my mode of life in my new home.
Though the name of Lesbos is one so rich in historical associations, and though the island itself is so conspicuous an object to all who sail past it on their way to Smyrna or Constantinople, it has never been much explored, and the accounts given by the travellers who have visited it are exceedingly vague and meagre.18 I shall therefore be minute in my description. The town of Mytilene, which the older travellers call Castro, but which has now resumed its original name, is situated on a peninsula on the E. side of the island (see the Map, Plate 2). This peninsula consists of a rocky promontory connected with the mainland by a low isthmus, on either side of which is a small harbour, one to the north, the other to the south. These ports were formerly connected by a canal, called by the ancients Euripus. The rocky promontory, now a peninsula, is therefore spoken of by Strabo and others as an island,19 and from the strength of its position was originally chosen as the site of the city itself, and afterwards became its Acropolis. As the population increased, and the situation became more secure, the town spread from the island to the shores of the two harbours. A
