We now pass from the northern members to the heart and head of Greece—Peloponnesus and Attica, taking the former first in order, and giving as much as can be ascertained respecting its early historical phænomena.

The traveller who entered Peloponnesus from Bœotia during the youthful days of Herodotus and Thucydides, found an array of powerful Doric cities conterminous to each other, and beginning at the Isthmus of Corinth. First came Megara, stretching across the isthmus from sea to sea, and occupying the high and rugged mountains called Oneia and Geraneia: next Corinth, with its strong and conspicuous acropolis, and its territory occupying the portion of the isthmus at once most level and narrowest, which divided its two harbours called Lechæum and Kenchreæ. Westward of Corinth, along the Corinthian Gulf, stood Sikyon, with a plain of uncommon fertility between the two towns: southward of Sikyon and Corinth were Phlius and Kleonse, both conterminous, as well as Corinth, with Argos and the Argolic peninsula. The inmost bend of the Argolic Gulf, including a considerable space of flat and marshy ground adjoining to the sea, was occupied by Argos; the Argolic peninsula was divided by Argos with the Doric cities of Epidaurus and Trœzen, and the Dryopian city of Hermionê, the latter possessing the south-western corner. Proceeding southward along the western coast of the gulf, and passing over the little river called Tanos, the traveller found himself in the dominion of Sparta, which comprised the entire southern region of the peninsula from its eastern to its western sea, where the river Neda flows into the latter.