Page:Genius, and other essays.djvu/241

TREASURE TOMBS AT MYKENÆ thought to be the progenitors and companions of men—allowing for this we not only begin to feel that the Iliad and Odyssey are true to the physical status of the Mediterranean islands and shores, but we more than suspect that their stories of wars and warriors, of voyages, sieges, and of civil and domestic life, are the narratives of actual matters which were of the highest relative importance in a half-barbaric age; lastly, we look backward to find that Homer's personages were living, loving, warring, human beings, and that, while yet scarcely having left the flesh, their deeds and sayings, by turns wise and paltry, joyous and tragical, were the most exciting themes of the minstrel of that ancient time.

One of The Tribune's writers has well said that it is indeed a most fortunate thing that this man of our time has believed in Homer; that Dr. Schliemann was so impressed in youth with faith in the reality of the actions and manners depicted in the Ionic verse as to acquire a fortune with purpose to become an explorer, and to prove by his own exertions the general historic truth of the Iliad and Odyssey. There has been much dispute over his achievements in the Troad. The spot selected, after preliminary experiments elsewhere, for his serious efforts to uncover the ruins of Troia, was chosen against the judgment of many scholars. The unearthed relics, although marked with the sun-emblem which might typify the name of Ilios, were not of such a character as at once to remove all scepticism from European archæologists. Even in his own country his reports were [227]