Page:History of Art in Phrygia, Lydia, Caria and Lycia.djvu/257

 THE LYDIANS, THEIR COUNTRY, HISTORY, AND RELIGION. 241 cunning art, of the above writers. 1 The astonishment and awe aroused in the Ionian cities were deep and profound at the sight of a people concentrating themselves under the command of an energetic and gallant captain, for the avowed purpose of attacking their neighbours and moving back their frontiers in every direc- tion ; who, whilst their hands were full in quelling internal dis- turbances, had allowed the Greeks to spread along the coast, ascend the course of the rivers up to a certain distance, and occupy the fertile stretches around Magnesia. As soon as they became conscious of their strength, they regretted having given up to another people so many fertile deltas, so many fine harbours hollowed beneath high promontories, when the desire to have an outlook towards the sea became too strong to be resisted. Lydia is one of the most favoured, the most fertile regions of the peninsula. The winter is milder and the summer less dry than on the central plateau, and its situation near the sea also causes more rainfall. The vine, olive, and fig tree prosper on the lower hills ; the slopes of Tmolus and other mountains are, and above all were, covered with forests of pine, oak, and beech. These slopes now are brown and bare, and have never recovered from the wanton neglect, and worse, brought about by ages of wretchedness and misery which followed on the fall of the Roman Empire. In the plains, many of which are extensive, the soil consists of a fat ooze, left by the overflowing of streams after they have rid themselves of the pebbly mass wrenched from the flanks of the mountains, when their course becomes sluggish and peaceful, and lends itself to the purposes of irrigation, so that the land can be turned to pasture or ploughed fields at will. The best-mounted horsemen of Asia Minor were Lydians, because they had an abundance of grass. The clemency of the heavens, the variety and plentifulness of rude creature-comforts, which an inexhaustible soil provided for man and beast, all conspired to ensure the well-being of the inhabi- tants ; and when a lucky chance raised in their midst intelligent and energetic chieftains, what more natural than that a remarkable development, political and military, should have been the result ? That which also contributed to the rapid growth and prosperity of the commonwealth was the happy choice of the site upon which was built their capital a site easily identified, whether from indications 1 NICHOLAS OF DAMASCUS, Frag. Hist. Grac., torn. iii. pp. 384, 385. VOL. i. R