Page:Travels & discoveries in the Levant (1865) Vol. 1.djvu/277

Rh of the people of Calymna in honour of the people of Iassos, in Caria. This interesting document was destined to be built into a church now erecting.103

In a garden called Blyko, near the harbour, were a number of columns and the angle of a cornice, recently dug up. On three sides of this cornice were inscribed grants of freedom to certain slaves by their masters. These documents were made out in the name of the Stephaneophoros, a local magistrate.104

Our caique went before the wind from Calymnos to Cos in two hours and a half. The distance I was told was twenty-five miles, and the pace very good for a caique. The scenery all round us was very picturesque. On every side were jagged mountain-lines which seemed to have been convulsed into fantastic forms by some primeval force. Behind us were some small islands near Leros, on our right Cos, on our left a stern headland near Myndos [Gumischlu], and straight ahead the high mountain-ridge which terminates in Cape Crio. This wild scenery is far more impressive when seen from a caique than from the deck of a steamer. When we got to Cos, the wind blew so strong that our anchor would not hold, and we were driven right across the bows of a larger vessel, and nearly impaled on her bowsprit. At present, the anchorage is in an open road. In antiquity there was here a snug little harbour, which has been gradually filled up by sheer neglect, as is the case with many other ports in the Archipelago.

I found here a very intelligent Greek merchant, named Demetri Platanista, who had a small