Page:Travels & discoveries in the Levant (1865) Vol. 1.djvu/50

28 very fine silver decadrachm of Athens. This is a coin of extreme rarity. I never saw but two; that in the British Museum, from Mr. Burgon's collection, and one belonging to the Due de Luynes. The one I examined at Athens had the appearance of being perfectly genuine.

It is to be regretted that the Greek Government does not build a museum capable of containing not only sculptures, but those more portable antiquities, such as vases, which are now dispersed, by being sold to strangers, all note of their discovery being carefully suppressed in the course of this contraband trade.

It is equally to be regretted that excavations are not carried on at Athens more vigorously. The Government seems to want either the power or the will to direct such researches; while, at the same time, it is unwilling that they should be undertaken by private enterprise. Still there exists at Athens, at present, as much interest in archseological studies as could perhaps be expected, considering that Greek civilization itself is of so recent a date; and this interest has been very much sustained by the residence of so accomplished a scholar as our present Minister at Athens, Sir T. Wyse.

The Archæological Society here, of which Messrs. Finlay and Hill, among the English, and MM. Rhangabé and Pittakys, among the Greeks, are members, has also done much useful work, by the publication of new discoveries in the Ephemeris Archceologike, a monthly periodical, written in modern Greek.