Page:Travels and adventures of Wm. Lithgow (3).pdf/14

14 him into the sea. Nothing was saved but his coffer made of reeds in which he carried his papers and linen, and held it always in his arms. In this eave, which was 30 paces long, they abode three days without meat and drink, till, on the fourth, the tempest ceasing some fishing boats relieved them. Seventeen other boats were cast away on this eoast and not a man saved. Through this island Lithgow travelled with a thankful heart to Sio the eapital, where, passing by an old castle, he was told that Homer’s sepulehre was still extant there; and being desirous to see it, he deseended by sixteen steps into a dark eell, and through that to another square room, where he saw an aneient tomb on which were engraven some ancient Greek letters, whieh he could not understand. By Mitylene, or Lesboa he next sailed in a earmoesalo to Negropoint (of old Euboea,) and in their way they were ehased by two Turkish galliots into a long creek, where the Turks were deterred from attaeking them, by bonfires made by the Greeks for six sueeeeding nights, our traveller, as a stranger, being exposed every night to stand centinel in the midst of frost and snow, on the top of a high promontory, whieh however invited his mule to bewail his toilsome life, his solitary wandering, and his long distanee from his native eountry.