across the ravine and up a winding road, and stood on the old Acropolis,

with the prodigious walls of the citadel towering above our heads. We

did not stop to inspect their massive blocks of marble, or measure their

height, or guess at their extraordinary thickness, but passed at once

through a great arched passage like a railway tunnel, and went straight

to the gate that leads to the ancient temples. It was locked! So, after

all, it seemed that we were not to see the great Parthenon face to face.

We sat down and held a council of war. Result: the gate was only a

flimsy structure of wood--we would break it down. It seemed like

desecration, but then we had traveled far, and our necessities were

urgent. We could not hunt up guides and keepers--we must be on the ship

before daylight. So we argued. This was all very fine, but when we came

to break the gate, we could not do it. We moved around an angle of the

wall and found a low bastion--eight feet high without--ten or twelve

within. Denny prepared to scale it, and we got ready to follow. By dint

of hard scrambling he finally straddled the top, but some loose stones

crumbled away and fell with a crash into the court within. There was

instantly a banging of doors and a shout. Denny dropped from the wall in

a twinkling, and we retreated in disorder to the gate. Xerxes took that

mighty citadel four hundred and eighty years before Christ, when his five

millions of soldiers and camp-followers followed him to Greece, and if we

four Americans could have remained unmolested five minutes longer, we

would have taken it too.

The garrison had turned out--four Greeks. We clamored at the gate, and

they admitted us. [Bribery and corruption.]

392

The Innocents Abroad