The object of the visit to Joannina was to see Ali Pasha, in those days the most celebrated Vizier in all the western provinces of the Ottoman empire; but he was then at Tepellene.  The luxury of resting, however, in a capital, was not to be resisted, and they accordingly suspended their journey until they had satisfied their curiosity with an inspection of every object which merited attention.  Of Joannina, it may be said, they were almost the discoverers, so little was known of it in England—­I may say in Western Europe—­previous to their visit.

The palace and establishment of Ali Pasha were of regal splendour, combining with Oriental pomp the elegance of the Occident, and the travellers were treated by the Vizier’s officers with all the courtesy due to the rank of Lord Byron, and every facility was afforded them to prosecute their journey.  The weather, however—­the season being far advanced—­was wet and unsettled, and they suffered more fatigue and annoyance than travellers for information or pleasure should have had to encounter.

The journey from Joannina to Zitza is among the happiest sketches in the Pilgrimage of Childe Harold.

   He pass’d bleak Pindus, Acherusia’s lake,
   And left the primal city of the land,
   And onwards did his farther journey take
   To greet Albania’s chief, whose dread command
   Is lawless law; for with a bloody hand
   He sways a nation, turbulent and bold: 
   Yet here and there some daring mountain-band
   Disdain his power, and from their rocky hold
Hurl their defiance far, nor yield unless to gold.

   Monastic Zitza! from thy shady brow,
   Thou small, but favour’d spot of holy ground! 
   Where’er we gaze, above, around, below,
   What rainbow tints, what magic charms are found;
   Rock, river, forest, mountain, all abound;
   And bluest skies that harmonize the whole. 
   Beneath, the distant torrent’s rushing sound
   Tells where the volumed cataract doth roll
Between those hanging rocks that shock yet please the soul.

In the course of this journey the poet happened to be alone with his guides, when they lost their way during a tremendous thunderstorm, and he has commemorated the circumstance in the spirited stanzas beginning—­

Chill and mink is the nightly blast.

CHAPTER XI

Halt at Zitza—­The River Acheron—­Greek Wine—­A Greek Chariot—­ Arrival at Tepellene—­The Vizier’s Palace

The travellers, on their arrival at Zitza, went to the monastery to solicit accommodation; and after some parley with one of the monks, through a small grating in a door plated with iron, on which marks of violence were visible, and which, before the country had been tranquillised under the vigorous dominion of Ali Pasha, had been frequently battered in vain by the robbers who then infested the neighbourhood.  The prior, a meek and lowly man, entertained them in a warm chamber with grapes and a pleasant white wine, not trodden out by the feet, as he informed them, but expressed by the hand.  To this gentle and kind host Byron alludes in his description of “Monastic Zitza.”