4.

Although Delos854 was so famous, yet it became still more so, and flourished after the destruction of Corinth by the Romans.855 For the merchants resorted thither, induced by the immunities of the temple, and the convenience of its harbour. It lies favourably856 for those who are sailing from Italy and Greece to Asia. The general festival held there serves the purposes of commerce, and the Romans particularly frequented it even before the destruction of Corinth.857 The Athenians, after having taken the island, paid equal attention to the affairs both of religion and of commerce. But the generals858 of Mithridates, and the tyrant,859 who had occasioned the defection of (Athens from the Romans), ravaged it entirely. The Romans received the island in a desolate state on the departure of the king to his own country; and it has continued in an impoverished condition to the present time.860 The Athenians are now in possession of it.