Page:History of Greece Vol II.djvu/424

 4Qb HISTORY OF GREECE. while his beautiful wife, whom Aristo coveted and entrapped from him, is expressly described as the daughter of opulent parents. Sperthies and Bulis, the Talthybiads, are designated as belonging to a distinguished race, and among the wealthiest men in Sparta. 1 Demaratus was the only king of Sparta, in the days of Herodo- tus, who had ever gained a chariot-victory in the Olympic games ; but we know by the case of Lichas, during the Peloponnesian war, Evagoras, and others, that private Spartans were equally successful; 2 and for one Spartan who won the prize, there must of course have been many who bred their horses and started their chariots unsuccessfully. It need hardly be remarked, that chariot-competition at Olympia was one of the most significant evidences of a wealthy house: nor were there wanting Spartans who kept horses and dogs without any exclusive view to the games. We know from Xenophon that, at the time of the battle of Leuktra, " the very rich Spartans " provided the horses to be mounted for the state-cavalry. 3 These and other proofs, of the existence of rich men at Sparta, are inconsistent with the idea of a body of citizens each possessing what was about enough for the frugal maintenance of six persons, and no more. As we do not find that such was in practice the state of prop- erty in the Spartan community, so neither can we discover that the lawgiver ever tried either to make or to keep it so. "What he did was to impose a rigorous public discipline, with simple slothing and fare, incumbent alike upon the rich and the poor (this was his special present to Greece, according to Thucydides, 4 and his great point of contact with democracy, according to Aris- totle) ; but he took no pains either to restrain the enrichment of the former, or to prevent the impoverishment of the latter. He meddled little with the distribution of property, and such neglect is one of the capital deficiences for which Aristotle censures him That philosopher tells us, indeed, that the Spartan law had made it dishonorable (he does not say, peremptorily forbidden) to buy cr sail landed property, but that there was the fullest liberty both 4 1 Herod, vi. 61. ola avdpiJTruv rt Mfiiuv tivyaTepa, etc ; vii. 134. . iv. p. 141 ; Aristot. Polit. ii. 2, 5. 4 Thncyd. i. 6 ; Aristot. Polit. iv. 7, 4, 5 ; viii. 1. B.
 * Herod, vi. 70-103 ; Thucyd. v. 50.
 * Xenoph. Hellen. vi. 4, 11 ; Xenoph. de Rep. Lac. v. 3 ; Molpis np.