Page:Xenophon by Alexander Grant.djvu/139

Rh selves. Theft, deceit, calumny, and ingratitude were thus brought to punishment. And it was commonly said that the Persian boys went to school to learn justice, as elsewhere boys go to school to learn to read. To this arrangement the trifling objection might be made, that it seems to imply a very abundant and continuous crop of naughtiness among the boys themselves, else the trials would have come to an end, and the study of "justice" would have been stopped. Xenophon, however, makes no remark on this point, nor does he mention any other subjects of study as entering into the curriculum of this model university. Indeed, the education given seems very much to have been based on those "Aryan principles" of instruction of which we have heard of late, and according to which book-learning will always be at a discount. A Spartan system of diet appears to have been prescribed for the boys, consisting of bread and cresses, with water to drink. The boys learned shooting with the bow, and throwing the javelin; and at the age of seventeen they passed into the class of youths.

From seventeen to twenty-seven the chief means of cultivation for the youths appear to have consisted in patrol-duty and hunting. On the advantages of hunting as a preparation and training for war, the Persians, according to Xenophon, laid great stress, and the youths were constantly engaged in formal hunting-parties under the king. They bivouacked in the open fields, and were restricted to the most ascetic fare; and as a result of this system Xenophon mentions that every Persian avoids, as a piece of bad manners,