THE 



POPULAR SCIENCE 



MONTHLY. 



NOVEMBER, 1908 



DEDUCT EONS FROM THE RECORDS OF RFXXIXG IX THE 



LAST OLYMPIAD 



Br Professor A. E. KENNELLY 



HARVARD UNIVERSITY 



IT is much to be regretted that after all the races held in the ancient 

 davs of Greece and Rome, when the laurel crown of victory was 

 the height of ambition in youthful manhood, we have no means of com- 

 paring the achievements of their runners with our own. We shall 

 never know how their track speeds compare with those of modern times, 

 because records did not become possible until after the invention and 

 development of the portable chronometer. 



The olympiads, or quadrennial athletic meetings of ancient Greece, 

 were held in such national renown, that they served as historical epochs 

 for the chronological establishment of events. Owing, however, to the 

 absence of sufficiently precise instruments for measuring and recording 

 time, each race or speed-contest, although an event of great momentary 

 importance, was necessarily cut off from all comparison with similar 

 preceding or succeeding races. The victor in each race overcame the 

 opponents who contested with him shoulder to shoulder ; but there could 

 be no means of determining whether the victor of a given event in one 

 olympiad excelled the victor in other olympiads. 



With the introduction of the stop-watch, races ceased to be merely 

 momentary efforts for mastery in speed. To the interest of the local 

 and passing contest was added the new interest of the perennial con- 

 test, and of the record. In the racing of the finest horses, the record 

 has come to be regarded as the principal event, and the winning of the 

 race as the secondary event, after the excitement of the occasion has 

 subsided. In the racing of the swiftest men, the record is gaining in 

 importance; but we still attach principal attention to the winning of 



voi/. lxxiii. — 25. 



