Traln\ng for 

 the Olympic 

 games as de- 

 Icribed by Epic. 



fetus. 



Galen was a 

 Cymnafiach. 



V'et of the 

 Athletat mod. 

 ly vegetable. 



70 ATHLETIC EXERCISES. 



Epicletus in alluding to the Olympic games gives a some- 

 what more detailed account of the previous training the 

 candidates were obliged to undergo. *' I would conquer 

 at the Olympic games,*' he supposes his pupil to say, and 

 then goes on to tell him ; Bi't then consider what piccedes 

 and follows, and then if * oe for your advantage engage 

 in the affair. You must conform to rules; submit to a 

 diet J refrain from dainties ; exercise your body whether 

 yoa chuse it or not, at a stated hour, in heat or cold ; you 

 must drink no cold water; nor sometimes even wine. In 

 a word, you must give yourself up to your master as to 

 a physician. Then, in a combat you may be thrown into 

 a ditch, dislocate your arm, turn your ankle, swallow abun- 

 dance of dust ; and after all lose the victory.*** 



Oalen, the celebrated physician, was himself addicted 

 to the exercises of the pafcestra in his youth, and has left 

 a detailed account of the pain he s-uffered in the reduction 

 of his shoulder, which had been dislocated in a wrestling 

 match. He afterwards became a gymnasiarch, or super- 

 intendant of a company of gladiators, and many remarks 

 on their diet, exercises, health, and habits are to be found 

 in his writings. 



The diet of the Athieios, in the more early ages consisted 

 of dried figs, new cheese, and boiled grain/ The antients 

 appear to have derived a favourable opinion of the nutri- 

 tious properties of figs, from observing that the persont 

 who wci'e appointed to guard the fig-gardens and vineyards, 

 when the fruit was nearly ripe, and who fed upon hardly 

 any thing else for a month or six weeks, during that period 

 became remarkably fat. Geese were also fed on figs, in 

 order to produce those enlarged livers which constituted 

 a favourite delicacy of the Roman epicures. The fat and 

 sleek appearance which the negroes, and indeed all the do- 

 mestic animals in the West Indies, acquire during the season 

 of boiling the sugar, notwithstanding the increased labour 

 they undergo at that period, furnishes another proof of the 

 nutritious properties of saccharine matter. It is a fact. 



• Carter's Epictctiis, Book iii. chap, 15, 



perhaps 



