128 IIORSE-BACK RIDING. 



matched, and now they ride into the Hsts, where 

 the address of the charioteers and the swiftness of 

 the horses decide the victory." 



Such is the idea we gather of the Olympian ren- 

 dezvous from the pages of Pausanias. He mentions 

 only stalls or coach-houses for the horses and char- 

 iots, but there is ground for believing that these 

 structures were arched and consisted of more than 

 one story, in order to furnish apartments for the use 

 of the participants of the games. 



It is probable, too, that, occupying a site so fre- 

 quented and celebrated, where the exhibition of any 

 thing like extraordinary skill would confer corre- 

 sponding honor upon the architect, they abounded in 

 decoration and ornament. 



Still following the authority of Pausanias, we find 

 that the race-course for chariots consisted of two 

 divisions — the longer of the two being an artificial 

 terrace, the other an elevation of moderate height ; 

 but he furnishes no statistics concerning the length 

 and breadth of the inclosure, though it could not 

 have been less than several hundred feet. 



One author has been guilty of a fault common to 

 historians, viz., that of thinking only of the times in 

 which they write, and forgetting that the human in- 

 stitutions they are describing are not perpetual, but 

 as perishable as men themselves. " Debemur morti 

 nos nostraque. " 



These games, therefore, consecrated by religion, 



