GENTLEMEN COACHMEN. 381 



large sum to sell a battle at the Olympic games. Having 

 beaten his man with much difficulty, he was asked what 

 he should gain by such a victory ? ' I shall have the 

 honour,' said he, ' of being posted before my king in 

 battle.' As a further proof of the moral effect of these 

 contentions for honour, it is stated in history, that when 

 the conquerors returned to their native cities, they made 

 their entry through a breach in the walls — by which was 

 implied, that cities inhabited by such men had no need 

 of walls. This, however, was not all. Greece was always 

 fond of pomp and splendour and the celebration of these 

 games suited their taste. The feasts of victory — the 

 entertainments to the winners — were magnificent in the 

 extreme, and the city of Olympia (the Newmarket of the 

 day) was enriched by all the works of art. 

 The poet says, 



How few the joys that every bosom shares ! 



and thus it has been with gentleman coachmanship. In 

 Greece it was the amusement of kings, whose fame was 

 immortalised by the first poets of the heroic age. ' The 

 candidate there,' says Gibbon, ' might pursue the foot- 

 steps of Diomede and Menelaus, and conduct his own 

 horses in the rapid career. His fame was chanted in 

 lyric strains more durable than monuments of brass or 

 marble ; but a senator of Rome, or even a citizen, con- 

 scious of his dignity, would have blushed to expose his 

 person or his horses in a Roman circus. Here the reins 

 were abandoned to servile hands ; and if the profits of a 

 favourite charioteer sometimes exceeded those of an advo- 



