ANCIENT RACING. 291 



down to US, relating to this race. A mare, called 

 Aura, the property of one Phidolas, a Corinthian, 

 threw her jockey, but continued her course as if he 

 had kept his seat, increasing her pace at the sound 

 of the trumpet, and, finally, as the story goes, pre- 

 senting herself before the judges, as if conscious of 

 having won. The Eleans, however, declared her to 

 be the winner, and allowed Phidolas to dedicate a 

 statue to her. In the 131st Olympiad, the race 

 of the 'TT^'kog xsXtjs, or under-aged horses, was esta- 

 blished ; but with respect to all these races, we are 

 left in obscurity as to the weight the horses carried, 

 as also the distance they ran ; and whether or not 

 such matters were regulated by their age, and not 

 at all by their size. It is the general opinion that 

 they were left to the discretion of the judges (the 

 Hellanodics, as they were called,) who regulated 

 all matters at Olympia, as the members of our 

 Jockey Club do at Newmarket ; but, as may be 

 expected from the character of the times, exercising 

 a power over their brother sportsmen, which would 

 not be relished at the present day, although, in 

 some respects, well worthy of imitation. For ex- 

 ample, they not only excluded from the games and 

 imposed fines upon such as were convicted of frau- 

 dulent or corrupt practices, but inflicted bodily cor- 

 rection upon them besides. And some very inter- 

 esting facts are the result of the rigid scrutiny of 

 this Elean Jockey Club. Alexander the Great was 

 ambitious of obtaining the Olympic crown, but was 

 objected to as being a Macedonian, the prize he 

 wished to contend for being confined to Grecians. 



