NOTES. 123 



— the Greek brooch being shaped somewhat Hke 

 the modern safety-pin. In the anatomical writers 

 it was naturally applied to the small bone in the 

 man's arm or leg, — the radius or fibula. In the 

 horse, of course, this bone is above what we call 

 his "knee;" and Xenophon, who has not yet 

 reached this knee, cannot be thinking of a part 

 above it. Hence it has generally been believed 

 that he meant a bone in the knee itself, one of 

 the astragals. But I believe that Xenophon was 

 not thinking of the skeleton, but rather of the 

 animal as he looked in the flesh. Indeed he may 

 not have understood the anatomy of the horse in 

 its relation to man's ; certainly below he speaks of 

 the forearm as if it corresponded to the upper 

 instead of to the lower arm in man. What, then, 

 was more natural than that he should compare the 

 back sinew to the small bone of man's leg? This 

 granted, he has described what naturally follows 

 when a horse with *' gummy" legs (just what he 

 has been speaking of) is put to hard work. He 

 breaks down, or gives way in the back sinews. 

 This explanation seems to have occurred to none 

 of the commentators, — not even to Dindorf, 

 though he had the advantage of using the frag- 

 ment of Simon (see p. 109) in which the word 

 irepovT] is used exactly as in Xenophon. I am 

 happy to be supported in my view of the passage 

 by Dr. Lyman, Dean of the Harvard Veterinary 



