ON THE ILLUSTRATIONS. 1 83 



pedestals on which the helpers in the modern 

 circus stand when they hold out the paper hoops 

 through which the rider is to jump. Of an event 

 in which highly trained horses bore a part an 

 amusing story is told. The luxurious people of 

 Sybaris in Southern Italy had trained their horses 

 to dance to the music of the flute. Their invet- 

 erate enemies, the people of Croton, took advan- 

 tage of this, and having substituted flutes instead 

 of the usual trumpets in their army, suddenly 

 struck up a dancing tune just as a battle was 

 beginning. Thereupon the horses of the Sybarites 

 instantly threw ofl" their riders, and began to skip 

 and dance, and the men of Croton won the battle 

 (Aelian, N. A., xvi, 23). If there is any truth in 

 this story, it shows either that the Greeks of 

 Magna Graecia used cavalry earlier than the 

 people of Greece proper (for Sybaris was de- 

 stroyed by Croton in 510 b. c, and we have seen 

 that the Athenians had no cavalry before the 

 Persian wars), or else that the event described 

 took place after the return of the Sybarites to the 

 site of their old city, about 450 b. c. 



Page 157. A silver coin of Potidaea, of about 

 500 B. c, from the " Catalogue of Coins in the 

 British Museum," Macedonia, p. 99. The rider is 

 Poseidon Hippios, the sea-god here appearing as 

 patron of horses, which, according to the myth, he 

 created. On the size of the horse see p. 98. 



