Chap. 20.] INSTAIfCES OF KEMAEKABLE AGILITY. 
161 
seized and dragged him to the camp. Yinnius Yalens, who 
served as a centurion in the praBtorian guard of Augustus, was 
in the habit of holding up waggons laden with casks, until 
they were emptied ; and of stopping a carriage with one hand, 
and holding it ba^jk, against all the efforts of the horses to 
drag it forward. He performed other wonderful feats also, an 
account of which may still be seen inscribed on his monument. 
Yarro, also, gives the following statement : Fusius, who 
used to be called the ' bumpkin Hercules,' was in the habit 
of carrying his own mule; while Salvius was able to mount 
a ladder, with a weight of two hundred pounds attached to his 
feet, the same to his hands, and two hundred pounds on each 
shoulder." I myself once saw, — a most marvellous display of 
strength, — a man of the name of Athanatus walk across the 
stage, wearing a leaden breast-plate of five hundred pounds 
weight, while shod with buskins of the same weight. When 
Milo, the wrestler, had once taken his stand, there was not a 
person who could move him from his position ; and when he 
grasped an apple in his hand, no one could so much as open 
one of his fingers. 
CHAP. 20. INSTAIfCES OF EEMARKABLE AGILITY. 
It was considered a very great thing for Philippides to run 
one thousand one hundred and sixty stadia, the distance between 
Athens and Lacedsemon, in two days, until Amystis, the Lace- 
daemonian courier, and Philonides,*^ the courier of Alexander 
the Great, ran from Sicyon to Elis in one day, a distance of thir- 
teen hundred and five stadia.^^ In our own times, too, we are 
much more consistent with probability. " Inermi dextra superatura, et 
imo digito postremo correptum incastra," &c. — " Conquered him with the 
right hand, and that unarmed, and then with a single finger dragged him 
to the camp." 
3& ^'Eusticellus." 
Philonides has been already mentioned, B. ii. c. 73, as being in the 
habit of going from Sicyon to Elis in nine hours. — B. 
^1 We may consult the learned notes of Ajasson, Lemaire, vol. iii. p. 
99, respecting the exact distances here indicated by Pliny. We may re- 
mark, that a stadium is about one-eighth of a mile, according to which esti- 
mate, Philippides must have gone 142 miles in two days, and the other 150 
miles in one day; as it is implied, that these journeys were performed on 
foot, even the former of them is obviously impossible. — B. Query, how- 
ever, as to this last assertion ; according to recent pedestrian feats, it does 
not appear to be absolutely impossible. 
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