And now, at last, we set out on the journey to Olympia.

The dress of the boys is a simple chiton, a little garment of linen without sleeves, and they have sandals on their feet, because this journey is long, and they will not unfit their feet for the race; but often and often they have walked miles and miles barefooted. They need no hats, for one of their earliest lessons was to stand with uncovered head in the hottest sunshine, as well as to endure the coldest weather without any clothes at all. So they walk with a light step, and find little trouble in keeping up with their older brothers, who are going to join in the wrestling matches and the other games.

Eudexion, indeed, rides on horseback, wearing his white chlamys, purple-bordered and with four tasselled corners. But even that you would not think was much of a dress, for it is only an oblong strip of cloth with a button to fasten it together on the right shoulder, so as to leave the right arm bare, and free to use spear or bow.

You will see by and by, however, that this very simple way of dressing is exceedingly convenient to these Greeks.

It is the Seventy-seventh Olympiad. You remember that Kablu measured time by moons, Cleon measured by Olympiads. And what was an Olympiad? Why, it was four years; and it was counted from one celebration of the Olympic games to another.

If you asked Cleon at what time he began to go to school, he would have answered, "In the third year of the Seventy-fourth Olympiad." Now count back, and you will find out how old he is.

But we must go back to our journey. You and I should call such a journey a long, delightful pic-nic; camping at night in a sheltering cave; bathing every day in some clear stream; feasting on wild figs and olives and almonds; and stopping sometimes at a farm-house for barley-cakes and honey.

We join in the morning song of the farmer's boys,—

and we watch the toiling oxen, yoked with a maple yoke, curved like a serpent winding round their necks; and we listen to the half-naked, happy-looking lad who trudges beside them, singing to himself, "He who toils is beloved by gods and men." "Be industrious, for famine is the companion of the idle."

At noon we reach a hospitable farm-house, where the cook stands beside her fire, stirring a great pot of broth with a fig-tree ladle to give it a fine flavor; and in fact we find bowls of it delicious and refreshing as a preparation for the afternoon's march. You see we don't travel on the Spartan plan.

But we mustn't stop too long on the road. Only notice, as we come nearer and nearer to the beautiful valley, what troops of people we meet, all on their way to the same place. Some have come down from the mountains, and among them is an old man who has come all the way from a distant mountain hamlet, and only to-day joined the company in which we meet him.

"Were you not afraid to travel so far alone?" he was asked.

"Oh no," he answered; "I carry a laurel staff."

Though you and I don't see how a laurel staff should protect him, Cleon knows that the sacred laurel is a safeguard from all evil, and he looks curiously and with a sort of awe at the old man's staff.

But while we talk, Cleon is already in the valley, and stands gazing, for the first time in his life, at the golden Victory. On the morrow morning he will pray to Zeus for victory, and then take his place among the foot-racers.

There couldn't be a brighter morning than the next. How the sun shines on the golden statue and shield, and on the hundred bronze statues of Olympian victors that stand around the sacred place.

Perhaps you can't understand how games could be sacred. But I think there is a true meaning in thinking of it as Cleon had been taught to. The great god Zeus had given him a strong and beautiful body, and now he came to the temple of Zeus to show that he had used that body well, and trained it to feats of strength and skill, kept it sacred, not injured it by carelessness or ill-treatment, but made the most of it all the time.

All the boys who are to run are together on one side of the field. Cleon, who arrives very early, watches the others as they enter. He is thinking whether they will be worthy opponents in the race. He is not afraid of any of the Athenian boys. He has beaten them all many times already. But here are boys from all parts of Greece, and good runners too. Still he has little fear until he sees a rugged, sun-burned face under a shock of uncombed hair, keen eyes that look neither to the right nor to the left, and yet see everything; a light step, neither quick nor slow, but very sure, caring not for rough roads, wet or dry, trained to march in the darkest night as steadily as by day. It is Aristodemus, the Spartan boy,—not a very pleasing object beside the Athenian boys, in their clean linen chitons, and fresh from their morning bath.

Aristodemus has but one chiton a year, and he wears that until it is worn out. In summer he often goes without, in order that it may last through the winter; and this poor garment, I am sure, has never made the acquaintance of the washtub. This, however, is the boy—the one boy—that Cleon has reason to dread in the race.

And now the day begins with a solemn sacrifice to Zeus, the father of light. Ten bulls, their horns decked with oak wreaths, are led up to the altar and killed, and the priest prays. As the flame is kindled and curls up around the sacrifice, the people all join in the sacred chorus, ending with the prayer, "Zeus, our Lord, give unto us whatever is good, whether we ask it of thee or not; whatever is evil keep from us, even if we ask it of thee."

Then the games begin. The boys race first. Their pedagogues have already handed in their names and stated their parentage, for none who are not of pure Greek descent can enter, nor can any one who has committed crime.

A silver urn contains the lots which assign places to the racers. The boys move forward in order, and draw. Then the holders of the first four numbers take their places first upon the course.

And now you see how convenient is the Greek dress, for unfasten only one button and off falls the chiton, and the boy is ready for the race, with his agile limbs free from all clothes, and without the least feeling of shame, for you must remember that this has always been the custom with them.

The signal is given and they are off, like bright arrows from a bow.

The victor is Charicles, one of Cleon's Athenian friends. He stands now by himself, a proud and happy boy, to watch the next four.

Aristodemus is winner in the third race, Cleon in the fourth. And now all the winners are to run together for the olive crown.

Cleon stands erect, raises his hands towards heaven, and calls upon Zeus, Athene, and Apollo to help him.

Then once again the signal is given, and, with his bright locks blowing in the wind, Cleon is off.

These two boys—the Spartan and the Athenian—quickly outstrip the others. The Athenians cheer Cleon, calling upon Pallas Athene to aid him for the honor of Athens.

The Spartans shout to Aristodemus to conquer for Sparta. When Cleon's foot is at the goal, Aristodemus is but one pace behind him; so the olive crown is for the golden head of Cleon instead of the tangled locks of the Spartan boy. But Cleon turns to grasp the hand of his opponent, understanding now, perhaps for the first time,—

Now our boy will have his name inscribed first on the list of victors, for they always give the boys the first place. He has done honor to his parents and to his city, and he stands through the long summer day to watch the race of the young men in armor, the leaping, wrestling, and throwing the spear; and last, the great chariot race; and he has a new feeling of belonging to it all; and he shouts when Athens wins, and watches anxiously when the Corinthian and Theban youths throw the spear or the diskos, lest they should excel his dear Athenians.

The wrestling on the second day was perhaps the most skilful ever seen in Greece,—the young men, their bodies oiled and sprinkled with sand, seizing each other's slight forms with a grasp that would not let go.

At last two of them only remained to decide the contest, a Spartan and an Athenian. They were locked in each other's arms and neither would yield.

The silent, almost breathless, people watch them as the minutes go by. At last, the Spartan, as if he had summoned all his strength for this one effort, slowly forces his antagonist to the ground, and then falls beside him—dead. There is a great shout. "The crown of the dead victor for Sparta!" And the Spartans themselves are loudest in the applause. Nobody sorrows over him.

They will carry back his crown, to hang it over his grave in Sparta. His name will be written among the victors; perhaps, even, he will have a statue in his honor. So they despatch a swift runner to Sparta to tell the good news to his father, and then the games go on.

When they are finished, all these people disperse until the next Olympiad, and wherever they go they will be eagerly asked, "Who has won at the games?" and they will tell the names with pride, and rehearse the story of the dead victor.

Cleon goes home to Athens, and he finds the door of his father's house decorated with garlands, while that of Theognis, his next neighbor, has a little flock of soft, white wool hanging over it. He shouts for joy when he sees the garlands, for he knows the meaning of such a decoration, a baby brother has been born to him, and this is the festival day in honor of the happy event.

The Spartan nurse who has been hired to take care of him has this morning carried the tiny baby, in her arms, two or three times around the burning altar of the hearth, while all the household united in the worship of Hestia, the goddess of the hearth. In a few days will come the name-day, and the festival for the friends and relatives.

Cleon is glad to be at home before this feast-day, for he likes to see the guests in their rich dresses, with golden grasshoppers fastening the heavy curls on their foreheads, to hear the music, and perhaps to get a taste of the fruits left from their tables.

And what was the meaning of the flock of wool on the door of Theognis? Oh, that meant a baby too, but a girl, not a boy. I suppose they put wool because she would be a spinner and weaver, as all Greek women were.

And now I am reminded by the wreath on the door that I have never taken you into Cleon's home, and you don't even know at all what kind of house it is.

Let us go out into the street and see just how the outside looks.

I should call it a blank wall built up close to the street, with a door in the middle of it. Do you think Cleon's little sister Thratta will be looking out at the front windows to see the people pass in the streets. Oh no, indeed, people don't look out of their front windows in Athens. The front rooms are only for the porters, and sometimes even for the stables, so we pass quickly through the narrow entry that lies between them, and reach what I should call the real, true house.

Did you notice that the door, unlike ours, opens outwards, and, as the house stands directly on the street, the opening of the door may knock down some person who is passing, and yet there are very few such accidents, for whoever goes out knocks loudly on the inside of the door before he opens it, and the passers by hear the knock, understand its meaning, and keep out of the way.

Do you wonder why they made the doors in this way? So did I, until they showed me how well a house might be defended against an enemy, if the door opened outwards—and in those old times, you know, there were many wars, and much fighting even in the streets of cities sometimes.

But we are friends, not enemies, and now we are fairly inside the house and looking at the beautiful statue that stands at the inner doorway. It is Apollo, god of the silver bow. He stands there to guard and to bless the house.

We pass him and follow Cleon as he runs through the door at the end of the passage to seek his mother. Here we stand in a fine open courtyard, right in the middle of the house. The blue sky is overhead, rows of marble pillars form a colonnade around it, and pleasant rooms open from it on both sides.

But neither the mother nor little Thratta is here; and out through the door at the other end runs Cleon. Another open hall, but not half so large as the first, and in it the sacred hearth of stone round which the baby was carried to-day.

See, just as we come in, a slave girl who has in her hand the fragments of a beautiful porcelain pitcher, has run to the hearth and knelt upon it, while she looks up tearfully to the hand that is about to strike her for her carelessness. She has run to the altar of the hearth for protection, and she is safe; no one will punish her there.

Cleon even remembers how one wild, stormy night, when he was a very little child, a poor stranger, lost in the storm, entered the house and claimed the protection of the hearth, and how his father had said kindly, "If you were my enemy, you were safe on the asylum of the hearth."

I think we, who are strangers, will wait beside the hearth while Cleon opens the door at the left side of the hall and finds his mother with the little new baby brother.

But I hear the sound of the loom, and presently Cleon will lead us still on through another door at the back of the hall, to the rooms where the maids are spinning and weaving, and then out into the garden, where little Thratta is playing at hide-and-seek with her playmate Cadmea.

But we must not forget that Cleon has brought home the crown of wild olive. He is an honor to his parents and to Athens. His father and mother praise him, his sister Thratta makes him a myrtle wreath, and he begins to feel himself growing into a good citizen.

By the way, do you notice that he wears golden ear-rings? Don't you think that is odd for a boy? I thought so, and I wondered why, until he told me this story about it.

"Have you ever heard," he said, "of the sacred oracle of Apollo at Delphi? When anything of importance is to be decided, the Greeks always go and ask the wise counsel of the oracle. So once when the wise men were trying to find out what they should do to make their sons grow up into good citizens, they decided to send two men—my father was one and Polycles the other—to ask the oracle.

"This was the answer, I have heard it often and know it by heart: 'If the Athenians desire good citizens, let them put whatever is most beautiful into the ears of their sons.'

"Gold was the most beautiful, so after that we all had ear-rings of gold; but last summer I heard Pericles say in the assembly that it was not ear-rings of gold that the oracle meant, but jewels of thought set in golden words."

And now that we are at home again in Athens, Cleon will not let us go until we have been up to the Acropolis to see the statue of Pallas Athene, the guardian goddess of the city. If we had come by sea we could have seen the crest of her helmet and the point of her spear shining like gold, while we were still many miles away.

Every year there is a festival held in her honor at Athens, but last year it was grander than usual; the third year of each Olympiad being especially sacred to her.

The Athenians love her well. They believe that it is she who made the olive-tree and blessed their land with it, and so, on the Acropolis, they cherish always her sacred olive-tree, and they go to ask her help in war and in peace; for she can inspire their warriors to do glorious deeds, and she has also taught the peaceful arts of spinning and weaving, and all manner of industries. I think we might call her the goddess of intelligence or wisdom.

In her honor there are processions and dances and games,—one race that I should particularly like to see, the torch-race; the runners carry lighted torches, and the victor is he who reaches the goal with his torch still alight. That is not an easy thing to do, I fancy,—could you do it?

Cleon is still too young for the torch race, but his brother Eudexion took part in it. He ran, but he did not win. Do you want to know who did? It was Daldion, and they were all glad of his success, for he deserved it, and besides he was an orphan; and in Athens, if a boy lost his parents, the state became father and mother to him, and instead of having only one father he had a hundred. So Daldion had been brought up and educated by the state, and at this festival of Pallas Athene he came of age. It was a grand celebration of his birthday. He was taken into the theatre, and, in the presence of all the people, clad in a complete suit of armor, a gift from the state, in memory of his brave father who fell in battle, and to-day he has quickly won renown by this victory in the race, and everybody rejoices with him.

He is also expert in the Pyrrhic dance, a beautiful stately dance with poised spear and shield, the dancers moving to the sound of martial music. This, too, is a service in honor of the gods.

But we must not linger too long in Athens; we will only stay for the naming-day festival of Cleon's baby brother.

His father went, early in the morning, to the market to hire cooks and to buy fish, for in Athens fish is a great delicacy and much prized. Skins of wine he bought, too, and baskets of fruit, and garlands also, enough for all the guests; and he hired dancing-girls and flute-players for their entertainment.

The guests came in dresses of fine, white wool, bordered with purple or scarlet. Their hair was curled and fastened with golden grasshoppers. When they came in, the slaves brought perfumed waters for their hands, and then set out tables with dishes and drinking-cups of silver.

There were roasted pike, and barley-cakes and bread carried about in baskets, and eaten with cheese from Sicily, or the honey of Hymettus. There were figs from the island of Rhodes, where the great Colossus bestrides the harbor; dates brought across the sea from Egypt, and almonds and melons and other fruits.

Cleon himself is admitted to the dining-room for the first time, because he has honored himself and his family by his victory.

He cannot, of course, come as the equal of his father and the guests. They will recline on the soft-cushioned couches, and the slaves will serve them; while he sits upright upon a bench and listens in respectful silence to the talk and the music.

He does not share the feast, but he knows very well that a boy should not expect it; and I fancy he enjoys quite as well his supper of pancakes and honey, after the dinner is over and the guests are gone.

It is night. Cleon goes through the passes between the tall pillars of the colonnade to his little bedroom, and falls quickly asleep on his bed, which is hardly more than a hard bench. And we—the strangers—will sail away to Italy, and up the Yellow Tiber, to Rome.