r sons. During the first five years of his life the boy
remained wholly with the women, and was scarcely, if at all, seen by his
father. After that time his training commenced. He was expected to rise
before dawn, and to appear at a certain spot, where he was exercised
with other boys of his age in running, slinging stones, shooting with
the bow, and throwing the javelin. At seven he was taught to ride, and
soon afterwards he was allowed to begin to hunt. The riding included,
not only the ordinary management of the horse, but the power of jumping
on and off his back when he was at speed, and of shooting with the bow
and throwing the javelin with unerring aim, while the horse was still at
full gallop. The hunting was conducted by state-officers, who aimed at
forming by its means in the youths committed to their charge all the
qualities needed in war. The boys were made to bear extremes of heat
and cold, to perform long marches, to cross rivers without wetting their
weapons, to sleep in the open air at night, to be content with a single
meal in two days, and to support themselves occasionally on the wild
products of the country, acorns, wild pears, and the fruit of the
terebinth-tree. On days when there was no hunting they passed their
mornings in athletic exercises, and contests with the bow or the
javelin, after which they dined simply on the plain food mentioned above
as that of the men in the early times, and then employed themselves
during the afternoon in occupations regarded as not illiberal--for
instance, in the pursuits of agriculture, planting, digging for roots,
and the like, or in the construction of arms and hunting implements,
such as nets and springes. Hardy and temperate habits being secured
by this training, the point of morals on which their preceptors mainly
insisted was the rigid observance of truth. Of intellectual education
they had but little. It seems to have been no part of the regular
training of a Persian youth that he should learn to read. He was given
religious notions and a certain amount of moral knowledge by means of
legendary poems, in which the deeds of gods and heroes were set before
him by his teachers, who recited or sung them in his presence, and
afterwards required him to repeat what he had heard, or, at any rate,
to give some account of it. This education continued for fifteen years,
commencing when the boy was five, and terminating when he reached the
age of twenty.

The effect of