his age the elder men took even greater interest in them,
frequenting the gymnasia where they were, and listening to their
repartees with each other, and that not in a languid careless manner,
but just as if each thought himself the father, instructor, and captain
of them all.

Thus no time was left unemployed, and no place was left without some one
to give good advice and punish wrong-doing; although a regular
superintendent of the boys was appointed from the leading men of the
city, and they had their own chiefs, who were the wisest and bravest of
the Eirenes. This is a name given to those who have begun their second
year after ceasing to be children, and the eldest of the children are
called Melleirenes. This Eiren, who is twenty years old, commands his
company in their battles, and in the house uses them as his servants to
prepare dinner. He orders the bigger boys to carry logs of wood, and the
little ones to gather pot herbs. They also bring him what they steal,
which they do, some from the gardens, and some from the men's
dining-tables, where they rush in very cleverly and cautiously; for if
one be taken, he is severely scourged for stealing carelessly and
clumsily. They also steal what victuals they can, learning to take them
from those who are asleep or off their guard. Whoever is caught is
punished by stripes and starvation. Their meals are purposely made
scanty, in order that they may exercise their ingenuity and daring in
obtaining additions to them. This is the main object of their short
commons, but an incidental advantage is the growth of their bodies, for
they shoot up in height when not weighed down and made wide and broad by
excess of nutriment. This also is thought to produce beauty of figure;
for lean and slender frames develop vigour in the limbs, whereas those
which are bloated and over-fed cannot attain this, from their weight.
This we see in the case of women who take purgatives during pregnancy,
whose children are thin, but well-shaped and slender, because from their
slight build they receive more distinctly the impress of their mother's
form. However, it may be that the cause of this phenomenon is yet to be
discovered.

XVII. The boys steal with such earnestness that there is a story of one
who had taken a fox's cub and hidden it under his cloak, and, though his
entrails were being torn out by the claws and teeth of the beast,
persevered in concealing it until he died. This may be believed from