the celebration of that great
spectacle, was liable to be thrown from a rock. The consequence was,
that not one female was detected, except _Callipatria_, or, as others
called her, _Pherenice_. This woman, disguised in the habit of a
teacher of gymnastic exercises, introduced her son, _Pisidorus_, to
contend for the victor's prize. Her son succeeded. Transported with
joy at a sight so glorious, the mother overleaped the fence, which
enclosed the magistrates, and, in the violence of that exertion, let
fall her garment. She was, by consequence, known to be a woman, but
absolved from all criminality. For that mild and equitable sentence,
she was indebted to the merit of her father, her brothers, and her
son, who all obtained the victor's crown. The incident, however, gave
birth to a new law, whereby it was enacted, that the masters of the
gymnastic art should, for the future, come naked to the Olympic games.
_AElian_ lib. x. cap. 1; and see _Pausanias_, lib. v. cap. 6.

[f] Nicostratus is praised by Pausanias (lib. v. cap. 20), as a great
master of the athletic arts. Quintilian has also recorded his prowess.
"Nicostratus, whom in our youth we saw advanced in years, would
instruct his pupil in every branch of his art, and make him, what he
was himself, an invincible champion. Invincible he was, since, on one
and the same day, he entered the lists as a wrestler and a boxer, and
was proclaimed conqueror in both." _Ac si fuerit qui docebitur, ille,
quem adolescentes vidimus, Nicostratus, omnibus in eo docendi partibus
similiter uteretur; efficietque illum, qualis hic fuit, luctando
pugnandoque quorum utroque in certamine iisdem diebus coronabatur
invictum._ Quint. lib, ii. cap. 8.

Section XI.

[a] Nero's ambition to excel in poetry was not only ridiculous, but,
at the same time, destructive to Lucan, and almost all the good
authors of the age. See _Annals_, b. xv. According to the old
scholiast on the Satires of Persius, the following verses were either
written by Nero, or made in imitation of that emperor's style:

Torva Mimalloneis implerunt cornua bombis,
Et raptum vitulo caput ablatura superbo
Bassaris, et lyncem Maenas flexura corymbis,
Evion ingeminat: reparabilis adsonat echo.

The affectation of rhyme, which many ages afterwards was the
essential part of monkish verse, the tumour of the words, and the
wretched penury of thought, may be imputed to a frivolous prince, who
studied his art of