the fathers of the bride and the
bridegroom, and that the motives which induced a man to marry were less
the desire for companionship than the natural wish for children and a
sense of duty to the country.[95] Demosthenes, in his speech against
Neaera, declares:[96] "We have courtesans for our pleasures, concubines
for the requirements of the body, and wives for the procreation of
lawful issue." If he had been speaking at a drinking-party, instead of
before a jury, he might have added, "and young men for intellectual
companions."

The fourth point which I have noted above requires more illustration,
since its bearing on the general condition of Athenian society is
important. Owing to the prevalence of paiderastia, a boy was exposed in
Athens to dangers which are comparatively unknown in our great cities,
and which rendered special supervision necessary. It was the custom for
fathers, when they did not themselves accompany their sons,[97] to
commit them to the care of slaves chosen usually among the oldest and
most trustworthy. The duty of the attendant guardian was not to instruct
the boy, but to preserve him from the addresses of importunate lovers or
from such assaults as Peisthetaerus in the _Birds_ of Aristophanes
describes.[98] He followed his charge to the school and the gymnasium,
and was responsible for bringing him home at the right hour. Thus at the
end of the _Lysis_ we read:[99]--

"Suddenly we were interrupted by the tutors of Lysis and Menexenus;
who came upon us like an evil apparition with their brothers, and
bade them go home, as it was getting late. At first, we and the
bystanders drove them off; but afterwards, as they would not mind,
and only went on shouting in their barbarous dialect, and got
angry, and kept calling the boys--they appeared to us to have been
drinking rather too much at the Hermaea, which made them difficult
to manage--we fairly gave way and broke up the company."

In this way the daily conduct of Athenian boys of birth and good
condition was subjected to observation; and it is not improbable that
the charm which invested such lads as Plato portrayed in his _Charmides_
and _Lysis_ was partly due to the self-respect and self-restraint
generated by the peculiar conditions under which they passed their life.

Of the way in which a Greek boy spent his day, we gain some notion from
two passages in Aristophanes and Lucian. The Dikaios Logos[100]