Jumping, also, was comparatively simple and restricted in its scope. Of high jumping and pole jumping the Greeks had none, for athletics were always practical, and as there were no hedges in Greece for soldiers to jump over it was unnecessary to practise high jumping in the school. Their long jump differed from ours in that it was always performed with the help of jumping weights--_halteres_--things much like our dumb-bells and used in a very similar fashion. With these implements a class of pupils would practise together to the music of the flute. Both standing and running jumps were performed from a take-off into a pit--_skamma_--and jumps of over twenty feet were common; the fifty-five feet ascribed to Phayllus is an impossible exaggeration. But if in running and jumping we have little to learn, it is very different in regard to the ‘field events,’ the throwing of the javelin and the diskos. Here the Greek system of body poise and muscular development gave their athletes an enormous advantage and enabled them easily to perform movements which to our modern bodies seem almost impossible. Both exercises were especially popular at Athens, and were there regarded as part of gymnastics rather than athletics: i.e. they were designed, not as [Illustration: THE DISKOBOLOS OF MYRON] competitive sports, but as means to improve bodily efficiency. The javelin was a light stick of wood, usually pointless. Distance throwing was far more usual than throwing at a mark, and for this purpose a thong--_amentum_--was used, fastened near the centre of the javelin shaft. Such a thong practically quadruples the range of throw, but the process needs long practice and is of course highly artificial in comparison with the natural use of the spear in hunting or in war. Greek athletics had a definite purpose, and we may be sure that it was not the actual throw but the movements necessary for the throw that gave its value to the exercise. These movements, the short, quick steps before the cast and the sharp turn of the body to the right, are illustrated frequently on the vases; the throw itself is seldom represented, and then with very poor results. The diskos was a flat and fairly heavy circle of bronze. It was thrown from behind a line and in a restricted space, a throw of 100 feet being exceptionally good. II Such is a brief account of the gymnastic sports and exercises which formed so important a part of a Greek’s everyday round. Each one of them had its own special value in developing the strength of some particular part of the body, and taken together they formed a complete and adequate training for what was to an ancient citizen the chief business of life--war.