In the Hieron of Xenophon (xi. 11)--a conversation between the despot Hieron and the poet Simonides--the poet, exhorting Hieron to govern his subjects in a mild, beneficent, and careful spirit, expatiates upon the popularity and warm affection which he will thereby attract to himself from them. Of this affection one manifestation will be (he says) as follows:--[Greek: ô(/ste ou) mo/non philoi=o a)/n, a)lla\ kai\ e)rô=|o, u(p' a)nthrô/pôn; _kai\ tou\s kalou\s ou) peira=|n, a)lla\ peirô/menon u(p' au)tô=n a)ne/chesthai a)/n se de/oi_], &c. These words illustrate the adventure described by Alkibiades in the Platonic Symposion. Herakleides of Pontus, Dikæarchus, and the Peripatetic Hieronymus, all composed treatises [Greek: Peri\ E)rôtos], especially [Greek: peri\ paidikô=n e)rô/tôn] (Athenæ. xiii. 602-603).] [Side-note: Perfect self-command of Sokrates--proof against every sort of trial.] Not merely upon this point but upon others also, Alkibiades recounts anecdotes of the perfect self-mastery of Sokrates: in endurance of cold, heat, hunger, and fatigue--in contempt of the dangers of war, in bravery on the day of battle--even in the power of bearing more wine than any one else, without being intoxicated, whenever the occasion was such as to require him to drink: though he never drank much willingly. While all his emotions are thus described as under the full control of Reason and Eros Philosophus--his special gift and privilege was that of conversation--not less eccentric in manner, than potent, soul-subduing,[43] and provocative in its effects. [Footnote 43: Plato, Sympos. pp. 221-222. Alkibiades recites acts of distinguished courage performed by Sokrates, at the siege of Potidæa as well as at the battle of Delium. About the potent effect produced by the conversation of Sokrates upon his companions, compare Sympos. p. 173 C-D. In the Xenophontic Apology (s. 18), Sokrates adverts to the undisturbed equanimity which he had shown during the long blockade of Athens after the battle of Ægospotami, while others were bewailing the famine and other miseries.] [Side-note: Drunkenness of others at the close of the Symposion--Sokrates is not affected by it, but continues his dialectic process.]