It would be very interesting to know in detail what rules the Greeks prescribed for this purpose. Pausanias tells us (vi. 7, 9) that a certain Dromeus, who won ten victories in long races at various games (about Ol. 74, 485 B. C.), was the first who thought of eating meat in his training, for that up to that time the diet of athletes had been cheese from wicker baskets (_ἐκ τῶν ταλάρων_).(124) It must be remembered that meat diet was not common among the Greeks, who, like most southern people, lived rather upon fish, fruit, and vegetables, so that the meat dinners of Bœotia were censured as heavy and rather disgusting. However, the discovery of Dromeus was adopted by Greek athletes ever after, and we hear of their compulsory meals of large quantities of meat, and their consequent sleepiness and sluggishness in ordinary life, in such a way as to make us believe that the Greeks had missed the real secret of training, and actually thought that the more strong nutriment a man could take, the stronger he would become. The quantity eaten by athletes is universally spoken of as far exceeding the quantity eaten by ordinary men, not to speak of its heavier quality. The suspicion that, in consequence, Greek athletic performances were not in speed greater than, if even equal to, our own, is however hard to verify, as we are without any information as to the time in which their running feats were performed. They had no watches, or nice measures of short moments of time, and always ran races merely to see who would win, not to see in how short a time a given distance could be done. Nevertheless, as the course was over soft sand, and as the vases picture them rushing along in spread-eagle fashion, with their arms like the sails of a windmill—in order to aid the motion of their bodies, as the Germans explain (after Philostratos)—nay, as we even hear of their having started shouting, if we can believe such a thing, their time performances in running must have been decidedly poor.(125) In the Olympic games the running, which had originally been the only competition, always came first. The distance was once up the course, and seems to have been about 200 yards. After the year 720 B. C. (?) races of double the course, and long races of about 3000 yards were added;(126) races in armor were a later addition, and came at the end of the sports. It is remarkable that among all these varieties hurdle races were unknown, though the long jump was assigned a special place, and thought very important. We have several extraordinary anecdotes of endurance in running long journeys cited throughout Greek history, and even now the modern inhabitants are remarkable for this quality. I have seen a young man keep up with a horse ridden at a good pace across rough country for many miles, and have been told that the Greek postmen are quite wonderful for their speed and lasting. But this is compatible with very poor performances at prize meetings.