But these denunciations of athletes do not apply so much to Athens as to the other States of Hellas. The Athenian Agora was full of the statues of generals and patriots, not, as was the usual custom, of athletes.[349] The author of the treatise on the Athenian constitution,[350] writing in the early days of the Peloponnesian War, notices that the democracy had driven gymnastics out of fashion.[351] He writes as one of the aristocrats who, like Pindar and his princely friends, cared mainly for the body and the outward beauties of life: the democracy was vulgar, for it could not spend all its time in bodily exercises and musical banquets. No doubt at that period in Athens, as can be seen in Aristophanes, there was a reaction in favour of intellectual pursuits against the exclusive athleticism of the preceding age: the time of the citizens in a great democracy was also largely monopolised by State duties, whether in the Assembly or in the Law Courts or in fighting by sea or land. But athletics still remained quite sufficiently popular even at Athens, and athletic “shop” remained one of the chief topics of conversation at a dinner-party.[352] * * * * * Gymnastic exercises centred round two sorts of buildings which are often confused, the “gymnasium” and the “palaistra.” The former may be said to correspond to the whole series of fields and buildings intended for games, which surround a modern public school, including football and cricket grounds, running track and jumping pit, fives courts, and so forth. The “palaistra” often resembled little more than the playground of a village school: it only demanded a sandy floor, and sufficient privacy to protect the exercises from intrusion: such buildings could be run up at private expense in the smallest villages, and were often attached to private houses. A “gymnasium,” on the other hand, must have cost a vast sum to erect: even a great capital like Athens only possessed three in the fourth century; small towns must have been unable to afford them at all. But the gymnasia were public buildings, open to all; they were always full of citizens of all ages, practising or watching others practise; they were a fashionable place of resort, where Sophists lectured in the big halls, and philosophers taught in the shady gardens. For the trainer who wished to instruct his class of boys they were wholly unsuitable; besides, any casual stranger could stand by and get a lesson for nothing. Consequently, even at Athens, the boys were taught in palaistrai which could be closed to the public:[353] in the towns and villages there was no other place.