_Running_ needs no comment: the methods are much the same in all ages. The chief distances for races in Hellas were the Stadion or 200 yards,[401] the Diaulos or quarter-mile, and the Long-distance race, which varied from three-quarter mile to about three miles. The race in armour was not taught to boys. Races were often run over soft sand, where the runners sank in, just as long-distance races in England often include a ploughed field or two. The sand made running both a more severe exercise (so that a shorter distance sufficed) and also a better training for war. For the _long jump_ the Hellenes used the “halteres” or light dumb-bells, to assist their momentum.[402] Even in competitions, a flute-player stood by, to give the competitors the assistance of his music: no doubt it helped them to manage their steps so as to “take off” on the right spot. They alighted into a large sandy pit, dug up by the ever-present pickaxe: the jump was only measured if they came down on to this evenly, leaving a clear trace of their foot. The _diskos_ was a flat circle of polished bronze or other metal.[403] The specimen in the British Museum is between 8 and 9 inches in diameter, and is inscribed with athletic pictures on either side. It was flung with either hand. A great many attitudes were necessary before the diskos was launched, and every muscle of the body must have been well exercised in the process. The time was given, in the palaistra, by a flute-player. In competitions both the distance and the direction of the throw were taken into consideration. Boys learnt to throw the _javelin and spear_ by practising with long unpointed rods, which were also used for a variety of physical exercises. The mark seems to have been a sort of croquet-hoop or pair of compasses, fixed into the ground: other targets were also employed.[404] The vases which represent this pursuit often show the paidotribes carrying this hoop or fixing it into the ground. It was planted at a fixed distance which was stepped out. It may be mentioned, before we leave the “paidotribes,” that his fee for his whole course seems to have been a μνᾶ [mna], about £4:[405] this enabled the pupil to attend his lectures “for ever,” that is, perhaps till the course was finished. Or perhaps this sum made a pupil a life-member of a particular private palaistra.