practice among the ancient Germans, of jesting with freedom at table, alluded to in a verse of the Niebelungen Lied.(1781) But this primitive custom having been retained longer in Sparta than elsewhere, it struck all foreigners as a peculiarity, of which the antique polish was sometimes rather offensive. Still, if we justly estimate the manners of that city, they do not deserve the name of needless austerity and strictness; it was the only Greek state in which a statue was erected to Laughter:(1782) in late times even Agesilaus(1783) and Cleomenes III.(1784) amidst all the changes of their life, cheered their companions with wit and playfulness. 3. This national mode of expression had likewise a considerable effect on the progress of literature in Greece. Plato properly calls the Seven Sages, imitators and scholars of the Lacedæmonian system, and points out the resemblance between their sayings and the Laconian method of expression.(1785) Of these, three, or, if we reckon both Myson and Periander, four, were of Doric descent, and Cheilon was a Spartan;(1786) there were also perhaps at the same time others of the same character, as Aristodemus the Argive.(1787) The sayings attributed to these sages were not so much the discoveries of particular individuals, as the indications of the general opinion of their contemporaries. And hence the Pythian Apollo, directed by the national ideas of the Dorians, particularly countenanced their philosophers, to whose sententious mode of expression his own oracles bore a certain resemblance.(1788) It appears also that the Amphictyons caused some of their apophthegms to be inscribed on the temple of Delphi;(1789) and the story of the enumeration of the Seven Sages by the oracle, although fabulously embellished, is founded on a real fact.(1790) 4. Since in this apophthegmatic and concise style of speaking the object was not to express the meaning in a clear and intelligible manner, it was only one step further altogether to conceal it. Hence the _griphus_ or riddle was invented by the Dorians, and, as well as the epigram, was much improved by Cleobulus the Rhodian,(1791) and his daughter Cleobulina.(1792) It was also a favourite amusement with the Spartans,(1793) and in the ancient times of Greece was generally a common pastime.(1794)