Elsewhere in Greece,—observes the author of this tract,[854] whoever he was,—persons, the most solicitous respecting the education of their children, placed over them at the first dawn of intellectual developement, pædagogues, who at the outset undertook their instruction, and afterwards conducted them to the schools where letters, music, and gymnastics were taught. In this respect, however, as a modern writer has shown, the institutions of Sparta were in no degree superior, since Helots were there the instructors of young children; and, on this account, he rejects the story of Plutarch,[855] that they were compelled to intoxicate themselves, to exhibit to the youths a practical proof of the deformity of drunkenness.[856] It was contrary, he says, to common sense. But as common sense had very little to do with any part of the system, this is a poor argument, and will not weigh against positive testimony. Footnote 854: Rep. Lac. ii. 1. Cf. Pfeiff. Ant. p. 370. Footnote 855: Lycurg. 28. Müll. Dor. ii. 39. Commonly, also, the nurses of the kings were Helots.—Plut. Ages. § 3. Footnote 856: Plut. Inst. Lac. § 29. Another evil which the Pseudo-Xenophon discovers in the common Hellenic plan of training,[857] was that lads were indulged with the use of shoes, and rendered effeminate by frequent changes of clean linen, while their appetite, generally keen in boyhood,[858] was suffered to be the measure of what they ate. Lycurgus, he remarks, managed all these things differently. Instead of remaining under the superintendence of their parents, and frequenting what schools and masters they might judge proper, boys at Sparta passed under a sort of camp discipline regulated by the laws and intrusted to the guardianship of a particular magistrate, whom they denominated a Pædonomos. This part of the system Xenophon[859] prefers to the Athenian practice of intrusting youth to the care of servile pædagogues. The Pædonomos, however, resembled in many respects the Athenian Gymnasiarch, and, so far as I can perceive, possessed no superiority over him, except that his authority extended beyond school hours. He was, indeed, a kind of despot, vested with the power to call the boys together when he pleased, and inflict chastisement, at his own discretion, on any whom he detected exhibiting the least symptom of effeminacy. To enable him to carry his resolutions instantly into effect he marched about the town like an executioner, attended by men having whips, who at his nod seized the boy delinquent and subjected him at once to the torture. Thus possessing the power of enforcing obedience, a great show at least of reverence attended him. Footnote 857: De Rep. Laced. ii. 5. Cf. Plut. Lycurg. § 17. Footnote 858: