For sheer range and variety, the Atlantean pastimes excelled those of any other people I had ever encountered. To begin with the simplest first, there were athletic games, races and competitions that might have been popular even in the upper world; and on the outskirts of Archeon were fields where the young and even the middle-aged gathered in crowds, testing their prowess by boxing and wrestling, by hurling round, flat objects like the ancient discus, by sprinting along specified race-courses, by engaging in a sort of ball game remotely like tennis, or by participating in that more popular contest known as “sortos,” which reminded me of baseball except for the fact that it did not require so many players. I was surprised to observe that the Atlanteans could enter into these sports with hot enthusiasm; but I also noted that they could view their athletics with sanity, and were interested in their games only while actually engaged in them, and did not come forth in throngs as mere onlookers, nor waste time discussing the contests beforehand or after they were over, nor prostitute their spirit to a professional or commercial outlook. Not less popular than the athletics--in fact, probably much more popular--were the dances that featured prominently in Atlantean life. These were of a hundred styles and varieties, from the ethereal butterfly movements of trained women, such as Aelios, to the tripping and capering of children keeping time spontaneously to the rhythm of a song. Leaving out of account the dances for which unusual skill was necessary, the most interesting to my mind were those held on the polished floors of the temples, where as many as a hundred men and women would gather, all swaying synchronously to the subdued beat of the music, some in couples holding hands and some singly, but all lightly passing back and forth with bird-like co-ordinated movements, until as one watched, one lost sight of individuals and thought of them all only as the parts of some exquisite, ever-varying whole. It was not surprising to me to observe that the Atlantean love of the dance was matched by an equal taste for music. Having no technical musical knowledge, I cannot comment upon the Atlantean development of the art, except to say that its cultivation was widespread, that public concerts were held almost daily in the halls of Archeon, and that invariably their effect upon me was pleasing beyond anything I had ever heard on earth. Perhaps it was that the Atlantean music possessed in high degree the power of awakening ecstasy and visions; perhaps it was that its restrained melancholy and plaintive rapture were as keys, that unlocked a universe beyond the universe of sense, and brought the time-bound spirit into touch with the timeless; but, at all events, it possessed a ravishing power reminding me of the most consummate violin performances, and yet surpassing even the violin in the almost complete severance it effected between body and soul.