attributes of the female mind as capable of cultivation." The anecdote of the daughter of Cleomenes, who warned her father, though yet a child, of the Persian's gold, is still more in point than the pretty story of Agesilaus found playing horse with a stick to amuse his infant-boy. It proves rational relations and intercourse between parents and children.
The moral influence of the relation of friendship is to be considered in the Dorian education. Every well-educated man was bound to be the love of some youth, who was called his Listener, as he was called Inspirer; and these words express the pure and intellectual connection. Plutarch, who has much misrepresented this "friendship," admits, however, that for some faults the inspirer was punished, instead of the listener. The listener had also liberty by law to punish his inspirer for any insult or disgraceful treatment. The friends could represent each other in the public assembly, and stood side by side in war. Cicero testifies to the sanctity of the Dorian friendship.
It was only in Sparta and Crete that this institution was recognized by the state; but it was founded on feelings which, it is evident, belonged to the Dorian race; for, in their other cities, particular friends are spoken of by name. The relation was not merely of men. Noble women would have their female listeners; and sometimes a female inspirer had a small company of girls, who cultivated music and poetry. In his history of Grecian literature, K. O. Müller gives details respecting this. The moral and intellectual training implied in the existence and respect for the family, presided over by cultivated female intelligence, is an explanation of the long conservation of the Dorian virtue, and prevented the hardening effect of what seems to us living in public. The Dorian men eat in public in messes, and had λέσχαι, or little clubs, at which they conversed with a freedom guarded by a high sense of honor; and to these conversations the youths were gradually introduced by their inspirers. Instead of the gossip which destroys mind, the conversation, rational, brilliant with wit and humor, was of the sort which makes the man, by keeping him in relation with worthy objects. The sentences of this conversation, which have
