The servile war which took place among the Samians had a more fortunate issue, though but few particulars respecting it have come down to us. It was related, however, by Malacos in his annals of the Siphnians, that Ephesos was first founded by a number of Samian slaves, who, having retired to a mountain on the island to the number of a thousand, inflicted numerous evils on their former tyrants. These, in the sixth year of the war, having consulted the oracle, came to an understanding with their slaves, who were permitted to depart in safety from the island. They sailed away, and became the founders of the city and people of Ephesos.

In Attica the institution of slavery, though attended by innumerable evils is said to have exhibited itself under the mildest form which it any where assumed in the ancient world. With their characteristic attention to the interests of humanity, the Athenians enacted a law, in virtue of which, slaves could indict their masters for assault and battery. Hyperides observed in his oration against Mantitheos, "our laws, making no distinction in this respect between freemen and slaves, grant to all alike the privilege of bringing an action against those who insult or injure them." To the same effect spoke Lycurgus in his first oration against Lycophron. Plato was less just to them than the laws of their country. If, in his imaginary state, a slave killed a slave in self-defense, he was judged innocent; if a freeman, he was put to death like a parricide. But Demosthenes has preserved the law which empowered any Athenian, not laboring under legal disability, to denounce to the Thesmothetæ the person who offered violence to man, woman or child, whether slave or free. Such actions were tried before the court of Helixa, and numerous were the examples of men who suffered death for crimes committed against slaves. Another privilege enjoyed by the slave class in Attica was that of purchasing their own freedom, as often as, by the careful management of the peculium secured them by law, they were enabled to offer their owners an equivalent for their services. At Athens, with some exceptions, every temple in the city appears to have been open to them. Occasionally, certain of their number were selected to accompany their masters to consult the oracle at Delphi, when they were permitted, like free citizens, to wear crowns upon their heads, which, for the time, conferred upon them exemption from blows or stripes. Among their more serious grievances was their liability to personal chastisement; which was too much left to the discretion of their owners. In time of war, however, this privilege was not practised, since the flogged slaves could go over to the enemy, as sometimes happened. They are said, besides, to have worked the mines in fetters; probably, however, only in consequence of a revolt, in which they slew the overseers of the mines, and taking possession of the acropolis of Sunium, laid waste, for a time, the whole of the adjacent districts. This took place simultaneously with the second insurrection of the slaves in Sicily, in the quelling of which nearly a million of their number were destroyed.

We find from contemporary writers, that except in cases of incorrigible perverseness, slaves were encouraged to marry; it being supposed they would

thus become more attached to their masters, who, in return, would put more trust in slaves born and brought up in the house, than in such as were purchased.

We have seen that slaves were protected by the laws from grievous insults and contumely; but if, in spite of legal protection, their masters found means to render their lives a burden, the state provided them with an asylum in the temple of Theseus and the Eumenides. Having there taken sanctuary, their oppressors could not force them thence without incurring the guilt of sacrilege. Thus in a fragment of Aristophanes' Seasons, we find a slave deliberating whether he should take refuge in the Theseion, and there remain until he could procure his transfer to a new master; for any one who conducted himself too harshly towards his slaves, was by law compelled to sell them. Not only so, but the slave could institute an action against his lord and master, or against any other citizen who behaved unjustly or injuriously towards him. The right of sanctuary was, however, limited, and extended from the time of the slave's flight to the next new moon, when a periodical slave auction appears to have been held.

On this occasion the slaves were stationed in a circle in the market place, and the one whose turn it was to be sold, mounted a table, where he exhibited himself and was knocked down to the best bidder. The sales seem to have been conducted precisely like those of the present day in Richmond, Charleston, New Orleans and other cities of the south. The Greek auctioneer, or slave-broker, however, was answerable at law if the quality of the persons sold did not correspond with the description given of them in the catalogue. It appears that, sometimes, when the articles were lively, or witty, they made great sport for the company, as in the case of Diogenes, who bawled aloud"whoever among you wants a master, let him buy me."

Diogenes, of Sinope, flourished about the fourth century before Christ, and was the most famous of the Cynic philosophers. Having been banished from his native place with his father, who had been accused of coining false money, he went to Athens, and requested Antisthenes to admit him among his disciples. That philosopher in vain attempted to repel the importunate supplicant, even by blows, and finally granted his request. Diogenes devoted himself, with the greatest diligence, to the lessons of his master, whose doctrines he extended still further. He not only, like Antisthenes, despised all philosophical speculations, and opposed the corrupt morals of his time, but also carried the application of his doctrines, in his own person, to the extreme. The stern austerity of Antisthenes was repulsive; but Diogenes exposed the follies of his contemporaries with wit and humor, and was, therefore, better adapted to be the censor and instructer of the people, though he really accomplished little in the way of reforming them. At the same time, he applied, in its fullest extent, his principle of divesting himself of all superfluities. He taught that a wise man, in order to be happy, must endeavor to preserve himself independent of fortune, of men, and of himself: in order to do this, he must despise riches,

power, honor, arts and sciences, and all the enjoyments of life. He endeavor ed to exhibit, in his own person, a model of Cynic virtue. For this purpose he subjected himself to the severest trials, and disregarded all the forms of polite society. He often struggled to overcome his appetite, or satisfied it with the coarsest food; practised the most rigid temperance, even at feasts, in the midst of the greatest abundance, and did not even consider it beneath his dignity to ask alms. By day, he walked through the streets of Athens barefoot, without any coat, with a long beard, a stick in his hand, and a wallet on his shoulders; by night, he slept in a tub, though this has been doubted. He defied the inclemency of the weather, and bore the scoffs and insults of the people with the greatest equanimity. Seeing a boy draw water with his hand, he threw away his wooden goblet as an unnecessary utensil. He never spared the follies of men, but openly and loudly inveighed against vice and corruption, attacking them with satire and irony. The people, and even the higher classes, heard him with pleasure, and tried their wit upon him. When he made them feel his superiority, they often had recourse to abuse, by which, however, he was little moved. He rebuked them for expressions and actions which violated decency and modesty, and therefore it is not credible that he was guilty of the excesses with which his enemies have reproached him. His rudeness offended the laws of good breeding rather than the principles of morality. Many anecdotes, however, related of this singular person, are mere fictions. On a voyage to Egina, he fell into the hands of pirates, who sold him as a slave to the Corinthian Xeniades in Crete. The latter emancipated him, and intrusted him with the education of his children. He attended to the duties of his new employment with the greatest care, commonly living in summer at Corinth, and in winter at Athens. It was at the former place that Alexander found him on the road-side, basking in the sun, and, astonished at the indifference with which the ragged beggar regarded him, entered into conversation with him, and finally gave him permission to ask for a boon. "I ask nothing," answered the philosopher, "but that thou wouldst get out of my sunshine." Surprised at this proof of content, the king is said to have exclaimed, "Were I not Alexander, I would be Diogenes." At another time, he was carrying a lantern through the streets of Athens, in the daytime: on being asked what he was looking for, he answered, "I am seeking a man." Thinking he had found, in the Spartans, the greatest capacity for becoming such men as he wished, he said, "Men I have found nowhere; but children, at least, I have seen at Lacedæmon." Being asked, "What is the most dangerous animal?" his answer was, "Among wild animals, the slanderer; among tame, the flatterer." He died 324 B. C., at a great age. When he felt death approaching, he seated himself on the road leading to Olympia, where he died with philosophical calmness, in the presence of a great number of people, who were collected around him.

Slaves of little or no value, were contemptuously called "salt bought," from a custom prevalent among the inland Thracians, of bartering their captives for

salt; whence it may be inferred that domestics from that part of the world were considered inferior.

Respecting the price of slaves, a passage occurs in the Memorabilia, where Socrates inquires whether friends were to be valued at so much per head, like slaves; some of whom, he says, were not worth a demimina, while others would fetch two, five, or even ten mine; that is, the price varied from ten to two hundred dollars. Nicias bought an overseer for his silver mines at the price of a talent, or about twelve hundred dollars.

Exclusively of the fluctuations caused by the variations in the supply and demand, the market price of slaves was affected by their age, health, strength, beauty, natural abilities, mechanical ingenuity, and moral qualities. The meanest and cheapest class were those who worked in the mills, where mere bodily strength was required. A low value was set upon slaves who worked in the mines-a sum equal to about eight dollars. In the age of Demosthenes, ordinary house slaves, male or female, were valued at about the same price. Demosthenes considered two minæ and a half, fifty dollars, a large sum for a person of this class. Of the sword cutlers possessed by the orator's father, some were valued at six minæ, others at five, while the lowest were worth above three. Chairmakers sold for about two minæ, forty dollars. The wages of slaves, when let out for hire by their masters, varied greatly, as did the profit derived from them. Expert manufacturers, of fine goods produced their owners much larger returns than miners.

Slaves at Athens were divided into two classes, private and public. The latter, who were the property of the state, performed several kinds of service. supposed to be unworthy of freemen. They were, for example, employed as vergers, messengers, scribes, clerks of public works, and inferior servants of the gods. Most of the temples of Greece possessed a great number of slaves, or serfs, who cultivated the sacred domains, exercised various humbler offices of religion, and were ready on all occasions to execute the orders of the priests. At Corinth, where the worship of Aphrodite chiefly prevailed, these slaves consisted almost exclusively of women, who, having on certain occasions burnt frankincense, and offered up public prayers to the goddess, were sumptuously feasted within the precincts of her fane.*

Among the Athenians, the slaves of the republic, generally captives taken in war, received a careful education, and were sometimes intrusted with important duties. Out of their number were selected the secretaries, who, in time of war, accompanied the generals and treasurers of the army, and made exact minutes of the expenditure, in order that, when, on their return, these officers should come to render an account of their proceedings, their books might be compared with those of the secretaries. In cases of difficulty, these unfortu

* APHRODITE, the Goddess of Love among the Greeks, synonymous with Aphrogeneia, that is, born of the foam of the sea. Aphrodisia was a festival sacred to Venus, which was celebrated in various parts of Greece, but with the greatest solemnity in the island of Cyprus.

nate individuals were subjected to torture, in order to obtain that kind of evidence which the ancients deemed most satisfactory, but which the moderns regard with extreme uncertainty.

Esop, the oldest Greek fabulist, was a native of Phrygia, and a slave, until he was set free by his last owner. He lived about the middle of the sixth century B. C. He inculcated rules of practical morality, drawn from the habits of the inferior creation, and thus spread his fame through Greece and all the neighboring countries. Croesus, king of Lydia, invited Æsop to his court, and kept him always about his person. Indeed, he was never absent, except during his journeys to Greece, Persia and Egypt. Croesus once sent him to Delphi to offer sacrifice to Apollo; while engaged in this embassy, he wrote his fable of the Floating Log, which appeared terrible at a distance, but lost its terrors when approached. The priests of Delphi, applying the fable to themselves, resolved to take vengeance on the author, and plunged him from a precipice. Planudes, who wrote a miserable romance, of which he makes Esop the hero, describes him as excessively deformed and disagreeable in his appearance, and given to stuttering; but this account does not agree with what his contemporaries say of him. The stories related of Esop, even by the ancients, are not entitled to credit. A collection of fables made by Planudes, which are still extant under the name of the Grecian fabulist, are ascribed to him with little foundation; their origin is lost in the darkness of antiquity.

A very significant and pleasant custom prevailed when a slave newly purchased was first brought into the house. They placed him before the hearth, where his future master, mistress and fellows ervants poured baskets of ripe fruit, dates, figs, filberts, walnuts, &c., upon his head, to intimate that he was come into the abode of plenty. The occasion was converted by his fellow slaves into a holiday and feast; for custom appropriated to them whatever was cast upon the new comer.

Their food was commonly, as might be expected, inferior to that of their masters. Thus the dates grown in Greece, which ripened but imperfectly, were appropriated to their use; and for their drink they had a thin wine, made of the husks of grapes, laid, after they had been pressed, to soak in water, and then squeezed again. A drink precisely similar is now made in the wine districts of France. They generally ate barley bread; the citizens themselves frequently did the same. To give a relish to their plain meal of bread, plain broth and salted fish, they were indulged with pickles. In the early ages of the commonwealth, they imitated the frugal manner of their lords, so that no slave, who valued his reputation, would be seen to enter a tavern; but in later times they naturally shared largely in the general depravity of morals, and placed their greatest good in eating and drinking. Their whole creed, on this point, has been summed up in a few words by the poet Socian. "Wherefore," exclaims a slave, "dole forth these absurdities; these ravings of sophists, prating up and down the Lyceum, the Academy, and the gates of the Odeion? In all these there is nothing of value. Let us drink-let us drink deeply