[*]In this respect the Greek vase paintings can compete with the best work in the Japanese prints.

The potters are justly proud of their work; often they do not hesitate to add their signatures, and in this way later ages can name the “craftsmen” who have transmitted to them these objects of abiding beauty.  The designers also are accommodating enough to add descriptive legends of the scenes which they depict,—­Achilles, Hercules, Theseus, and all the other heroes are carefully named, usually with the words written above or beside them.

The pottery of Athens, then, is truly Athenian; that is to say, it is genuinely elegant, ornamental, simple, and distinctive.  The best of these great vases and mixing bowls are works of art no less than the sculptures of Phidias upon the Parthenon.

Chapter XIII.  The Armed Forces of Athens.

85.  Military Life at Athens.—­Hitherto we have seen almost nothing save the peaceful civic side of Athenian life, but it is a cardinal error to suppose that art, philosophy, farming, manufacturing, commerce, and bloodless home politics sum up the whole of the activities of Attica.  Athens is no longer the great imperial state she was in the days of Pericles, but she is still one of the greatest military powers in Greece,[*] and on her present armed strength rests a large share of her prestige and prosperity.  Her fleet, which is still her particular boast, must of course be seen at the Peireus; but as we go about the streets of the main city we notice many men, who apparently had recently entered their house doors as plain, harmless citizens, now emerging, clad in all the warrior’s bravery, and hastening towards one of the gates.  Evidently a review is to be held of part of the citizen army of Athens.  If we wish, we can follow and learn much of the Greek system of warfare in general and of the Athenian army in particular.

[*]Of course the greatest military power of Greece had been Sparta until 371 B.C., when the battle of Leuctra made Thebes temporarily “the first land power.”

Even at the present day, when there is plenty of complaint that Athenians are not willing to imitate the sturdy campaigning of their fathers, the citizens seem always at war, or getting ready for it.  Every citizen, physically fit, is liable to military service from his eighteenth to his sixtieth year.  To make efficient soldiers is really the main end of the constant physical exercise.  If a young man takes pride in his hard and fit body, if he flings spears at the stadium, and learns to race in full armor, if he goes on long marches in the hot sun, if he sleeps on the open hillside, or lies on a bed of rushes watching the moon rise over the sea,—­it is all to prepare himself for a worthy part in the “big day” when Athens will confront some old or new enemy on the battlefield.  A great deal of the conversation among the younger men is surely not about Platonic ideals, Demosthenes’s last political speech, nor the best fighting cocks; it is about spears, shield-straps, camping ground, rations, ambuscades, or the problems of naval warfare.