pence in ready money, but I can draw for a thousand pounds." -BOSWELL'S Johnson, 1773. Lady Mary Montague, however, declared him to be "the best company in the world; " but Pope's testimony confines the "Spectator's" agreeability to his friends: before strangers he maintained a stiff silence.

AGESILAUS II.

[One of the most distinguished of the Spartan kings, ascended the throne 398 B.C.; commanded an expedition to Persia, but was called home about 394; saved Sparta when threatened by Epaminondas, 362; died about 361.]

I have heard the nightingale herself.

When told of a man who imitated the nightingale to perfection. - PLUTARCH: Life.

Being asked which was the better virtue, valor or justice, he replied, "Unsupported by justice, valor is good for nothing; and if all men were just, there would be no need of valor."- Ibid.

When the physician Menecrates, who, from his cure of desperate cases, was called Jupiter, addressed him a letter, "Menecrates Jupiter to King Agesilaus, health," the Spartan returned a laconic answer: "King Agesilaus to Menecrates, his senses."— Ibid.

Upon his arrival in Egypt, where he had taken a command under Tachos, his small stature and mean attire made the Egyptians declare the fable to be true that "the mountain had brought forth a mouse;" to which the king replied, "They will find me a lion by and by."— ATHENÆUS, quoted by PLUTARCH: Life.

Observing that a certain malefactor bore torture with remarkable firmness, he said, “What a great rogue he must be, whose courage and constancy are bestowed on crime alone!"

When asked what boys should learn, he replied, “That which they will use when men.' PLUTARCH: Laconic Apothegms. From this course of life, we reap liberty.

To one who wondered at the poor attire and fare of the Spartans. When asked why they wore their hair long, he replied, "Because of all personal ornaments it costs the least." Having kept at a distance the enemies of Sparta, he could say, "No Spartan woman has ever seen the smoke of the enemy's camp."

He showed the citizens in arms to one who asked why Sparta had no walls, with the words, "These are the walls of Sparta." He used to say that "cities should be walled with the courage of the inhabitants.” — PLUTARCH: Life. When asked where the boundaries of Sparta were, he replied, "On the points of our spears."

Being shown a well-walled city, and asked if it were not a fine thing; "For women," he answered, "not men, to live in.” Thus Agis II., observing the high and strong walls of Corinth, asked, "What women live there?"— Laconic Apothegms.

When asked what good the laws of Lycurgus had brought to Sparta, he replied, "Contempt of pleasure;" and in answer to the question how he acquired his great reputation for bravery, "By contemning death." Agis II. made the same answer when asked how a man could be always free.

Youth, thy words need an army.

To a Megarian talking boastfully of his city. Also told of Lysander. PLUTARCH: Life. When a well-contrived but difficult plan to free Greece was proposed to Agis II., he replied, "Friend, thy words need an army and a treasure."― Laconic Apothegms. Shakespeare says, "The phrase would be more german to the matter, if we could carry a cannon by our sides.". Hamlet, V. 2.

Accepting an inferior seat at a public dancing, Agesilaus said, "It is not the places which grace men, but men the places." He thought with Rob Roy, "Where Macgregor sits, there is the head of the table."

To one commending the skill of a certain orator in magnifying petty matters, the king replied, "I do not think that shoemaker a good workman who makes a great shoe for a little foot."

On his death-bed, charging his friends that no fiction or counterfeit (so he called statues) should be made of him, Agesilaus said, "If I have done any honorable exploit, that is my monument; but if I have done none, all your statues will signify nothing."

Epaminondas declared on his death-bed that his victories of

"Leuctra and Mantinea are daughters enough to keep my name alive."

Alexander I., of Russia, declined a monument to commemorate his military exploits, with the words, " May a monument be erected to me in your hearts, as it is to you in mine;" an echo of the sentiment of the Czar Peter III. (1728-1762), refusing a golden statue, "If by good government I could raise a memorial in my people's hearts, that would be the statue for me."

"They offer me a statue," said Bonaparte, when First Consul, “but I must look at the pedestal: they may make it a prison."

AGIS II.

[King of Sparta, 427 B.C.; defeated the Athenians and their allies at Mantinea, about 414; died 399.]

The Spartans do not inquire how many the enemy are, but where they are.

PLUTARCH: Laconic Apothegms. Being asked what was chiefly learned at Sparta, he replied, "To know how to govern, and to be governed."— Ibid.

He said to an orator who asserted that speech was the best thing, "You, then, when you are silent, are worth nothing."Ibid.

Agis IV., called by Plutarch "the younger," king of Sparta 244-240 B.C., replied to the jeer of an Athenian at the Lacedæmonian short-swords, "The jugglers would easily swallow them," by saying, "And yet we can reach our enemies' hearts with them."-Apothegms of Kings and Great Commanders.

ALCIBIADES.

[Born in Athens 450 B.C.; of remarkable personal beauty, and powerful and versatile intellect, but fickle and licentious; was the ward of Pericles and the favorite pupil of Socrates; accused of sacrilege, and condemned in his absence, he joined the Sicilians against his countrymen, 413; recalled 411, gained several victories, but was finally defeated and superseded; withdrawing into Asia from the Thirty Tyrants, he was attacked by night, and killed, 404.]

I would have the Athenians talk of this, lest they should find something worse to say of me.

When told that all Athens rung with the story of his treatment of a dog of uncommon size and beauty, the tail of which he caused to be cut off. — PLUTARCH: Life.

Happening to go into a grammar-school, he asked the master for a volume of Homer; and, upon his making answer that he had nothing of Homer's, gave him a box on the ear, and left him. Another schoolmaster telling him that he had Homer corrected by himself, "How!" said Alcibiades, “do you employ your time in teaching children to read? You, who are able to correct Homer, might seem to be fit to instruct men." — Ibid.

Calling at the house of Pericles, and being told that he was considering how to give in his accounts to the people, and was therefore not at leisure, Alcibiades remarked, "He had better consider how to avoid giving in any account at all.". - Ibid.

His answer, when summoned out of Sicily by the Athenians to plead for his life, was, "A criminal is a fool who studies a defence when he might fly for it."— Apothegms.

The misanthropic Timon rejoiced at a later period to see Alcibiades carried in honor from the place of assembly, and said, "Go on, my brave boy, and prosper; for your prosperity will cause the ruin of all this crowd."— Life of Alcibiades.

JEAN D'ALEMBERT.

[An eminent French geometer and philosopher, born at Paris, Nov. 16, 1717; elected to the Academy of Sciences, 1741; to the French Academy 1754, of which he became secretary 1772; joint editor with Diderot of the Encyclopædia, and the friend of Voltaire; died Oct. 29, 1783.]

A philosopher is a fool who torments himself while he is alive, to be talked of after he is dead.

He declined in 1762 an urgent invitation from Catherine II., of Russia, to undertake at St. Petersburg the education of her son, at a salary of one hundred thousand francs, with the words, "What I have learned from books is a little science and satisfaction, but not the harder art of fashioning princes."

He said of the French philosophers, "They believe themselves profound, while they are only hollow" (Ils se croient profonds, et ne sont que creux). Talleyrand said of Sieyes and his political day-dreams, in answer to some one who called him profound, "Perhaps you mean hollow" (Profond, hem! vous voulez dire, peut-être, creux). Victor Hugo appropriated the remark by saying, "Sieyes, homme profond, qui était devenu creux.”. QuatreVingt-Treize, I. 3, 5.

Go on, and the light will come to you.

ALEXANDER THE GREAT.

[Son of Philip of Macedon, born 356 B.C.; ascended the throne, 336; took Thebes by assault, 335; crossed the Hellespont, 334; defeated the Persians at the Granicus, took Halicarnassus, marched through Asia Minor, defeated Darius at Issus, 333; took possession of Phoenicia and Egypt; marching again against Darius, defeated a million Persians at Arbela; conquered Media and the northern and central, provinces of Asia; crossed the Indus, 327, and defeated Porus; on his return died of fever at Babylon, 323.]

My father will leave me nothing to do.

Hearing when a boy of Philip's military successes. - PLUTARCH: Apothegms.

When his father had been run through the thigh, and was troubled by his lameness, Alexander encouraged him by saying, "Be of good cheer, father; and show yourself in public, that you may be reminded of your bravery at every step." - Fortune of Alexander the Great.

His father encouraged him, being nimble and light-footed, to run in the races at the Olympic games: he promised to, "if there are any kings there to run with me; for I can conquer only private men, while they may conquer a king."— Apothegms.

When Philip asked him what forfeit he would pay if he could not ride Bucephalus, he replied, "I will pay the price of the horse." The price asked by his owner, a Thessalian, was thirteen talents (£2518), or, as Pliny says, sixteen talents. After Alexander had turned the horse to the sun so as to remove the shadow which had frightened him, and, gently stroking him,