Essex County herald. [volume] (Guildhall, Vt.) 1873-1964, 1896-04-10

sunset crowds Of WUrkingmen were seen
moving through this street. the lower end Of
which opens upon a bridge across the
lliss0s, and on the opposite bank lies the
Panathenaic stadion.
When the International athletic committee,
at Il session In Paris last year. decided to
have series of athletic contests once in
four years in various countries, it is not sur
pristng that they selected Greece for the
first contest.
Although Greece now has as little of the
athletic habit as any nation of the civilized
world, its past is interviewer with athletics.
Ancient Greece witnessed q very apotheosis
Of athletics Olympia Is magic word, and
the committee were doubtless swaved partly
by sentimental reasons In the choice Of name
aud place.
But some may wonder why, since the
games come to Greece, they are not to be
held at Olympia to justify the name which
they have taken. This is because the origi-
nators of the scheme. although conceding
something to sentiment are no Missionaries,
but men Of practical common sense. Even
their concession to sentiment is likely to
turn out to be clever piece of practical
management, calculated to launch the games
upon the world with greater eclat and pres
age of success than could have been secured
in any other way. The games also have a
name which will be Just as true in 1900 in
Paris and in 1904 in America, as it is this
year In Athens.
The stadion at Olympia, although exca-
waited at each emu by the Germans, still lies
In most of its course under fifteen or twenty
feet of earth. But the stadion at Athens has
always in modern times been fit place for
monster meeting, provided people would
be contented to sit on its sloping sides with
out seats. When a local Athenian commit
tee was formed, composed of most of the
citizens conspicuous for wealth or position.
and some resident foreigners under the
presidency of Constantine, crown prince of
Greece, one of the first questions before it
was this question of seating; and its atten-
tion was naturally directed to the stadion.
wealthy and generous Greek of Alex
andria. George Averoff. who, like many
other Greeks living in partibus intidelium,
was known as man always on the watch to
do something for Athens. readily took upon
himself the expense of restoring 1t to some
thing like its former splendor, when it was
lined with marble and seated 200 specta-
tors. He has already given over nine hun
dred thousand drachmas. which If the
drachma were at par, would be $3.50, 600, but
which now amounts to only about 100000.
There il a subcommittee of the general
committee; designated as the committee on
the preparation of the stadlon, composed of
several practical architects. but including
also the ephor general OF antiquities. and the
directors of the foreign archaeological
schools. The presence of the archaeological
element on this committee emphasizes the
fact that the new work is to be a restoration
ofthe old.
The earliest stadion at Athens-and no
Greek city could be without .stadion--ap-
pears to have been in the plain toward
Phaleron. 1t is only subsequent to the
battle of Ch9roneia, when Athens political
aspirations were crushed, that the stadion
which we know was begun. Lykurgos, the
orator, the stanch friend of Demosthenes,
the man of unimpeachable probity, the
enemy of sinners to such degree that the
Athenians used to say of him that he clipped
his pen not in ink but in DEATH" was in
trusted with the care of the finances of the
city for twelve years, and became greater
builder than Eubouleus, who, as his prede
cessor had, with his 'repairs of old build
ings and fountains and fooleries" been q