sacrifices.  But in any case he is subject to one grievous hardship:  when his testimony is required in court he must be “put to the question” by torture.  On the other hand, if his master has wronged him intolerably, he can take sanctuary at the Temple of Theseus, and claim the privilege of being sold to some new owner.  A slave, too, has still another grievance which may be no less galling because it is sentimental.  His name (given him arbitrarily perhaps by his master) is of a peculiar category, which at once brands him as a bondsman:  Geta, Manes, Dromon, Sosias, Xanthias, Pyrrhias,—­such names would be repudiated as an insult by a citizen.

[*]Who, however, could not be trusted to cook a formal dinner.  For such purpose an expert must be hired.

42.  Cruel and Kind Masters.—­Slavery in Athens, as everywhere else, is largely dependent upon the character of the master; and most Athenian masters would not regard crude brutality as consistent with that love of elegance, harmony, and genteel deliberation which characterizes a well-born citizen.  There do not lack masters who have the whip continually in their hands, who add to the raw stripes fetters and branding, and who make their slaves unceasingly miserable; but such masters are the exception, and public opinion does not praise them.  Between the best Athenians and their slaves there is a genial, friendly relation, and the master will put up with a good deal of real impertinence, knowing that behind this forwardness there is an honest zeal for his interests.

Nevertheless the slave system of Athens is not commendable.  It puts a stigma upon the glory of honest manual labor.  It instills domineering, despotic habits into the owners, cringing subservience into the owned.  Even if a slave becomes freed, he does not become an Athenian citizen; he is only a “metic,” a resident foreigner, and his old master, or some other Athenian, must be his patron and representative in every kind of legal business.  It is a notorious fact that the mere state of slavery robs the victim of his self-respect and manhood.  Nevertheless nobody dreams of abolishing slavery as an institution, and the Athenians, comparing themselves with other communities, pride themselves on the extreme humanity of their slave system.

43.  The “City Slaves” of Athens.—­A large number of nominal “slaves” in Athens differ from any of the creatures we have described.  The community, no less than an individual, can own slaves just as it can own warships and temples.  Athens owns “city slaves” (Demosioi) of several varieties.  The clerks in the treasury office, and the checking officers at the public assemblies are slaves; so too are the less reputable public executioners and torturers; in the city mint there is another corps of slave workers, busy coining “Athena’s owls”—­the silver drachmas and four-drachma pieces.  But chiefest of all, the city owns its public police force.