So then, had I not been a mother, Rome would not be
besieged
: had I not a son, I might have died free in a free country.
Universal Anthology - v02
And there was an overflowing population of Albans and of Latins.
The shepherds, too, had come into that design, and all these readily inspired hopes, that Alba and Lavinium would be but petty places in comparison with the city which they intended to build.
But ambition of the sovereignty, the bane of their grandfather, interrupted these designs, and thence arose a shameful quarrel from a beginning sufficiently amicable.
For as they were twins, and the respect due to seniority could not determine the point, they agreed to leave to the tutelary gods of the place to choose, by augury, which should give a name to the new city, which govern it when built.
Romulus chose the Palatine and Remus the Aventine hill vol. ii. —24
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as their stands to make their observations. It is said, that to Remus an omen came first, six vultures ; and now, the omen having been declared, when double the number presented itself to Romulus, his own party saluted each king ; the former claimed the kingdom on the ground of priority of time, the latter on account of the number of birds. Upon this, having met in an altercation, from the contest of angry feelings they turn to bloodshed ; there Remus fell from a blow received in the crowd. A more common account is, that Remus, in deri sion of his brother, leaped over his new-built wall, and was, for that reason, slain by Romulus in a passion ; who, after sharply chiding him, added words to this effect, "So shall every one fare, who shall dare leap over my fortifications. " Thus Romu lus got the sovereignty to himself ; the city, when built, was called after the name of its founder. . . .
Meanwhile the city increased by their taking in various lots of ground for buildings, whilst they built rather with a view to future numbers than for the population which they then had. Then, lest the size of the city might be of no avail, in order to augment the population, — according to the ancient policy of the founders of cities, who, after drawing together to them an obscure and mean multitude, used to feign that their offspring sprung out of the earth, — he opened as a sanctuary a place which is now inclosed as you go down "to the two groves. " Hither fled from the neighboring states, without distinction whether freemen or slaves, crowds of all sorts, desirous of change : and this was the first accession of strength to their rising greatness. When he was now not dissatisfied with his strength, he next sets about forming some means of directing that strength. He creates one hundred senators, either because that number was sufficient, or because there were only one hun dred who could name their fathers. They certainly were called Fathers, through respect, and their descendants, Patricians.
"Rape of the Sabines. "
And now the Roman state was become so powerful that it was a match for any of the neighboring nations in war; but from the paucity of women, its greatness could only last for one age of man ; for they had no hope of issue at home, nor had they any intermarriages with their neighbors. Therefore, by the advice of the Fathers, Romulus sent ambassadors to
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the neighboring states to solicit an alliance and the privilege of intermarriage for his new subjects. Nowhere did the em bassy obtain a favorable hearing : so much did they at the same time despise, and dread for themselves and their posterity, so great a power growing up in the midst of them. They were dismissed by the greater part with the repeated question, "Whether they had opened any asylum for women also, for that such a plan only could obtain them suitable matches? " The Roman youth resented this conduct bitterly, and the matter unquestionably began to point towards violence.
Romulus, to afford a favorable time and place for this, dis sembling his resentment, purposely prepares games in honor of Neptunus Equestris ; he calls them Consualia. Great numbers assembled, from a desire also of seeing the new city ; especially their nearest neighbors, the Caeninenses, Crustumini, and Antemnates. Moreover, the whole multitude of the Sa- bines came, with their wives and children. When the time of the spectacle came on, and while their minds and eyes were intent upon it, according to concert a tumult began, and upon a signal given the Roman youth ran different ways to carry off the virgins by force. A great number were carried off at hap hazard, according as they fell into their hands. Persons from the common people, who had been charged with the task, con veyed to their houses some women of surpassing beauty, des tined for the leading senators. The festival being disturbed by this alarm, the parents of the young women retire in grief, appealing to the compact of violated hospitality, and invoking the god, to whose festival and games they had come, deceived by the pretense of religion and good faith. Neither had the ravished virgins better hopes of their condition, or less indig nation. But Romulus in person went about and declared, " That what was done was owing to the pride of their fathers, who had refused to grant the privilege of marriage to their neighbors ; but notwithstanding, they should be joined in law ful wedlock, participate in all their possessions and civil privi leges, and, than which nothing can be dearer to the human heart, in their common children. He begged them only to assuage the fierceness of their anger, and cheerfully surrender their affections to those to whom fortune had consigned their persons. " [He added] "That from injuries love and friend ship often arise ; and that they should find them kinder hus bands on this account, because each of them, besides the
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performance of his conjugal duty, would endeavor to the utmost of his power to make up for the want of their parents and native country. " To this the caresses of the husbands were added, excusing what they had done on the plea of passion and love — arguments that work most successfully on women's hearts.
At this juncture the Sabine women, from the outrage on whom the war originated, with hair disheveled and garments rent, the timidity of their sex being overcome by such dreadful scenes, had the courage to throw themselves amid the flying weapons, and making a rush across, to part the incensed armies, and assuage their fury, imploring their fathers on the one side, their husbands on the other, "that as fathers-in-law and sons-in-law they would not contaminate each other with impious blood, nor stain their offspring with parricide, the one their grandchildren, the other their children. If you are dissatisfied with the affinity between you, if with our marriages, turn your resentment against us ; we are the cause of war, we of wounds and of bloodshed to our husbands and parents. It were better that we perish than live widowed or fatherless without one or other of you. " The circumstance affects both the multitude and the leaders. Silence and a sudden suspension ensue. Upon this the leaders come forward in order to concert a treaty, and they not only conclude a peace, but form one state out of two. They associate the regal power, and transfer the entire sovereignty to Rome. [Romulus disappeared in a thunder storm, and was never seen again. ]
f The Horatii and Curiatii.
It happened that there were in each of the two armies three brothers born at one birth, unequal neither in age nor strength. That they were called Horatii and Curiatii is certain enough ; nor is there any circumstance of antiquity more celebrated ; yet in a matter so well ascertained, a doubt remains concerning their names, to which nation the Horatii and to which the Curiatii belonged. Authors claim them for both sides ; yet I find more who call the Horatii Romans. My inclination leads me to follow them. The kings confer with the three brothers, that they should fight with their swords each in defense of their respective country, (assuring them) that dominion would be on that side on which victory should be. No objection is
LEGENDS OF EARLY ROME. 373
made ; time and place are agreed on. Before they engaged, a compact is entered into between the Romans and Albans on these conditions, that the state whose champions should come off victorious in that combat, should rule the other state with out further dispute.
The treaty being concluded, the twin brothers, as had been agreed, take arms. Whilst their respective friends exhortingly reminded each party " that their country's gods, their country and parents, all their countrymen both at home and in the army, had their eyes then fixed on their arms, on their hands ; naturally brave, and animated by the exhortations of their friends, they advance into the midst between the two lines. The two armies sat down before their respective camps, free rather from present danger than from anxiety ; for the sover eign power was at stake, depending on the valor and fortune of so few. Accordingly, therefore, eager and anxious, they have their attention intensely riveted on a spectacle far from pleasing. The signal is given ; and the three youths on each side, as if in battle array, rush to the charge with determined fury, bearing in their breasts the spirits of mighty armies ; nor do the one or the other regard their personal danger ; the pub lic dominion or slavery is present to their mind, and the fortune of their country, which was ever after destined to be such as they should now establish it. As soon as their arms clashed on the first encounter, and their burnished swords glittered, great horror strikes the spectators ; and, hope inclining to neither side, their voice and breath were suspended.
Then having engaged hand to hand, when not only the movements of their bodies, and the rapid brandishings of their arms and weapons, but wounds also and blood were seen, two of the Romans fell lifeless, one upon the other, the three Albans being wounded. And when the Alban army raised a shout of joy at their fall, hope entirely, anxiety however not yet, deserted the Roman legions, alarmed for the lot of the one, whom the three Curiatii surrounded. He happened to be unhurt, so that, though alone he was by no means a match for them all together, yet he was confident against each singly. In order, therefore, to separate their attack, he takes to flight, presuming that they would pursue him with such swiftness as the wounded state of his body would suffer each. He had now fled a con siderable distance from the place where they had fought, when, looking behind, he perceives them pursuing him at great inter
374 LEGENDS OF EARLY ROME.
vals from each other ; and that one of them was not far from him. On him he turned round with great fury. And whilst the Alban army shouts out to the Curiatii to succor their brother, Horatius, victorious in having slain his antagonist, was now proceeding to a second attack. Then the Romans encourage their champion with a shout such as is usually (given) by persons cheering in consequence of unexpected suc cess ; he also hastens to put an end to the combat. Wherefore before the other, who was not far off, could come up, he dis patches the second Curiatius also.
And now, the combat being brought to an equality of num bers, one on each side remained, but they were equal neither in hope nor in strength. The one his body untouched by a weapon, and by a double victory made courageous for a third contest ; the other dragging along his body exhausted from the wound, exhausted from running, and dispirited by the slaughter of his brethren before his eyes, presents himself to his victori ous antagonist. Nor was that a fight. The Roman, exulting, says, " Two I have offered to the shades of my brothers ; the third I will offer to the cause of this war, that the Roman may rule over the Alban. " He thrusts his sword down into his throat, whilst faintly sustaining the weight of his armor ; he strips him as he lies prostrate. The Romans receive Horatius with triumph and congratulation ; with so much the greater joy, as success had followed so close on fear. They then turn to the burial of their friends with dispositions by no means alike ; for the one side was elated with (the acquisition of) empire, the other subjected to foreign jurisdiction ; their sepul- chers are still extant in the place where each fell ; the two Roman ones in one place nearer to Alba, the three Alban ones towards Rome ; but distant in situation from each other, and just as they fought.
Before they parted from thence, when Mettus, in conformity to the treaty which had been concluded, asked what orders he had to give, Tullus orders him to keep the youth in arms, that he designed to employ them, if a war should break out with the Veientes. After this both armies returned to their homes. Horatius marched foremost, carrying before him the spoils of the three brothers ; his sister, a maiden who had been betrothed to one of the Curiatii, met him before the gate Capena ; and having recognized her lover's military robe, which she herself had wrought, on her brother's shoulders, she tore her hair, and
LEGENDS OF EARLY ROME. 375
with bitter waitings called by name on her deceased lover. The sister's lamentations in the midst of his own victory, and of such great public rejoicings, raised the indignation of the excited youth. Having therefore drawn his sword, he run the damsel through the body, at the same time chiding her in these words : " Go hence, with thy unseasonable love to thy spouse, forgetful of thy dead brothers, and of him who survives, forget ful of thy native country. So perish every Roman woman who shall mourn an enemy. "
This action seemed shocking to the fathers and to the peo ple; but his recent services outweighed its guilt. Neverthe less, he was carried before the king for judgment. The king, that he himself might not be the author of a decision so melan choly, and so disagreeable to the people, or of the punishment consequent on that decision, having summoned an assembly of the people, says, " I appoint, according to law, duumvirs to pass sentence on Horatius for treason. " The law was of dread ful import. " Let the duumvirs pass sentence for treason. If he appeal from the duumvirs, let him contend by appeal ; if they shall gain the cause, cover his head ; hang him by a rope from a gallows ; scourge him either within the pomcerium or without the pomcerium. " When the duumvirs appointed by this law, who did not consider that, according to the law, they could acquit even an innocent person, had found him guilty, one of them says : " P. Horatius, I judge thee guilty of treason. Go, lictor, bind his hands. " The lictor had approached him, and was fixing the rope. Then Horatius, by the advice of Tullus, a favorable interpreter of the law, says, "I appeal. " Accordingly the matter was contested by appeal to the people.
On that trial persons were much affected, especially by P. Horatius, the father declaring that he considered his daughter deservedly slain ; were it not so, that he would by his authority as a father have inflicted punishment on his son. He then entreated that these would not render childless him whom but a little while ago they had beheld with a fine prog eny. During these words the old man, having embraced the youth, pointing to the spoils of the Curiatii fixed up in that place which is now called Pila Horatia, " Romans," said he, " can you bear to see bound beneath a gallows amidst scourges and tortures, him whom you just now beheld marching deco rated (with spoils) and exulting in victory ; a sight so shock
376 LEGENDS OF EARLY ROME.
ing as the eyes even of the Albans could scarcely endure. Go, lictor, bind those hands, which but a little while since, being armed, established sovereignty for the Roman people. Go, cover the head of the liberator of this city ; hang him on the gallows ; scourge him, either within the pomcerium, so it be only amid those javelins and spoils of the enemy; or without the pomoerium, only amid the graves of the Curiatii. For whither can you bring this youth, where his own glories must not redeem him from such ignominy of punishment ? "
The people could not withstand the tears of the father, or the resolution of the son, so undaunted in every danger ; and acquitted him more through admiration of his bravery than for the justice of his cause. But that so notorious a murder might be atoned for by some expiation, the father was com manded to make satisfaction for the son at the public charge. He, having offered certain expiatory sacrifices, which were ever after continued in the Horatian family, and laid a beam across the street, made his son pass under it as under a yoke, with his head covered. This remains even to this day, being constantly repaired at the expense of the public ; they call it Sororium Tigillum. A tomb of square stone was erected to Horatia in the place where she was stabbed and fell.
Sextus Tarquin and Lucretia.
As it commonly happens in standing camps, the war against the Rutulians being rather tedious than violent, furloughs were easily obtained, more so by the officers, however, than the common soldiers. The young princes sometimes spent their leisure hours in feasting and entertainments. One day as they were drinking in the tent of Sextus Tarquin, where Collatinus Tarquinius, the son of Egerius, was also at supper, mention was made of wives. Every one commended his own in an ex travagant manner, till a dispute arising about it, Collatinus said: "There was no occasion for words, that it might be known in a few hours how far his Lucretia excelled all the rest. If then, added he, we have any share of the vigor of youth, let us mount our horses and examine the behavior of our wives ; that must be most satisfactory to every one, which shall meet his eyes on the unexpected arrival of the husband. " They were heated with wine. " Come on, then," say all. They immedi ately galloped to Rome, where they arrived in the dusk of the
LEGENDS OF EARLY ROME. 87T
evening. From thence they went to Collatia, where they find Lucretia, not like the king's daughters-in-law, whom they had seen spending their time in luxurious entertainments with their equals, but though at an advanced time of night, employed at her wool, sitting in the middle of the house amid her maids working around her. The merit of the contest regarding the ladies was assigned to Lucretia. Her husband on his arrival, and the Tarquinii, were kindly received ; the husband, proud of his victory, gives the young princes a polite invitation. There the villanous passion for violating Lucretia by force seizes Sex- tus Tarquin ; both her beauty, and her approved purity, act as incentives. And then, after this youthful frolic of the night, they return to the camp.
A few days after, without the knowledge of Collatinus, Sextus came to Collatia with one attendant only ; where, being kindly received by them, as not being aware of his intention, after he had been conducted after supper into the guests' cham ber, burning with passion, when everything around seemed sufficiently secure, and all fast asleep, he comes to Lucretia, as she lay asleep, with a naked sword, and with his left hand press ing down the woman's breast, he says, " Be silent, Lucretia ;
I I have a sword in my hand ; you shall die, if you utter a word. " When awaking terrified from sleep, the woman beheld no aid, impending death nigh at hand; then
am Sextus Tarquin ;
Tarquin acknowledged his passion, entreated, mixed threats with entreaties, tried the female's mind in every possible way. When he saw her inflexible, and that she was not moved even by the terror of death, he added to terror the threat of dis honor ; he says that he will lay a murdered slave naked by her side when dead, so that she may be said to have been slain in infamous adultery.
When by the terror of this disgrace his lust, as it were vic torious, had overcome her inflexible chastity, and Tarquin had departed, exulting in having triumphed over a lady's honor, Lucretia, in melancholy distress at so dreadful a misfortune, dispatches the same messenger to Rome to her father, and to Ardea to her husband, that they would come each with one trusty friend ; that it was necessary to do so, and that quickly. Sp. Lucretius comes with P. Valerius, the son of Volesus, Col latinus with L. Junius Brutus, with whom, as he was returning to Rome, he happened to be met by his wife's messenger. They find Lucretia sitting in her chamber in sorrowful dejection.
378 LEGENDS OF EARLY ROME.
On the arrival of her friends the tears burst from her eyes ; and to her" husband, on his inquiry " whether all was right," she says : By no means, for what can be right with a woman who has lost her honor? The traces of another man are on your bed, Collatinus. But the body only has been violated, the mind is guiltless; death shall be my witness. But give me your right hands, and your honor, that the adulterer shall not come off unpunished. It is Sextus Tarquin, who, an enemy in the guise of a guest, has borne away hence a triumph fatal to me, and to himself, if you are men. "
They all pledge their honor ; they attempt to console her, distracted as she was in mind, by turning away the guilt from her, constrained by force, on the perpetrator of the crime ; that it is the mind sins, not the body ; and that where intention was wanting guilt could not be. " It is for you to see," says she, " what is due to him. As for me, though I acquit myself of guilt, from punishment I do not discharge myself ; nor shall any woman survive her dishonor pleading the example of Lu- cretia. " The knife, which she kept concealed beneath her gar ment, she plunges into her heart, and falling forward on the wound, she dropped down expiring. The husband and father shriek aloud.
Brutus, while they were overpowered with grief, having drawn the knife out of the wound, and holding it up before him reeking with blood, said, " By this blood, most pure before the pollution of royal villainy, I swear, and I call you, O gods, to witness my oath, that I shall pursue Lucius Tarquin the Proud, his wicked wife, and all their race, with fire, sword, and all other means in my power ; nor shall I ever suffer them or any other to reign at Rome. " Then he gave the knife to Col latinus, and after him to Lucretius and Valerius, who were sur prised at such extraordinary mind in the breast of Brutus. However, they all take the oath as they were directed, and, converting their sorrow into rage, follow Brutus as their leader, who from that time ceased not to solicit them to abolish the regal power.
Coriolanus.
In this year, when everything was quiet from war abroad, and the dissensions were healed at home, another much more serious evil fell upon the state ; first a scarcity of provisions, in consequence of the lands lying untilled during the secession
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379
of the commons ; then a famine such as befalls those who are besieged. And it would have ended in the destruction of the slaves at least, and indeed some of the commons also, had not the consuls adopted precautionary measures, by
sending per . . . It was debated in the senate at what rate it should be given to the commons. Many were of the opinion that the time was come for putting
down the commons, and for recovering those rights which had been wrested from the senators by secession and violence. In particular, Marcius Coriolanus, an enemy to tribunitian power, says: "If they desire the former rate of provisions, let them restore to the senators their former rights. Why do I, after being sent under the yoke, after being, as it were, ransomed from robbers, behold plebeian magistrates and Sicinius invested with power ? Shall I submit to these indignities longer than is necessary ? Shall I, who would not have endured King Tar- quin, tolerate Sicinius ? Let him now secede, let him call away the commons. The road lies open to the sacred mount and to other hills. Let them carry off the corn from our lands, as they did three years since. Let them have the benefit of that scarcity which in their frenzy they have occasioned. I will venture to say, that, brought to their senses by these sufferings, they will themselves become tillers of the lands, rather than, taking up arms and seceding, they would prevent them from being tilled. "
This proposal both appeared to the senate too harsh, and from exasperation well-nigh drove the people to arms : " That they were now assailed with famine, as if enemies; that they were defrauded of food and sustenance; that the foreign corn, the only support which fortune unexpectedly furnished to them, was being snatched from their mouth, unless the tribunes were given up in chains to C. Marcius, unless he glut his rage on the backs of the commons of Rome. That in him a new executioner had started up, who ordered them to die or be slaves. " An assault would have been made on him as he left the senate house, had not the tribunes very opportunely ap pointed him a day for trial ; by this their rage was suppressed, every one saw himself become the judge, the arbiter of the life and death of his foe. At first Marcius heard the threats of the tribunes with contempt; but the commons had risen with such violent determination, that the senators were obliged to extri cate themselves from danger by the punishment of one.
sons in every direction to buy up corn.
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They resisted, however, in spite of popular odium, and em ployed, each individual his own powers, and all those of the entire order. And first, the trial was made whether they could upset the affair, by posting their clients (in several places), by deterring individuals from attending meetings and cabals. Then they all proceeded in a body (you would suppose that all the senators were on their trial) earnestly entreating the com mons, that if they would not acquit as innocent, they would at least pardon as guilty, one citizen, one senator. As he did not attend on the day appointed, they persevered in their resent ment. Being condemned in his absence, he went into exile to the Volsci, threatening his country, and even then breathing all the resentment of an enemy.
[He is made general of the Volscians, ravages Roman territory, and puts Rome itself in imminent danger. ]
Sp. Nautius and Sex. Furius were now consuls. Whilst they were reviewing the legions, posting guards along the walls and other places where they had determined that there should be posts and watches, a vast multitude of persons de manding peace terrified them first by their seditious clamor; then compelled them to convene the senate, to consider the question of sending ambassadors to C. Marcius. The senate entertained the question, when it became evident that the spirits of the plebeians were giving way, and ambassadors being sent to Marcius concerning peace, brought back a harsh answer, " If their lands were restored to the Volscians, that they might then consider the question of peace ; if they were disposed to enjoy the plunder of war at their ease, that he, mindful both of the injurious treatment of his countrymen, as well as of the kindness of strangers, would do his utmost to make it appear that his spirit was irritated by exile, not crushed. " When the same persons are sent back a second time, they are not admitted into the camp. It is recorded that the priests also, arrayed in their insignia, went as suppliants to the enemy's camp; and that they did not influence his mind more than the ambassadors.
Then the matrons assemble in a body around Veturia, the mother of Coriolanus, and his wife, Volumnia : whether that was the result of public counsel, or of the women's fear, I can not ascertain. They certainly carried their point that Veturia, a lady advanced in years, and Volumnia, leading her two sons by Marcius, should go into the camp of the enemy, and that
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women should defend by entreaties and tears a city which men. were unable to defend by arms. When they reached the camp and it was announced to Coriolanus that a great body of women were approaching, he, who had been moved neither by the maj esty of the state in its ambassadors, nor by the sanctity of reli gion so strikingly addressed to his eyes and understanding in its priests, was much more obdurate against the women's tears. Then one of his acquaintances, who recognized Veturia, distin guished from all the others by her sadness, standing between her daughter-in-law and grandchildren, says, " Unless my eyes deceive me, your mother, children, and wife are approaching. "
When Coriolanus, almost like one bewildered, rushing in consternation from his seat, offered to embrace his mother as she met him, the lady, turning from entreaties to angry rebuke, says : " Before I receive your embrace, let me know whether I have come to an enemy or to a son ; whether Iam in your camp a captive or a mother? —Has length of life and a hapless old age reserved me for this to behold you an exile, then an enemy ? Could you lay waste this land, which gave you birth and nurtured you? Though you had come with an incensed and vengeful mind, did not your resentment subside when you entered its frontiers? When Rome came within view, did it not occur to you, within these walls my house and guardian gods are, my mother, wife, and children ?
So then, had I not been a mother, Rome would not be besieged : had I not a son, I might have died free in a free country. But I can now suffer nothing that is not more discreditable to you than distressing to me; nor however wretched I may be, shall I be so long. Look to these, whom, if you persist, either an untimely death or lengthened slavery awaits. " Then his wife and children embraced him : and the lamentation proceeding from the entire crowd of women, and their bemoaning themselves and their country, at length overcame the man; then, after embracing his family, he sends them away ; he moved his camp farther back from the city.
Then, after he had drawn off his troops from the Roman territory, they say that he lost his life, overwhelmed by the odium of the proceeding : different writers say by different modes of death :
I find in Fabius, far the most ancient writer, that he lived even to old age ; he states positively, that advanced in years he made use of this phrase, "That exile bore much
heavier on the old man. "
382 LEGENDS OF EARLY ROME.
Virginia.
Another atrocious deed follows in the city, originating in lust, attended with results not less tragical than that deed which drove the Tarquins from the city and the throne through the injured chastity and violent death of Lucretia : so that the decemvirs not only had the same end as the kings had, but the same cause also of losing their power. Appius Claudius was seized with a criminal passion for violating the person of a young woman of plebeian condition. Lucius Virginius, the girl's father, held an honorable rank among the centurions at Algidum, a man of exemplary good conduct both at home and in the service. His wife had been educated in a similar manner, as also were their children. He had betrothed his daughter to Lucius Icilius, who had been a tribune, a man of spirit and of approved zeal in the interest of the people. This young woman, in the bloom of youth, distinguished for beauty, Appius, burning with desire, attempted to seduce by bribes and promises ; and when he perceived that all the avenues (to the possession of her) were barred by modesty, he turned his thoughts to cruel and tyrannical violence. He instructed a dependent of his, Marcus Claudius, to claim the girl as his slave, and not to yield to those who might demand her interim retention of liberty, considering that, because the girl's father was absent, there was an opportunity for committing the injury.
The tool of the decemvir's lust laid hands on the girl as she was coming into the forum (for there in the sheds the literary schools were held) ; calling her " the daughter of his slave and a slave herself," he commanded her to follow him ; that he would force her away if she demurred. The girl being stupefied with terror, a crowd collects at the cries of the girl's nurse, who besought the protection of the citizens. The popu lar names of her father, Virginius, and of her spouse, Icilius, are in the mouths of every one. Their regard for them gains over their acquaintances, whilst the heinousness of the proceed ing gains over the crowd. She was now safe from violence, when the claimant says, " That there was no occasion for raising a mob ; that he was proceeding by law, not by force. " He cites the girl into court. Those who stood by her advising her to follow him, they now reached the tribunal of Appius.
The claimant rehearses the farce well known to the judge,
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as being the author of the plot : " That a girl born in his house, and clandestinely transferred from thence to the house of Vir- ginius, had been fathered on the latter. That he stated a thing ascertained by certain evidence, and would prove it to the sat isfaction even of Virginius himself whom the principal portion of that loss would concern. That it was but just that in the interim the girl should accompany her master. "
The advocates for Virginia, after they had urged that Vir ginius was absent on business of the state, that he would be here in two days if word were sent to him, that it was unfair that in his absence he should run any risk regarding his chil dren, demand that he adjourn the whole matter till the arrival of the father ; that he should allow the claim for her interim liberty according to the law passed by himself, and not allow a maiden of ripe age to encounter the risk of her reputation be fore that of her liberty.
Appius prefaced his decree by observing that the very law, which Virginius's friends were putting forward as the ground of their demand, clearly showed how much he favored liberty. But that liberty would find secure protection in it on this con dition, that it varied neither with respect to cases or persons. For with respect to those individuals who were claimed as free, that point of law was good, because any person may proceed by law (and act for them) ; with respect to her who is in the hands of her father, that there was no other person (than her father) to whom her master need relinquish his right of posses sion. That it was his determination, therefore, that her father should be sent for: in the mean time, that the claimant should suffer no loss of his right, but that he should carry off the girl with him, and promise that she should be produced on the arrival of him who was called her father. When many rather murmured against the injustice of this decision than any one individual ven tured to protest against it, the girl's uncle, Publius Numitorius, and her betrothed spouse, Icilius, just come in ; and way being made through the crowd, the multitude thinking that Appius might be most effectually resisted by the intervention of Icilius, the lictor declares that " he had decided the matter," and removes Icilius, when he attempted to raise his voice. Injustice so atro cious would have fired even a cool temper.
" By the sword, Appius," says he, " I must be removed hence, that you may carry off in silence that which you wish to be con cealed. This young woman I am about to marry, determined
384 LEGENDS OF EARLY ROME.
to have a lawful and chaste wife. Wherefore call together all the lictors even of your colleagues ; order the rods and axes to be had in readiness ; the betrothed wife of Icilius shall not re main without her father's house. Though you have taken from us the aid of our tribunes, and the power of appeal to the com mons of Rome, — the two bulwarks for maintaining our liberty, — absolute dominion has not therefore been given to you over our wives and children. Vent your fury on our backs and necks ; let chastity at least be secure. If violence be offered to her, I shall implore the protection of the citizens here present in behalf of my spouse ; Virginius will implore that of the soldiers in behalf of his only daughter ; we shall all implore the pro tection of gods and men, nor shall you carry that sentence into effect without our blood. I demand of you, Appius, con sider again and again to what lengths you are proceeding. Let Virginius, when he comes, consider what conduct he should pursue with respect to his daughter. Let him only be assured of this, that if he yield to the claims of this man, he will have to seek out another match for his daughter. As for my part, in vindicating the liberty of my spouse, life shall leave me sooner than my honor. "
The multitude was now excited, and a contest seemed likely to ensue. The lictors had taken their stand around Icilius ; nor did they, however, proceed beyond threats, when Appius said : " That it was not Virginia that was defended by Icilius, but that, being a restless man, and even now breathing the spirit of the tribuneship, he was seeking an occasion for a dis turbance. That he would not afford him material on that day ; but in order that he may now know that the concession has been made not to his petulance, but to the absent Virginius, to the name of father and to liberty, that he would not decide the cause on that day, nor interpose a decree ; that he would re quest of Marcus Claudius to forego somewhat of his right, and suffer the girl to be bailed till the next day. But unless the father attended on the following day, he gave notice to Icilius, and to men like Icilius, that neither the founder would be wanting to his own law, nor firmness to the Decemvir. "
When the time of this act of injustice was deferred, and the friends of the maiden had retired, it was first of all deter mined that the brother of Icilius and the son of Numitorius, both active young men, should proceed thence straightforward to the gate, and that Virginius should be brought from the
LEGENDS OF EARLY ROME. 385
camp with all possible haste. They proceed according to direc tions and with all speed carry the account to her father. When the claimant of the maiden was pressing Icilius to be come defendant, and give sureties, and Icilius said that that was the very thing he was doing, designedly spinning out the time, until the messengers sent to the camp might gain time for their journey, the multitude raised their hands on all sides, and every one showed himself ready to go surety for Icilius. And he with tears in his eyes says, " It is very kind of you ; on to-morrow I will avail myself of your assistance ; at present I have sufficient sureties. " Thus Virginia is bailed on the secu rity of her relations. Appius, having delayed a short time that he might not appear to have sat on account of the present case, went home when no one applied (all other concerns being given up from their solicitude about the one) and writes to his colleagues to the camp not to grant leave of absence to Virgin- ius, and even to keep him in confinement. This wicked scheme was late, as it deserved to be ; for Virginius, having already obtained his leave, had set out at the first watch.
But in the city, when the citizens were standing in the forum erect with expectation, Virginius, clad in mourning, by break of day conducts his daughter, also attired in weeds, attended by some matrons, into the forum, with a considerable body of advocates. He then began to go round and to solicit indi viduals ; and not only to entreat their aid as a boon to his prayers, but demanded it as due to him : " That he stood daily in the field of battle in defense of their children and wives, nor was there any other man, to whom a greater number of brave and intrepid deeds in war can be ascribed than to him. What availed it, whilst the city was still secure, their children would be exposed to suffer the severest hardships which would have to be dreaded was taken " Delivering these obser vations like one haranguing in an assembly, he solicited them individually. Similar arguments were used by Icilius the female attendants produced more effect by their silent tears than any language.
With mind utterly insensible to all this, (such parox ysm of madness, rather than of love, had perverted his mind,) Appius ascended the tribunal and when the claimant began to complain briefly, that justice had not been administered to him on the preceding day through desire to please the people, before either he could go through with his claim, or an oppor-
TOL. II. — 25
; a
a
a
;
if it
?
if,
386 LEGENDS OF EARLY ROME.
tunity of reply was afforded to Virginius, Appius interrupts him, [and] passed a sentence consigning her to slavery. At first all were astounded with amazement at so heinous a proceeding ; then silence prevailed for some time. Then when Marcus Claudius proceeded to seize the maiden, the matrons standing around her, and was received with piteous lamentation of the women, Virginius, menacingly extending his hands towards Appius, says, " To Icilius, and not to you, Appius, have I be trothed my daughter, and for matrimony, not prostitution, have I brought her up. Do you wish men to gratify their lust pro miscuously, like cattle and wild beasts ? Whether these per
sons will endure such things, I know not ;
will not who have arms in their hands. " When the claimant was repulsed by the crowd of women and advocates who were standing around her, silence was commanded by the crier.
The decemvir, engrossed in mind by his lustful propensities, states that not only from the abusive language of Icilius yes terday, and the violence of Virginius, of which he had the entire Roman people as witnesses, but from authentic informa tion also he ascertained, that cabals were held in the city during the whole night to stir up a sedition. Accordingly that he, being aware of that danger, had come down with armed sol diers ; not that he would molest any peaceable person, but in order to punish suitably to the majesty of the government persons disturbing the tranquillity of the state. It will, there fore, be better to remain quiet. " Go, lictor," says he, " remove the crowd ; and make way for the master to lay hold of his slave. " When, bursting with passion, he had thundered out these words, the multitude themselves voluntarily separated, and the girl stood deserted, a prey to injustice.
I hope that those
Then Virginius, when he saw no aid anywhere, says, " I beg you, Appius, first pardon a father's grief, if I have said any thing too harsh against you : in the next place, suffer me to question the nurse before the maiden, what all this matter is ? that if I have been falsely called her father, I may depart hence with a more resigned mind. " Permission being granted, he draws the girl and the nurse aside to the sheds near the temple of Cloacina, which now go by the name of the new sheds : and there snatching up a knife from a butcher, " In this one way, the only one in my power, do I secure to you your liberty. " He then transfixes the girl's breast, and looking back towards the tribunal, he says, " With this blood I devote thee, Appius,
VIRGINIA. 387
and thy head. " Appius, aroused by the cry raised at so dread ful a deed, orders Virginius to be seized. He, armed with the knife, cleared the way whithersoever he went, until, protected by the crowd of persons attending him, he reached the gate. Icilius and Numitorius take up the lifeless body and exhibit it to the people : they deplore the villainy of Appius, the fatal beauty of the maiden, and the dire necessity of the father. The matrons who followed exclaim, " Was this the condition of rearing children? were these the rewards of chastity? " and other things which female grief on such occasions suggests. The voice of the men, and more especially of Icilius, entirely turned on the tribunitian power.
VIRGINIA.
By THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY.
[Thomas Babington Macaulay : An English historian and essayist ; born October 25, 1800 ; son of a noted philanthropist and a Quaker lady ; died at London, December 28, 1859. He was educated at Trinity College, Cambridge, and called to the bar, but took to writing for the periodicals and to politics ; became famous for historical essays, was a warm advocate of Parliamentary Reform, and was elected to Parliament in 1830. In 1834 he was made a member of the Supreme Legislative Council for India, residing there till 1838, and making the working draft of the present Indian" Penal Code. He was Secretary at War in 1839. The first two volumes of his History of England" were published in December, 1848. His fame rests even more on his historical essays, his unsur passed speeches, and his " Lays of Ancient Rome. "]
The Patricians, during more than a century after the expul sion of the Kings, held all the high military commands. A Plebeian, even though, like Lucius Siccius, he were distin guished by his valor and knowledge of war, could serve only in subordinate posts. A minstrel, therefore, who wished to celebrate the early triumphs of his country, could hardly take any but Patricians for his heroes. The warriors who are men tioned in the two preceding lays, Horatius, Lartius, Herminius, Aulus Posthumius, ^Ebutius Elva, Sempronius Atratinus, Valerius Poplicola, were all members of the dominant order; and a poet who was singing their praises, whatever his own political opinions might be, would naturally abstain from insulting the class to which they belonged, and from reflecting on the system which had placed such men at the head of the legions of the commonwealth.
But there was a class of compositions in which the great families were by no means so courteously treated. No parts
388
VIRGINIA.
of early Roman history are richer with poetical coloring than those which relate to the long contest between the privileged houses and the commonalty. The population of Rome was, from a very early period, divided into hereditary castes, which, indeed, readily united to repel foreign enemies, but which regarded each other, during many years, with bitter animosity. Between those castes there was a barrier hardly less strong than that which, at Venice, parted the members of the Great Coun cil from their countrymen. In some respects, indeed, the line which separated an Icilius or a Duilius from a Posthumius or a Fabius was even more deeply marked than that which separated the rower of a gondola from a Contarini or a Morosini. At Venice the distinction was merely civil. At Rome it was both civil and religious. Among the grievances under which the Plebeians suffered, three were felt as pecul iarly severe. They were excluded from the highest magis tracies ; they were excluded from all share in the public lands ; and they were ground down to the dust by partial and bar barous legislation touching pecuniary contracts. The ruling class in Rome was a moneyed class ; and it made and adminis tered the laws with a view solely to its own interest. Thus the relation between lender and borrower was mixed up with the relation between sovereign and subject. The great men held a large portion of the community in dependence by means of advances at enormous usury. The law of debt, framed by creditors, and for the protection of creditors, was the most hor rible that has ever been known among men. The liberty, and even the life, of the insolvent were at the mercy of the Patri cian money lenders. Children often became slaves in conse quence of the misfortunes of their parents. The debtor was imprisoned, not in a public jail under the care of impartial public functionaries, but in a private workhouse belonging to the creditor. Frightful stories were told respecting these dun geons. It was said that torture and brutal violation were common; that tight stocks, heavy chains, scanty measures of food, were used to punish wretches guilty of nothing but pov erty ; and that brave soldiers, whose breasts were covered with honorable scars, were often marked still more deeply on the back by the scourges of high-born usurers.
The Plebeians were, however, not wholly without constitu tional rights. From an early period they had been admitted to some share of political power. They were enrolled each in
VIRGINIA.
389
his century, and were allowed a share, considerable though not proportioned to their numerical strength, in the disposal of those high dignities from which they were themselves excluded. Thus their position bore some resemblance to that of the Irish Catholics during the interval between the year 1792 and the year 1829. The Plebeians had also the privilege of annually appointing officers, named Tribunes, who had no active share in the government of the Commonwealth, but who, by degrees, acquired a power formidable even to the ablest and most reso lute Consuls and Dictators. The person of the Tribune was inviolable ; and, though he could directly effect little, he could obstruct everything.
During more than a century after the institution of the Tribuneship, the Commons struggled manfully for the removal of the grievances under which they labored; and, in spite of many checks and reverses, succeeded in wringing concession after concession from the stubborn aristocracy. At length, in the year of the city 378, both parties mustered their whole strength for their last and most desperate conflict. The popular and active Tribune, Caius Licinius, proposed the three memor able laws which are called by his name, and which were in tended to redress the three great evils of which the Plebeians complained. He was supported, with eminent ability and firmness, by his colleague, Lucius Sextius. The struggle appears to have been the fiercest that ever in any community terminated without an appeal to arms. If such a contest had raged in any Greek city, the streets would have run with blood. But, even in the paroxysms of faction, the Roman retained his gravity, his respect for law, and his tenderness for the lives of his fellow-citizens. Year after year Licinius and Sextius were reelected Tribunes. Year after year, if the narrative which has come down to us is to be trusted, they continued to exert, to the full extent, their power of stopping the whole machine of government. No curule magistrates could be chosen; no military muster could be held. We know too little of the state of Rome in those days to be able to conjecture how, during that long anarchy, the peace was kept, and ordinary justice admin istered between man and man. The animosity of both parties rose to the greatest height. The excitement, we may well suppose, would have been peculiarly intense at the annual election of Tribunes. On such occasions there can be little doubt that the great families did all that could be done, by
390 VIRGINIA.
threats and caresses, to break the union of the Plebeians. That union, however, proved indissoluble. At length the good cause triumphed. The Licinian laws were carried. Lucius Sextius was the first Plebeian Consul, Caius Licinius the third.
The results of this great change were singularly happy and glorious. Two centuries of prosperity, harmony, and victory followed the reconciliation of the orders. Men who remem bered Rome engaged in waging petty wars almost within sight of the Capitol lived to see her the mistress of Italy. While the disabilities of the Plebeians continued, she was scarcely able to maintain her ground against the Volscians and Hernicans. When those disabilities were removed, she rapidly became more than a match for Carthage and Macedon.
During the great Licinian contest the Plebeian poets were, doubtless, not silent. Even in modern times songs have been by no means without influence on public affairs ; and we may therefore infer that, in a society where printing was unknown, and where books were rare, a pathetic or humorous party ballad must have produced effects such as we can but faintly conceive. It is certain that satirical poems were common at Rome from a very early period. The rustics, who lived at a distance from the seat of government, and took little part in the strife of factions, gave vent to their petty local animosities in coarse Fescennine verse. The lampoons of the city were doubtless of a higher order ; and their sting was early felt by the nobility. For in the Twelve Tables, long before the time of the Licinian laws, a severe punishment was denounced against the citizen who should compose or recite verses reflecting on another. Satire is, indeed, the only sort of composition in which the Latin poets whose works have come down to us were not mere imitators of foreign models ; and it is therefore the only sort of composition in which they have never been rivaled. It was not, like their tragedy, their comedy, their epic and lyric poetry, a hothouse plant which, in return for assiduous and skillful cul ture, gave only scanty and sickly fruits. It was hardy and full of sap ; and in all the various juices which it yielded might be distinguished the flavor of the Ausonian soil. "Satire," says Quinctilian, with just pride, "is all our own. " Satire sprang, in truth, naturally from the constitution of the Roman govern ment and from the spirit of the Roman people ; and, though at length subjected to metrical rules derived from Greece, retained to the last an essentially Roman character. Lucilius was the
VIRGINIA. 391
earliest satirist whose works were held in esteem under the Caesars. But many years before Lucilius was born, Naevius had been flung into a dungeon, and guarded there with circum stances of unusual rigor, on account of the bitter lines in which he had attacked the great Caecilian family. The genius and spirit of the Roman satirists survived the liberty of their country, and were not extinguished by the cruel despotism of the Julian and Flavian Emperors. The great poet who told the story of Domitian's turbot, was the legitimate successor of those forgotten minstrels whose songs animated the factions of the infant Republic.
These minstrels, as Niebuhr has remarked, appear to have generally taken the popular side. We can hardly be mistaken in supposing that, at the great crisis of the civil conflict, they employed themselves in versifying all the most powerful and virulent speeches of the Tribunes, and in heaping abuse on the leaders of the aristocracy. Every personal defect, every domestic scandal, every tradition dishonorable to a noble house, would be sought out, brought into notice, and exaggerated. The illustrious head of the aristocratical party, Marcus Furius Camillus, might perhaps be, in some measure, protected by his venerable age and by the memory of his great services to the State. But Appius Claudius Crassus enjoyed no such im munity. He was descended from a long line of ancestors dis tinguished by their haughty demeanor, and by the inflexibility with which they had withstood all the demands of the Plebeian order. While the political conduct and the deportment of the Claudian nobles drew upon them the fiercest public hatred, they were accused of wanting, if any credit is due to the early history of Rome, a class of qualities which, in the military Commonwealth, is sufficient to cover a multitude of offenses. The chiefs of the family appear to have been eloquent, versed in civil business, and learned after the fashion of their age; but in war they were not distinguished by skill or valor. Some of them, as if conscious where their weakness lay, had, when filling the highest magistracies, taken internal adminis tration as their department of public business, and left the military command to their colleagues. One of them had been intrusted with an army, and had failed ignominiously. None of them had been honored with a triumph. None of them had achieved any martial exploit, such as those by which Lucius Quinctius Cincinnatus, Titus Quinctius Capitolinus, Aulus
392 VIRGINIA.
Cornelius Cossus, and, above all, the great Camillus, had extorted the reluctant esteem of the multitude. During the Licinian conflict, Appius Claudius Crassus signalized himself by the ability and severity with which he harangued against the two great agitators. He would naturally, therefore, be the favorite mark of the Plebeian satirists; nor would they have been at a loss to find a point on which he was open to attack.
His grandfather, called, like himself, Appius Claudius, had left a name as much detested as that of Sextus Tarquinius. This elder Appius had been Consul more than seventy years before the introduction of the Licinian laws. By availing him self of a singular crisis in public feeling, he had obtained the consent of the Commons to the abolition of the Tribuneship, and had been the chief of that Council of Ten to which the whole direction of the State had been committed. In a few months his administration had become universally odious. It had been swept away by an irresistible outbreak of popular fury; and its memory was still held in abhorrence by the whole city. The immediate cause of the downfall of this execrable govern ment was said to have been an attempt made by Appius Claudius upon the chastity of a beautiful young girl of humble birth. The story ran that the Decemvir, unable to succeed by bribes and solicitations, resorted to an outrageous act of tyranny. A vile dependent of the Claudian house laid claim to the damsel as his slave. The cause was brought before the tribunal of Appius. The wicked magistrate, in defiance of the clearest
proofs, gave judgment for the claimant. But the girl's father, a brave soldier, saved her from servitude and dishonor by stab bing her to the heart in the sight of the whole Forum. That blow was the signal for a general explosion. Camp and city rose at once ; the Ten were pulled down ; the Tribuneship was reestablished ; and Appius escaped the hands of the executioner only by a voluntary death.
It can hardly be doubted that a story so admirably adapted to the purposes both of the poet and of the demagogue would be eagerly seized upon by minstrels burning with hatred against the Patrician order, against the Claudian house, and especially against the grandson and namesake of the infamous Decemvir.
In order that the reader may judge fairly of these fragments of the lay of Virginia, he must imagine himself a Plebeian who has just voted for the reelection of Sextius and Licinius. All the power of the Patricians has been exerted to throw out the
VIRGINIA. 893
two great champions of the Commons. Every Posthumius, jiEmilius, and Cornelius has used his influence to the utmost. Debtors have been let out of the workhouses on condition of voting against the men of the people : clients have been posted to hiss and interrupt the favorite candidates : Appius Claudius Crassus has spoken with more than his usual eloquence and asperity: all has been in vain; Licinius and Sextius have a fifth time carried all the tribes: work is suspended: the booths are closed : the Plebeians bear on their shoulders the two cham pions of liberty through the Forum. Just at this moment it is announced that a popular poet, a zealous adherent of the Trib unes, has made a new song which will cut the Claudian nobles to the heart. The crowd gathers round him, and calls on him to recite it. He takes his stand on the spot where, according to tradition, Virginia, more than seventy years ago, was seized by the pandar of Appius, and he begins his story.
Romulus chose the Palatine and Remus the Aventine hill vol. ii. —24
370 LEGENDS OF EARLY ROME.
as their stands to make their observations. It is said, that to Remus an omen came first, six vultures ; and now, the omen having been declared, when double the number presented itself to Romulus, his own party saluted each king ; the former claimed the kingdom on the ground of priority of time, the latter on account of the number of birds. Upon this, having met in an altercation, from the contest of angry feelings they turn to bloodshed ; there Remus fell from a blow received in the crowd. A more common account is, that Remus, in deri sion of his brother, leaped over his new-built wall, and was, for that reason, slain by Romulus in a passion ; who, after sharply chiding him, added words to this effect, "So shall every one fare, who shall dare leap over my fortifications. " Thus Romu lus got the sovereignty to himself ; the city, when built, was called after the name of its founder. . . .
Meanwhile the city increased by their taking in various lots of ground for buildings, whilst they built rather with a view to future numbers than for the population which they then had. Then, lest the size of the city might be of no avail, in order to augment the population, — according to the ancient policy of the founders of cities, who, after drawing together to them an obscure and mean multitude, used to feign that their offspring sprung out of the earth, — he opened as a sanctuary a place which is now inclosed as you go down "to the two groves. " Hither fled from the neighboring states, without distinction whether freemen or slaves, crowds of all sorts, desirous of change : and this was the first accession of strength to their rising greatness. When he was now not dissatisfied with his strength, he next sets about forming some means of directing that strength. He creates one hundred senators, either because that number was sufficient, or because there were only one hun dred who could name their fathers. They certainly were called Fathers, through respect, and their descendants, Patricians.
"Rape of the Sabines. "
And now the Roman state was become so powerful that it was a match for any of the neighboring nations in war; but from the paucity of women, its greatness could only last for one age of man ; for they had no hope of issue at home, nor had they any intermarriages with their neighbors. Therefore, by the advice of the Fathers, Romulus sent ambassadors to
LEGENDS OF EARLY ROME. 371
the neighboring states to solicit an alliance and the privilege of intermarriage for his new subjects. Nowhere did the em bassy obtain a favorable hearing : so much did they at the same time despise, and dread for themselves and their posterity, so great a power growing up in the midst of them. They were dismissed by the greater part with the repeated question, "Whether they had opened any asylum for women also, for that such a plan only could obtain them suitable matches? " The Roman youth resented this conduct bitterly, and the matter unquestionably began to point towards violence.
Romulus, to afford a favorable time and place for this, dis sembling his resentment, purposely prepares games in honor of Neptunus Equestris ; he calls them Consualia. Great numbers assembled, from a desire also of seeing the new city ; especially their nearest neighbors, the Caeninenses, Crustumini, and Antemnates. Moreover, the whole multitude of the Sa- bines came, with their wives and children. When the time of the spectacle came on, and while their minds and eyes were intent upon it, according to concert a tumult began, and upon a signal given the Roman youth ran different ways to carry off the virgins by force. A great number were carried off at hap hazard, according as they fell into their hands. Persons from the common people, who had been charged with the task, con veyed to their houses some women of surpassing beauty, des tined for the leading senators. The festival being disturbed by this alarm, the parents of the young women retire in grief, appealing to the compact of violated hospitality, and invoking the god, to whose festival and games they had come, deceived by the pretense of religion and good faith. Neither had the ravished virgins better hopes of their condition, or less indig nation. But Romulus in person went about and declared, " That what was done was owing to the pride of their fathers, who had refused to grant the privilege of marriage to their neighbors ; but notwithstanding, they should be joined in law ful wedlock, participate in all their possessions and civil privi leges, and, than which nothing can be dearer to the human heart, in their common children. He begged them only to assuage the fierceness of their anger, and cheerfully surrender their affections to those to whom fortune had consigned their persons. " [He added] "That from injuries love and friend ship often arise ; and that they should find them kinder hus bands on this account, because each of them, besides the
372 LEGENDS OF EARLY ROME.
performance of his conjugal duty, would endeavor to the utmost of his power to make up for the want of their parents and native country. " To this the caresses of the husbands were added, excusing what they had done on the plea of passion and love — arguments that work most successfully on women's hearts.
At this juncture the Sabine women, from the outrage on whom the war originated, with hair disheveled and garments rent, the timidity of their sex being overcome by such dreadful scenes, had the courage to throw themselves amid the flying weapons, and making a rush across, to part the incensed armies, and assuage their fury, imploring their fathers on the one side, their husbands on the other, "that as fathers-in-law and sons-in-law they would not contaminate each other with impious blood, nor stain their offspring with parricide, the one their grandchildren, the other their children. If you are dissatisfied with the affinity between you, if with our marriages, turn your resentment against us ; we are the cause of war, we of wounds and of bloodshed to our husbands and parents. It were better that we perish than live widowed or fatherless without one or other of you. " The circumstance affects both the multitude and the leaders. Silence and a sudden suspension ensue. Upon this the leaders come forward in order to concert a treaty, and they not only conclude a peace, but form one state out of two. They associate the regal power, and transfer the entire sovereignty to Rome. [Romulus disappeared in a thunder storm, and was never seen again. ]
f The Horatii and Curiatii.
It happened that there were in each of the two armies three brothers born at one birth, unequal neither in age nor strength. That they were called Horatii and Curiatii is certain enough ; nor is there any circumstance of antiquity more celebrated ; yet in a matter so well ascertained, a doubt remains concerning their names, to which nation the Horatii and to which the Curiatii belonged. Authors claim them for both sides ; yet I find more who call the Horatii Romans. My inclination leads me to follow them. The kings confer with the three brothers, that they should fight with their swords each in defense of their respective country, (assuring them) that dominion would be on that side on which victory should be. No objection is
LEGENDS OF EARLY ROME. 373
made ; time and place are agreed on. Before they engaged, a compact is entered into between the Romans and Albans on these conditions, that the state whose champions should come off victorious in that combat, should rule the other state with out further dispute.
The treaty being concluded, the twin brothers, as had been agreed, take arms. Whilst their respective friends exhortingly reminded each party " that their country's gods, their country and parents, all their countrymen both at home and in the army, had their eyes then fixed on their arms, on their hands ; naturally brave, and animated by the exhortations of their friends, they advance into the midst between the two lines. The two armies sat down before their respective camps, free rather from present danger than from anxiety ; for the sover eign power was at stake, depending on the valor and fortune of so few. Accordingly, therefore, eager and anxious, they have their attention intensely riveted on a spectacle far from pleasing. The signal is given ; and the three youths on each side, as if in battle array, rush to the charge with determined fury, bearing in their breasts the spirits of mighty armies ; nor do the one or the other regard their personal danger ; the pub lic dominion or slavery is present to their mind, and the fortune of their country, which was ever after destined to be such as they should now establish it. As soon as their arms clashed on the first encounter, and their burnished swords glittered, great horror strikes the spectators ; and, hope inclining to neither side, their voice and breath were suspended.
Then having engaged hand to hand, when not only the movements of their bodies, and the rapid brandishings of their arms and weapons, but wounds also and blood were seen, two of the Romans fell lifeless, one upon the other, the three Albans being wounded. And when the Alban army raised a shout of joy at their fall, hope entirely, anxiety however not yet, deserted the Roman legions, alarmed for the lot of the one, whom the three Curiatii surrounded. He happened to be unhurt, so that, though alone he was by no means a match for them all together, yet he was confident against each singly. In order, therefore, to separate their attack, he takes to flight, presuming that they would pursue him with such swiftness as the wounded state of his body would suffer each. He had now fled a con siderable distance from the place where they had fought, when, looking behind, he perceives them pursuing him at great inter
374 LEGENDS OF EARLY ROME.
vals from each other ; and that one of them was not far from him. On him he turned round with great fury. And whilst the Alban army shouts out to the Curiatii to succor their brother, Horatius, victorious in having slain his antagonist, was now proceeding to a second attack. Then the Romans encourage their champion with a shout such as is usually (given) by persons cheering in consequence of unexpected suc cess ; he also hastens to put an end to the combat. Wherefore before the other, who was not far off, could come up, he dis patches the second Curiatius also.
And now, the combat being brought to an equality of num bers, one on each side remained, but they were equal neither in hope nor in strength. The one his body untouched by a weapon, and by a double victory made courageous for a third contest ; the other dragging along his body exhausted from the wound, exhausted from running, and dispirited by the slaughter of his brethren before his eyes, presents himself to his victori ous antagonist. Nor was that a fight. The Roman, exulting, says, " Two I have offered to the shades of my brothers ; the third I will offer to the cause of this war, that the Roman may rule over the Alban. " He thrusts his sword down into his throat, whilst faintly sustaining the weight of his armor ; he strips him as he lies prostrate. The Romans receive Horatius with triumph and congratulation ; with so much the greater joy, as success had followed so close on fear. They then turn to the burial of their friends with dispositions by no means alike ; for the one side was elated with (the acquisition of) empire, the other subjected to foreign jurisdiction ; their sepul- chers are still extant in the place where each fell ; the two Roman ones in one place nearer to Alba, the three Alban ones towards Rome ; but distant in situation from each other, and just as they fought.
Before they parted from thence, when Mettus, in conformity to the treaty which had been concluded, asked what orders he had to give, Tullus orders him to keep the youth in arms, that he designed to employ them, if a war should break out with the Veientes. After this both armies returned to their homes. Horatius marched foremost, carrying before him the spoils of the three brothers ; his sister, a maiden who had been betrothed to one of the Curiatii, met him before the gate Capena ; and having recognized her lover's military robe, which she herself had wrought, on her brother's shoulders, she tore her hair, and
LEGENDS OF EARLY ROME. 375
with bitter waitings called by name on her deceased lover. The sister's lamentations in the midst of his own victory, and of such great public rejoicings, raised the indignation of the excited youth. Having therefore drawn his sword, he run the damsel through the body, at the same time chiding her in these words : " Go hence, with thy unseasonable love to thy spouse, forgetful of thy dead brothers, and of him who survives, forget ful of thy native country. So perish every Roman woman who shall mourn an enemy. "
This action seemed shocking to the fathers and to the peo ple; but his recent services outweighed its guilt. Neverthe less, he was carried before the king for judgment. The king, that he himself might not be the author of a decision so melan choly, and so disagreeable to the people, or of the punishment consequent on that decision, having summoned an assembly of the people, says, " I appoint, according to law, duumvirs to pass sentence on Horatius for treason. " The law was of dread ful import. " Let the duumvirs pass sentence for treason. If he appeal from the duumvirs, let him contend by appeal ; if they shall gain the cause, cover his head ; hang him by a rope from a gallows ; scourge him either within the pomcerium or without the pomcerium. " When the duumvirs appointed by this law, who did not consider that, according to the law, they could acquit even an innocent person, had found him guilty, one of them says : " P. Horatius, I judge thee guilty of treason. Go, lictor, bind his hands. " The lictor had approached him, and was fixing the rope. Then Horatius, by the advice of Tullus, a favorable interpreter of the law, says, "I appeal. " Accordingly the matter was contested by appeal to the people.
On that trial persons were much affected, especially by P. Horatius, the father declaring that he considered his daughter deservedly slain ; were it not so, that he would by his authority as a father have inflicted punishment on his son. He then entreated that these would not render childless him whom but a little while ago they had beheld with a fine prog eny. During these words the old man, having embraced the youth, pointing to the spoils of the Curiatii fixed up in that place which is now called Pila Horatia, " Romans," said he, " can you bear to see bound beneath a gallows amidst scourges and tortures, him whom you just now beheld marching deco rated (with spoils) and exulting in victory ; a sight so shock
376 LEGENDS OF EARLY ROME.
ing as the eyes even of the Albans could scarcely endure. Go, lictor, bind those hands, which but a little while since, being armed, established sovereignty for the Roman people. Go, cover the head of the liberator of this city ; hang him on the gallows ; scourge him, either within the pomcerium, so it be only amid those javelins and spoils of the enemy; or without the pomoerium, only amid the graves of the Curiatii. For whither can you bring this youth, where his own glories must not redeem him from such ignominy of punishment ? "
The people could not withstand the tears of the father, or the resolution of the son, so undaunted in every danger ; and acquitted him more through admiration of his bravery than for the justice of his cause. But that so notorious a murder might be atoned for by some expiation, the father was com manded to make satisfaction for the son at the public charge. He, having offered certain expiatory sacrifices, which were ever after continued in the Horatian family, and laid a beam across the street, made his son pass under it as under a yoke, with his head covered. This remains even to this day, being constantly repaired at the expense of the public ; they call it Sororium Tigillum. A tomb of square stone was erected to Horatia in the place where she was stabbed and fell.
Sextus Tarquin and Lucretia.
As it commonly happens in standing camps, the war against the Rutulians being rather tedious than violent, furloughs were easily obtained, more so by the officers, however, than the common soldiers. The young princes sometimes spent their leisure hours in feasting and entertainments. One day as they were drinking in the tent of Sextus Tarquin, where Collatinus Tarquinius, the son of Egerius, was also at supper, mention was made of wives. Every one commended his own in an ex travagant manner, till a dispute arising about it, Collatinus said: "There was no occasion for words, that it might be known in a few hours how far his Lucretia excelled all the rest. If then, added he, we have any share of the vigor of youth, let us mount our horses and examine the behavior of our wives ; that must be most satisfactory to every one, which shall meet his eyes on the unexpected arrival of the husband. " They were heated with wine. " Come on, then," say all. They immedi ately galloped to Rome, where they arrived in the dusk of the
LEGENDS OF EARLY ROME. 87T
evening. From thence they went to Collatia, where they find Lucretia, not like the king's daughters-in-law, whom they had seen spending their time in luxurious entertainments with their equals, but though at an advanced time of night, employed at her wool, sitting in the middle of the house amid her maids working around her. The merit of the contest regarding the ladies was assigned to Lucretia. Her husband on his arrival, and the Tarquinii, were kindly received ; the husband, proud of his victory, gives the young princes a polite invitation. There the villanous passion for violating Lucretia by force seizes Sex- tus Tarquin ; both her beauty, and her approved purity, act as incentives. And then, after this youthful frolic of the night, they return to the camp.
A few days after, without the knowledge of Collatinus, Sextus came to Collatia with one attendant only ; where, being kindly received by them, as not being aware of his intention, after he had been conducted after supper into the guests' cham ber, burning with passion, when everything around seemed sufficiently secure, and all fast asleep, he comes to Lucretia, as she lay asleep, with a naked sword, and with his left hand press ing down the woman's breast, he says, " Be silent, Lucretia ;
I I have a sword in my hand ; you shall die, if you utter a word. " When awaking terrified from sleep, the woman beheld no aid, impending death nigh at hand; then
am Sextus Tarquin ;
Tarquin acknowledged his passion, entreated, mixed threats with entreaties, tried the female's mind in every possible way. When he saw her inflexible, and that she was not moved even by the terror of death, he added to terror the threat of dis honor ; he says that he will lay a murdered slave naked by her side when dead, so that she may be said to have been slain in infamous adultery.
When by the terror of this disgrace his lust, as it were vic torious, had overcome her inflexible chastity, and Tarquin had departed, exulting in having triumphed over a lady's honor, Lucretia, in melancholy distress at so dreadful a misfortune, dispatches the same messenger to Rome to her father, and to Ardea to her husband, that they would come each with one trusty friend ; that it was necessary to do so, and that quickly. Sp. Lucretius comes with P. Valerius, the son of Volesus, Col latinus with L. Junius Brutus, with whom, as he was returning to Rome, he happened to be met by his wife's messenger. They find Lucretia sitting in her chamber in sorrowful dejection.
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On the arrival of her friends the tears burst from her eyes ; and to her" husband, on his inquiry " whether all was right," she says : By no means, for what can be right with a woman who has lost her honor? The traces of another man are on your bed, Collatinus. But the body only has been violated, the mind is guiltless; death shall be my witness. But give me your right hands, and your honor, that the adulterer shall not come off unpunished. It is Sextus Tarquin, who, an enemy in the guise of a guest, has borne away hence a triumph fatal to me, and to himself, if you are men. "
They all pledge their honor ; they attempt to console her, distracted as she was in mind, by turning away the guilt from her, constrained by force, on the perpetrator of the crime ; that it is the mind sins, not the body ; and that where intention was wanting guilt could not be. " It is for you to see," says she, " what is due to him. As for me, though I acquit myself of guilt, from punishment I do not discharge myself ; nor shall any woman survive her dishonor pleading the example of Lu- cretia. " The knife, which she kept concealed beneath her gar ment, she plunges into her heart, and falling forward on the wound, she dropped down expiring. The husband and father shriek aloud.
Brutus, while they were overpowered with grief, having drawn the knife out of the wound, and holding it up before him reeking with blood, said, " By this blood, most pure before the pollution of royal villainy, I swear, and I call you, O gods, to witness my oath, that I shall pursue Lucius Tarquin the Proud, his wicked wife, and all their race, with fire, sword, and all other means in my power ; nor shall I ever suffer them or any other to reign at Rome. " Then he gave the knife to Col latinus, and after him to Lucretius and Valerius, who were sur prised at such extraordinary mind in the breast of Brutus. However, they all take the oath as they were directed, and, converting their sorrow into rage, follow Brutus as their leader, who from that time ceased not to solicit them to abolish the regal power.
Coriolanus.
In this year, when everything was quiet from war abroad, and the dissensions were healed at home, another much more serious evil fell upon the state ; first a scarcity of provisions, in consequence of the lands lying untilled during the secession
LEGENDS OF EARLY ROME.
379
of the commons ; then a famine such as befalls those who are besieged. And it would have ended in the destruction of the slaves at least, and indeed some of the commons also, had not the consuls adopted precautionary measures, by
sending per . . . It was debated in the senate at what rate it should be given to the commons. Many were of the opinion that the time was come for putting
down the commons, and for recovering those rights which had been wrested from the senators by secession and violence. In particular, Marcius Coriolanus, an enemy to tribunitian power, says: "If they desire the former rate of provisions, let them restore to the senators their former rights. Why do I, after being sent under the yoke, after being, as it were, ransomed from robbers, behold plebeian magistrates and Sicinius invested with power ? Shall I submit to these indignities longer than is necessary ? Shall I, who would not have endured King Tar- quin, tolerate Sicinius ? Let him now secede, let him call away the commons. The road lies open to the sacred mount and to other hills. Let them carry off the corn from our lands, as they did three years since. Let them have the benefit of that scarcity which in their frenzy they have occasioned. I will venture to say, that, brought to their senses by these sufferings, they will themselves become tillers of the lands, rather than, taking up arms and seceding, they would prevent them from being tilled. "
This proposal both appeared to the senate too harsh, and from exasperation well-nigh drove the people to arms : " That they were now assailed with famine, as if enemies; that they were defrauded of food and sustenance; that the foreign corn, the only support which fortune unexpectedly furnished to them, was being snatched from their mouth, unless the tribunes were given up in chains to C. Marcius, unless he glut his rage on the backs of the commons of Rome. That in him a new executioner had started up, who ordered them to die or be slaves. " An assault would have been made on him as he left the senate house, had not the tribunes very opportunely ap pointed him a day for trial ; by this their rage was suppressed, every one saw himself become the judge, the arbiter of the life and death of his foe. At first Marcius heard the threats of the tribunes with contempt; but the commons had risen with such violent determination, that the senators were obliged to extri cate themselves from danger by the punishment of one.
sons in every direction to buy up corn.
380 LEGENDS OF EARLY ROME.
They resisted, however, in spite of popular odium, and em ployed, each individual his own powers, and all those of the entire order. And first, the trial was made whether they could upset the affair, by posting their clients (in several places), by deterring individuals from attending meetings and cabals. Then they all proceeded in a body (you would suppose that all the senators were on their trial) earnestly entreating the com mons, that if they would not acquit as innocent, they would at least pardon as guilty, one citizen, one senator. As he did not attend on the day appointed, they persevered in their resent ment. Being condemned in his absence, he went into exile to the Volsci, threatening his country, and even then breathing all the resentment of an enemy.
[He is made general of the Volscians, ravages Roman territory, and puts Rome itself in imminent danger. ]
Sp. Nautius and Sex. Furius were now consuls. Whilst they were reviewing the legions, posting guards along the walls and other places where they had determined that there should be posts and watches, a vast multitude of persons de manding peace terrified them first by their seditious clamor; then compelled them to convene the senate, to consider the question of sending ambassadors to C. Marcius. The senate entertained the question, when it became evident that the spirits of the plebeians were giving way, and ambassadors being sent to Marcius concerning peace, brought back a harsh answer, " If their lands were restored to the Volscians, that they might then consider the question of peace ; if they were disposed to enjoy the plunder of war at their ease, that he, mindful both of the injurious treatment of his countrymen, as well as of the kindness of strangers, would do his utmost to make it appear that his spirit was irritated by exile, not crushed. " When the same persons are sent back a second time, they are not admitted into the camp. It is recorded that the priests also, arrayed in their insignia, went as suppliants to the enemy's camp; and that they did not influence his mind more than the ambassadors.
Then the matrons assemble in a body around Veturia, the mother of Coriolanus, and his wife, Volumnia : whether that was the result of public counsel, or of the women's fear, I can not ascertain. They certainly carried their point that Veturia, a lady advanced in years, and Volumnia, leading her two sons by Marcius, should go into the camp of the enemy, and that
LEGENDS OF EARLY ROME. 381
women should defend by entreaties and tears a city which men. were unable to defend by arms. When they reached the camp and it was announced to Coriolanus that a great body of women were approaching, he, who had been moved neither by the maj esty of the state in its ambassadors, nor by the sanctity of reli gion so strikingly addressed to his eyes and understanding in its priests, was much more obdurate against the women's tears. Then one of his acquaintances, who recognized Veturia, distin guished from all the others by her sadness, standing between her daughter-in-law and grandchildren, says, " Unless my eyes deceive me, your mother, children, and wife are approaching. "
When Coriolanus, almost like one bewildered, rushing in consternation from his seat, offered to embrace his mother as she met him, the lady, turning from entreaties to angry rebuke, says : " Before I receive your embrace, let me know whether I have come to an enemy or to a son ; whether Iam in your camp a captive or a mother? —Has length of life and a hapless old age reserved me for this to behold you an exile, then an enemy ? Could you lay waste this land, which gave you birth and nurtured you? Though you had come with an incensed and vengeful mind, did not your resentment subside when you entered its frontiers? When Rome came within view, did it not occur to you, within these walls my house and guardian gods are, my mother, wife, and children ?
So then, had I not been a mother, Rome would not be besieged : had I not a son, I might have died free in a free country. But I can now suffer nothing that is not more discreditable to you than distressing to me; nor however wretched I may be, shall I be so long. Look to these, whom, if you persist, either an untimely death or lengthened slavery awaits. " Then his wife and children embraced him : and the lamentation proceeding from the entire crowd of women, and their bemoaning themselves and their country, at length overcame the man; then, after embracing his family, he sends them away ; he moved his camp farther back from the city.
Then, after he had drawn off his troops from the Roman territory, they say that he lost his life, overwhelmed by the odium of the proceeding : different writers say by different modes of death :
I find in Fabius, far the most ancient writer, that he lived even to old age ; he states positively, that advanced in years he made use of this phrase, "That exile bore much
heavier on the old man. "
382 LEGENDS OF EARLY ROME.
Virginia.
Another atrocious deed follows in the city, originating in lust, attended with results not less tragical than that deed which drove the Tarquins from the city and the throne through the injured chastity and violent death of Lucretia : so that the decemvirs not only had the same end as the kings had, but the same cause also of losing their power. Appius Claudius was seized with a criminal passion for violating the person of a young woman of plebeian condition. Lucius Virginius, the girl's father, held an honorable rank among the centurions at Algidum, a man of exemplary good conduct both at home and in the service. His wife had been educated in a similar manner, as also were their children. He had betrothed his daughter to Lucius Icilius, who had been a tribune, a man of spirit and of approved zeal in the interest of the people. This young woman, in the bloom of youth, distinguished for beauty, Appius, burning with desire, attempted to seduce by bribes and promises ; and when he perceived that all the avenues (to the possession of her) were barred by modesty, he turned his thoughts to cruel and tyrannical violence. He instructed a dependent of his, Marcus Claudius, to claim the girl as his slave, and not to yield to those who might demand her interim retention of liberty, considering that, because the girl's father was absent, there was an opportunity for committing the injury.
The tool of the decemvir's lust laid hands on the girl as she was coming into the forum (for there in the sheds the literary schools were held) ; calling her " the daughter of his slave and a slave herself," he commanded her to follow him ; that he would force her away if she demurred. The girl being stupefied with terror, a crowd collects at the cries of the girl's nurse, who besought the protection of the citizens. The popu lar names of her father, Virginius, and of her spouse, Icilius, are in the mouths of every one. Their regard for them gains over their acquaintances, whilst the heinousness of the proceed ing gains over the crowd. She was now safe from violence, when the claimant says, " That there was no occasion for raising a mob ; that he was proceeding by law, not by force. " He cites the girl into court. Those who stood by her advising her to follow him, they now reached the tribunal of Appius.
The claimant rehearses the farce well known to the judge,
LEGENDS OF EARLY ROME. 383
as being the author of the plot : " That a girl born in his house, and clandestinely transferred from thence to the house of Vir- ginius, had been fathered on the latter. That he stated a thing ascertained by certain evidence, and would prove it to the sat isfaction even of Virginius himself whom the principal portion of that loss would concern. That it was but just that in the interim the girl should accompany her master. "
The advocates for Virginia, after they had urged that Vir ginius was absent on business of the state, that he would be here in two days if word were sent to him, that it was unfair that in his absence he should run any risk regarding his chil dren, demand that he adjourn the whole matter till the arrival of the father ; that he should allow the claim for her interim liberty according to the law passed by himself, and not allow a maiden of ripe age to encounter the risk of her reputation be fore that of her liberty.
Appius prefaced his decree by observing that the very law, which Virginius's friends were putting forward as the ground of their demand, clearly showed how much he favored liberty. But that liberty would find secure protection in it on this con dition, that it varied neither with respect to cases or persons. For with respect to those individuals who were claimed as free, that point of law was good, because any person may proceed by law (and act for them) ; with respect to her who is in the hands of her father, that there was no other person (than her father) to whom her master need relinquish his right of posses sion. That it was his determination, therefore, that her father should be sent for: in the mean time, that the claimant should suffer no loss of his right, but that he should carry off the girl with him, and promise that she should be produced on the arrival of him who was called her father. When many rather murmured against the injustice of this decision than any one individual ven tured to protest against it, the girl's uncle, Publius Numitorius, and her betrothed spouse, Icilius, just come in ; and way being made through the crowd, the multitude thinking that Appius might be most effectually resisted by the intervention of Icilius, the lictor declares that " he had decided the matter," and removes Icilius, when he attempted to raise his voice. Injustice so atro cious would have fired even a cool temper.
" By the sword, Appius," says he, " I must be removed hence, that you may carry off in silence that which you wish to be con cealed. This young woman I am about to marry, determined
384 LEGENDS OF EARLY ROME.
to have a lawful and chaste wife. Wherefore call together all the lictors even of your colleagues ; order the rods and axes to be had in readiness ; the betrothed wife of Icilius shall not re main without her father's house. Though you have taken from us the aid of our tribunes, and the power of appeal to the com mons of Rome, — the two bulwarks for maintaining our liberty, — absolute dominion has not therefore been given to you over our wives and children. Vent your fury on our backs and necks ; let chastity at least be secure. If violence be offered to her, I shall implore the protection of the citizens here present in behalf of my spouse ; Virginius will implore that of the soldiers in behalf of his only daughter ; we shall all implore the pro tection of gods and men, nor shall you carry that sentence into effect without our blood. I demand of you, Appius, con sider again and again to what lengths you are proceeding. Let Virginius, when he comes, consider what conduct he should pursue with respect to his daughter. Let him only be assured of this, that if he yield to the claims of this man, he will have to seek out another match for his daughter. As for my part, in vindicating the liberty of my spouse, life shall leave me sooner than my honor. "
The multitude was now excited, and a contest seemed likely to ensue. The lictors had taken their stand around Icilius ; nor did they, however, proceed beyond threats, when Appius said : " That it was not Virginia that was defended by Icilius, but that, being a restless man, and even now breathing the spirit of the tribuneship, he was seeking an occasion for a dis turbance. That he would not afford him material on that day ; but in order that he may now know that the concession has been made not to his petulance, but to the absent Virginius, to the name of father and to liberty, that he would not decide the cause on that day, nor interpose a decree ; that he would re quest of Marcus Claudius to forego somewhat of his right, and suffer the girl to be bailed till the next day. But unless the father attended on the following day, he gave notice to Icilius, and to men like Icilius, that neither the founder would be wanting to his own law, nor firmness to the Decemvir. "
When the time of this act of injustice was deferred, and the friends of the maiden had retired, it was first of all deter mined that the brother of Icilius and the son of Numitorius, both active young men, should proceed thence straightforward to the gate, and that Virginius should be brought from the
LEGENDS OF EARLY ROME. 385
camp with all possible haste. They proceed according to direc tions and with all speed carry the account to her father. When the claimant of the maiden was pressing Icilius to be come defendant, and give sureties, and Icilius said that that was the very thing he was doing, designedly spinning out the time, until the messengers sent to the camp might gain time for their journey, the multitude raised their hands on all sides, and every one showed himself ready to go surety for Icilius. And he with tears in his eyes says, " It is very kind of you ; on to-morrow I will avail myself of your assistance ; at present I have sufficient sureties. " Thus Virginia is bailed on the secu rity of her relations. Appius, having delayed a short time that he might not appear to have sat on account of the present case, went home when no one applied (all other concerns being given up from their solicitude about the one) and writes to his colleagues to the camp not to grant leave of absence to Virgin- ius, and even to keep him in confinement. This wicked scheme was late, as it deserved to be ; for Virginius, having already obtained his leave, had set out at the first watch.
But in the city, when the citizens were standing in the forum erect with expectation, Virginius, clad in mourning, by break of day conducts his daughter, also attired in weeds, attended by some matrons, into the forum, with a considerable body of advocates. He then began to go round and to solicit indi viduals ; and not only to entreat their aid as a boon to his prayers, but demanded it as due to him : " That he stood daily in the field of battle in defense of their children and wives, nor was there any other man, to whom a greater number of brave and intrepid deeds in war can be ascribed than to him. What availed it, whilst the city was still secure, their children would be exposed to suffer the severest hardships which would have to be dreaded was taken " Delivering these obser vations like one haranguing in an assembly, he solicited them individually. Similar arguments were used by Icilius the female attendants produced more effect by their silent tears than any language.
With mind utterly insensible to all this, (such parox ysm of madness, rather than of love, had perverted his mind,) Appius ascended the tribunal and when the claimant began to complain briefly, that justice had not been administered to him on the preceding day through desire to please the people, before either he could go through with his claim, or an oppor-
TOL. II. — 25
; a
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;
if it
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if,
386 LEGENDS OF EARLY ROME.
tunity of reply was afforded to Virginius, Appius interrupts him, [and] passed a sentence consigning her to slavery. At first all were astounded with amazement at so heinous a proceeding ; then silence prevailed for some time. Then when Marcus Claudius proceeded to seize the maiden, the matrons standing around her, and was received with piteous lamentation of the women, Virginius, menacingly extending his hands towards Appius, says, " To Icilius, and not to you, Appius, have I be trothed my daughter, and for matrimony, not prostitution, have I brought her up. Do you wish men to gratify their lust pro miscuously, like cattle and wild beasts ? Whether these per
sons will endure such things, I know not ;
will not who have arms in their hands. " When the claimant was repulsed by the crowd of women and advocates who were standing around her, silence was commanded by the crier.
The decemvir, engrossed in mind by his lustful propensities, states that not only from the abusive language of Icilius yes terday, and the violence of Virginius, of which he had the entire Roman people as witnesses, but from authentic informa tion also he ascertained, that cabals were held in the city during the whole night to stir up a sedition. Accordingly that he, being aware of that danger, had come down with armed sol diers ; not that he would molest any peaceable person, but in order to punish suitably to the majesty of the government persons disturbing the tranquillity of the state. It will, there fore, be better to remain quiet. " Go, lictor," says he, " remove the crowd ; and make way for the master to lay hold of his slave. " When, bursting with passion, he had thundered out these words, the multitude themselves voluntarily separated, and the girl stood deserted, a prey to injustice.
I hope that those
Then Virginius, when he saw no aid anywhere, says, " I beg you, Appius, first pardon a father's grief, if I have said any thing too harsh against you : in the next place, suffer me to question the nurse before the maiden, what all this matter is ? that if I have been falsely called her father, I may depart hence with a more resigned mind. " Permission being granted, he draws the girl and the nurse aside to the sheds near the temple of Cloacina, which now go by the name of the new sheds : and there snatching up a knife from a butcher, " In this one way, the only one in my power, do I secure to you your liberty. " He then transfixes the girl's breast, and looking back towards the tribunal, he says, " With this blood I devote thee, Appius,
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and thy head. " Appius, aroused by the cry raised at so dread ful a deed, orders Virginius to be seized. He, armed with the knife, cleared the way whithersoever he went, until, protected by the crowd of persons attending him, he reached the gate. Icilius and Numitorius take up the lifeless body and exhibit it to the people : they deplore the villainy of Appius, the fatal beauty of the maiden, and the dire necessity of the father. The matrons who followed exclaim, " Was this the condition of rearing children? were these the rewards of chastity? " and other things which female grief on such occasions suggests. The voice of the men, and more especially of Icilius, entirely turned on the tribunitian power.
VIRGINIA.
By THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY.
[Thomas Babington Macaulay : An English historian and essayist ; born October 25, 1800 ; son of a noted philanthropist and a Quaker lady ; died at London, December 28, 1859. He was educated at Trinity College, Cambridge, and called to the bar, but took to writing for the periodicals and to politics ; became famous for historical essays, was a warm advocate of Parliamentary Reform, and was elected to Parliament in 1830. In 1834 he was made a member of the Supreme Legislative Council for India, residing there till 1838, and making the working draft of the present Indian" Penal Code. He was Secretary at War in 1839. The first two volumes of his History of England" were published in December, 1848. His fame rests even more on his historical essays, his unsur passed speeches, and his " Lays of Ancient Rome. "]
The Patricians, during more than a century after the expul sion of the Kings, held all the high military commands. A Plebeian, even though, like Lucius Siccius, he were distin guished by his valor and knowledge of war, could serve only in subordinate posts. A minstrel, therefore, who wished to celebrate the early triumphs of his country, could hardly take any but Patricians for his heroes. The warriors who are men tioned in the two preceding lays, Horatius, Lartius, Herminius, Aulus Posthumius, ^Ebutius Elva, Sempronius Atratinus, Valerius Poplicola, were all members of the dominant order; and a poet who was singing their praises, whatever his own political opinions might be, would naturally abstain from insulting the class to which they belonged, and from reflecting on the system which had placed such men at the head of the legions of the commonwealth.
But there was a class of compositions in which the great families were by no means so courteously treated. No parts
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of early Roman history are richer with poetical coloring than those which relate to the long contest between the privileged houses and the commonalty. The population of Rome was, from a very early period, divided into hereditary castes, which, indeed, readily united to repel foreign enemies, but which regarded each other, during many years, with bitter animosity. Between those castes there was a barrier hardly less strong than that which, at Venice, parted the members of the Great Coun cil from their countrymen. In some respects, indeed, the line which separated an Icilius or a Duilius from a Posthumius or a Fabius was even more deeply marked than that which separated the rower of a gondola from a Contarini or a Morosini. At Venice the distinction was merely civil. At Rome it was both civil and religious. Among the grievances under which the Plebeians suffered, three were felt as pecul iarly severe. They were excluded from the highest magis tracies ; they were excluded from all share in the public lands ; and they were ground down to the dust by partial and bar barous legislation touching pecuniary contracts. The ruling class in Rome was a moneyed class ; and it made and adminis tered the laws with a view solely to its own interest. Thus the relation between lender and borrower was mixed up with the relation between sovereign and subject. The great men held a large portion of the community in dependence by means of advances at enormous usury. The law of debt, framed by creditors, and for the protection of creditors, was the most hor rible that has ever been known among men. The liberty, and even the life, of the insolvent were at the mercy of the Patri cian money lenders. Children often became slaves in conse quence of the misfortunes of their parents. The debtor was imprisoned, not in a public jail under the care of impartial public functionaries, but in a private workhouse belonging to the creditor. Frightful stories were told respecting these dun geons. It was said that torture and brutal violation were common; that tight stocks, heavy chains, scanty measures of food, were used to punish wretches guilty of nothing but pov erty ; and that brave soldiers, whose breasts were covered with honorable scars, were often marked still more deeply on the back by the scourges of high-born usurers.
The Plebeians were, however, not wholly without constitu tional rights. From an early period they had been admitted to some share of political power. They were enrolled each in
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his century, and were allowed a share, considerable though not proportioned to their numerical strength, in the disposal of those high dignities from which they were themselves excluded. Thus their position bore some resemblance to that of the Irish Catholics during the interval between the year 1792 and the year 1829. The Plebeians had also the privilege of annually appointing officers, named Tribunes, who had no active share in the government of the Commonwealth, but who, by degrees, acquired a power formidable even to the ablest and most reso lute Consuls and Dictators. The person of the Tribune was inviolable ; and, though he could directly effect little, he could obstruct everything.
During more than a century after the institution of the Tribuneship, the Commons struggled manfully for the removal of the grievances under which they labored; and, in spite of many checks and reverses, succeeded in wringing concession after concession from the stubborn aristocracy. At length, in the year of the city 378, both parties mustered their whole strength for their last and most desperate conflict. The popular and active Tribune, Caius Licinius, proposed the three memor able laws which are called by his name, and which were in tended to redress the three great evils of which the Plebeians complained. He was supported, with eminent ability and firmness, by his colleague, Lucius Sextius. The struggle appears to have been the fiercest that ever in any community terminated without an appeal to arms. If such a contest had raged in any Greek city, the streets would have run with blood. But, even in the paroxysms of faction, the Roman retained his gravity, his respect for law, and his tenderness for the lives of his fellow-citizens. Year after year Licinius and Sextius were reelected Tribunes. Year after year, if the narrative which has come down to us is to be trusted, they continued to exert, to the full extent, their power of stopping the whole machine of government. No curule magistrates could be chosen; no military muster could be held. We know too little of the state of Rome in those days to be able to conjecture how, during that long anarchy, the peace was kept, and ordinary justice admin istered between man and man. The animosity of both parties rose to the greatest height. The excitement, we may well suppose, would have been peculiarly intense at the annual election of Tribunes. On such occasions there can be little doubt that the great families did all that could be done, by
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threats and caresses, to break the union of the Plebeians. That union, however, proved indissoluble. At length the good cause triumphed. The Licinian laws were carried. Lucius Sextius was the first Plebeian Consul, Caius Licinius the third.
The results of this great change were singularly happy and glorious. Two centuries of prosperity, harmony, and victory followed the reconciliation of the orders. Men who remem bered Rome engaged in waging petty wars almost within sight of the Capitol lived to see her the mistress of Italy. While the disabilities of the Plebeians continued, she was scarcely able to maintain her ground against the Volscians and Hernicans. When those disabilities were removed, she rapidly became more than a match for Carthage and Macedon.
During the great Licinian contest the Plebeian poets were, doubtless, not silent. Even in modern times songs have been by no means without influence on public affairs ; and we may therefore infer that, in a society where printing was unknown, and where books were rare, a pathetic or humorous party ballad must have produced effects such as we can but faintly conceive. It is certain that satirical poems were common at Rome from a very early period. The rustics, who lived at a distance from the seat of government, and took little part in the strife of factions, gave vent to their petty local animosities in coarse Fescennine verse. The lampoons of the city were doubtless of a higher order ; and their sting was early felt by the nobility. For in the Twelve Tables, long before the time of the Licinian laws, a severe punishment was denounced against the citizen who should compose or recite verses reflecting on another. Satire is, indeed, the only sort of composition in which the Latin poets whose works have come down to us were not mere imitators of foreign models ; and it is therefore the only sort of composition in which they have never been rivaled. It was not, like their tragedy, their comedy, their epic and lyric poetry, a hothouse plant which, in return for assiduous and skillful cul ture, gave only scanty and sickly fruits. It was hardy and full of sap ; and in all the various juices which it yielded might be distinguished the flavor of the Ausonian soil. "Satire," says Quinctilian, with just pride, "is all our own. " Satire sprang, in truth, naturally from the constitution of the Roman govern ment and from the spirit of the Roman people ; and, though at length subjected to metrical rules derived from Greece, retained to the last an essentially Roman character. Lucilius was the
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earliest satirist whose works were held in esteem under the Caesars. But many years before Lucilius was born, Naevius had been flung into a dungeon, and guarded there with circum stances of unusual rigor, on account of the bitter lines in which he had attacked the great Caecilian family. The genius and spirit of the Roman satirists survived the liberty of their country, and were not extinguished by the cruel despotism of the Julian and Flavian Emperors. The great poet who told the story of Domitian's turbot, was the legitimate successor of those forgotten minstrels whose songs animated the factions of the infant Republic.
These minstrels, as Niebuhr has remarked, appear to have generally taken the popular side. We can hardly be mistaken in supposing that, at the great crisis of the civil conflict, they employed themselves in versifying all the most powerful and virulent speeches of the Tribunes, and in heaping abuse on the leaders of the aristocracy. Every personal defect, every domestic scandal, every tradition dishonorable to a noble house, would be sought out, brought into notice, and exaggerated. The illustrious head of the aristocratical party, Marcus Furius Camillus, might perhaps be, in some measure, protected by his venerable age and by the memory of his great services to the State. But Appius Claudius Crassus enjoyed no such im munity. He was descended from a long line of ancestors dis tinguished by their haughty demeanor, and by the inflexibility with which they had withstood all the demands of the Plebeian order. While the political conduct and the deportment of the Claudian nobles drew upon them the fiercest public hatred, they were accused of wanting, if any credit is due to the early history of Rome, a class of qualities which, in the military Commonwealth, is sufficient to cover a multitude of offenses. The chiefs of the family appear to have been eloquent, versed in civil business, and learned after the fashion of their age; but in war they were not distinguished by skill or valor. Some of them, as if conscious where their weakness lay, had, when filling the highest magistracies, taken internal adminis tration as their department of public business, and left the military command to their colleagues. One of them had been intrusted with an army, and had failed ignominiously. None of them had been honored with a triumph. None of them had achieved any martial exploit, such as those by which Lucius Quinctius Cincinnatus, Titus Quinctius Capitolinus, Aulus
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Cornelius Cossus, and, above all, the great Camillus, had extorted the reluctant esteem of the multitude. During the Licinian conflict, Appius Claudius Crassus signalized himself by the ability and severity with which he harangued against the two great agitators. He would naturally, therefore, be the favorite mark of the Plebeian satirists; nor would they have been at a loss to find a point on which he was open to attack.
His grandfather, called, like himself, Appius Claudius, had left a name as much detested as that of Sextus Tarquinius. This elder Appius had been Consul more than seventy years before the introduction of the Licinian laws. By availing him self of a singular crisis in public feeling, he had obtained the consent of the Commons to the abolition of the Tribuneship, and had been the chief of that Council of Ten to which the whole direction of the State had been committed. In a few months his administration had become universally odious. It had been swept away by an irresistible outbreak of popular fury; and its memory was still held in abhorrence by the whole city. The immediate cause of the downfall of this execrable govern ment was said to have been an attempt made by Appius Claudius upon the chastity of a beautiful young girl of humble birth. The story ran that the Decemvir, unable to succeed by bribes and solicitations, resorted to an outrageous act of tyranny. A vile dependent of the Claudian house laid claim to the damsel as his slave. The cause was brought before the tribunal of Appius. The wicked magistrate, in defiance of the clearest
proofs, gave judgment for the claimant. But the girl's father, a brave soldier, saved her from servitude and dishonor by stab bing her to the heart in the sight of the whole Forum. That blow was the signal for a general explosion. Camp and city rose at once ; the Ten were pulled down ; the Tribuneship was reestablished ; and Appius escaped the hands of the executioner only by a voluntary death.
It can hardly be doubted that a story so admirably adapted to the purposes both of the poet and of the demagogue would be eagerly seized upon by minstrels burning with hatred against the Patrician order, against the Claudian house, and especially against the grandson and namesake of the infamous Decemvir.
In order that the reader may judge fairly of these fragments of the lay of Virginia, he must imagine himself a Plebeian who has just voted for the reelection of Sextius and Licinius. All the power of the Patricians has been exerted to throw out the
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two great champions of the Commons. Every Posthumius, jiEmilius, and Cornelius has used his influence to the utmost. Debtors have been let out of the workhouses on condition of voting against the men of the people : clients have been posted to hiss and interrupt the favorite candidates : Appius Claudius Crassus has spoken with more than his usual eloquence and asperity: all has been in vain; Licinius and Sextius have a fifth time carried all the tribes: work is suspended: the booths are closed : the Plebeians bear on their shoulders the two cham pions of liberty through the Forum. Just at this moment it is announced that a popular poet, a zealous adherent of the Trib unes, has made a new song which will cut the Claudian nobles to the heart. The crowd gathers round him, and calls on him to recite it. He takes his stand on the spot where, according to tradition, Virginia, more than seventy years ago, was seized by the pandar of Appius, and he begins his story.
