All rose to their feet, as Catiline entered, hushed in dread expectation.
He stood for one moment, gazing on his adherents, tried veterans every man of them, case-hardened in the furnace of Sylla's fiery discipline, with proud confidence and triumph in his eye; and then addressed them in clear high tones, piercing as those of an adamantine trumpet.
"Since," he said, "it is permitted to us neither to live in Rome securely, nor to die in Rome honorably, I go forth—will you follow me?"
And, with an unanimous cry, as it had been the voice of one man, they answered,
"To the death, Catiline!"
"I go forth, harming no one, hating no one, fearing no one! Guiltless of all, but of loving the people! Goaded to ruin by the proud patricians, injured, insulted, well nigh maddened, I go forth to seek, not power nor revenge, but innocence and safety. If they will leave me peace, the lamb shall be less gentle; if they will drive me into war, the famished lion shall be tamer. Soldiers of Sylla, will you have Sylla's friend in peace for your guardian, in war for your captain?"
And again, in one tumultuous shout, they replied, "In peace, or in war, through life, and unto death, Catiline!"
"Behold, then, your Eagle!"—and, with the word, he snatched from a marble slab on which it lay, covered by tapestry, the silver bird of Mars, hovering with expanded wings over a bannered staff, and brandished it on high, in triumph. "Behold your standard, your omen, and your God! Swear, that it shall shine yet again above Rome's Capitol!"
Every sword flashed from its scabbard, every knee was bent; and kneeling, with the bright blades all pointed like concentric sunbeams toward that bloody idol, in deep emotion, and deep awe, they swore to be true to the Eagle, traitors to Rome, parricides to their country.
"One cup of wine, and then to horse, and to glory!"