Now at this time many of the laws of the good king Servius were restored, which Tarquinius the tyrant had overthrown. For the commons again chose their own judges, to try all causes between a man and his neighbour; and they had again their meetings and their sacrifices in the city and in the country, every man in his own tribe and in his own district. And lest there should seem to be two kings instead of one, it was ordered that one only of the two should bear rule at one time, and that the lictors with their rods and axes should walk before him alone. And the two were to bear rule month by month.
Then King Tarquinius sent to Rome, to ask for all the goods that had belonged to him; and the senate after a while decreed that the goods should be given back. But those whom he had sent to Rome to ask for his goods, had meetings with many young men of noble birth, and a plot was laid to bring back King Tarquinius. So the young men wrote letters to Tarquinius, pledging to him their faith, and among them were Titus and Tiberius, the sons of Brutus. But a slave happened to overhear them talking together, and when he knew that the letters were to be given to the messengers of Tarquinius, he went and told all that he had heard to Brutus and to Publius Valerius. Then they came and seized the young men and their letters, and so the plot was broken up.
After this there was a strange and piteous sight to behold. Brutus and Publius sat on their judgment seats in the Forum, and the young men were brought before them. Then Brutus bade the lictors to bind his own two sons, Titus and Tiberius, together with the others, and to scourge them with rods, according to the law. And after they had been scourged, the lictors struck off their heads with their axes, before the eyes of their father; and Brutus neither stirred from his seat nor turned away his eyes from the sight, yet men saw as they looked on him that his heart was grieving inwardly over his children. Then they marvelled at him, because he had loved justice more than his own blood, and had not spared his own children when they had been false to their country, and had offended against the law.
When King Tarquinius found that the plot was broken up, he persuaded the people of Veii and the people of Tarquinii, cities of the Etruscans, to try to bring him back to Rome by force of arms. So they assembled their armies, and Tarquinius led them within the Roman border. Brutus and Publius led the Romans out to meet them, and it chanced that Brutus, with the Roman horsemen, and Aruns, the son of King Tarquinius, with the Etruscan horse, met each other in advance of the main battles. Aruns, seeing Brutus in his kingly robe, and with the lictors of a king around him, levelled his spear, and spurred his horse against him. Brutus met him, and each ran his spear through the body of the other, and they both fell dead. Then the horsemen on both parts fought, and afterwards the main battles, and the Veientines were beaten, but the Tarquinians beat the Romans, and the battle was neither won nor lost; but in the night there came a voice out of the wood that was hard by, and it said, “One man more has fallen on the part of the Etruscans than on the part of the Romans; the Romans are to conquer in the war.” At this the Etruscans were afraid, and believing the voice, they immediately marched home to their own country, while the Romans took up Brutus, and carried him home and buried him; and Publius made an oration in his praise, and all the matrons of Rome mourned for him for a whole year, because he had avenged Lucretia well.
When Brutus was dead, Publius ruled over the people himself; and he began to build a great and strong house on the top of the hill Velia, which looks down upon the Forum. This made the people say, “Publius wants to become a king, and is building a house in a strong place, as if for a citadel where he may live with his guards, and oppress us.” But he called the people together, and when he went down to them, the lictors who walked before him lowered the rods and the axes which they bore, to show that he owned the people to be greater than himself. He complained that they had mistrusted him, and he said that he would not build his house on the top of the hill Velia, but at the bottom of it, and his house should be no stronghold. And he called on them to make a law, that whoever should try to make himself king should be accursed, and whosoever would might slay him. Also, that if a magistrate were going to scourge or kill any citizen, he might carry his cause before the people, and they should judge him. When these laws were passed, all men said, “Publius is a lover of the people, and seeks their good”: and he was called Publicola, which means, “the people’s friend,” from that day forward.
Then Publius called the people together in their centuries, and they chose Spurius Lucretius, the father of Lucretia, to be their magistrate for the year, in the room of Brutus. But he was an old man, and his strength was so much gone, that after a few days he died. They then chose in his room Marcus Horatius.
Now Publius and Marcus cast lots which should dedicate the temple to Jupiter on the hill of the Capitol, which King Tarquinius had built; and the lot fell to Marcus, to the great discontent of the friends of Publius. So when Marcus was going to begin the dedication, and had his hand on the doorpost of the temple, and was speaking the set words of prayer, there came a man running to tell him that his son was dead. But he said, “Then let them carry him out and bury him”; and he neither wept nor lamented, for the words of lamentation ought not to be spoken when men are praying to the blessed gods, and dedicating a temple to their honour. So Marcus honoured the gods above his son, and dedicated the temple on the hill of the Capitol; and his name was recorded on the front of the temple.
PORSENNA’S WAR UPON THE ROMANS; THE STORY OF HORATIUS AT THE BRIDGE, AS TOLD BY DIONYSIUS
But when King Tarquinius found that the Veientines and Tarquinians were not able to restore him to his kingdom, he went to Clusium, a city in the farthest part of Etruria, beyond the Ciminian forest, and besought Lars Porsenna, the king of Clusium, to aid him. So Porsenna raised a great army, and marched against Rome, and attacked the Romans on the hill Janiculum, the hill on the outside of the city beyond the Tiber.[b]
When the two armies charged, they both fought bravely and sustained the shock for a considerable time, the Romans having the advantage of their enemies both in experience and perseverance, and the Tyrrhenians and Latins being much superior in number. And, many being killed on both sides, fear seized the Romans; first, those on the left wing, when they saw their two commanders, Valerius, and Lucretius, carried out of the field wounded; after which, those on the right wing, who had already the advantage over the forces commanded by Tarquinius, seeing the flight of their friends, were possessed with the same terror. And all of them, hastening to the city, and endeavouring to force their way in a body over the same bridge, the enemy made a strong attack upon them; and the city having no walls in that part next the river, was very near being taken by storm, which had certainly happened if the pursuers had entered it at the same time with those who fled. But three men put a stop to the pursuit of the enemy and saved the whole army; two of these were Spurius Lartius and Titus Herminius among the elders, who had the command of the right wing; and of the younger, Publius Horatius, who was called Cocles from the loss of one of his eyes, which had been struck out in a battle; a person, of all men, the most remarkable for the fine proportion of his limbs, and for his bravery. This man was nephew to Marcus Horatius, one of the consuls, but derived his high birth from Marcus Horatius, one of the three brothers who overcame the three Albans. These three without other assistance, placing their backs against the bridge, stopped the passage of the enemy for a considerable time, and stood their ground while a shower of all sorts of weapons fell upon them, and numbers also pressed them sword in hand, till the whole army passed the river.