of any treaty.  The herald asked King Tullus, “Dost thou command me, O king, to conclude a treaty with the pater patratus of the Alban people?” On the king so commanding him he said, “I demand vervain of thee, O king.”  The king replied, “Take some that is pure.”  The herald brought a pure blade of grass from the citadel; then again he asked the king, “Dost thou, O king, appoint me the royal delegate of the Roman people, the Quirites, and my appurtenances and attendants?” The king replied, “So far as it may be done without detriment to me and to the Roman people, the Quirites, I do so.”  The herald was Marcus Valerius, who appointed Spurius Fusius pater patratus,[21] touching his head and hair with the vervain.[22] The pater patratus was appointed ad iusiurandum patrandum, that is, to ratify the treaty; and he went through it in a lengthy preamble, which, being expressed in a long set form, it is not worth while to repeat.  After having set forth the conditions, he said:  “Hear, O Jupiter; hear, O pater patratus of the Alban people, and ye, O Alban people, give ear.  As those conditions, from first to last, have been publicly recited from those tablets or wax without wicked or fraudulent intent, and as they have been most correctly understood here this day, the Roman people will not be the first to fail to observe those conditions.  If they shall be the first to do so by public consent, by fraudulent intent, on that day do thou, O Jupiter, so strike the Roman people, as I shall here this day strike this swine; and do thou strike them so much the more, as thou art more mighty and more powerful.”  When he said this, he struck the swine with a flint stone.  The Albans likewise went through their own set form and oath by the mouth of their own dictator and priests.

The treaty being concluded, the twin-brothers, as had been agreed, took arms.  While their respective friends exhorted each party, reminding them that their country’s gods, their country and parents, all their fellow-citizens both at home and in the army, had their eyes then fixed on their arms, on their hands, being both naturally brave, and animated by the shouts and exhortations of their friends, they advanced into the midst between the two lines.  The two armies on both sides had taken their seats in front of their respective camps, free rather from danger for the moment than from anxiety:  for sovereign power was at stake, dependent on the valour and fortune of so few.  Accordingly, therefore, on the tip-toe of expectation, their attention was eagerly fixed on a spectacle far from pleasing.  The signal was given:  and the three youths on each side, as if in battle array, rushed to the charge with arms presented, bearing in their breasts the spirit of mighty armies.  Neither the one nor the other heeded their personal danger, but the public dominion or slavery was present to their mind, and the thought that the fortune of their country would be such hereafter as they themselves