down beneath the earth, which implied that this spot was destined to become the head of the whole world; and hence the old name of the “Saturnine Hill” was changed to the “Capitoline.”  All the gods who had been worshipped from time immemorial on this hill, when consulted by auguries, gave permission for the removal of their shrines and altars in order that room might be provided for the gigantic temple of the great Ruler of the gods, save Terminus and Youth, who refused to abandon the sacred spot, and whose obstinacy was therefore regarded as a sign that the boundaries of the city should never be removed, and that her youth would be perpetually renewed.  But a still more wonderful sign of the future of Rome was given on this occasion.  A mysterious woman, endowed with preternatural longevity—­believed to be no other than Deiphobe, the Cumaean Sibyl herself, the daughter of Circe and Gnostus, who had been the guide of AEneas into the world of the dead—­appeared before Tarquin and offered him for a certain price nine books, which contained her prophecies in mystic rhyme.  Tarquin, ignorant of the value of the books, refused to buy them.  The Sibyl departed, and burned three of them.  Coming back immediately, she offered the remaining six at the same price that she had asked for the nine.  Tarquin again refused; whereupon the Sibyl burned three more volumes, and returning the third time, made the same demand for the reduced remnant.  Struck with the singularity of the proceeding, the king consulted the augurs; and learning from them the inestimable preciousness of the books, he bought them, and the Sibyl forthwith vanished as mysteriously as she had appeared.  This legend reads like a moral apothegm on the increasing value of life as it passes away.

Whatever credence we may attach to this account of their origin—­or rather, whatever sediment of historical truth may have been precipitated in the fable—­there can be no doubt that the so-called Sibylline books of Rome did actually exist, and that for a very long period they were held in the highest veneration.  They were concealed in a stone chest, buried under the ground, in the temple of Jupiter, on the Capitol.  Two officers of the highest rank were appointed to guard them, whose punishment, if found unfaithful to their trust, was to be sewed up alive in a sack and thrown into the sea.  The number of guardians was afterwards increased, at first to ten and then to fifteen, whose priesthood was for life, and who in consequence were exempted from the obligation of serving in the army and from other public offices in the city.  Being regarded as the priests of Apollo, they had each in front of his house a brazen tripod, similar to that on which the priestess of Delphi sat.