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CHAPTER I.

OF THE ORIGIN OF THE ROMANS.

In Alba he shall fix his royal seat.—­Dryden.

1.  The Romans were particularly desirous of being thought descendants of the gods, as if to hide the meanness of their real ancestry. AEne’as, the son of Venus and Anchi’ses, having escaped from the destruction of Troy, after many adventures and dangers, arrived in Italy, A.M. 2294, where he was kindly received by Lati’nus, king of the Latins, who promised him his daughter Lavin’ia in marriage.

2.  Turnus, king of the Ru’tuli, was the first who opposed AEne’as, he having long made pretensions to her himself.  A war ensued, in which the Trojan hero was victorious, and Turnus slain.  In consequence of this, Lavin’ia became the wife of AEne’as, who built a city to her honour, and called it Lavin’ium.  Some time after, engaging in a war against Mezen’tius, one of the petty kings of the country, he was vanquished in turn, and died in battle, after a reign of four years. 3.  Asca’nius his son, succeeded to the kingdom; and to him Sil’vius, a second son, whom he had by Lavin’ia.  It would be tedious and uninteresting to recite a dry catalogue of the kings that followed, of whom we know little more than the names; it will be sufficient to say, that the succession continued for nearly four hundred years in the same family, and that Nu’mitor, the fifteenth from AEne’as, was the last king of Alba.

Nu’mitor, who took possession of the kingdom in consequence of his father’s will, had a brother named Amu’lius, to whom were left the treasures which had been brought from Troy. 4.  As riches too generally prevail against right, Amu’lius made use of his wealth to supplant his brother, and soon found means to possess himself of the kingdom.  Not contented with the crime of usurpation, he added that of murder also.  Nu’mitor’s sons first fell a sacrifice to his suspicions; and to remove all apprehensions of being one day disturbed in his ill-gotten power, he caused Rhe’a Sil’via, his brother’s only daughter, to become a vestal.

5.  His precautions, however, were all frusrtrated in the event.  Rhe’a Sil’via, and, according to tradition, Mars the god of war, were the parents of two boys, who were no sooner born, than devoted by the usurper to destruction. 7.  The mother was condemned to be buried alive, the usual punishment for vestals who had violated their vows, and the twins were ordered to be flung into the river Tiber. 8.  It happened, however, at the time this rigorous sentence was put into execution, that the river had, more than usual, overflowed its banks, so that the place where the children were thrown being distant from the main current, the water was too shallow to drown them.  It is said by some, that they were exposed in a cradle, which, after floating for a time, was, by the water’s retiring, left on