Part 14 (1/2)
Without intending to do it, Romulus aroused a great deal of ill feeling by these two things that he did. The patricians formed a sort of senate-a body of elders-for the government of Rome, and it seemed to them that they should have been consulted about the hostages and the division of land. No one knew but the Tuscans might rise up again against Rome, and in that case these men ought to be here to serve as a pledge. Moreover, the land belonged not to Romulus personally but to the city, and the senate ought to have had the dividing of it. It was time to settle whether Rome was to be governed by one man, or by the elders of the people, as in the days of old. It was not fit that men should hold land who were not descended from land-holders.
Not all the elders, or senators, took this view. It really never had been decided how far a general who took command in a war had a right to dictate in the outcome of it. Generally speaking, in a war, the men who fought took whatever they could lay their hands on. They plundered a city when they took it, and each man had what he could carry away. In this case the city of the Veientines had not been plundered, because the rulers surrendered and asked for peace before Romulus had a chance to take it.
The land which had been given up was a kind of plunder, and the general had a right to divide it. This was the view of Caius Cossus and Marcus Colonus and his brother, and some of the others in the senate. But Naso-who never had enough land-and some of his friends, who never were satisfied unless they had their own way, had a great deal to say about the high-handed methods of the veteran general, the founder of the city. They said that he treated them all as if they were under the yoke, and that this was insulting to free-born Romans. In short, the time had come when all of the men who wished for more power than they had were ready to declare that Romulus was a tyrant. It was quite true that he was the only man strong enough to stand in their way if he chose. It was also true that he was the only man who was disposed to consider the rights of the _plebs_ and the outsiders who were not citizens, and had according to ancient custom no right to share in the governing of the city at all.
XXII
THE GOAT'S MARSH
Public opinion in Rome was like a whirlpool. The currents that battled in it circled round and round, but got nowhere. Calvo, the last of the older men who had been fathers of the people when Romulus founded the city, began to wonder if at last the downfall of the chief was near. He could not see how one man could make peace between the factions, or how he could dominate them by his single will. But it was never the way of the veteran pontiff to talk, when talk would do no good, and he waited to learn what Romulus would do.
What Romulus did was to visit him one night at his villa, alone and in secret. He had sent his servant beforehand to ask that Calvo would arrange this, and when some hours later a tall man in the dress of a shepherd appeared at the gate, the old porter admitted him without question, and there was no one in the way. The two sat and talked in the solar chamber, with no witnesses but the stars.
”They do not understand,” Romulus said thoughtfully, when they had been all over the struggle between the two parties, from beginning to end.
”They do not see that the thing which must be done is the thing which is right, whether it be by my will or another's.”
”They are ready, some of them, to declare that a thing is wrong because you saw it before they did,” said Calvo dryly.
”The people are with me-I believe,” said Romulus, ”the soldiers, and the common folk-but they have no voice in the government. Yet are they men, Tertius Calvo,-many of them children of Mars as we are. Am I not bound to do what is right for them, as well as for the dwellers within the palaces?”
”I have always believed so,” nodded Calvo. ”When a man makes a road or a bridge, he does not make it for the strong and powerful alone; it is even more for the weak, the ignorant and those who cannot work for themselves.
If the G.o.ds meant not this to be so, they would arrange it so that the sun should s.h.i.+ne only on a few, and the rest should dwell in twilight; they would give rain only to those whom they favor, and good water only to the chosen of the G.o.ds. But the world is not made in that way. Therefore we who are the chosen of the G.o.ds to do their will on earth should be of equal mind toward all-men, women and children.”
Calvo paused, as if he were thinking how he should say what he thought, and then went on.
”Whether men are high or low, Romulus, founder of the city, they have minds and they think, and the G.o.ds, who know all men's souls, hear their unspoken thoughts as well as ours. Therefore it is not a small thing when many believe in a man, for their belief, like a river, will grow and grow until it makes itself felt by those who hold themselves as greater. I have seen this happen when a good man whom all men loved came to die. He was greater after his death than when he was alive, for the grief and the love of the poor encompa.s.sed his spirit and made it strong.”
Romulus smiled in the way he did when he was thinking more than he meant to say. ”I shall be very strong when I am dead,” was his only comment. And Calvo knew that it was the truth.
Romulus was now fifty-eight years old, and Calvo was seventy-two. Both of them were thinking that it would not be many years when they would both, perhaps, be talking together in the world of shadows as they were talking now. Then Romulus told Calvo what he was going to do.
This talk took place a little after the beginning of the fifth month, which the Romans called Quintilis, but which we call July. In this month the sun is hot and the air is sluggish and damp, and in the year when these things happened it was more so than usual. The heralds announced in the market place, one sultry morning, that there would be a meeting of all the people at a place called the Goat's Marsh some miles outside the city.
Romulus would there tell publicly why he sent back their hostages to the Tuscans and how the lands were to be divided among the soldiers. No longer would the people have to depend on what was said by one and another, he would tell them himself. Partly out of curiosity, partly with the determination that they too would speak, the greater part of the patricians also went to hear.
The Goat's Marsh was no longer a marsh, but it had kept its name partly because of the fig orchards, which bore the little fruits called the goat figs. There was a plain at the foot of a little hill, which made it a good place for any public meeting, and the country people for miles around crowded in to see Romulus and to hear him speak.
They raised a shout as his tall figure appeared but he waved them to silence.
”I have not much to say,” he began, and in the still air the intense interest of his listeners seemed to tingle like lightning before a storm, ”but much has been said which was not true. I will not waste time in repeating lies.
”Ye know that the Tuscan cities were here before we came, and that their people are many. We cannot kill them or drive them away, if we would. They are our neighbors.
”We made war against them and we beat them, and took their city Fidenae and their city Veii. Before we made peace they had to pay us certain lands.
Before peace was made and the price paid, there were sons of their blood in our power, whom we kept as a pledge that they were willing to pay the price. That was all. They were not guilty of any crime against us. They were here to show that their people meant to keep faith. When peace was made I sent them back.