desirous of everything being done in due form, that the event might
correspond with the prediction, forthwith went down to the Tiber. In
the meantime the Roman priest sacrificed the cow to Diana, gave great
satisfaction to the king, and to the whole state.

Servius, though he had now acquired an indisputable right to the
kingdom by long possession, yet, as he heard that expressions were
sometimes thrown out by young Tarquin, to the effect that he occupied
the throne without the consent of the people, having first secured the
good-will of the people by dividing among them, man by man, the land
taken from their enemies, he ventured to propose the question to
them, whether they chose and ordered that he should be king, and
was declared king with greater unanimity than any other of his
predecessors. And yet even this circumstance did not lessen Tarquin's
hope of obtaining the throne; nay, because he had observed that the
matter of the distribution of land to the people was against the will
of the fathers, he thought that an opportunity was now presented to
him of arraigning Servius before the fathers with greater violence,
and of increasing his own influence in the senate, being himself a
hot-tempered youth, while his wife Tullia roused his restless temper
at home. For the royal house of the Roman kings also exhibited an
example of tragic guilt, so that through their disgust of kings,
liberty came more speedily, and the rule of this king, which was
attained through crime, was the last. This Lucius Tarquinius (whether
he was the son or grandson of Tarquinius Priscus is not clear:
following the greater number of authorities, however, I should feel
inclined to pronounce him his son) had a brother, Arruns Tarquinius, a
youth of a mild disposition. To these two, as has been already stated,
the two Tullias, daughters of the king, had been married, they also
themselves being of widely different characters. It had come to pass,