Tarquinius, in admiration, heaped various honors upon him, accorded
him the privilege of a bronze image, and did not again make any change
in the established constitution, but employed Attus as a counselor on
all matters.

He fought against the Latins who had revolted, and afterwards against
the Sabines, who, aided by the Etruscans as allies, had invaded the
Roman country; and he conquered them all. He discovered that one of
the priestesses of Vesta, who are required by custom to remain virgins
all their life, had been seduced by a man, whereupon he arranged a
kind of underground chamber with a long passage, and after placing in
it a bed, a light, and a table nearly full of foods, he brought
thither the unchaste woman escorted by a procession and having
introduced her alive into the room walled it up. From his institution
this plan of punishing those of the priestesses that do not keep their
virginity has continued to prevail. The men that outrage them have
their necks inserted in cloven pillars in the Forum, and then are
maltreated naked until they give up the ghost.

However, an attack was made upon Tarquinius by the children of Marcius
because he would not yield the sovereignty to them, but instead placed
a certain Tullius, borne to him by a slave woman, at the head of them
all. This more than anything else displeased the patricians. The young
men interested some of the latter class in their cause and formed a
plot against the king. They arrayed two men like rustics, equipped
with axes and scythes, and made them ready to attack him. So these
two, when they did not find Tarquinius in the Forum, went to the royal
court (pretending, of course, to have a dispute with each other) and
asked for admission to his presence. Their request was granted and
they began to make opposing arguments, and while Tarquinius was giving