The Comic History of Rome. À Beckett Gilbert Abbott
skirted with flag stones towards the outer side, and the Romans no doubt would derive more security from laying down their flags on the outer wall than from hanging out their banners.
The greatest work, however, of the reign of Servius was the reform of the Constitution, which he constructed with a view to the reconciling of the wide differences between the patricians and the plebeians, so as to form one powerful body by making somebodies of those who had hitherto been treated as nobodies. His first care was to divide the plebeians into thirty tribes – a name derived from the word tribus, or three, and applied to the three plebeian tribes – the derivation being so simple that were we to ask any schoolboy if he understood it, his answer would be, that "he might be whipped" and he would assuredly deserve to be whipped "if he didn't." These thirty tribes were placed under an officer called a tribunus, whose duty it was to keep a list of the members and collect the tributum– a word, to which in the reader's ready mind, the word tribute will at once be attributed. Besides the orders of patricians and plebeians, whose position was determined by descent alone, Servius thought there were many who might be connected together by a tie proper to them all, namely, that of property. He accordingly established a census to be held every five years, in which the name of every one who had come to man's estate was put down, together with the amount of his other estate, if he was lucky enough to have any. The whole number was divided into two heads, one of which was foot, or pedites, and the other horse, or equites, among whom an equitable share of rights and duties had to be distributed. The pedites, or infantry, were not all on the same footing, but were subdivided into six classes, according to the amount of their possessions, which determined their position in the army; but even the sixth class, or those who had no other possession than their self-possession, were not excluded from the service. Each class was divided into seniors and juniors, the former being men between forty-five and sixty; the latter, including all below forty-five and above seventeen, at which early age, though frequently not bearded themselves, they were expected to go forth and beard the enemy. In addition to the two assemblies of the curiæ (the comitia curiata) and the tribes (the comitia tributa), there was instituted by Servius a great national assembly called the comitia centuriata, and consisting of the whole of the centuries. Of these centuries there were altogether one hundred and ninety-three; but, instead of every individual member being allowed a separate vote, the suffrage was distributed amongst classes according to their wealth or the number of asses they possessed, a principle which the opponent of a mere property qualification will regard as somewhat asinine. By this arrangement the poor were practically excluded from voting at all, unless the rich were disagreed among themselves, when the merely industrious classes, such as the Fabri– the very extensive family of the Smiths and the Carpenters – the Cornicines– the respectable race of Hornblowers – and others of similar degree sometimes had sufficient weight to turn the balance.
Though the equestrian centuries comprised the richest class, they seem to have been in one respect little better than beggars on horseback, for each eques received from the treasury a sum for the purchase of his horse and an annual grant for its maintenance. The amount was levied upon orphans and widows, who were, it is true, exempt from other imposts, though their contributing from their slender means to keep a horse on its legs caused many to complain that the law rode rough-shod over them. The Assembly of the Centuries was a grand step towards self-government, and, though many may think that wealth had an actual preponderance, it was always possible for a member of a lower class to get into a higher, and thus an inducement to self-advancement was secured, which is, certainly, not one of the least useful ends of government. There were numerous instances of energetic Romans rising from century to century with a rapidity showing that they were greatly in advance of the age, or, at all events, of the century in which they were originally placed by their lot, or rather by their little.
Servius introduced into Rome the Etruscan As, of the value of which we can give no nearer notion than by stating the fact that a Roman sheep was worth about ten Etruscan asses. To the poorer classes these coins could have been of little service, and by way of small change they were permitted to use shells, from which we no doubt get the phrase of "shelling out," a quaint expression sometimes used to describe the process of paying. In some parts of the world shells are still current as cash, and even among ourselves fish are employed at cards as the representatives of money. Though in ordinary use for the smaller purposes of commerce, shells were not receivable as taxes, for when the Government required the sinews of war it would not have been satisfied with mussels or any other similar substitute.
The Roman As was of bronze and stamped on one side with a portrait of Janus, whose two heads we never thought much better than one, though they appeared appropriately on a coin as a sign, perhaps, that people are often made doublefaced by money. On the other side was the prow of a ship, which might be emblematical of the fact that money is necessary to keep one above water.
In the time of Servius all were expected to arm themselves according to their means, and the richest were thoroughly clad in bronze for the protection of their persons, while the poorer, who could not afford anything of the kind, were obliged to trust for their self-defence to their own natural metal. The patricians carried a clypeus, or shield, of such dimensions as to cover frequently the whole body, and by hiding himself behind it the wearer often escaped a hiding from the enemy. The material of which the clypeus was composed was wood covered with a bull's skin that had been so thoroughly tanned as to afford safety against the severest leathering.
CHAPTER THE FOURTH.
FROM THE ACCESSION OF TARQUINIUS SUPERBUS TO THE BANISHMENT OF THE ROYAL FAMILY, AND THE ABOLITION OF THE KINGLY DIGNITY
Tarquinius had ascended the throne more by the force of his fists, than by the strength of his arms; for he had aimed a blow, not only at the crown, but at the face of the unhappy sovereign who had preceded him. Carrying his hostility beyond the grave, Tarquinius refused to bury his animosity, or to grant his victim a funeral. The upstart nature of the new king gained for him the nickname of Superbus, or the proud, though he had as little to be proud of as some of the most contemptible characters in history. He, however, asserted himself with so much audacity, that the people were completely overawed by his pretensions, and many made away with themselves, to insure their lives, by a sort of Irish policy, against Tarquin's violence. He took away the privileges of the plebeians, and sent many to the scaffold, by employing them as common bricklayers; but there were several who preferred laying violent hands on themselves, to laying a single brick of the magnificent buildings which he planned, in the hope, perhaps, that the splendour of the constructions of his reign would induce posterity to place the best construction on his character.
He coolly assumed the whole administration of the law, and added the office of executioner to that of judge, while he combined with both the character of a criminal, by seizing the property of all those whom he punished, and thus adding robbery to violence. To prevent the possibility of a majority against him in the Senate, he cut off several of the heads of that body; and though he never condescended to submit to the Assembly a single question, he treated the unhappy members as if they had much to answer for.
Finding the continued ill-treatment of his own people getting rather monotonous, he sought the pleasures of variety, by harassing the Volscians, whom he robbed of a sufficient sum to enable him to commence a temple to Jupiter. Bricks and mortar soon ran up above the estimated cost; and Tarquin had scarcely built the lower floor, when he came to the old story of shortness of funds, which he supplied by making the people pay as well as work, and taxing at once their time and their pockets. This temple was on the Capitoline Hill; and it is said that in digging the foundations the workmen hit upon a freshly-bleeding human head, which, of course, must be regarded as an idle tale; nor would it be right for history to hold an elaborate inquest on this head, since it would be impossible to find a verdict without having first found the body. The augur, who, according to the legend, was present on the occasion, is reported to have made a post-mortem examination of the head, which he identified as that of one Tolus; but who Tolus was, or whether he ever was at all, we are told nothing on any competent authority. The augur, whose duty it was to be ready to interpret anything that turned up, no sooner saw the head, than putting upon it the best face he could, he declared it to be a sign that Rome was destined to be the head of the world – an obvious piece of fulsome adulation, worthy of being