blood, and cried aloud, "By this blood I swear, calling
the Gods to witness, that I will pursue with fire and sword and with all
other means of destruction Tarquin the Proud, with his accursed wife and
all his race; and that I will suffer no man hereafter to be king in this
city of Rome." And when he had ended he bade the others swear after the
same form of words. This they did and, forgetting their grief, thought
only how they might best avenge this great wrong that had been done.
First they carried the body of Lucretia, all covered with blood, into
the market-place of Collatia (for these things happened at Collatia),
and roused all the people that saw a thing so shameful and pitiful, till
all that were of an age for war assembled themselves carrying arms. Some
of them stayed behind to keep the gates of Collatia, that no one should
carry tidings of the matter to the King, and the rest Brutus took with
him with all the speed that he might to Rome. There also was stirred up
a like commotion, Brutus calling the people together and telling them
what a shameful wrong the young Tarquin had done. Also he spake to them
of the labours with which the King wore them out in the building of
temples and palaces and the like, so that they who had been in time past
the conquerors of all the nations round about were now come to be but
as hewers of wood and drawers of water. Also he set before them in what
shameful sort King Tullius had been slain, and how his daughter had
driven her chariot over the dead body of her father. With suchlike words
he stirred up the people to great wrath, so that they passed a decree
that there should be no more kings in Rome, and that Lucius Tarquin with
his wife and his children should be banished. After this Brutus made
haste to the camp and stirred up the army against the King. And in the
meanwhile Queen Tullia fled from her palace, all that saw her cursing
her as she went As for King Tarquin, when he came to the city he found
the gates shut against him; thereupon he returned and dwelt at Caere
that is in the land of Etruria, and two of his sons with him; but Sextus
going to Gabii, as to a city which he had made his own, was slain by the
inhabitants.
The King and his house being thus driven out, Brutus was made consul
with one Collatinus for his colleague. First he bound the people by an
oath that they would never thereafter suffer any man to be king at
Rome; and afterwards, because Collatinus was of
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