master's
children could see him Plautus ran to yoke himself again to the
mill-spindle, while the Greek left the place, astounded by this episode.

What a people this, which converted its debtors into slaves and turned
its poets into beasts of burden!

The Greek sauntered back through the Forum munching his loaf of bread.
He was waiting for the Senate to assemble, and to pass away the time he
climbed to the crest of the Palatine Hill, the sacred ground which was
the cradle of Rome. He visited the Lupercal Grotto where Romulus and
Remus had been suckled by the she-wolf. At the entrance to the narrow
cave, denuded by the winter, the Ruminal fig tree extended its naked
branches, the famous tree in the shade of which the twin founders of the
city had frolicked. Near it on a granite pedestal stood the wolf, in
dark and lustrous bronze, the work of an Etruscan artist, with the
hideous half-open fauces, and her belly bristling with a double row of
gleaming teats to which two naked children clung, sprawling on the
ground.

From this height Actaeon looked down upon the broad city, a wave of roofs
between the seven hills, invading the heights and dispersing through the
deep valleys. Almost at the side of the Palatine rose the Capitolium,
the great fortress of Rome, on the naked crags of the Tarpeian rock, and
the Greek passed from the summit of one to that of the other to examine
the temple of Jupiter Capitolinus, more famous than beautiful.

He turned his back on the rude temple of Mars, which occupied the
highest point of the Palatine, and following a path between abrupt rocks
he crossed to the Capitoline. On his way he met the priests of Jupiter,
walking with sacerdotal rigidity as if ever offering sacrifices to their
god. He saw the vestals wrapped in their flowing white veils, marching
with a sturdy tread. Some _milites_ were climbing up to the temple of
Mars, their broad breasts encased in overlapping bands of copper, their
bare thighs covered by strips of wool hanging from the waist; one hand
resting on the pommel of their short swords while they talked with
enthusiasm of the coming Illyrian campaign, without thought of the
situation of their allies in Iberia.

Actaeon entered the sacred precincts of the Capitoline, surrounded by
frowning ramparts. It was the ancient mount Tarpeius, with its two
summits united by an extensive flat. The higher part which lay toward
the north was occupied by the Arx or citadel of Rome; o