there
would be about them no stain or sign of blood. This done, they entered
the Temple of Juno, bowing low, and taking care not to touch the statue
of the goddess, which only the priest could touch. They asked the
goddess whether it was her pleasure to go with them to Rome.

Then a wonder happened; from the mouth of the image came the words "I
will go." And when they now touched it, it moved of its own accord. It
was carried to Rome, where a temple was built and consecrated to Juno on
the Aventine Hill.

On his return to Rome Camillus entered the city in triumph, and rode to
the Capitol in a chariot drawn by four white horses, like the horses of
Jupiter or those of the sun. Such was his ostentation that wise men
shook their heads. "Marcus Camillus makes himself equal to the blessed
gods," they said. "See if vengeance come not on him, and he be not made
lower than other men."

There is one further legend about Camillus. After the fall of Veii he
besieged Falerii. During this siege a school-master, who had charge of
the sons of the principal citizens, while walking with his boys outside
the walls, played the traitor and led them into the Roman camp.

But the villain received an unexpected reward. Camillus, justly
indignant at the act, put thongs in the boys' hands and bade them flog
their master back into the town, saying that the Romans did not war on
children. On this the people of Falerii, overcome by his magnanimity,
surrendered themselves, their city, and their country into the hands of
this generous foe, assured of just treatment from so noble a man.

But trouble came upon Camillus, as the wise men had predicted. He was an
enemy of the commons and was to feel their power. It was claimed that he
had kept for himself part of the plunder of Veii, and on this charge he
was banished from Rome. But the time was near at hand when his foes
would have to pray for his return. The next year the Gauls were to come,
and Camillus was to be revenged upon his ungrateful country. This story
we have next to tell.

_THE GAULS AT ROME._

We have related in the preceding tale how a Veientian prophet predicted
the ruin of Rome, in retribution for the cruelty of the Romans to the
people of Veii. It is the story of this disaster which we have now to
tell. While the Romans were assailing Veii and making other conquests
among the neighboring cities, a new people had come into Central Italy,
a fair-faced, light-haired, great-