mulus, desisted not from demanding a fresh monarch. The nobles then
prudently resolved to establish an interregnum--a new political form,
unknown to other nations. It was not without its use, however, since,
during the interval which elapsed before the definitive nomination of
the new king, the State was not left without a ruler, nor subjected too
long to the same governor, nor exposed to the fear lest some one, in
consequence of the prolonged enjoyment of power, should become more
unwilling to lay it aside, or more powerful if he wished to secure it
permanently for himself. At which time this new nation discovered a
political provision which had escaped the Spartan Lycurgus, who
conceived that the monarch ought not to be elective--if indeed it is
true that this depended on Lycurgus--but that it was better for the
Lacedaemonians to acknowledge as their sovereign the next heir of the
race of Hercules, whoever he might be: but our Romans, rude as they
were, saw the importance of appointing a king, not for his family, but
for his virtue and experience.

XIII. And fame having recognized these eminent qualities in Numa
Pompilius, the Roman people, without partiality for their own citizens,
committed itself, by the counsel of the senators, to a king of foreign
origin, and summoned this Sabine from the city of Cures to Rome, that
he might reign over them. Numa, although the people had proclaimed him
king in their Comitia Curiata, did nevertheless himself pass a Lex
Curiata respecting his own authority; and observing that the
institutions of Romulus had too much excited the military propensities
of the people, he judged it expedient to recall them from this habit of
warfare by other employments.

XIV. And, in the first place, he divided severally among the citizens
the lands which Romulus had conquered, and taught them that even
without the aid of pillage and devastation they could, by the
cultivation of their own territories, procure themselves all kinds of
commodities. And he inspired them with the love of peace and
tranquillity, in which faith and justice are likeliest to flourish, and
extended the most powerful protection to the people in the cultivation
of their fields and the enjoyment of their produce. Pompilius likewise
having created hierarchical institutions of the highest class, added
two augurs to the old number. He intrusted the superintendence of the
sacred rites to five pontiffs, selected from the body of the no