two babes were put in a trough on
the waters of the river Tiber, there to perish. The river had overflowed
its banks, and left the children on dry ground, where, however, they
were found by a she-wolf, who fondled and fed them like her own
offspring, until a shepherd met with them and took them home to his
wife. She called them Romulus and Remus, and bred them up as shepherds.

When the twin brothers were growing into manhood, there was a fight
between the shepherds of Numitor and Amulius, in which Romulus and Remus
did such brave feats that they were led before Numitor. He enquired into
their birth, and their foster-father told the story of his finding them,
showing the trough in which they had been laid; and thus it became plain
that they were the grandsons of Numitor. On finding this out, they
collected an army, with which they drove away Amulius, and brought their
grandfather back to Alba Longa.

They then resolved to build a new city for themselves on one of the
seven low hills beneath which ran the yellow river Tiber; but they were
not agreed on which hill to build, Remus wanting to build on the
Aventine Hill, and Romulus on the Palatine. Their grandfather advised
them to watch for omens from the gods, so each stood on his hill and
watched for birds. Remus was the first to see six vultures flying, but
Romulus saw twelve, and therefore the Palatine Hill was made the
beginning of the city, and Romulus was chosen king. Remus was affronted,
and when the mud wall was being raised around the space intended for the
city, he leapt over it and laughed, whereupon Romulus struck him dead,
crying out, "So perish all who leap over the walls of my city."

[Illustration: GLADIATORIAL SHOWS AT A BANQUET]

Romulus traced out the form of the city with the plough, and made it
almost a square. He called the name of it Rome, and lived in the midst
of it in a mud-hovel, covered with thatch, in the midst of about fifty
families of the old Trojan race, and a great many young men, outlaws and
runaways from the neighboring states, who had joined him. The date of
the building of Rome was supposed to be A.D. 753; and the
Romans counted their years from it, as the Greeks did from the
Olympiads, marking the date A.U.C., _anno urbis conditae_, the
year of the city being built. The youths who joined Romulus could not
marry, as no one of the neighboring nations would give his daughter to
one of these robbers, as they were esteemed. The nearest