erfectly obedient, and
obeyed as perfectly as they could their fathers, their officers, their
magistrates, and, as they thought, their gods.

[Illustration]

CHAPTER VIII.

MENENIUS AGRIPPA'S FABLE.

B.C. 494.

A great deal of the history of Rome consists of struggles between the
patricians and plebeians. In those early days the plebeians were often
poor, and when they wanted to improve their lands they had to borrow
money from the patricians, who not only had larger lands, but, as they
were the officers in war, got a larger share of the spoil. The Roman law
was hard on a man in debt. His lands might be seized, he might be thrown
into prison or sold into slavery with his wife and children, or, if the
creditors liked, be cut to pieces so that each might take his share.

One of these debtors, a man who was famous for bravery as a centurion,
broke out of his prison and ran into the Forum, all in rags and with
chains still hanging to his hands and feet, showing them to his
fellow-citizens, and asking if this was just usage of a man who had done
no crime. They were very angry, and the more because one of the consuls,
Appius Claudius, was known to be very harsh, proud and cruel, as indeed
were all his family. The Volscians, a tribe often at war with them,
broke into their land at the same time, and the Romans were called to
arms, but the plebeians refused to march until their wrongs were
redressed. On this the other consul, Servilius, promised that a law
should be made against keeping citizens in prison for debt or making
slaves of their children; and thereupon the army assembled, marched
against the enemy, and defeated them, giving up all the spoil to his
troops. But the senate, when the danger was over, would not keep its
promises, and even appointed a Dictator to put the plebeians down.
Thereupon they assembled outside the walls in a strong force, and were
going to attack the patricians, when the wise old Menenius Agrippa was
sent out to try to pacify them. He told them a fable, namely, that once
upon a time all the limbs of a man's body became disgusted with the
service they had to render to the belly. The feet and legs carried it
about, the hands worked for it and carried food to it, the mouth ate
for it, and so on. They thought it hard thus all to toil for it, and
agreed to do nothing for it--neither to carry it about, clothe it, nor
feed it. But soon all found themselves growing weak and starved, and
we