uth to mouth. It was even determined by
agreement whether the stones were to be thrown by hand or whether the
more deadly sling was to be used.

At the appointed time, the combatants appear in the arena, sometimes as
many as a hundred on a side, and the tournament begins, as in Homeric
times, with taunts and abuse, which presently end in skirmishes between
the boys who have come to look on. Scouts are placed at distant points
to cry 'Fire' at the approach of the dreaded Bargello and his men, who
are the only representatives of order in the city and not, indeed,
anxious to face two hundred infuriated slingers for the sake of making
peace.

One boy throws a stone and runs away, followed by the rest, all
prudently retiring to a safe distance. The real combatants wrap their
long cloaks about their left arms, as the old Romans used their togas on
the same ground, to shield their heads from the blows; a sling whirls
half a dozen times like lightning, and a smooth round stone flies like a
bullet straight at an enemy's face, followed by a hundred more in a
deadly hail, thick and fast. Men fall, blood flows, short deep curses
ring through the sunny air, the fighters creep up to one another,
dodging behind trees and broken ruins, till they are at cruelly short
range; faster and faster fly the stones, and scores are lying prostrate,
bleeding, groaning and cursing. Strength, courage, fierce endurance and
luck have it at last, as in every battle. Down goes the leader of
Trastevere, half dead, with an eye gone, down goes the next man to him,
his teeth broken under his torn lips, down half a dozen more, dead or
wounded, and the day is lost. Trastevere flies towards the bridge,
pursued by Monti with hoots and yells and catcalls, and the thousands
who have seen the fight go howling after them, women and children
screaming, dogs racing and barking and biting at their heels. And far
behind on the deserted Campo Vaccino, as the sun goes down, women weep
and frightened children sob beside the young dead. But the next feast
day would come, and a counter-victory and vengeance.

That has always been the temper of the Romans; but few know how
fiercely it used to show itself in those days. It would have been
natural enough that men should meet in sudden anger and kill each other
with such weapons as they chanced to have or could pick up, clubs,
knives, stones, anything, when fighting was half the life of every grown
man. It is harder to under