of my
mistress, and to her am I devoted."[58]

But yet the misfortunes of others were not able to alleviate the grief
of Egeria; and, throwing herself down at the base of the hill, she
dissolved into tears; until, moved by her affection as she grieved, the
sister of Phoebus formed a cool fountain from her body, and dissolved her
limbs in ever-flowing waters.

But this new circumstance surprised the Nymphs; and the son of the
Amazon[59] was astonished, in no other manner than as when the Etrurian
ploughman beheld the fate-revealing clod in the midst of the fields move
at first of its own accord and no one touching it, and afterwards assume
a human form, and lose {that} of earth, and open its new-made mouth with
{the decrees of} future destiny. The natives called him Tages. He was
the first to teach the Etrurian nation to foretell future events.

Or, as when Romulus once saw his lance, fixed in the Palatine hill,
suddenly shoot forth; which {now} stood there with a root newly-formed,
{and} not with the iron {point} driven in; and, now no longer as a dart,
but as a tree with limber twigs, it sent forth, for the admiring
{spectators}, a shade that was not looked for.

Or, {as} when Cippus beheld his horns in the water of the stream, (for
he did see them) and, believing that there was a false representation in
the reflection, often returning his fingers to his forehead, he touched
what he saw. And now, no {longer} condemning his own eyesight, he stood
still, as he was returning victorious from the conquest of the enemy;
and raising his eyes towards heaven, and his hands in the same
direction, he exclaimed, "Ye Gods above! whatever is portended by this
prodigy, if it is auspicious, then be it auspicious to my country and to
the people of Quirinus; but if unfortunate, be it {so} for myself." And
{then} he made atonement at the grassy altars built of green turf, with
odoriferous fires, and presented wine in bowls, and consulted the
panting entrails of slaughtered sheep what the meaning of it was. Soon
as the soothsayer of the Etrurian nation had inspected them, he beheld
in them the great beginnings of {future} events, but still not clearly.
But when he raised his searching eyes from the entrails of the sheep, to
the horns of Cippus, he said, "Hail, O king! for thee, Cippus, thee and
thy horns shall this place and the Latian towers obey. Only do thou lay
aside all delay; hasten to enter the gates wide open; thus the fates
c