ess inferior, of sovereign power in matters of religion.
AEneas Silvius, therefore, and his descendants, became _kings_, and as
such commanded the armies and directed the affairs of state, while
Iulus and his family were exalted, in connection with them, to the
highest pontifical dignities.

This state of things, once established, continued age after age, and
century after century, for about four hundred years. No records, and
very few traditions in respect to what occurred during this period
remain. One circumstance, however, took place which caused itself to
be remembered. There was one king in the line of the Silvii, whose
name was Tiberinus. In one of his battles with the armies of the
nation adjoining him on the northern side, he attempted to swim across
the river that formed the frontier. He was forced down by the current,
and was seen no more. By the accident, however, he gave the name of
Tiber to the stream, and thus perpetuated his own memory through the
subsequent renown of the river in which he was drowned. Before this
time the river was called the Albula.

Another incident is related, which is somewhat curious, as
illustrating the ideas and customs of the times. One of this Silvian
line of sovereigns was named Alladius. This Alladius conceived the
idea of making the people believe that he was a god, and in order to
accomplish this end he resorted to the contrivance of imitating, by
artificial means, the sound of the rumbling of thunder and the flashes
of lightning at night from his palace on the banks of the lake at Alba
Longa. He employed, probably, for this purpose some means similar to
those resorted to for the same end in theatrical spectacles at the
present day. The people, however were not deceived by this imposture,
though they soon after fell into an error nearly as absurd as
believing in this false thunder would have been; for, on an occasion
which occurred not long afterward, probably that of a great storm
accompanied with torrents of rain upon the mountains around, the lake
rose so high as to produce an inundation, in which the water broke
into the palace, and the pretended thunderer was drowned. The people
considered that he was destroyed thus by the special interposition of
heaven, to punish him for his impiety in daring to assume what was
then considered the peculiar attribute and prerogative of supreme
divinity. In fact, the rumor circulated, and one historian has
recorded it as true, that A