round this altar in the
year 17 B. C., we already possessed ample information from such
materials as the oracle of the Sibyl, referred to by Zosimus, the
_Carmen Saeculare_ of Horace, and the legends and designs on the medals
struck for the occasion; but the official report, discovered September
20, 1890, produces an altogether different impression; it enables us
actually to take part in the pageant, to follow with rapture Horace as
he leads a chorus of fifty-four young men and girls of patrician
birth, singing the hymn which he composed for the occasion.[46]

There is such a tone of simplicity and common-sense, such a display of
method and mutual respect between Augustus, the Senate, and the
Quindecemviri, in the official transactions which preceded, attended
and followed the celebration, in the resolutions passed by the several
bodies, in the proclamations addressed to the people, and in the
arrangements for the festivities, which a mass of a million or more
spectators was expected to attend, that a lesson in civic dignity
could be learned from this report by modern governments and
corporations.

The official report begins, or rather began (the first lines are
missing), with the request presented by the Quindecemviri to the
Senate to take their proposal into consideration, and grant the
necessary funds, followed by a decree of the Senate accepting the
proposal and inviting Augustus to take the direction of the
festivities. The request was addressed to the Senate on February 17,
by Marcus Agrippa, president of the Quindecemviri, standing before the
seat of the consuls. What a scene to witness! We can picture to
ourselves the two consuls, Gaius Furnius and Junius Silanus, clad in
their official robes, listening to the speech of the great statesman,
who is supported by twenty colleagues, all ex-consuls, and chosen
among the noblest, richest, and most gallant patricians of the age.
The Senate agrees that the preparations for the festival, the building
of the temporary stages, hippodromes, tribunes, and scaffoldings shall
be executed by the contractors (_redemptores_), and that the treasury
officials shall provide the funds.

Lines 1-23 contain a letter from Augustus to the Quindecemviri
detailing the programme of the ceremonies, the number and quality of
persons who shall take part in it, the dates and hours, and the number
and character of the victims. Two clauses of the imperial manifesto
are especially noteworthy.