ear to him, and had
known the boys from their infancy, and had often assisted in taking
care of them, was killed in the endeavor to aid his brother to appease
the tumult.

At length the disturbance was quelled. The result of the conflict was,
however, to show that Romulus and his party were the strongest.
Romulus accordingly went on to build the walls of the city at the spot
which he had first chosen. The lines were marked out, and the
excavations were commenced with great ceremony.

In laying out the work, the first thing to be done was to draw the
lines of what was called the _pomoerium_. The pomoerium was a sort
of symbolical wall, and was formed simply by turning a furrow with a
plow all around the city, at a considerable distance from the real
walls, for the purpose, not of establishing lines of defense, but of
marking out what were to be the limits of the corporation, so to
speak, for legal and ceremonial purposes. Of course, the pomoerium
included a much greater space than the real walls, and the people were
allowed to build houses anywhere within this outer inclosure, or even
without it, though not very near to it. Those who built thus were, of
course, not protected in case of an attack, and of course they would,
in such case, be compelled to abandon their houses, and retreat for
safety within the proper walls.

So Romulus proceeded to mark out the pomoerium of the city,
employing in the work the ceremonies customary on such occasions. The
plow used was made of copper, and for a team to draw it a bullock and
a heifer were yoked together. Men appointed for the purpose followed
the plow, and carefully turned over the clods _toward_ the wall of the
city. This seems to have been considered an essential part of the
ceremony. At the places where roads were to pass in toward the gates
of the city, the plow was lifted out of the ground and carried over
the requisite space, so as to leave the turf at those points unbroken.
This was a necessary precaution; for there was a certain consecrating
influence that was exerted by this ceremonial plowing which hallowed
the ground wherever it passed in a manner that would very seriously
interfere with its usefulness as a public road.

The form of the space inclosed by the pomoerium, as Romulus plowed
it, was nearly square, and it included not merely the Palatine hill
itself, but a considerable portion of level land around it.

Though Romulus thus seemed to have conquered, in