competitors at
home in displays of bravery, loath to own themselves inferior in that
respect, were wont to ascribe their deficiencies to his strength of
body, which they said no resistance and no fatigue could exhaust.

The first time he went out to the wards, being yet a stripling, was
when Tarquinius Superbus, who had been king of Rome and was afterwards
expelled, after many unsuccessful attempts now entered upon his last
effort, and proceeded to hazard all as it were upon a single throw.
A great number of the Latins and other people of Italy joined their
forces, and were marching with him toward the city, to procure his
restoration; not, however, so much out of a desire to serve and oblige
Tarquin, as to gratify their own fear and envy at the increase of the
Roman greatness, which they were anxious to check. The armies met and
engaged in a decisive battle, in the vicissitudes of which, Marcius,
while fighting bravely in the dictator's presence, saw a Roman soldier
struck down at a little distance, and immediately stepped in before him,
and slew his assailant. The general, after having gained the victory,
crowned him for this act with a garland of oak branches; it being the
Roman custom thus to adorn those who had saved the life of a citizen;
whether the law intended some special honor to the oak, in memory of
the Arcadians, a people the oracle had made famous by the name of
acorn-eaters; or, the oak wreath, being sacred to Jupiter, the guardian
of the city, might, therefore be thought a proper ornament for one who
preserved a citizen. And the oak, in truth, is the tree which bears the
most and the prettiest of any that grow wild, and is the strongest of
all that are under cultivation; its acorns were the principal diet of
the first mortals, and the honey found in it gave them drink.

In this battle it is stated that Castor and Pollux appeared, and,
immediately after the battle, were seen at Rome just by the fountain
where their temple now stands, with their horses foaming with sweat, and
told the news of the victory of the people in the Forum. The fifteenth
of July, being the day of this conquest, became consequently a solemn
holiday sacred to the Twin Brothers.

It may be observed, in general, that when young men arrive early at fame
and repute, if they are of a nature but slightly touched with emulation,
this early attainment is apt to extinguish their thirst and satiate
their small appetite; whereas the first di