Page:In Maremma, by Ouida (vol 2).djvu/216

 mountains, and the greed of consul and of emperor robbed the land of her marbles of Luini, of her temple-columns, of her bronze and her gold work, of her delicate potteries, of her colossal statues.

The brother of Fabius Maximus, with his slave, disguised as shepherds of Gaul, with javelins and sickles, wending their perilous way through the darkness of the dreaded Ciminian woods, and descending to the rich plains and the stately cities to propose the admittance of that mission from Rome which was ultimately to be the curse of Etruria; the augurs tracing with their wand the lines of separation on the heavens, watching the flight of herons, of storks, of crows, to gather the secrets of the future, taking warning or counsel from the play of lightning on the heads of the spears, worshipping with blood-sacrifice Jupiter Elicius amidst the thunders of the storm; the fifty-oared armed galleys going out from the sunny crowded ports, some up the tawny Tiber, some away to Spina for the tin and amber come overland from the far Scandinavian waters, some by the Ægean coasts to the gorgeous and languid lands of the East, where the Tyrrhene mariners were welcomed as