Page:The Children's Plutarch, Romans.djvu/182

 to village he had driven the peasants, and they had swarmed into Xanthus, and the Roman army had now begirt it with a terrible ring of power and death. Some of the Xanthians dived from the walls into the river that ran by. A multitude of them burst from the gates one night, and set fire to the machines (battering engines) which the Romans used to break the ramparts of the city. They were driven back. The flames spread from the engines to some wooden houses on the walls. A red light shot over the doomed town, and by its glare were seen men, women, and children hurrying from street to street, pursued by the stern Romans. But the people's soul fiercely fought against the idea of yielding to Brutus. They saw no hope in his rule and the rule of the haughty nobles who took his side, and who wished to make Rome everything, and leave the rest of the empire in slavery. They set fire to houses with their own hands, and then, with loud shouts of defiance, leaped into the dreadful flames and died for freedom! In one house Brutus saw the dead body of a woman, clasping her dead babe in one arm; she had set fire to her cottage, and then hanged herself sooner than fall into the power of the besiegers.