Page:The Children's Plutarch, Romans.djvu/47

 one who is willing to suffer. There are in the city three hundred young men who have sworn to slay you if I did not succeed. At any moment any of them may fall upon you and rob the Etruscans of their king.”

The king admired the valor of Mutius and the spirit of the Roman people. He let him go free, and made peace with the city of Rome, and retired to his own country.

Brutus, for the sake of justice and of the city of Rome, bore pain in his heart and soul. Mutius, for the sake of Rome, bore pain in his body. Neither of them thought of his own comfort. Each of them lived for others.

 

HE general of the Roman army stood on a high tower, and looked over the walls. Thence he saw the streets of a city. Men ran up and down the streets with shouts. Houses blazed with fire. Roman soldiers were earning bundles of spoil. The city had belonged to the Etruscan people, and had fallen into the hands of the Romans after a siege of ten years.

“This is a grand success, sir,” said some of the general's friends.

Then the general, whose name was Camillus,