Page:The history of Rome. Translated with the author's sanction and additions.djvu/87

Rh the well-closed store-chamber of the community, the Roman Vesta, and the Roman Penates; as indications of the visible unity of that supreme household which included all Rome. The regal office was constituted by election; but the community did not owe fidelity and obedience to the king until he had convoked the assembly of freemen capable of bearing arms, and formally challenged its allegiance. Then he acquired in its entireness that power over the community which belonged to the house-father in his household; and, like him, he ruled for life. He held intercourse with the gods of the community, whom he consulted and whom he appeased (auspicia publica), and he nominated all the priests and priestesses. The agreements which he concluded in name of the community with foreigners were binding upon the whole people; although in other instances no member of the community was bound by an agreement with a nonmember. His "command" (imperium) was all-powerful in peace and in war, on which account "messengers" (lictores, from licere, to summon) preceded him with axes and rods on all occasions when he appeared officially. He alone had the right of publicly addressing the burgesses, and it was he who kept the keys of the public treasury. He had the same right as a lather had to exercise discipline and jurisdiction. He ordained punishments for breaches of order, and, in particular, flogging for military offences. He sat in judgment in all private and in all criminal processes, and decided absolutely regarding life and death as well as regarding freedom; he could hand over one burgess to fill the place of a slave to another; he could even order a burgess to be sold into actual slavery, or, in other words, into banishment. When he had pronounced sentence of death, he was entitled, but not obliged, to allow an appeal to the people for pardon. He called out the people for service in war, and commanded the army; but with these high functions he was no less bound, when an alarm of fire was raised, to appear in person at the scene of the burning.

As the house-master was not simply the greatest, but the only power in the house, so the king was not merely the first, but the only holder of power in the state. He might indeed form colleges of men of skill composed of those specially conversant with the rules of sacred or of public law, and call upon them for their advice: he might, to facilitate his exercise of power, intrust to others particular