VIRGINIA.

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A COLLECTION Consisting exclusively of warsongs would give an imperfect, or rather an erroneous notion of the spirit of the old Latin ballads. The Patricians, during about a century and a half after the expulsion of the kings, held all the high military commands. Plebeian, even though, like Lucius Siccius, he were distinguished by his valour and knowledge of war, could serve only in subordinate posts. A minstrel, therefore, who wished to celebrate the early triumphs of his country, could hardly take any but Patricians for his heroes. The warriors who are mentioned in the two preceding lays, Horatius, Lartius, Her-ed still more deeply on the back by the scourges minius, Aulus Posthumius, butius Elva, Sem- of high-born usurers. pronius Atratinus, Valerius Poplicola, were all The Plebeians were, however, not wholly members of the dominant order; and a poet without constitutional rights. From an early who was singing their praises, whatever his period they had been admitted to some share own political opinions might be, would natu- of political power. They were enrolled in the rally abstain from insulting the class to which centuries, and were allowed a share, considerthey belonged, and from reflecting on the sys-able though not proportioned to their numerical tem which had placed such men at the head of strength, in the disposal of those high dignities the legions of the commonwealth. from which they were themselves excluded. Thus their position bore some resemblance to that of the Irish Catholics during the interval between the year 1792 and the year 1829. The Plebeians had also the privilege of annually appointing officers, named Tribunes, who had no active share in the government of the Com monwealth, but who. by degrees, acquired a power which made them formidable even to the ablest and most resolute Consuls and Dicta tors. The person of the Tribune was inviola ble; and, though he could directly effect little, he could obstruct every thing.

of the Patrician money-lenders. Children often became slaves in consequence of the misfor tunes of their parents. The debtor was imprisoned, not in a public jail under the care of impartial public functionaries, but in a private workhouse belonging to the creditor. Fright ful stories were told respecting these dungeons. It was said that torture and brutal violation were common; that tight stocks, heavy chains, scanty measures of food, were used to punish wretches guilty of nothing but poverty; and that brave soldiers, whose breasts were covered with honourable scars, were often mark

During more than a century after the institu

But there was a class of compositions in which the great families were by no means so courteously treated. No parts of early Roman history are richer with poetical colouring than those which relate to the long contest between the privileged houses and the commonalty. The population of Rome was, from a very early period, divided into hereditary castes, which, indeed, readily united to repel foreign enemies, but which regarded each other, during many years, with bitter animosity. Between those castes there was a barrier hardly less strong than that which, at Venice, parted the members of the Great Council from their country-tion of the Tribuneship, the Commons strugmen. In some respects indeed, the line which gled manfully for the removal of grievances separated an Icilius or a Duilius from a Post- under which they laboured; and, in spite of humius or a Fabius was even more deeply many checks and reverses, succeeded in marked than that which separated the rower wringing concession after concession from the of a gondola from a Contarini or a Morosini. stubborn aristocracy. At length, in the year At Venice the distinction was merely civil. At of the city 378, both parties mustered their Rome it was both civil and religious. Among whole strength for their last and most desperate the grievances under which the Plebeians suf- conflict. The popular and active Tribune, fered three were felt as peculiarly severe. Caius Licinius, proposed the three memorable They were excluded from the highest magis- laws which are called by his name, and which tracies; they were excluded from all share in were intended to redress the three great evils the public lands; and they were ground down of which the Plebeians complained. He was to the dust by partial and barbarous legislation supported, with eminent ability and firmness, touching pecuniary contracts. The ruling by his colleague, Lucius Sextius. The strug class in Rome was a moneyed class; and it gle appears to have been the fiercest that ever made and administered the laws with a view in any community terminated without an apsolely to its own interest. Thus the relation peal to arms. If such a contest had raged in between lender and borrower was mixed up any Greek city, the streets would have run with the relation between sovereign and sub with blood. But, even in the paroxysms of ject. The great men held a large portion of the faction, the Roman retained his gravity, his community in dependence by means of ad- respect for law, and his tenderness for the lives vances at enormous usury. The law of debt, of his fellow-citizens. Year after year Licinius framed by creditors, and for the protection of and Sextius were re-elected Tribunes. Year cr.uitors, was the most horrible that has ever after year, if the narrative which has come been known among men. The liberty, and down to us is to be trusted, they continued to even the life, of the insoivent were at the mercy exert, to the full extent, their power of stopping