The king's curiosity
was now aroused, and he bought the three books, upon which the
prophetess vanished. The volumes were placed under the new temple on
the Capitoline, no one doubting that they actually contained precepts
of the utmost importance. The wise-looking augurs came together, peered
into the rolls, and told the king and the people that they were right,
and age after age the books were appealed to for direction, though, as
the people never were permitted even to peep into the sacred cell in
which they were hidden, they never could be quite certain that the
augurs who consulted them found any thing in them that they did not put
there themselves.
While Tarquinius was going on with his great works, while he was
oppressing his own people and conquering his neighbors uninterruptedly,
he was suddenly startled by a dire portent. A serpent crawled out from
beneath the altar in his palace and coolly ate the flesh of the royal
sacrifice. The meaning of this appalling omen could not be allowed to
remain uncertain, and as no one in Italy was able to explain it,
Tarquin sent to the oracle of Apollo at Delphi, to ask the
signification. Delphi is a place situated in the midst of the most
sublime scenery of Greece, just north of the Gulf of Corinth.
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