CHAPTER VII.
THE ROMAN GOVERNMENT.
So far as true history can guess, the Romans really did have kings and drove them out, but there are signs that, though Porsena was a real king, the war was not so honorable to the Romans as they said, for he took the city and made them give up all their weapons to him, leaving them nothing but their tools for husbandry.

But they liked to forget their misfortunes.
The older Roman families were called patricians, or fathers, and thought all rights to govern belonged to them.

Settlers who came in later were called plebeians, or the people, and at first had no rights at all, for all the land belonged to the patricians, and the only way for the plebeians to get anything done for them was to become hangers-on--or, as they called it, clients--of some patrician who took care of their interests.

There was a council of patricians called the Senate, chosen among themselves, and also containing by right all who had been chief magistrates.

The whole assembly of the patricians was called the Comitia.