That he, as soon as he was his own master, had come to Rome with his wife and whole fortune, and had there spent a greater part of that age, in which men are employed in civil offices, than he had in his native country: that he had both in peace and war thoroughly learned the Roman laws and religious customs, under a master not to be objected to, king Ancus himself; that he had vied with all in duty and loyalty to his prince, and even with the king himself in his bounty to others." While he was recounting these undoubted facts, the people by a great majority elected him king.

The same ambition which had prompted Tarquin, in other respects an excellent man, to aspire to the crown, followed him whilst on the throne.

And being no less mindful of strengthening his own power, than of increasing that of the commonwealth, he elected a hundred into the fathers, who from that time were called Minorum Gentium, _i.

e._ of the younger families: a party hearty in the king's cause, by whose favour they had got into the senate.

The first war he waged was with the Latins, from whom he took the town of Apiolae by storm, and having brought back thence more booty than the character of the war would lead one to expect, he celebrated games with more cost and magnificence than former kings.