Historical Tales [calibre 5.4.1]

The messenger sent, Menenius Agrippa Lanatus, was a man famed for eloquence, and a popular favorite. In his address to the people in their camp he repeated to them the following significant fable;

"At a time when all the parts of the body did not agree together, as they do now, but each had its own method and language, the other parts rebelled against the belly. They said that it lay quietly enjoying itself in the centre, while they, by care, labor, and service, kept it in luxury. They therefore conspired that the hands should not convey food to the mouth, the mouth receive it, nor 'the teeth chew it. They thus hoped to subdue the belly by famine; but they found that they and all the other parts of the body suffered as much. Then they saw that the belly by no means rested in sloth; that it supplied instead of receiving nourishment, sending to all parts of the body the blood that gave life and strength to the whole system."

It was the same, he said, with the body of the state. All must work in unity, if all would prosper. This homely argument hit the popular fancy. The people consented to treat for their return if their liberties could be properly secured. But they must now have deeds instead of words. It was not political power they sought, but protection, and protection they would have.

Their demands were as follows: All debts should be cancelled, and all debtors held by their creditors should be released. And hereafter the Plebeians should have as their protectors two officials, who should have power to veto all oppressive laws, while their persons should be held as sacred and inviolable as those of the messengers of the gods. These officials were to be called Tribunes, and to be the chief officers of the commons as the consuls were of the nobles.

This proposition was accepted by the senate, and a treaty signed between the contesting parties, as solemnly as if they had been two separate nations. It was an occasion as important to the liberties of Romans as the treaty signed many centuries afterwards on the field of Runnymede, between King John and his barons, was to the liberties of Englishmen, and was held by the Romans in like high regard. The hill on which the treaty had been made was ever after known as the Sacred Mount. Its top was consecrated and an altar built upon it, on which sacrifices were made to Jupiter, the god who strikes men with terror and then delivers them from fear; for the people had fled thither in dread, and were now to return home in safety.

Thus ended the great revolt of the people, who had gained in the Tribunes defenders of more power and importance than they or the senate knew. They were never again to suffer from the bitter oppression to which they had been subjected in preceding years. As for Lanatus, to whose pleadings they had yielded, he died before the year ended, and was found to have not left enough to pay for his funeral. Therefore the Plebeians collected funds to give him a splendid burial; but the senate having decreed that the state should bear this expense, the money raised by the grateful people was formed into a fund for the benefit of his children.