Scarcely had Phoebus shown a rim above the horizon: their anxious minds with hope and fear did quake. The king took his stand, and, his head veiled in a snow-white hood, lifted up his hands, hands which the gods already knew so well. And thus he spoke: “The time has come to receive the promised boon; fulfil thy promise, Jupiter.” Even while he spoke, the sun had already lifted his full orb above the horizon, and a loud crash rang out from heaven’s vault. Thrice did the god thunder from a cloudless sky, thrice did he hurl his bolts. Take my word for it: what I say is wonderful but true. At the zenith the sky began to yawn; the multitude and their leader lifted up their eyes. Lo, swaying gently in the light breeze, a shield fell down. The people sent up a shout that reached the stars. The king lifted from the ground the gift, but not till he had sacrificed a heifer, which had never submitted her neck to the burden of the yoke, and he called the shield ancile, because it was cut away (recisum) on all sides, and there was no angle that you could mark.
Then, remembering that the fate of empire was bound up with it, he formed a very shrewd design. He ordered that many shields should be made, wrought after the same pattern, in order to deceive a traitor’s eyes. The work was finished by Mamurius; whether he was more perfect in character or in smithcraft, it would be hard for any man to say. Bountiful Numa said to him, “Ask a reward for your service. If I have a reputation for honesty, you shall not ask in vain.” He had already named the Salii from their dancing (saltus), and had given them arms and a song to be sung to a certain tune. Then Mamurius made answer thus: “Give me glory for my reward, and let my name be chanted at the end of the song.” Hence the priests pay the reward that was promised for the work of old, and they invoke Mamurius.
If, damsel, thou wouldst wed, put off the wedding, however great the haste ye both may be in; short delay hath great advantage. Weapons excite to battle, and battle ill assorts with married folk; when the weapons shall have been stored away, the omens will be more favourable. On these days, too, the holy wife of the Flamen Dialis in his peaked cap must keep her hair uncombed.
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