Ab urbe condita

Although the portents had been averted by due expiation and the answers given by the soothsayer and the oracle were matters of common knowledge, and all that man could do had been done by the selection of M. Furius, the greatest of all commanders —notwithstanding

all this, when the capture of Veii was announced in Rome, after so many years of undecided warfare and numerous defeats, the rejoicing was as great as if there had been no hope of success.

Anticipating the order of the senate, all the temples were filled with Roman mothers offering thanksgivings to the gods. The senate ordered that the public thanksgivings should be continued for four days, a longer period than for any previous war.

The arrival of the Dictator, too, whom all classes poured out to meet, was welcomed by a greater concourse than that of any general before.

His triumph went far beyond the usual mode of celebrating the day; himself the most conspicuous object of all, he was drawn into the City by a team of white horses, which men thought unbecoming even for a mortal man, let alone a Roman citizen.