The Story of Rome From the Earliest Times to the End of the Republic, Arthur Gilman [world best books to read .TXT] 📗

-PHILOSOPHERDINING-TABLE AND COUCHESCOVERINGS FOR THE FEETARTICLES OF THE ROMAN TOILETRUINS OF THE COLOSSEUM, SEEN FROM THE PALATINE HILLA COLUMBARIUMTHE STORY OF ROME.I.

ONCE UPON A TIME.

Once upon a time, there lived in a city of Asia Minor, not far fromMount Ida, as old Homer tells us in his grand and beautiful poem, aking who had fifty sons and many daughters. How large his family was,indeed, we cannot say, for the storytellers of the olden time were notvery careful to set down the actual and exact truth, their chief objectbeing to give the people something to interest them. That theysucceeded well in this respect we know, because the story of this oldking and his great family of sons and daughters has been told andretold thousands of times since it was first related, and that was solong ago that the bard himself has sometimes been said never to havelived at all. Still; somebody must have existed who told the wondrousstory, and it has always been attributed to a blind p