The Palace and Park by Phillips, Forbes, Latham, Owen, Scharf, and Shenton

[Date and place of birth unknown.] The first Consul, and one of the Founders, of the Roman Republic. Before he was elected to the Consulate in B.C. 509, he had been the main cause of the expulsion of royalty from Rome in the persons of Tarquin and his sons. He fell in battle whilst defending, as Consul, the infant Republic against the royal exiles fighting for their restoration. These are admitted facts in the life of Lucius Junius Brutus. His assumption of idiotcy during the reign of the Tarquins, in order to carry on with greater safety his patriotic designs, and his connexion with the affecting history of the devoted Lucretia, are events which in recent years have passed from the grave volume of history to the more fascinating pages of poetry. Philosophical historians permit us to sing, but no longer to believe in, the once cherished narratives of earliest Rome. The act, whether historical or merely traditionary, which the most memorably distinguishes his name, is that of ordering the execution of his two sons, convicted of conspiring for the restoration of the Tarquins. [From the bronze in the Palazzo dei Conservatori of the Capitol at Rome.]