1After the battle had gone this way, such terror came upon Tarquinius and the Etruscans that, giving up the attempt as fruitless, both armies, Veientine and Tarquinian, went off by night, each to their own homes. 2They add marvels to this battle: that in the silence of the following night a mighty voice issued from the Arsian wood; 2that the voice was believed to be that of Silvanus; 2that these were its words: one more of the Etruscans had fallen in the battle; 2the Roman was winning the war. 2Certainly the Romans left that place as victors, the Etruscans as vanquished. 3For when day dawned and none of the enemy was in sight, the consul Publius Valerius gathered the spoils and returned from there in triumph to Rome.
4He held his colleague's funeral with all the pomp possible at that time; 4but a far greater honour to his death was the public mourning, remarkable above all because the matrons mourned him for a year as they would a father, since he had been so fierce an avenger of outraged chastity. 5Then towards the consul who had survived, so changeable are the feelings of the mob, there arose out of favour not only ill will but even suspicion, with a dreadful charge. 6Rumour had it that he was aiming at kingship, because he had not had a colleague chosen in Brutus' place and was building on the top of the Velia: there, on a high and fortified site, there would be an impregnable citadel.
7Since these things, widely said and believed, troubled the consul's mind with their indignity, he called the people to an assembly and mounted the platform with the fasces lowered. 7That sight was welcome to the crowd: that the emblems of power had been lowered to them, and an admission made that the majesty and strength of the people were greater than the consul's. 8There, when they had been bidden to listen, the consul praised his colleague's good fortune, because he had met his death after freeing his country, holding the highest office, fighting for the state, his glory ripe and not yet turning to ill will; 8he himself, outliving his glory, survived to face accusation and ill will, and from liberator of his country had sunk to the level of the Aquilii and Vitellii.
8'Will no merit, then,' he said, 'ever be so proved in your eyes that it cannot be tainted by suspicion? 9Was I to fear that I, the bitterest enemy of kings, would myself face the charge of desiring kingship? 10Even if I lived on the citadel itself and the Capitol, was I to believe that I could be feared by my fellow citizens? 10Does my reputation among you hang on so slight a thing? 10Is your trust so lightly founded that where I am matters more than who I am? 11The house of Publius Valerius will not stand in the way of your liberty, citizens; 11the Velia will be safe for you.
11I shall not only bring my house down onto the level ground but even place it beneath the hill, so that you may live above me, the citizen you suspect; 11let those build on the Velia who are trusted with liberty more than Publius Valerius.' 11At once all the timber was brought down below the Velia, and the house was built at the very foot of the slope, where the temple of Vica Pota now stands.