Note 786 — Chapter I · (654-684.)

The vestals enjoyed great privileges: if they met by chance a criminal on his way to execution, he was set at liberty. (Plutarch, Numa, 14.)—Valerius Maximus (V. iv. 6) reports the following fact: “The vestal Claudia, seeing that a tribune of the people was about to drag her father, Appius Claudius Pulcher, with violence from his triumphal car, interfered between the tribune and him, by virtue of her right to oppose violence.”—Cicero (Oration for Cœlius, 14) likewise alludes to this celebrated anecdote.