III. After this, while the war was at its height, much alarm was caused
by the strange phenomenon seen at the Alban lake, which could not be
accounted for on ordinary physical principles. The season was autumn,
and the summer had not been remarkable for rain or for moist winds, so
that many of the streams and marshes in Italy were quite dried up, and
others held out with difficulty, while the rivers, as is usual in
summer, were very low and deeply sunk in their bed. But the Alban lake,
which is self-contained, lying as it does surrounded by fertile hills,
began for no reason, except it may be the will of Heaven, to increase in
volume and to encroach upon the hillsides near it, until it reached
their very tops, rising quietly and without disturbance. At first the
portent only amazed the shepherds and herdsmen of the neighbourhood; but
when the lake by the weight of its waters broke through the thin isthmus
of land which restrained it, and poured down in a mighty stream through
the fertile plains below to the sea, then not only the Romans, but all
the people of Italy, thought it a portent of the gravest character. Much
talk about it took place in the camp before Veii, so that the besieged
also learned what was happening at the lake.
IV. As always happens during a long siege, where there are frequent
opportunities of intercourse between the two parties, one of the Romans
had become intimate with a citizen of Veii, who was learned in legendary
lore, and was even thought to have supernatural sources of information.
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