=Ouid= writeth _Lib._4. _Fastorum_, that =Remus= appeared in the night time vnto =Fastulus=, and to his wife =Accia Laurentia=, sometime his Nurse, complaining vnto them of his miserable death, and desiring them to make laboure, that the same day wherein he was slaine, might bee accounted amongst their holy dayes. The people of _Rome_ (as =Ouid= witnesseth, _Lib._2. _Fastorum_) kept a feast in the moneth of Februarie called _Feralia_, in the which they did sacrifice vnto the infernall goddes, and those whose duties it was to celebrate the funeralls of their Auncesters, carried dishes of meat to their sepulchers. Whereof =Fastus= and =Varro= called the same feast by the name of _Feralia_. These dishes of meate were set vpon a stone, at the time of these sacrifices: for the which cause, as =Seruius= saith, they were called _Silicernium_, by the which word some will haue a certaine feast signified, which is bestowed vppon old men. =Donatus= sayth, that _Silicernium_ is a supper, which is made to the infernall Gods, because _Eam silentes cernant_, that is, the deade soules do receiue it, or because those that doe serue it, do onely _cernere_, sée it, and not taste thereof, &c. There were also certaine holie feastes called _Parentalia_, in the which meate was carried to the Sepulchers, for the soules of Parents and Auncestours before deceased. And albeit they suppose, that soules were pleased with small giftes, as of milke, wine, and such like, whereof mention is made in =Ouid=, yet notwithstanding they also killed sacrifices, whereof some suppose that _Feralia_ tooke their name, _à feriendis pecudibus_, of killing shéepe. Vnto their sacrifices they also added praiers, and kindled lightes. When in times past the Romanes being troubled with warres, had let passe the feast of _Parentalia_, they therefore supposed (that the infernall Goddes being for the same cause angrie) there arose stormes and pestilence, and that soules rising out of their graues, did wander with pittifull complaintes about the graues, and by the highway sides, and in the fieldes. This feaste endured by the space of fiftéene dayes, in the whiche married women lay not with their husbandes, neither those whiche were marriageable did marrie, and the Images of their Goddes were couered. The soules of them that were dead, when they came to the meate, they wandred about the graues, and were fed (as they thought) with the banquet. [Sidenote: Lemuria.] [Sidenote: Ouid.]