Or in case this may not go current for an authenticall historie, and worthie of credit; what and if we say that unto _Hercules_ as to some great bellie god, and one who loved good cheere, they offered and sacrificed plenteously and in great liberalitie? Or rather, for that by this meanes they would take downe and diminish a little, their excessive riches which ordinarily is an eie-sore and odious unto the citizens of a popular state, as if they meant to abate and bring low (as it were) that plethoricall plight and corpulency of the bodie, which being growen to the height is daungerous: supposing by such cutting off, and abridging of superfluities, to do honour and service most pleasing unto _Hercules_, as who joied highly in frugalitie: for that in his life time he stood contented with a little, and regarded no delicacie or excesse whatsoever. 19. _Why begin the Romans their yeere at the moneth Januarie?_ FOR in old time the moneth of March was reckoned first, as a man may collect by many other conjectures, and by this specially, that the fift moneth in order after March was called _Quintilis_, and the sixt moneth _Sextilis_, and all the rest consequently one after another until you come to the last, which they named December, because it was the tenth in number after March: which giveth occasion unto some for to thinke & say, that the Romans (in those daies) determined and accomplished their compleat yeere, not in twelve moneths but in ten: namely, by adding unto everie one of those ten moneths certain daies over and above thirtie. Others write, that December indeed was the tenth moneth after March; but Januarie was the eleventh, and Februarie the twelfth: in which moneth they used certaine expiatorie and purgatorie sacrifices, yea, and offered oblations unto the dead (as it were) to make an end of the yere. Howbeit afterwards they transposed this order, and ranged Januarie in the first place, for that upon the first day thereof, which they call the Calends of Januarie; the first Consuls that ever bare rule in _Rome_ were enstalled, immediatly upon the deposition and expulsion of the kings out of the citie. But there seemeth to be more probability & likelihood of truth in their speech, who say, that _Romulus_ being a martiall prince, and one that loved warre and feats of armes, as being reputed the sonne of _Mars_, set before all other moneths, that which caried the name of his father: howbeit _Numa_ who succeeded next after him, being a man of peace, and who endevored to withdraw the hearts and minds of his subjects and citizens from warre to agriculture, gave the prerogative of the first place unto Januarie, and honoured _Janus_ most, as one who had beene more given to politick government, and to the husbandrie of ground, than to the exercise of warre and armes.