While the owner was occupied about his hands the Roman priest took advantage of the pause to slaughter the animal, and, on his return, the Sabine found that he had unintentionally washed his hands of the business altogether. The oracle was thus fulfilled in favour of the Romans, who trumpeted the fact through the bull's horns, which were hung up in front of the temple in memory of this successful piece of priest-craft. The growing popularity of Servius with the plebs made the patricians anxious to get rid of him, for they had not the sense to feel that if they aspired to be the pillars of the state, a close union with the class beneath, or, as they would have contemptuously termed it, the base, was indispensable. It happened that Servius, in the hope of propitiating the two sons of Tarquinius, had given them his two daughters as their wives, though it was a grievous mistake to suppose that family marriages are usually productive of family union. Jealousy and quarrelling ensued, which ended in the elder, Tullia, persuading her sister's husband Lucius Tarquinius to murder his own brother and his own wife, in order that he might make a match with the lump of female brimstone that had inflamed his brutal passions. Not satisfied with the double murder, which would have qualified her new husband to be struck in the hardest wax and to occupy chambers among the worst of horrors, Tullia was always whispering into his ear that she wished her father farther, and by this demoniac spell she worked on the weak and wicked mind of Lucius Tarquinius. It having been reported that Servius Tullus intended to crown his own reign by uncrowning himself, and exchanging, as it were, the royal stock for consuls, the patricians thought it would be a good opportunity to speculate for a fall, by attempting the king's overthrow. Tullia and her husband were asked to join in this conspiracy, when it was found that the wretched and corrupt pair would be quite ripe for any enormity. It was arranged, therefore, that Lucius Tarquinius, at a meeting of the Senate, should go down to the House with all the insignia of royalty, and, having seated himself upon the throne, the trumpeters in attendance were, by one vigorous blow, to proclaim him as the sovereign. When Servius heard the news he proceeded to the Assembly, where all things--including the trumpets--seemed to be flourishing in favour of the traitor. As the sound of the instruments fell upon the old king's ears, he seemed to tremble for a moment before the rude blast which threatened the blasting of all his benevolent views, but calling out from the doorway in which he stood, he rebuked the insolence and treachery of his son-in-law. A disgraceful scene ensued, in which other blows than those of the trumpeters were exchanged, and Servius, who had in vain desired the traitor to "come off the throne," was executing a threat to "pull him off" as well as the old man's strength, or rather, his feebleness, would allow him.