By courage and strength Horatius prevailed over every obstacle, and Cocles owed to the cockles of his heart, as well as to the muscles of his body, the happy results of his hazardous experiment. To recompense him for his risk by water, the grateful nation gave him a large portion of land, and erected his statue in the Comitium, a portion of the Forum from which orators were in the habit of holding forth, and where the figure of Horatius was placed to speak for itself to the populace. Though the enemy was kept out of the city, the Romans were kept in, while provisions were growing shorter and shorter every day--a sort of growth that led of course to a constant diminution. Such was the gratitude of the citizens to Horatius, that they subscribed to give him always as much as he could eat; and although the fact involves a pun we abominate, we are obliged to state the truth, that, in order to give him his desert, many went without their dinners. The Romans had declared they would hold out to the last, and though they were left with scarcely any food, though they might have at once procured it, had they consented to eat their own words, they declined to satisfy their hunger by such a humiliating process. All hope of saving the city being apparently lost, the senate entered into an agreement with one Caius Mucius, who could talk a little Tuscan, and who undertook to go across the water for the purpose of killing Porsenna. Mucius disguised himself in an Etrurian helmet--a sort of Tuscan bonnet--and with a sword concealed under the folds of his ample Roman wrap-rascal, he arrived at Porsenna's camp, just as the salaries were being paid to the soldiers. While the troops were intent on drawing their pay, Mucius slily drew his sword, and seeing an individual rather handsomely dressed, rushed upon him to administer to him, with the weapon, a most unhandsome dressing.