previously transgressed them, besides swearing that they themselves would never afterward willingly transgress the inscribed laws, or rule or obey any ruler governing otherwise than according to his father’s laws. Then after invoking these denunciations on themselves and their descendants, and after drinking from the cup and depositing it in the temple of the god, and sitting the necessary time at supper, they, as soon as it was dark and the fire of the sacrifice had ceased to burn, dressed themselves in beautiful dark-blue robes, and sat down on the ground, near the embers of the sacrifice, over which they had sworn. All the fire in the temple having been extinguished for the night, they then mutually judged one another respecting any accusation of transgressing the laws. After their acts of judgment were ended, and daylight had come, they inscribed their decisions on a golden tablet and deposited it and their dresses in the temple as memorials. There were also many other special laws respecting the privileges of the kings. The principal ones were that they should never wage war upon one another, that all should lend their aid when any attempt was made in their cities to destroy the royal race, that they should consult together as their ancestors had done respecting the right course to be pursued in war and in other matters, and that they should allot the government of the empire to the Atlantic race. They did not allow the king, however, any authority to put to death any of his kinsmen, unless the execution was approved by more than five of the ten.’”[24] The priest also related that it was “about nine thousand years ago that war was proclaimed between those dwelling outside the Pillars of Hercules and all those within them.”[25] Athens “was the leader of the latter people and directed the operations of the war, and the kings of the Atlantic island were the commanders of the forces of the former.”[26] “‘But in a later age,’ said the priest, ‘by extraordinary earthquakes and deluges, bringing destruction in a single day and night, the whole of your formidable race was at once sunk under the earth, and the Atlantic island in like manner plunged beneath the sea and concealed from view; therefore that sea is, at present, neither passable nor to be traced out, being blocked up with a great depth of mud made by the sunken island.’”[27]