between his people and theirs.
The proposal seemed not unreasonable, and it was made in an unassuming
and respectful manner. In the message which Romulus commissioned the
embassadors to deliver, he admitted that his colony was yet small,
and by no means equal in influence and power to the kingdoms whose
alliance he desired; but he reminded those whom he addressed that
great results came sometimes in the end from very inconsiderable
beginnings, and that their enterprise thus far, though yet in its
infancy, had been greatly prospered, and was plainly an object of
divine favor, and that the time might not be far distant when the new
state would be able fully to reciprocate such favors as it might now
receive.

The neighboring kings to whom these embassages were sent rejected the
proposals with derision. They did not even give _serious_ answers,
obviously considering the new city as a mere temporary gathering and
encampment of adventurers and outlaws, which would be as transient as
it was rude and irregular. They looked to see it break up as suddenly
and tumultuously as it had been formed. They accordingly sent back
word to Romulus that he must resort to the same plan to get women for
his city that he had adopted to procure recruits of men. He must open
an _asylum_ for them. The low and the dissolute would come flocking
to him then, they said, from all parts, and vagabond women would make
just the kind of wives for vagabond men.

Of course, the young men of the city were aroused to an extreme pitch
of indignation at receiving this response. They were clamorous for
war. They wished Romulus to lead them out against some of these cities
at once, and allow them at the same time to revenge the insults which
they had received, and to provide themselves with wives by violence,
since they could not obtain them by solicitation. But Romulus
restrained their ardor, saying that they must do nothing rashly, and
promising to devise a better way than theirs to attain the end.

The plan which he devised was to invite the people of the surrounding
states and cities both men and women, to come to Rome, with a view of
seizing some favorable occasion for capturing the women while they
were there, and driving the men away. The difficulty in the way of the
execution of this plan was obviously to induce the people to come, and
especially to bring the young women with them. The native timidity of
the maidens, joined to the contemptuous feeling