submit to have our daughters taken away
from us by treachery and force."

Reasonable as this proposition seems, Romulus did not think it best
to accede to it. It was, in fact, too late, for such deeds once done
can hardly be undone. Romulus replied, that the women, being now the
wives of the Romans, could not be surrendered. The violence, he said,
of which the Sabines complained was unavoidable. No other possible way
had been open to them for gaining the end. He was willing, he added,
to enter into a treaty of peace and alliance with the Sabines, but
they must acknowledge, as a preliminary to such a treaty, the validity
of the marriages, which, as they had already been consummated, could
not now be annulled.

The Sabines, on their part, could not accede to these proposals.
Being, however, still reluctant to commence hostilities, they
continued the negotiations--though while engaged in them they seemed
to anticipate an unfavorable issue, for they were occupied all the
time in organizing troops, strengthening the defenses of their
villages and towns, and making other vigorous preparations for war.

The Romans, in the mean time, seemed to find the young wives which
they had procured by these transactions a great acquisition to their
colony. It proved, too, that they not only prized the acquisition,
but they exulted so much in the ingenuity and success of the stratagem
by which their object had been effected, that a sort of symbolical
violence in taking the bride became afterward a part of the marriage
ceremony in all subsequent weddings. For always, in future years, when
the new-married wife was brought home to her husband's house, it was
the custom for him to take her up in his arms at the door, and carry
her over the threshold as if by force, thus commemorating by this
ceremony the coercion which had signalized the original marriages of
his ancestors, the founders of Rome.

CHAPTER XII.

THE SABINE WAR.

B.C. 750-746

King Acron.--Caenina.--Its distance from Rome.--Acron's hostility to
the new city.--His plans.--Romulus and Acron meet on the
field.--Anticipations of the spectators.--Romulus victorious.--Results
of his victory.--Subsequent policy of the Romans.--The trophy of the
victory.--First Roman triumph.--Annexation of more cities.--Women
summoned.--The address of Romulus.--His promises.--Generous policy
pursued by Romulus.--Enlargement of the city.--Plans of the
Sabines.--They mature their preparati