150 



Let us next consider the detail of the story. In the first place, as to 

 the time of the occurrence, there are two diverging statements. Livy is 

 sensible enough not to mention the exact date. It merely appears from 

 his narrative, that he thinks it took place very soon after the foundation 

 of the city, and, very naturally : for the want of a female population, it is 

 to be supposed, must have been felt very soon. Other writers were less 

 afraid than Livy of committing themselves to unfounded statements. 

 They boldly assert, that the rape took place in the fourth month after the 

 foundation of the city. This statement looks very authentic, and might 

 induce an incautious observer to suppose, that there really existed a 

 genuine and accurate tradition. But how easily is such a deceit 

 removed ! The foundation of the city was supposed to have taken place 

 on the 2l8t of Apiil, when the festival of the Palilia was celebrated in 

 honour of the pastoral goddess Pales, who made the flocks and herds 

 fruitful. The festival of the Consualia, in honour of Census, which 

 afforded the opportunity for carrying off the Sabine virgins, took place in 

 August, I. e. in the fourth month after the Palilia. Here we have the 

 authority, upon which the statement rests, that four months after the 

 foundation of the city the rape of the Sabines was effected.* 



This appeared, however, an incredibly short time to all reflecting 

 writers. In four months the whole state had to be organized, the 

 original companions of Romulus, the new adventurers, the strangers, of 

 all sorts, flocking to the Asylum, had to be enrolled as citizens, senators, 

 soldiers ; an army had to be formed ; the whole economy of a civil and 

 military administration had to be established. Granted that this could 

 be done in a very rough and crude manner, yet would it have been wise 

 or politic, or possible for Romulus to incur the hostility of such powerful 

 neighbours as the Sabines ? Arguments of this kind no doubt suggested 

 themselves to such writers, who endeavoured to dress up the old Roman 

 legends in the garb of a credible historical narrative, the rationalists of 

 Roman history, who thought, that by explaining away the miracles and 

 plausibly interpolating improbabilities, they could convert them into 

 historical facts. These writers, for instance, denied the miraculous 

 conception of Romulus ; his real father, they said, was not the God 

 Mars, but his uncle Amulius, who deceived the affrighted vestal virgin 

 Rea Silvia, by assuming the costume of the God of War. Nor was 

 Romulus carried off to heaven by his divine progenitor, when he sud- 

 denly disappeared diu-ing the thunder and rain in the field of Mars. 

 No, such a fable could not be beheved by reasonable men ! The truth 

 was, they said, that Romulus, being hated by the aristocracy, was cut to 



* Niebubr Rum. Hut Vol. I., Nota 080. 



