Sabines

“ There was a lack of women; but, by a cunning trick, the Romans seized on a large number of Sabine women, who had been decoyed to Rome, with their fathers and brothers, to see the games. The angry Sabines invaded Rome. Tarpeia, the daughter of the Roman captain, left open for them a gate into the Capitoline citadel, and so they won the Capitol. In the war that followed, by the intervention of the Sabine women, the Romans and Sabines agreed to live peaceably together as citizens of one town, under Romulus and the Sabine, Tatius. ”

“ Hereupon the two factions agreed that one should select a king from the ranks of the other. This, they thought, would both put an end to their quarrels for the present, and also ensure the candidate who should be chosen being impartial, because he would be friendly to the one party because it had chosen him, and to the other because he belonged to it by birth. The Sabines gave the Romans their choice which they would do; and they decided that it would be better to choose a Sabine king themselves, than to be ruled by a Roman chosen by the Sabines. ”

“ He finishes the details very prettily and skilfully, but has no idea of giving magnitude or motion to the whole. His stern Romans and fierce Sabines look like young gentlemen brought up at a dancing or fencing school, and taking lessons in these several elegant exercises. ”

“ The Sabines were a numerous and martial people, but lived in small, unfortified villages, as it befitted, they thought, a colony of the Lacedaemonians to be bold and fearless; nevertheless, seeing themselves bound by such hostages to their good behavior, and being solicitous for their daughters, they sent ambassadors to Romulus with fair and equitable requests, that he would return their young women and recall that act of violence, and afterwards, by persuasion and lawful means, seek friendly correspondence between both nations. ”

“ The Sabines bound themselves to do this and then went away. Titus Tatius, accordingly, when informed of this arrangement, [Pg 285] detailed a strong detachment of troops, and gave them orders to repair at night in a very silent and secret manner to the gate which had been designated as the place where they were to be let in. It is asserted, however, by some writers, that this apparent treachery on the part of Tarpeia was only a deep-laid stratagem on her part to draw the Sabines into a snare ”

“ He doubled this number after he had subdued the Equi in war, a powerful and ferocious race, which threatened the affairs of the Roman people. And when he had driven the Sabines from the walls of the city, he scattered them with his horse and conquered them. It is he whom we understand to have instituted the great games, which we call Roman, and to have made a vow during the Sabine war, while in battle, that he would raise a temple on the capitol to the great and good Jupiter. ”

“ As the legend runs Romulus and his band of adventurers, having no women with them, and too poor to buy some from their neighbors, decided in the fourth month after the foundation of Rome to get wives by resorting to a stratagem. Accordingly they invited their Sabine neighbors to partake with their wives and daughters in the celebration of a festival. Suspecting nothing, the Sabines came and greatly enjoyed the entertainments provided for them. But in the middle of the feast the Romans, far outnumbering the unarmed Sabines, rushed upon their maiden guests and carried them off by force. ”

“ Now you see how much these women helped to make a beginning of Rome.
30.—“Nor did the Sabine women contribute less to its increase than the Trojan women did to its beginning. For Romulus, having excited general enmity among all his neighbours by the seizure of their women, was harassed by wars on every side; which (he being a man of ability) were soon brought to a successful issue, except that with the Sabines, which was very great because Titus Tatius, king of the Sabines, was very powerful and wise. ”

“ The probability of Sabine raids and a Sabine settlement, possibly on the Quirinal Hill, in very early times may be admitted. The incursions of the highland Apennine tribes into the lowlands fill a large place in early Italian history. The Latins were said to have originally descended from the mountain glens near Reate. [16] The invasions of Campania and of Magna Graecia by Sabine (more correctly Safine) tribes are matter of history (see Samnites) , and the Sabines themselves are represented as a restless highland people, ever seeking, new homes in richer lands. ”

“ This levying the tribunes of the Commons sought to hinder; and perchance had done so, but there also came well-nigh to the walls of the city a great host of the Sabines plundering all the country. Thereupon the people willingly offered themselves, and there were levied forthwith two great armies. ”

“ The story goes on to tell that the Roman young men married the Sabine young women. Romulus had made this plan for the capture, for he thought it was of little use to have a city with so few women in it. For without the women, how could there be true homes?
Wars went on between Romans and Sabines for some years. At last a day came when each side had fiercely attacked the other; each had fled; each had begun the fight again. A crowd of women ran in between the armies. ”

“ The space afforded by the stone pediment is necessarily limited, and consequently Roman and Sabines, gentlemen and lady, are all piled one a-top of another in such inextricable confusion as to demand a good quarter of an hour's close observation to determine which of the muscular writhing legs belong to the Roman ravisher and which to the injured Sabine husband. As the sculptor has given none of his protégées any clothing, the snow has been kind enough to throw a modest white mantle over them all. ”

“ The consuls were therefore ordered to divide the provinces between them. The Sabines fell to the lot of Horatius, the Æquans and Volscians to that of Valerius. On their proclaiming a levy for these wars, through the good wishes of the commons, not only the younger men, but of those who [Pg 230] had served out their time, a considerable portion as volunteers, attended to give in their names: and hence the army was stronger not only by the number, but also by the kind of soldiers, veterans being mixed with them. ”

“ The city being thus doubled in number, an hundred of the Sabines were elected senators, and the legions were increased to six thousand foot and six hundred horse; then they divided the people into three tribes; the first, from Romulus, named Ramnenses; the second, from Tatius, Tatienses ”

“ It is life. And that is preferable, with its wounds and its anguish, to the gloomy darkness of disgust, to the poison of contempt, to the void of abdication, to that death of the heart which is called indifference. But all Sabine's courage abandoned her one evening when she appeared in a toilet such as women are inspired to wear in the hope of eclipsing a rival, and about which Calyste said, laughing:—
"In spite of all you can do, Sabine, you'll never be anything but a handsome Andalusian." ”

“ Sabin, that so great a man should talk with him so earnestly? He was looking up now, he was going to speak. What was he going to say? Harcutt held his breath. The idea of moving away never occurred to him now.
“Yet,” Mr. Sabin said slowly, “your country should be a low bidder. The importance of such a thing to you must be less than to France, less than to her great ally. Your relations here are close and friendly. Nature and destiny seemed to have made you allies. ”

“ Sabina used every means in her power, to dissuade her husband from his resolution; but he only replied, by saying; that so long as he could move an arm or a leg, the field should not lie idle. “If we cannot plough it, we will dig it: and I am no timid beast of labour, but a tried and dauntless soldier, over whom a goblin can have no power.” ”

“ Sabin’s face, no longer pleasant and courteous, had taken to itself some very grim lines.
“I am a weak man, Mr. Horser, but I am never without the means of self-defence,” Mr. Sabin said in a still, cold tone. “Be so good as to sit down in that easy-chair.”
Mr. Horser hesitated. For one moment he stood as though about to carry out his first intention. He stood glaring at his opponent, his face contracted into a snarl, his whole appearance hideous, almost bestial. Mr. Sabin smiled upon him contemptuously—the maddening, compelling smile of the born aristocrat. ”

“ You will go through it, Sabine, if you have not already done so. It seems we suffer all the time, because when that is over then we learn to appreciate gentleness and chivalry—and probably by then it is out of our reach."
"I don't believe anything is out of our reach if we want it enough," and Sabine closed her firm mouth.
"Then I wonder what you want, Sabine—because I know you do not really want Lord Fordyce—he represents chivalry—and I don't believe you are at that stage yet, dearest." ”

“ Sabin was thoughtful for several moments, then he took out his case and lit a cigarette. He watched the blue smoke floating away over the ship’s side, and looked no more at the woman at his elbow.
“If you decide,” he said quietly, “to settle in America, you must not allow yourself to forget that I am very much your debtor. I——”
“Your friendship,” she interrupted, “I shall be very glad to have. We may perhaps help one another to feel less lonely.” ”

“ We shall not wait, my child, till you are in extremis before coming to your relief. Keep a good heart! Your grief to-night is so bitter that my secret escapes me; but it is impossible for me not to give you a little hope."
"Will it make Calyste unhappy?" asked Sabine, looking anxiously at the duchess.
"Oh, heavens! shall I ever be as silly as that!" cried Athenais, naively.
"Ah, little girl, you know nothing of the precipices down which our virtue flings us when led by love," replied Sabine, making a sort of moral revelation, so distraught was she by her woe. ”

“ Sabin answered, “but it was scarcely necessary; you stopped to speak to him of your own accord, and you asked him to supper, which was scarcely discreet.”
“One gets so bored sometimes,” she admitted frankly.
“You are only a woman,” he said indulgently; “a year of waiting seems to you an eternity, however vast the stake. There will come a time when you will see things differently.”
“I wonder!” she said softly, “I wonder!”
Mr. Sabin had unconsciously spoken the truth when he had pleaded an appointment to Lord Wolfenden. His servant drew him on one side directly they entered the house. ”

“ Sabin, with his training and natural power of seeing through the words to the heart of the speaker, could not misunderstand her, and he spoke with a gentle earnestness very moving.
“Believe me, my dear lady, when I say that to every one once at least in his life there comes a chance of happiness, although every one is not wise enough to take it. ”

“ You forget, monsieur, that I am half blind, and that, by reason of this infirmity, I am doomed to ridicule, to poverty, or a humiliating idleness. I, who can never be anything but a burden to those who feel an interest in me, the idea that I should have the audacity—No, no, I repeat it, I even swear, that I have loved and still love Mlle. Sabine as one loves the good and the beautiful, without any other hope than of the heavenly felicity the love of the good and the beautiful inspires. ”

“ But that is his only fault, my dear father," added Sabine, with charming ingenuousness, "and though he surely cannot be held accountable for it, Suzanne is pitiless toward it, for she is always making fun of him."
"You do not make fun of him, I am sure."
"It would be cruel in me to do that, father, for he tries to be the first to laugh at his mishaps, though they worry him terribly. It is so sad to be almost blind. And this very evening—you can judge from that how courageous he is—he scalded his hand nearly to the bone with boiling water. You will see, father, what a dreadful burn it was. ”

“ She sat there, white and cowed, looking a great deal at Mr. Sabin with sad, far-away eyes, and seldom originating a remark. Mr. Watson, on the contrary, talked incessantly, in marked contrast to his previous silence; he drank no wine, but seemed in the best of spirits. Only once did he appear at a loss, and that was when the captain, helping himself to some nuts, turned towards Mr. Sabin and asked a question—
“I wonder, Mr. Sabin, whether you ever heard of an Indian nut called, I believe, the Fakella? They say that an oil distilled from its kernel is the most deadly poison in the world.” ”

“ When he was told that Sabine had long been in bed he rejoiced to find himself rich in the possession of a night in which to live over his emotions. He cursed the power of divination which love had bestowed upon Sabine. When by chance a man is adored by his wife, she reads on his face as in a book; she learns every quiver of its muscles, she knows whence comes its calmness, she asks herself the reason of the slightest sadness, seeking to know if haply the cause is in herself; she studies the eyes; for her the eyes are tinted with the dominant thought,—they love or they do not love. ”

“ Sabina—in whose eyes no tear had ever been seen— Sabina was weeping, Sabina had a heart like other women. Greatly astonished and deeply moved he saw her turn from him, utterly shaken by the agitation of her feelings, and sink on her knees by the side of the couch she had quitted to hide her face in the cushions. He stood motionless by her side, but presently going nearer to her:
"Stand up, Sabina," he said. "Your desire is a just one. You shall have the son for whom your soul longs." ”