Romulus, having found the altar, caused proclamation to be made, that, on an appointed day, a magnificent sacrifice would be offered; and public games and shows exhibited, which were to be open to all who should choose to attend them. Upon this, great numbers went there. The king, dressed in a purple robe, was seated on high, surrounded by the chief patricians: he was to arise, take up his robe, and throw it over him, as a signal for the attack: his subjects, with ready weapons, kept their eyes intently fixed upon their sovereign; and, when the sign was given, they drew their swords with a shout, and seized, and carried off the daughters of the Sabines, who fled, without offering resistance._”――PLUTARCH. The games which were instituted on this singular occasion were afterwards celebrated annually on the 12th of the calends of September, and considered to be an imitation of the Olympian Games of the Greeks. The Consuales, being celebrated in the Circus were sometimes called Circenses. The conduct of the Romans in the before-mentioned circumstances, and that of the Benjamites in a like predicament is so uniformly similar, that whoever attentively compares them, cannot think it very improbable that Romulus derived the idea of his stratagem from that passage of Jewish history. _Vide_ Judges, C. 21. NOTE 29. _Quintus Fabius Labeo._ If the accuracy of Plutarch may be depended on, Santra must have been mistaken in supposing Quintus Fabius Labeo to be still living at the time of the Andrian’s publication, or for several years before its appearance. This conclusion is deduced from the following circumstances: Quintus Fabius Maximus, whose prudent method of delaying a battle, and harassing his enemy, (in his campaigns against Hannibal,) procured him the surname of _Cunctator_, or _Delayer_, enjoyed the dignity of the consulship _five_ several times: he was first chosen in the year of Rome 525, and, supposing that he obtained that office in what Cicero calls _suo anno_, his own year, that is, as soon as he had attained the age required by law, Fabius must then have been forty-three years of age, and, as he died in his one hundredth year, he could not have been alive after the year 582. Quintus Fabius Labeo, who was the son of this hero, died (Plutarch informs us) some years before his father; and, consequently, could not have assisted Terence, even in his first play, the Andrian, which did not appear till the year of Rome 587. That Quintus Fabius Maximus Cunctator was the father of Quintus Fabius Labeo can admit of no doubt, though some authors who have mentioned them have omitted to notice their relationship. Plutarch expressly informs us, that the son of Quintus Fabius Maximus was of consular dignity, and, with the exception of the Cunctator, Quintus Fabius Labeo was the only Fabius whose name appears on record as consul, from the year of Rome 521 to the year 611.