With them the lance became the symbol of property, and even had a place in their judicial procedure. Their slaves were booty, their wives were booty, and their children, begotten of them, the fruit of their possessions.[218] [218] Ortolan’s _History of Roman Law_, p. 42. The right of fathers, under Romulus, to sell their sons, upon the accession of Numa the Sabine ruler, to the office of lawgiver, was withdrawn, and the reason given for it was consideration for women. According to Plutarch, Numa “reckoned it a great hardship, that a woman should marry a man as free, and then live with him as a slave.”[219] [219] Numa and Lycurgus compared. In the life of Numa by Plutarch we have a hint of a former age of universal freedom. It was one of this ruler’s institutions, that once a year the slaves should be entertained along with their masters at a public feast, there to enjoy the fruits “which they had helped to produce.” The same writer assures us that some are of the opinion that this is a remnant of that equality which was in existence in the times of Saturn, when there was neither master nor slave, but all were upon the same footing. Plutarch quotes from Macrobius, who says that this feast was celebrated in Italy long before the building of Rome. From all the facts to be gathered relative to the relations of the sexes in the age of Numa, it is plain that that freedom of action exercised by women in a former age among the Dorians, was rapidly declining, and that the early independence which has characterized the Sabine women was beginning to bring upon them the condemnation of their Roman lords. This is shown in the fact that it soon became Numa’s arduous task to institute certain restrictions on their former liberties. In a comparison between Lycurgus and Numa, Plutarch, in referring to this subject, observes: Numa’s strictures as to virgins tended to form them to that modesty which is the ornament of their sex; but the great liberty which Lycurgus gave them, brought upon them the censure of the poets, particularly Ibycus. The grossness which had been developed during the four or five hundred years following the age of Lycurgus, and the jealousy with which the movements of women had come to be regarded, are illustrated by the following stanza from Euripides: These quit their homes, ambitious to display, Amidst the youths, their vigour in the race, Or feats of wrestling, whilst their airy robe Flies back and leaves their limbs uncovered.[220] [220] Quoted by Plutarch. It is evident that not only in private life, but in their desire for public activity also, the independence of the Sabine women failed to comport with the ideas already in vogue among their Roman husbands regarding the “proper sphere” of women. Consequently their behaviour was thought to be