dialect has become obsolete. It must, then, be admitted to be
possible, or rather highly probable, that the stories of Romulus
and Remus, and of the Horatii and Curiatti, may have had a
similar origin.

Castilian literature will furnish us with another parallel case.
Mariana, the classical historian of Spain, tells the story of the
ill-starred marriage which the King Don Alonso brought about
between the heirs of Carrion and the two daughters of the Cid.
The Cid bestowed a princely dower on the sons-in-law. But the
young men were base and proud, cowardly and cruel. They were
tried in danger, and found wanting. They fled before the Moors,
and once, when a lion broke out of his den, they ran and crouched
in an unseemly hiding-place. They knew that they were despised,
and took counsel how they might be avenged. They parted from
their father-in-law with many signs of love, and set forth on a
journey with Doña Elvira and Doña Sol. In a solitary place the
bridegrooms seized their brides, stripped them, scourged them,
and departed, leaving them for dead. But one of the House of
Bivar, suspecting foul play, had followed the travellers in
disguise. The ladies were brought back safe to the house of their
father. Complaint was made to the king. It was adjudged by the
Cortes that the dower given by the Cid should be returned, and
that the heirs of Carrion together with one of their kindred
should do battle against three knights of the party of the Cid.
The guilty youths would have declined the combat; but all their
shifts were in vain. They were vanquished in the lists, and
forever disgraced, while their injured wives were sought in
marriage by great princes.