a woman in years, the wife of Mandonius, who was the brother of Indibilis, the chieftain of the Illergetians; she threw herself weeping at the general’s feet, and began to implore him to give particularly strict injunctions to their guardians with respect to the care and treatment of females.  Scipio replied, that nothing certainly should be wanting; when the woman rejoined:  “We do not much value such things, for what is not good enough for such a condition?  A care of a different kind disquiets me, when beholding the age of these females; for I am myself no longer exposed to the danger peculiar to females.”  Around her stood the daughters of Indibilis, in the bloom of youth and beauty, with others of equal rank, all of whom looked up to her as a parent.  Scipio then said:  “Out of regard for that discipline which I myself and the Roman nation maintain, I should take care that nothing, which is any where held sacred, should be violated among us.  In the present case, your virtue and your rank cause me to observe it more strictly; for not even in the midst of misfortunes have you forgotten the delicacy becoming matrons.”  He then delivered them over to a man of tried virtue, ordering him to treat them with no less respect and modesty than the wives and mothers of guests.

50.  The soldiers then brought to him a female captive, a grown-up virgin, of such exquisite beauty, that whichever way she walked she attracted the eyes of every body.  Scipio, on making inquiries as to her country and parentage, heard, among other particulars, that she was betrothed to a young prince of the Celtiberians, named Allucius.  He immediately, therefore, summoned from their abode her parents and lover, and having heard in the mean time that the latter was desperately enamoured of her, as soon as he arrived he addressed him in a more studied manner than her parents.  “A young man myself,” said he, “I address myself to a young man, and therefore there need be the less reserve in this conversation.  As soon as your intended bride, having been captured by my soldiers, was brought into my presence, and I was informed that she was endeared to you, which her beauty rendered probable, considering that I should myself wish that my affection for my intended bride, though excessive, should meet with indulgence, could I enjoy the pleasures suited to my age, (particularly in an honourable and lawful love,) and were not my mind engrossed by public affairs, I indulge as far as I can your passion.  Your mistress, while under my protection, has received as much respect as under the roof of her own parents, your father-in-law and mother-in-law.  She has been kept in perfect safety for you, that she might be presented to you pure, a gift worthy of me and of you.  This only reward I bargain for in return for the service I have rendered you, that you would be a friend to the Roman people, and if you believe that I am a true man, as these nations knew my father and uncle to have been heretofore,