Young Folks' History of England

amily were cut off. Among the Trojans there was a prince called ?neas, whose fathe

tle son Iulus, or Ascanius, while his wife Creusa followed close behind, and all the Trojans who could get their arms together joined him, so that they escaped in a body to Mount Ida; but just as they were outside t

troops had landed to get food, and were eating the flesh of the numerous goats which they found climbing about the rocks, down on them came the harpies, horrible birds with women's faces and hooked hands, with which they snatched away the food and spoiled what they could not eat. The Trojans shot at them, but the arrows glanced off their

CO

Hector's wife, whom he had gained after Pyrrhus had been killed. Helenus was a prophet, and gave ?neas much advice. In especial he said that when the Trojans should come to Italy, they would find, u

unning down to the beach begging to be taken in. He was a Greek, who had been left behind when Ulysses escaped from Polyphemus' cave, and had made his way to the forests, where he had lived ev

NT

ay, enclosed by tall cliffs with woods overhanging them. Here the tired wanderers landed, and, lighting a fire, ?neas went in quest of food. Coming out of the forest, they looked down from a hill, and beheld a multitude of people building a city, raisin

ntry as much land as could be enclosed by a bullock's hide. He granted this readily; and Dido, cutting the hide into the finest possible strips, managed to measure off with it ground enough to build the splendid city which she had named Carthage. She received ?neas most kindly, and took all his men into her city, hoping to keep them there for ever, and make him her husband. ?neas himself was so happ

THA

ld him that he must visit the under-world of Pluto to learn his fate. First, however, he had to go into a forest, and find there and gather a golden bough, which he was to bear in his hand to keep him safe. Long

ve, among them, to his surprise, poor forsaken Dido. A little further on he found the home of the warriors, and held converse with his old Trojan friends. He passed by the place of doom for the wicked, Tartarus; and in the Elysian fields, full of laurel groves and meads of asphodel, he found the spirit of his father Anchises, and with him was allowed to see the souls of all their descendants, as yet unborn, who should raise the glory of their name. They are described on to the very time when the poet wrote to whom we owe all the tale of the

N SO