o the islands and
Asia Minor, stopping at every place where Greek was spoken, to tell
about the wrath of Achilles, the death of Patroclus, Hector, or old
Priam, the burning of Troy, the wanderings of Ulysses, and the return of
the Greeks. Other youths learned the poems; and so, although they were
not written down for many a year, they were constantly recited and sung,
and thus kept alive in the memory of the people.

As for Homer, their author, we know but little about him. We are told
that he lived to be very old, and that although he was poor as long as
he lived, and forced to earn his living by reciting his songs, he was
greatly honored after his death.

His two great heroic poems--the Iliad, telling all about the Trojan War,
and the Od'ys-sey, relating how Ulysses sailed about for ten years on
his way home from Troy--were finally written down, and kept so carefully
that they can still be read to-day. Such was the admiration felt for
these poems, that some years after Homer's death an attempt was made to
find out more about him, and about the place where he was born.

Fifty cities claimed the honor of giving him birth; but, although it was
never positively found out where he was born, most people thought the
Island of Chi'os was his birthplace. The Greek towns, wishing to show
how much they admired the works of Homer, used to send yearly gifts to
this place, the native land of the grandest poet the world has ever
known.

XXI. THE RISE OF SPARTA.

The city of Sparta, founded in the days of the Pelasgians, and once
ruled over by Menelaus and Helen, had fallen, as we have seen, into the
hands of the Heraclidae when they came back to the Peloponnesus after
their exile of a hundred years. It was first governed by
A-ris-to-de'mus, one of their three leaders; and, as records soon began
to be kept, we know a great deal about the early history of this famous
place.

As the town had formerly belonged to the Heraclidae, and had been ruled
by one of their ancestors, called Lac-e-dae'mon, they called it by his
name, and the country around it they named La-co'ni-a. Having won back
the town by fighting, the Heraclidae said that they would attend to war
and politics, and make the conquered people till the ground.

The old inhabitants of Laconia, therefore, went on living in the
country, where they sowed and harvested for the benefit of the Spartans.
All the prisoners of war, however, became real slaves. They were obl