lls
sculptured with all the story of the siege of Troy, and all his friends
so perfectly represented, that he burst into tears at the sight.

Just then a beautiful queen, attended by a whole troop of nymphs, came
into the temple. This lady was Dido; her husband, Sichaeus, had been king
of Tyre, till he was murdered by his brother Pygmalion, who meant to
have married her, but she fled from him with a band of faithful Tyrians
and all her husband's treasure, and had landed on the north coast of
Africa. There she begged of the chief of the country 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 AEneas most kindly, and took all his men
into her city, hoping to keep them there for ever, and make him her
husband. AEneas himself was so happy there, that he forgot all his plans
and the prophecies he had heard, until Jupiter sent Mercury to rouse him
to fulfil his destiny. He obeyed the call; and Dido was so wretched at
his departure that she caused a great funeral pile to be built, laid
herself on the top, and stabbed herself with AEneas' sword; the pile was
burnt, and the Trojans saw the flame from their ships without knowing
the cause.

[Illustration: CARTHAGE.]

By-and-by AEneas landed at a place in Italy named Cumae. There dwelt one
of the Sybils. These were wondrous virgins whom Apollo had endowed with
deep wisdom; and when AEneas went to consult the Cumaean Sybil, she told
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
he sought it, until two doves, his mother's birds, came flying before
him to show him the tree where gold gleamed through the boughs, and he
found the branch growing on the tree as mistletoe grows on the thorn.

Guarded with this, and guided by the Sybil, after a great sacrifice,
AEneas passed into a gloomy cave, where he came to the river Styx, round
which flitted all the shades who had never received funeral rites, and
whom the ferryman, Charon, would not carry over. The Sybil, however,
made him take AEneas across, his boat groaning under the weight of a
human body. On the other side stood Cerberus, but the Sybil threw him a
cake of honey a