e, with garlands on their heads and circles of gold about their necks;
and each carried two spears of cornel-wood, tipped with steel. The young
equestrians were divided into three companies; one was commanded by
Ascanius himself, mounted on a beautiful Sidonian steed which had been
given him by Queen Dido; a second by the youthful Priam, a son of that
Polites whom Pyrrhus slew at the fall of Troy; and the third by Atys, a
boy who was Ascanius' especial friend and companion. They went through a
series of evolutions, now advancing in line, again forming in different
bands and pretending to charge one another, and afterwards going through
many other intricate manoeuvres. The scene was a most picturesque one, and
gave great pleasure to those who witnessed it.

AENEAS'S VISIT TO THE LOWER WORLD

By Charles Henry Hanson

Continuing his voyage, AEneas reached the shore of the country afterwards
named Campania, the modern province of Naples. Here the ships were
carefully moored, and the crews disembarked. Some busied themselves in
kindling fires and preparing a meal; others explored the country in search
of game. AEneas, however, hastened at once to seek the temple of Apollo and
the adjoining cave of the Cumaean Sibyl,--the most famous of all the
oracles of antiquity. The temple and cave were situated in a thick wood,
closely adjoining the gloomy lake of Avernus, a black pool of unknown
depth, hedged in by precipitous cliffs, and emitting gases so poisonous
that no bird was able to fly over it in safety. In the rocks at one side
of the lake there yawned a sombre cavern, which was believed in those days
to be the entrance to the kingdom of Pluto--the abode of the dead.

AEneas was surveying the temple,--an edifice of great splendor, adorned
with pictures wrought in metal by the cunning hand of Daedalus,--when
Achates, whom he had sent before him to the Sibyl's cave, approached,
conducting the priestess. "O prince," she said, "this is not the time for
admiring the works of men. It will be more fitting for you to propitiate
the god with sacrifices, so that he may inspire me." With this mandate the
hero at once complied, and then the Sibyl summoned him and his followers
to the entrance of her cave,--a vast apartment carved out of the living
rock, whence issued a hundred corridors. Scarcely had the Trojans
approached the threshold when the virgin exclaimed, "Now is the time to
consult your fate! The god! lo, the god!" As s