measure off with it ground enough to build the splendid city which she
had named Carthage. She received Æneas most kindly, and took all his men
into her city, hoping to keep them there for ever, and make him her
husband. Æneas 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 Æneas' sword; the pile was
burnt, and the Trojans saw the flame from their ships without knowing
the cause.

[Illustration: CARTHAGE.]

By-and-by Æneas landed at a place in Italy named Cumæ. There dwelt one
of the Sybils. These were wondrous virgins whom Apollo had endowed with
deep wisdom; and when Æneas went to consult the Cumæan 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,
Æneas 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 Æneas 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 and of some opiate, and he lay asleep, while Æneas passed