and his children's children and their descendants."

The answers or oracles of the gods were often given in mysterious
words, as in the present case. AEneas and his companions did not know
what land was meant by the "ancient mother," but Anchises, "revolving
in his mind the legends of the men of old," remembered having heard
that one of his ancestors, Teu'cer, (the father-in-law of Dardanus),
had come from the island of Crete. Believing, therefore, that that was
the land referred to in the words of the oracle, they set sail, having
first sacrificed to Apollo, to Neptune, god of the ocean, and to the
god of storms, that their voyage might be favorable.

A bull to Neptune, an oblation due,
Another bull to bright Apollo slew;
A milk-white ewe, the western winds to please
And one coal-black, to calm the stormy seas.
DRYDEN, _AEneid_, BOOK III.

They arrived safely at Crete (now known as Can'di-a) where they
remained a considerable time and built a city which AEneas called
Per'ga-mus, the name of the famous citadel or fort of Troy. But here a
new misfortune came upon the exiles in the shape of a plague, which
threatened destruction to man and beast and the fruits of the field.

Sudden on man's feeble frame
From tainted skies a sickness came,
On trees and crops a poisonous breath,
A year of pestilence and death.
CONINGTON, _AEneid_, BOOK III.