FATE OF THE CHIEF ACTORS IN THE CONFLICT.

Of the fate of some of the principal actors in the Trojan war
it may be stated that, of the prominent Trojans, AEneas alone
escaped. After many years of wanderings he landed in Italy with
a small company of Trojans; and the Roman writers trace to him
the origin of their nation. Priam was killed by Pyrrhus, the
son of Achilles, during the burning of Troy; while Achilles
himself fell some time before, shot with an arrow in the heel
by Paris, as Hector had prophesied would be the manner of his
death. Ajax, after the death of Achilles, had a contest with
Ulysses for the armor of the dead hero, but was unsuccessful,
and died by his own hand. The poet EN'NIUS ascribes the following
declaration to Tel'amon, the father of Ajax, when he heard of his
son's death:

I knew, when I begat him, he must die,
And trained him to no other destiny--
Knew, when I sent him to the Trojan shore,
'Twas not to halls of feast, but fields of gore.
--Trans. by PETERS.

Agamemnon, on his return to Greece, was barbarously murdered by
his unfaithful queen, Clytemnestra. Diomed was driven from Greece,
and barely escaped with his life. It is uncertain where or how
he died. Ulysses, after almost innumerable troubles and hardships
by sea and land, at last returned in safety to Ithaca. His
wanderings are the subject of Homer's Odyssey.

But it may be asked, what became of Helen, the primary cause