II. AENEAS LEAVES TROY—THE HARPIES—PROPHECY OF HELENUS-THE GIANT POLYPHEMUS.
In the early days of summer—the fleet being ready and all preparations complete—Anchises gave the order for departure, and so they set sail, piously carrying with them the images of their household gods and of the "great gods" of their nation. The first land they touched was the coast of Thrace, not far from Troy. AEneas thought he would build a city and make a settlement here, as the country had been, from early times, connected by ties of friendship with his own. To obtain the blessing of heaven on an undertaking of such importance, he set about performing religious services in honor of his mother Venus and the other gods, sacrificing a snow-white bull as an offering to Jupiter. Close by the place there happened to be a little hill, on the top of which was a grove of myrtle, bristling with thick-clustering, spear-like shoots. Wishing to have some of those plants to decorate his altars, AEneas pulled one up from the ground, whereupon he beheld drops of blood oozing from the torn roots. Though horrified at the sight he plucked another bough, and again blood oozed out as before. Then praying to the gods to save himself and his people from whatever evil there might be in the omen, he proceeded to tear up a third shoot, when from out the earth at his feet a voice uttered these words:
"O, AEneas! why do you tear an unhappy wretch? Spare me, now that I am in my grave; forbear to pollute your pious hands. It is from no tree- trunk that the blood comes. Quit this barbarous land with all speed. Know that I am Pol-y-do'rus. Here I was slain by many arrows, which have taken root and grown into a tree."
Deep was the horror of AEneas while he listened to this dreadful story, for he knew that Polydorus was one of the younger sons of Priam. Early in the war, his father, fearing that the Trojans might be defeated, had sent him for protection to the court of the king of Thrace. At the same time he sent the greater part of his treasures, including a large sum of money, to be taken care of by the king till the war should be over. But as soon as the Thracian monarch heard of the fall of Troy he treacherously slew the young prince and seized all his father's treasure.
False to divine and human laws,
The traitor joins the conqueror's cause,
Lays impious hands on Polydore,
And grasps by force the golden store.
Fell lust of gold! abhorred, accurst!
What will not men to slake such thirst?
CONINGTON, AEneid, BOOK III.
When AEneas related this story to his father and the other Trojan chiefs, they all agreed to depart forthwith from a land polluted by so black a crime. But first they performed funeral rites on the grave of Polydorus, erecting two altars which they decked with cypress wreaths, the emblem of mourning, and offering sacrifices to the gods.
Soon afterwards, the winds being favorable, they set sail, and in a few days reached De'los, one of the isles of Greece, where there was a famous temple of Apollo. A'ni-us, the king of the island, and a priest of Apollo, gave them a hospitable reception. In the great temple they made suitable offerings, and AEneas prayed to the god to tell them in what country they might find a resting place and a home. Scarcely had the prayer been finished when the temple and the earth itself seemed to quake, whereupon the Trojans prostrated themselves in lowly reverence upon the ground, and presently they heard a voice saying: "Brave sons of Dar'da-nus, the land which gave birth to your ancestors shall again receive your race in its fertile bosom. Seek out your ancient mother. There the house of AEneas shall rule over every coast, 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.