CHAPTER XV
AENEAS’S STORY
Thestorides settled behind Aeneas with his back against a great support beam and his writing implements spread out on the pavement beside him.
The Trojan stood at the foot of Dido’s couch and began his tale:
“I grew up in a small seaside village outside the city of Troy,” said Aeneas. “It was an ancient settlement, said to have been founded by Dardanus himself. Our village had no walls, and the sea lay below our back yards. When the Greeks arrived, led by Agamemnon of Mycenae and his brother Menelaus of Sparta, they found themselves repelled by Ilium’s high walls. They decided, for diversion, to raid the small villages of the area. When they arrived in our hamlet, I was living in my father Anchises’ house with my wife Creusa and my stepmother Charete.
“The Gr
