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THE ÆNEID.

From the shore of the bay the company now move off to a natural amphitheatre close at hand, where the rest of the games are to be exhibited. Æneas takes his place high in the midst on an extemporised throne. For the foot-race, which comes first on the list, a crowd of competitors enter, both of native Sicilians and of their Trojan guests. Among the Sicilians are Salius and Patron, of Greek families settled in the island, and Helymus and Panopes, friends and companions of Acestes. The favourites among the Trojans are Diores, one of the many sons of Priam, and Nisus and Euryalus, noted for their romantic friendship, of which we shall hear more hereafter. The prizes in this contest are a war-horse with full trappings for the first, an Amazonian quiver for the second, and a helmet—the spoil of some conquered Greek on the plain of Troy—for the third. Nisus goes off with a strong lead, and has the race easily in hand. Next him, but at a long interval, comes Salius, Euryalus lying third, Helymus and Diores, close together, fourth and fifth. But when within a short distance of the goal, Nisus slips up in the blood and filth which has been left uncleared at the spot where the oxen have been sacrificed, and falls heavily to the ground. Knowing himself to be out of the race, he determines that his dear Euryalus shall win. So, by a piece of most unjustifiable jockeyship, which ought to have led to his being warned off from all such contests for ever after, he rises up at the moment that Salius is passing, and brings him down upon him. Euryalus has thus an easy victory, Helymus and Diores coming in second