Æneas fled from Troy when that city was burning down and started off to find a new home. Finally after several years he came to Italy and the mouth of a river called the Tiber. There Æneas met the daughter of the man who was ruling over that country, a girl by the name of Lavinia, and married her, and they lived happily ever after. So the children of Æneas and Lavinia ruled over the land, and they had children, and their children had children, and their children had children, until at last boy twins were born. These twins were named Romulus and Remus. Here endeth the first part of the story and the trouble begins, for they did not live happily ever after. At the time the twins were born, a man had stolen the kingdom, and he feared that these two boys might grow up and take his stolen kingdom away from him. So he put the twins in a basket and set them afloat on the river Tiber, hoping that they might be carried out to sea or upset and be drowned. This, he thought, was nearly all right, so long as he didn’t kill them with his own hands. But the basket drifted ashore instead of going out to sea or upsetting, and a mother wolf found the twins and nursed them as if they were her own babies. And a woodpecker also helped and fed them berries. At last a shepherd found them and brought them up as if they were his own sons until they grew up and became men. This sounds a good deal like the story of Paris who was left out to die and was found and brought up by a shepherd also. [Illustration: Romulus and Remus with the wolf.] Each of the twins then wished to build a city. But they could not agree which one was to do it, and in quarreling over the matter, Romulus killed his own twin brother Remus. Romulus then built the city by the Tiber River, on the spot where he and his brother had been saved and nursed by the mother wolf. Here there were seven hills. This was in 753 B.C., and he named the city Roma after his own name, and the people who lived there were called Romans. So that is why, ever afterward, the Roman kings always said they were descended from the Trojan hero, Æneas, the great-great-great-grandfather of Romulus. Don’t you believe this story? Neither do I. But it is such an old, old story every one is supposed to have heard it even though it is only a legend. In order to get people for the city which he had started, it is said that Romulus invited all the thieves and bad men who had escaped from jail to come and live in Rome, promising them that they would be safe there. Then as none of the men had wives, and there were no women in his new city, Romulus thought up a scheme to get the men wives. He invited some people called Sabines, who lived near-by, both men and women, to come to Rome to a big party. They accepted, and a great feast was spread. In the middle of the feast, when every one was eating and drinking, a signal was given, and each of the Romans seized a Sabine woman for his wife and ran off with her.