Besides the intrinsic interest and importance of the facts stated in the last chapter, to the student of history, there was a special reason for calling the attention of the reader to them here, that he might know in what light the story of the destruction of Troy, and of the wanderings of Æneas, the great ancestor of Romulus, which we now proceed to relate, is properly to be regarded. The events connected with the destruction of Troy took place, if they ever occurred at all, about the year _twelve hundred_ before Christ. Homer is supposed to have lived and composed his poems about the year nine hundred; and the art of writing is thought to have been first employed for the purpose of recording continuous compositions, about the year six hundred. The story of Æneas then, so far as it has any claims to historical truth, is a tale which was handed down by oral tradition, among story-tellers for three hundred years, and then was clothed in verse, and handed down in that form orally by the memory of the reciters of it, in generations successive for three hundred years more, before it was recorded; and during the whole period of this transmission, the interest felt in it was not the desire for ascertaining and communicating historic truth, but simply for entertaining companies of listeners with the details of a romantic story. The story, therefore, can not be relied upon as historically true; but it is no less important on that account, that all well-informed persons should know what it is. The mother of Æneas (as the story goes), was a celebrated goddess. Her name was Aphrodite;[B] though among the Romans she afterward received the name of Venus. Aphrodite was not born of a mother, like ordinary mortals, but sprang mysteriously and supernaturally from a foam which gathered on a certain occasion upon the surface of the sea. At the commencement of her existence she crept out upon the shores of an island that was near,--the island of Cythera,--which lies south of the Peloponnesus. [Footnote B: Pronounced in four syllables, Aph-ro-di-te.] [Illustration: ORIGIN OF VENUS.] She was the goddess of love, of beauty, and of fruitfulness; and so extraordinary were the magical powers which were inherent from the beginning, in her very nature, that as she walked along upon the sands of the shore, when she first emerged from the sea, plants and flowers of the richest verdure and beauty sprang up at her feet wherever she stepped. She was, besides, in her own person, inexpressibly beautiful; and in addition to the natural influence of her charms, she was endued with the supernatural power of inspiring the sentiment of love in all who beheld her.