The story of the life and adventures of Æneas, which we have given in this and in the preceding chapters, is a faithful summary of the narrative which the poetic historians of those days recorded. It is, of course, not to be relied upon as a narrative of facts; but it is worthy of very special attention by every cultivated mind of the present day, from the fact, that such is the beauty, the grace, the melody, the inimitable poetic perfection with which the story is told, in the language in which the original record stands, that the narrative has made a more deep, and widespread, and lasting impression upon the human mind than any other narrative perhaps that ever was penned. CHAPTER VI. THE LANDING IN LATIUM. B.C. 1197-1190 Description of the country where Æneas landed.--The landing.--Mouth of the Tiber.--Burning of the ships.--Italy in ancient days.--Sacrifices offered.--Map of Latium.--Reconnoitring the country.--King Latinus.--An embassy.--The embassy come to the capital.--The embassadors are admitted to an audience.--Their address to king Latinus.--Latinus accedes to Æneas's requests.--Proposal of marriage.--Lavinia and Turnus.--The anger of Turnus at being set aside.--Lavinium.--Situation of the Trojan territory.--The story of Sylvia's stag.--Ascanius shoots the stag.--The resentment of Sylvia's brothers.--Sudden outbreak.--Death of Almon.--Great excitement.--Preparation for war.--Latinus.--The Trojans gradually gain ground.--Desire for peace.--Turnus opposes it.--A proposal for single combat.--Result of the combat.--Marriage of Æneas.--Æneas drowned in the Numicius. Latium was the name given to an ancient province of Italy, lying south of the Tiber. At the time of Æneas's arrival upon the coast it was an independent kingdom. The name of the king who reigned over it at this period was Latinus. The country on the banks of the Tiber, where the city of Rome afterward arose, was then a wild but picturesque rural region, consisting of hills and valleys, occupied by shepherds and husbandmen, but with nothing upon it whatever, to mark it as the site of a city. The people that dwelt in Latium were shepherds and herdsmen, though there was a considerable band of warriors under the command of the king. The inhabitants of the country were of Greek origin, and they had brought with them from Greece, when they colonized the country, such rude arts as were then known. They had the use of Cadmus's letters, for writing, so far as writing was employed at all in those early days. They were skillful in making such weapons of war, and such simple instruments of music, as were known at the time, and they could erect buildings, of wood, or of stone, and thus constructed such dwellings as they needed, in their towns, and walls and citadels for defence.