Spectrum obtained with ESO/VLT (PA = 88°), and again (as in the Fig. 11) the lower panel is plotted to bring out weaker lines. The spectrum has been dereddened using E(B − V) = 0.19 and R_V = 3.1. We note the significantly higher signal-to-noise in the VLT spectrum compared to Fig. 11, which made it possible to detect new lines in SNR 0540-69.3 as reported in Serafimovich et al. (2005) and here. Of particular importance are the [Ne III] lines and Hβ (see text).