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 When their hearts had grown a little more quiet, Mother Ceres looked anxiously at Proserpina.

'My child,' said she, 'did you taste any food while you were in King Pluto's palace? '

'Dearest mother,' answered Proserpina, 'I will tell you the whole truth. Until this very morning, not a morsel of food had passed my lips. But to-day they brought me a pomegranate (a very dry one it was, and all shrivelled up, till there was little left of it but seeds and skin), and having seen no fruit for so long a time, and being faint with hunger, I was tempted just to bite it. The instant I tasted it, King Pluto and Quicksilver came into the room. I had not swallowed a morsel; but—dear mother, I hope it was no harm—but six of the pomegranate seeds, I am afraid, remained in my mouth.'

'Ah, unfortunate child, and miserable me!' exclaimed Ceres. 'For each of those six pomegranate seeds you must spend one month of every year in King Pluto's palace. You are but half restored to your mother. Only six months with me, and six with that good-for-nothing King of Darkness!'

'Do not speak so harshly of poor King Pluto,' said Proserpina, kissing her mother. 'He has some very good qualities; and I really think I can bear to spend six months in his palace, if he will only let me spend the other six with you. He certainly did very wrong to carry me off; but then, as he says, it was but a dismal sort of life for him, to live in that great gloomy place, all alone; and it has made 195