Page:The Music of the Spheres.djvu/40

 made himself invisible by wearing his Hat of Darkness or was drawn in a sooty chariot by fierce black horses whose reins were covered with rust. One day when Typhon was causing trouble around Mount Etna by his incessant grumbling and turning about, Pluto came up to ascertain just how much his roof under the Sicilian land was endangered. This proved a sorry day for the earth, for while the gloomy-faced god was looking about for cracks, Venus saw him from a distant hilltop, and calling Cupid, told him to shoot the dour fellow with a gold-tipped arrow, for this was the only kingdom over which she had no control. The first person whom Pluto saw was Proserpine, the beautiful daughter of Ceres, the tutelary Goddess of Sicily, and falling immediately in love with her, he carried her off to his kingdom under the ground. Although for many days Proserpine wept bitterly, she gradually became reconciled, and once ate six pomegranate seeds from a tree in Pluto's sunless garden. This proved her undoing, for when Ceres discovered that Proserpine was Queen of the Kingdom of Shades, she inquired of the Fates if there was any chance of her daughter's release and they informed her that since Proserpine had tasted of the seeds, the food of death, she must spend six months of every year with Pluto. Thus, through six long months Ceres, the Goddess of the Harvests, sits and weeps and no fresh crops are planted and no fruits appear on trees or vines; in the meantime poor mortals do the best they can throughout the winter and wait eagerly for the springtime when Proserpine again appears above the land and Ceres, in happiness, sows the grain and covers the orchards with masses of blossoms.

Apollo, a son of Jupiter, was dazzling and life-giving—a direct contrast to Pluto, dark-visaged King of the Dead. Apollo's sun-palace, which had been built by Vulcan in the country beyond the east, was crusted thick with gold and embedded with large and wonderful jewels. His sun-chariot was also of gold, but of