s, she met creatures of another nature, who
used, in those old times, to haunt the pleasant and solitary places, and
were very sociable with persons who understood their language and customs,
as Mother Ceres did. Sometimes, for instance, she tapped with her finger
against the knotted trunk of a majestic oak; and immediately its rude bark
would cleave asunder, and forth would step a beautiful maiden, who was the
hamadryad of the oak, dwelling inside of it, and sharing its long life,
and rejoicing when its green leaves sported with the breeze. But not one
of these leafy damsels had seen Proserpina. Then, going a little farther,
Ceres would, perhaps, come to a fountain, gushing out of a pebbly hollow
in the earth, and would dabble with her hand in the water. Behold, up
through its sandy and pebbly bed, along with the fountain's gush, a young
woman with dripping hair would arise, and stand gazing at Mother Ceres,
half out of the water, and undulating up and down with its ever-restless
motion. But when the mother asked whether her poor lost child had stopped
to drink out of the fountain, the naiad, with weeping eyes (for these
water-nymphs had tears to spare for everybody's grief), would answer,
"No!" in a murmuring voice, which was just like the murmur of the stream.

Often, likewise, she encountered fauns, who looked like sunburnt country
people, except that they had hairy ears, and little horns upon their
foreheads, and the hinder legs of goats, on which they gamboled merrily
about the woods and fields. They were a frolicsome kind of creature, but
grew as sad as their cheerful dispositions would allow when Ceres inquired
for her daughter, and they had no good news to tell. But sometimes she
came suddenly upon a rude gang of satyrs, who had faces like monkeys and
horses' tails behind them, and who were generally dancing in a very
boisterous manner, with shouts of noisy laughter. When she stopped to
question them, they would only laugh the louder, and make new merriment
out of the lone woman's distress. How unkind of those ugly satyrs! And
once, while crossing a solitary sheep pasture, she saw a personage named
Pan, seated at the foot of a tall rock. And making music on a shepherd's
flute. He, too, had horns and hairy ears, and goat's feet; but being
acquainted with Mother Ceres, he answered her question as civilly as he
knew how, and invited her to taste some milk and honey out of a wooden
bowl. But neither could Pan tell he