s the least hint which
way to seek her. Thus passed the night; and still she continued her
search without sitting down to rest, or stopping to take food, or even
remembering to put out the torch although first the rosy dawn, and then
the glad light of the morning sun, made its red flame look thin and
pale. But I wonder what sort of stuff this torch was made of; for it
burned dimly through the day, and, at night, was as bright as ever, and
never was extinguished by the rain or wind, in all the weary days and
nights while Ceres was seeking for Proserpina.

It was not merely of human beings that she asked tidings of her
daughter. In the woods and by the streams, 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 same suddenly upon a rude gang of satyrs, who had faces
like monkeys, and horse