The Story of Proserpina
When Jupiter made himself ruler of the world, he imprisoned some of
the warring giants under Mount Etna in Sicily, much to the disgust
of Pluto, who was always fearing that when the giants got restless
and turned over and over underground (thus causing earthquakes), they
would some day make such a large crack in the earth that daylight would
be let into Hades. So Pluto often went up out of his sunless land to
look carefully over the island, and to be sure that no new fissure
was being made in the earth's surface. One day, as he was driving his
four coal-black horses through the vale of Enna, he saw a group of
maidens gathering violets on the hillside; and among them was one so
exquisitely fair that Pluto determined to take her for his wife. This
was Proserpina,[36] daughter of Ceres, the goddess of agriculture, a
maiden who had ever shunned the thought of marriage and preferred to
spend her life playing games, and dancing in the beautiful plain of
Enna, where there is never any frost or snow, but springtime lasts
through all the year.
Pluto had often tried to gain a wife by gentle means, but no one would
consent to share his grewsome home; so, knowing that this maiden he
desired would never listen to soft words of love, he determined to take
her by force. Driving his fiery horses at full speed, he rushed toward
the group of laughing girls, who scattered and fled at his approach.
Proserpina alone stood still, and stared, frightened and wondering, at
the grim figure confronting her, while the flowers she had gathered
dropped from her trembling hands. In a moment Pluto had seized her in
his strong arms; and, trampling all her violets under his ruthless
feet, he sprang into the chariot and urged his horses to their full
speed, hoping to reach Hades before the maiden's cries brought Ceres to
the rescue.
As he neared the Cyane River the waters, wishing to befriend
Proserpina, began to rise higher and higher, and with tossing waves
opposed the madly-rushing steeds. Fearing to risk the chariot in the
angry waters, Pluto struck the ground with his terrible two-pronged
fork, and a great chasm opened before him, into which the ruler of
Hades hurriedly plunged. Then the earth closed again over him and the
captured maiden. During the dreadful moments when Proserpina felt
herself held a prisoner in the arms of this bold wooer, she called
wildly to her mother for help; but soon she realized that her cries
would never reach Ceres's ears, and that she must find some other way
to let the goddess know of her unhappy fate. So she summoned enough
strength to struggle in her captor's embrace until she freed one arm
from his hold, and with it loosened her girdle, which she flung into
the Cyane River just before the yawning earth hid her so completely
that no traces were left to tell where she had gone.
When Ceres[37] came that evening into the vale of Enna and found that
her daughter was not playing as usual with the other maidens, she
questioned them, and learned their tearful story of the chariot with
its four black horses and terrible driver. Just what had become of
Proserpina no one could tell her; so the distracted mother began her
search, not knowing whether she might at any moment come upon her
daughter's body mangled by the chariot wheels. For days and days she
wandered, never stopping to rest except for a few hours at night when
it was too dark for her to see her way. Rosy-fingered Aurora, when she
left her soft couch to open the gates of the morning, and Hesperus,
when he led out the stars at evening, saw her still searching for the
lost Proserpina. Sometimes she was so weary that she sank down by the
roadside and let the night-dew drench her aching limbs. Sometimes she
rested under the trees when a storm broke over her head; but even here
the rain beat down upon her, and the wind blew its cold breath in her
face. Kindly people gave her food whenever she stopped to ask for it,
and though none knew that she was a goddess, they sympathized with her
grief when she told them that she was seeking her lost child. Only once
did she meet with unkindness. She was sitting at a cottage door eating
gruel from a bowl, and a lad--Stellio by name--laughed insolently at
her enjoyment of the meal. To punish him for his rudeness the goddess
threw some of the gruel in his face, and immediately he was changed
into a lizard.
One day Ceres found herself near the city of Eleusis, and to avoid
being recognized as a goddess, she disguised herself as an old beggar
woman. She sat for a long time on a stone by the roadside, mourning
her lost Proserpina, until a little girl came by, driving some goats.
Seeing the old woman's tearful face, the child stopped to ask her her
trouble, but before Ceres could answer, the girl's father joined her
and together they begged the stranger to come to their cottage and
rest. The goddess yielded at last to their kindly insistence, and as
she walked beside the old man, whose name was Celeus, he told her that
at home he had a sick boy who had lately grown so ill that to-day they
believed he would surely die. Ceres listened to his pathetic story, and
for a moment forgot her own grief. Seeing a chance to return the old
man's kindness, she followed him into the cottage; but first stopped by
the meadow to gather a handful of poppies. When the parents led her to
the sick child's bedside, she stooped and kissed the pale little face
and immediately it became rosy with health. The boy sprang up well and
strong again, to the great astonishment of his delighted family.
As they sat at the simple evening meal, the goddess put some
poppy-juice in the glass of milk set out for the boy; and that night,
when he was in a heavy sleep, she rubbed his body with oil, murmured
over him a solemn charm, and was about to lay him on the red-hot ashes
in the fire--that his mortal parts might be consumed and he himself
be made immortal--when his mother chanced to enter the room, and
springing forward with a cry of horror, snatched the boy from the fire.
Before the excited mother could vent her wrath on the old woman, Ceres
assumed her goddess form and quietly reproved the intruder; for her
interference had not averted a harm, but had prevented a great gift
from being conferred upon the unconscious child.
When Ceres left the cottage of Celeus, she continued her wanderings
over the earth, and finally returned, discouraged and heartbroken,
to Sicily. Chancing to be near the river Cyane, she went down to
the water's edge to drink, and happily discovered the girdle that
Proserpina had dropped there in her flight. This made her hopeful of
finding further traces of her lost daughter, so she lingered by the
river bank, eagerly scanning the overflowing stream. As she stood there
holding the recovered girdle in her hand, she heard a low murmuring
sound as if some one were speaking in whispers. The goddess listened,
wondering from what place the voice came; and soon she found that the
soft tones proceeded from a fountain which was so close to her that its
lightly-tossed spray fell on her hand. The murmur was often indistinct,
but Ceres understood enough to realize that the words were addressed to
her, and that the fountain was trying to tell her how Pluto had come up
from Hades and carried off Proserpina to be his wife.
While the goddess was musing over this painful revelation, the fountain
went on to say that it had not always been a stream in sunny Sicily,
but was once a maiden named Arethusa[38] and a native of the country
of Elis. As a follower of Diana she had roamed the wooded hills; and
one day, being wearied from the chase, she sought refreshment in the
forest stream. The drooping willows hung protectingly over the water,
and here the nymph bathed fearlessly, believing herself alone. But
Alpheus, the river-god, heard the splashing of the water, and rose
from his grassy bed to see who was disturbing his noon-day rest. At
the sight of Arethusa he was so delighted that he ventured to approach
her; but she fled terrified through the forest, calling on Diana for
help. The goddess, hearing her cries, changed her into a fountain; and
to further baffle the pursuing Alpheus, she wrapped it in a thick mist.
As the river-god could no longer see the nymph, he was about to give up
the chase, when Zephyrus maliciously blew away the cloud, and Alpheus
saw the bubbling fountain. Suspecting that this was Arethusa, the god
changed himself into a rushing torrent, and was preparing to mingle
his impetuous waves with the waters of the fountain, when the nymph
again called on Diana to protect her. The goddess came to her rescue by
opening a crevice in the earth, and here the shivering waters of the
fountain found a speedy refuge. To keep far out of the reach of Alpheus
it continued to flow underground for many miles, and even crept beneath
the sea until it reached Sicily, where Diana again cleft the earth and
allowed the fountain to come up into the sunlight. During her journey
through the dark underworld, Arethusa said that she had seen Proserpina
sitting, tearful and sad, on a throne beside the grim ruler of the
dead.
When she heard this story, Ceres was no longer in doubt where her lost
daughter could be found; but the knowledge gave her little comfort,
for she was aware how useless it would be to ask Pluto to give up the
wife he had so daringly won. Seeing no hope of regaining her child,
Ceres retired to a cave in the hills, and paid no heed to the waiting
earth that had suffered so long from her neglect. There was drought
in the land, and the crops were failing for want of water. The fruit
trees were drying up, and the flowers were withering on the parched
hillsides. Everything cried out for the protecting care of Ceres; but
the goddess stayed her hand, and in the solitude of the cave mourned
unceasingly for Proserpina. Famine spread over the land, but the
people, in spite of their dire need of food, burned sacrifices of sheep
and oxen on the altars of Ceres, while they importuned her with their
prayers. Jupiter heard their cries and besought the goddess to take the
earth again under her wise care; but Ceres refused to listen, for she
was indifferent now to the welfare of men, and no longer delighted in
the ripening harvest.
When sickness and death followed hard upon the famine, Jupiter saw
that he must save the sorely-stricken land, so he promised the goddess
that her daughter should be restored to her if she had eaten nothing
during all her sojourn in Pluto's realm. Mercury was sent to lead
Proserpina out of Hades; but when he reached there, he found that Pluto
had already given his wife some pomegranate seeds, hoping that she
would thereby stay forever in his keeping. Dismayed at this unexpected
downfall of her hopes, Ceres was about to shut herself up again in the
cave, when Jupiter, in behalf of the suffering earth, made a compromise
with Pluto whereby Proserpina was to spend half her time with her
mother in the land of sunshine and flowers, and the rest with her
husband in cold and cheerless Hades. Each spring Mercury was sent to
lead Proserpina up from the underworld lest her eyes, grown accustomed
only to shadows, should be dazzled by the blinding sunlight, and she
herself should lose the way. All things awaited her coming; and as soon
as her foot touched the winter-saddened earth the flowers bloomed to
delight her eyes, the grass sprang up to carpet her way with greenness,
the birds sang to cheer her long-depressed spirit, and above her the
sun shone brilliantly in the blue Sicilian sky.
Ceres no longer mourned, nor did she again suffer a great famine to
afflict the land. The patient old earth smiled again on Proserpina's
return, for then her mother gave the blighted vegetation a redoubled
care. But her happiness did not make the goddess forget the kindly old
man who had given her food and shelter at Eleusis, for she returned
there and taught the boy Triptolemus all the secrets of agriculture.
She also gave him her chariot, and bade him journey everywhere,
teaching the people how to plow and sow and reap, and care for their
harvests. Triptolemus carried out all her instructions; and as he
traveled over the country he was eagerly welcomed alike by prince and
peasant until he came to Scythia, where the cruel King Lyncus would
have killed him, in a fit of jealous wrath, had not Ceres interfered
with timely aid and changed the treacherous monarch into a lynx.