Chapter III: Epilogue: 230 (3)

“By this time Cassiopeia was ready to go on, and they started once more. They could see that Orion still talked and argued as he kept on by Major’s side, with the two dogs running about them both; but Major never once glanced at him or his dogs, and kept up his curious gait.

“And—do you believe?—now that they knew what his idea was, his legs did seem to make a circular motion; and they couldn’t help thinking that he did look a little like a great clumsy wagon; but they wouldn’t, one of them, have owned it to the others!

“‘Now what do you think of that?’ asked Orion, stopping to let them come up with him. ‘He’s started, and he may go forever!’

“‘That’s what _I_ say,’ observed Hercules.

“‘Draco says he can stop him,’ said Andromeda.

“‘Oh, can he?’ said Orion. ‘All right. Go ahead. It’s more than I can do.’

“‘I’m _pretty thure_ I can,’ said Draco, as he flopped along—and they stood aside to let him pass, he took so much room; ‘but you’ll have to thtand by what I thay. It’ll take diplomathy.’

“Then they all followed after to see what his diplomacy was, and how he would use it. And when he came up with Major he didn’t stop; he didn’t even seem to notice him, but kept flopping along until all but three coils of his tail had passed him. Then he stopped abruptly, as if he were very much surprised. ‘Why, I thought you were a wagon,’ he said. ‘But where are your hortheth?’

“Major held one foot suspended in the air for a moment, and they thought he might stop. But it was only an instant; then he went on.

“Draco raised his voice higher: ‘Don’t you know, you thilly, a wagon can’t go without thomething to draw it?’

“‘Then how did he get here?’ asked Perseus.

“‘S-s-sh!’ said every one.

“‘Now he’th thpoiled everything!’ complained Draco. And he flopped right down in the road—but Major kept straight on.

“‘No, he hasn’t,’ said Andromeda, encouragingly. ‘Don’t you mind. That was fine! I know how to manage.’ Then she ran on until she was a little ahead of Major. And she looked at him, very hard, and stooped down and looked at his legs. Then she called back, over his head:—

“‘It’s running downhill; but it will stop now. It’s beginning to go up.’

“WHY, I THOUGHT YOU WERE A WAGON,” HE SAID, “BUT WHERE ARE YOUR
HORTHETH?”
]

“Sure enough, it did begin to curve up just there; and Major lifted one foot—and put it down, heavily; then he swung the other around wildly—and they all crowded near, and said: ‘There! It’s stopping. It can’t run up-hill.’ And the next minute Major sat down with a hard _thump_, not very far from the edge of the Zodiac. And if you don’t believe he was a tired old Bear, you try it yourself!”

The Others giggled; but they believed it without interrupting. And the Princess went on: “When I told you about the old man in the Zodiac, I didn’t tell you this: besides his watering-pot, he has a great reputation for giving wise advice. So when the Star People are in any difficulty they go and consult Aquarius. Or they would go; but when he once begins to talk he goes on _forever_; and they are so tired with it, and it is so impossible to stop him without being rude, that they are rather more likely to say to some one else, ‘Why don’t you go and ask Aquarius?’ than they are to go themselves.

“When Major sat down _hard_, he was not far from Aquarius’ House, and the old man came to its limit to see what was going on, but the Star People pretended they didn’t see him, because they didn’t want him to begin talking.

“Cassiopeia was the person who discovered that they were out of one trouble only to be in another. They had stepped aside a little, to be out of Major’s hearing, and everybody—except Cassiopeia—was saying how good it was he had stopped. Draco just observed complacently, for the third time: ‘I don’t know how I happened to think of it. It theemed to _come_ to me,’ when Cassiopeia’s voice broke in on them, very cold and depressing: ‘It’s a pity it came so soon. Why didn’t you turn him around first?’

“‘Turn him around?’ said Cepheus. ‘What for?’

“‘What is the first Rule of the Sky?’ asked Cassiopeia, and they all recited in unison:—

“‘A Place for Everything; and Everything in its Place.’

“‘Yes,’ said Cassiopeia. ‘There _he_ is,’ and she pointed to Major, just _sitting_ exactly as he dropped, ‘and _there’s_ his place!’ and she waved her arm toward the North. ‘How are you going to get him there?’

“Then they were in a pickle! Major had always liked Andromeda, and she tried to coax him. But he wouldn’t pay the slightest attention when she talked.”

“He thinks he’s a Wagon, just the same, if he has stopped,” said Phyllisy.

“Of course,” said the Princess. “So it was no use to talk to him. Then they tried to push him and pull him around; but he shook them off, and even growled as no one had heard him growl before. Besides that, he was naturally an extremely large bear, and being a Dipper, with nothing to dip, and doing absolutely nothing else, had made him grow fat. Even if he had allowed them, they could hardly have moved him all that way. And certainly not without Hercules’ help. All this time he had stood aside, saying nothing, though they hadn’t noticed it, they were so busy with Major himself. At last Orion almost suggested setting his dogs on him. But they all said: ‘The idea! Poor, dear, old Major!’ and he said quickly, of course he didn’t mean it. He only said they _could_. Nobody answered him; nobody spoke at all for as much as a minute.

“Then Cassiopeia sniffed. Then she looked very hard at Hercules, and remarked: ‘If I could do anything I wouldn’t wait to be asked.’

“‘Who could?’ asked Perseus.

“‘I don’t say _any one_ could,’ said Cassiopeia. ‘But if I were so strong that my hands just—er—_swung_, and I saw that poor old lamb, far from his home, and with not sense enough to go to it, I’d do the best I could to take him there!’

“‘There aren’t stars enough in the Sky to make me touch him!’ said Hercules. ‘And it isn’t carryin’ him I mind. Bless you, I could pick him up like a baby. He doesn’t weigh so much.’

“‘Then why don’t you do it?’ asked Cepheus.

“‘’Tisn’t lucky,’ said Hercules. ‘He isn’t willing; and he’s an Innocent. No good ever comes of crossing an idjit. I wouldn’t lay so much as a finger on that loony bear—unless he was willing—for all you could offer! No, sir-ee!’

“Then they were just about ready to give up, or take anything that offered, so they weren’t very reluctant to see old Aquarius, who had been beckoning to them and waving his watering-pot for some time, and evidently had something to say. They drew near, where he could talk to them, though they groaned when they did it, for they knew he would bore them almost to death.

“‘I have been strangely unable to gain your notice, although I have made considerable effort to that end,’ he began, in his prosy way. ‘I have waved my hand—thus’ (he showed them how he had beckoned), ‘and my watering-pot—thus’ (and he showed them how he had waved the watering-pot, and hadn’t spilled a drop of water, although it had two spouts), ‘but in spite of my endeavors, I have been unable to attract your notice.’ (They looked at each other, and sighed.) ‘I have been thus persistent,’ he went on, ‘for _your_ good; not for my own pleasure—although conversation with congenial persons is always most agreeable to me—’

“‘Me, too,’ said Draco. ‘I jutht love to talk to my friendth.’

“‘Er—exactly,’ said Aquarius. ‘But it was not merely to converse—agreeable as it may be to us all—_all_,’ he repeated, waving his watering-pot benevolently. (And they looked at each other again; and some of them changed their weight over onto the other foot.) ‘No, I had a purpose in calling you hither. I rarely act without a purpose—’

“‘What was it?’ asked Perseus.

“‘I was about to mention it!’—looking at Perseus reprovingly. ‘You seemed in some perplexity concerning the removal of that misguided Bear to his proper place. I gather that he considers himself—and wishes to be considered—a Wagon! A most surprising hallucination. It might be interesting to consider how it could have arisen?’ He looked at them, in turn, to see if they were inclined to consider it, but they were not, and stood perfectly still, without any expression in their faces, until Hercules said: ‘You were going to tell us something.’

“‘Yes. I remember to have heard something that applies exactly to such a case. I am sure it will be a helpful suggestion.’

“Every one looked hopeful and interested, but Aquarius stopped short. They waited. Then, ‘I seem to have forgotten it for the moment. But never mind—it will come—it will come—’

“‘Oh, what’s the use waiting?’ muttered Orion.

“‘It will come,’ went on Aquarius, cheerfully. ‘It is something about wagons—and stars—I am sure it is just what is needed. Ah! I have it now: “Hitch your wagon to a star!”—The very thing! I knew it would come,’ and he went right on talking; but the Star People were not listening. If that was the best he could do in the way of advice, they were completely discouraged.

“‘I never heard such rubbish in my life!’ said Cassiopeia, under her breath. ‘Nor I,’ said Orion. ‘I know pretty much all there is to know about stars—and how could you hitch a wagon to one? And if you did, what then?’ They all thought that was the very silliest advice that ever was given; and there was old Aquarius talking and talking—and they didn’t know how they were to escape from him, when some one said:—

“‘Look at Major!’

“They all looked—even Aquarius stopped with his mouth open—and, what do you think? With all their trying they couldn’t move that foolish old Bear one inch. But now, when they were worried to death, and trying to think what to do next, and were leaving him alone—

“All at once he turned his great head and seemed to see for the first time where he was. Then he stood up; and they held their breath to see what he would do. He stood for a moment, swaying his huge body back and forth; then he swung around until his nose pointed to the North, and started off at an even trot, never looking to the right nor to the left, just like an ordinary bear, and not in the least like a wagon or a dipper! And he didn’t stop until he reached his very own place in the Sky. The Star People followed him all the way on tiptoe, not daring to speak for fear he would change his mind again before he reached home. But I shouldn’t wonder if old Aquarius went right on talking, though there was not a soul left to hear him; for no one thought to say ‘Good-by.’

“That was a long time ago, and Major still thinks he’s a Dipper; but he knows it’s no use to be a Wagon without horses. So he stays in his place, and the Star People feel pretty comfortable about him. But”—the Princess dropped her voice, and glanced up at the sky—“just suppose he ever finds out about Automobiles!”

“O-o-o-oh!” said the Others, politely horrified.

Then: “He won’t,” said Pat. “And I know what the other name for it is, besides Dipper and Great Bear. You needn’t tell.”

“I know, too,” said Phyllisy.

“I’d like to tell somebody,” said the Princess. “Come close, Kitten, and let me whisper it.”

So the Kitten came close, and she and the Princess found her ear—warm and rosy under a great deal of troublesome hair—and the Princess whispered in it until the Kitten laughed. “Now we all know, don’t we?” said the Princess. And they all nodded.

The waves were running away from them, up the beach, a long way beyond the point of the ship where the bowsprit used to be.

The Kitten knelt down and looked through a chink in the deck, at the water under it. She curved her hands each side of her eyes to shut off the sunlight so she could see more plainly, and to keep her hair from falling into them. “O-oh! it’s pretty closer,” she said.

“Let me see,” said Pat. The Kitten let her have the place, and she saw for herself. She was satisfied in a minute; then she settled back on her heels. “It’ll come just so close; then it’ll go back—and not any more. What makes it do that?” she said.

“The tide,” said Miss Phyllisy.

“I know that,” said Pat. “What _makes_ it?”

“It’s on account of Lady Moon going by,” said the Princess.

“That would be a different kind of Star Person. Isn’t she?” said Phyllisy.

“Pretty different, and especially nice. This is the story of her: She is Mother Earth’s dear daughter. Long ago her mother held her close in her arms; then Lady Moon was called away to live in Starland, and had to leave her mother’s side. Her dim gray robes never could be seen in that distant sky, so she carries a glowing lantern hung on her arm; and when the slide is open and Mother Earth sees its light, she knows where her child is wandering among the stars. Then her heart longs for her, and she reaches out toward her, trying always to come a little nearer. If you listen, you’ll hear the sea sobbing, to think how far away she has gone.” The Princess stopped talking, and tipped her head, listening. They listened with her, to the waves running into the old ship—and they truly seemed to grow sadder and sadder; not unhappy-sad, but romantic.

“That is beautiful, Dearie,” said Phyllisy. “It’s parable, isn’t it?”

“This is truly true,” answered the Princess. “Wherever the moon is, there every bit of the Earth feels it, and is drawn out toward it.”

“Hard rocks and all?” asked Pat, as if she never would believe it.

“Rocks and mountains and all,” said the Princess. “But they are so stiff they don’t give very much. But the sea yields easily, and the water heaps up toward the moon, and pulls away from the shore behind it; then when the moon passes on, it flattens out again. If we were down on the sand before every bit of the hard is covered up, I could draw something to show it plainer, in about two seconds, on the way back. But there’s no time to waste.”

So, without wasting any time, they left the old Wreck deep in the sand and water, with the waves running in from the Ocean and hurrying by it—on to the land. And when they found a hard place, the Princess drew the large round Earth with the sea humping up on the side of it toward the small round moon. And she drew several moons on several sides, to show how the hump would follow, and make the tide; but it was all one moon—only gone along a little farther. And she said it was truly the Earth that whirled in the middle, not the moon going around; but they weren’t to bother about that—and they didn’t.

VI
THE BEE BABY

“The pleasure of your company to drink tea with the Princess,” it said. And the Others left all their occupations and came at once.

She was expecting them, with the little tea-table set out and ready; but they might wash their hands in the Princess’s own bath-room, and have verbena water out of a tall bottle on them, if they liked; and they did—a great deal.

ANDROMEDA

“Poor Andromeda!” said the Princess. “She must have wished she had
been born with piggy eyes and a turned-up nose when she found what
came of her beauty. Here she is: chained to the rock, waiting for
the sea monster to come and devour her, but still lovely.”

“She isn’t chained _now_?” said Pat. “In the sky?”

“Dear me, no! Never, since Perseus happened along with Medusa’s head
in his wallet, and turned the sea monster into a rock. But this is
the way they stand to be looked at,—a tableau, with Perseus coming
to the rescue, and Cassiopeia looking on, thinking what a lucky
escape they had, and that her child is truly much lovelier than any
Nymph whatever. But she isn’t talking about it any more.”

“Perhaps she would have thought so, just the same, if Andromeda had
looked piggy,” observed Phyllisy.

“Very true, Madam Owl,” agreed the Princess. “But whether or no, she
certainly has four undeniably beautiful stars to wear—if anybody
will find them for her.”
]

The “tea” was in a high, cool, clinking pitcher of strange colored glass that let the light shine through, and it was golden and yet pinky, and tasted of fruits, but no kind any one could say. But they could have it in a teacup if they would rather. (The teapot was there too, by courtesy, to look on.) The Princess sat beside the table to pour it, with wide lace hanging over her arms, and coming out from under, but not catching when she handled the fragile cups, because she knew how—very deftly.

Pat chose a yellow cup, with butterflies and tiny roses, and Miss Phyllisy took one, white and very thin, with a dragon coiled around it and a red curly handle; but the Kitten had hers in a tall glass like the pitcher, and so did the Princess. And there were delicious little cakes, the kind the Princess had, and never any one else. It was most refreshing and restful to hot little girls out of a garden.

At last they said, “No, thank you, _really_,” when she asked if they would have another cup, because the cups were so small. Then the Princess went over to a comfortable chair near the long window, and watched the Others wandering about the room. Outside it would still be hot in the garden; but in the Princess’s own room it was cool and shaded, with interesting things to see, that they loved because they had seen them before.

“Suppose there were an Indian Squaw (_and there was_),” said the Princess, “and she was weaving a beautiful basket.”

“Is it that basket?” asked Pat.

“That very identical basket you’re going to hand me.”

So Pat brought it to the Princess, and Phyllisy and the Kitten came too. “And suppose, when she came near the top, she wove in this row of brown points like the teeth of a saw”—their heads were close together, following the Princess’s finger with their eyes. “Wouldn’t any one know that she meant them for mountains?”

“Did she?” asked Phyllisy.

“She did,” said the Princess.

“Oh-h,” said the Others.

“Or,” said the Princess, “suppose there were an Ancient Egyptian—the Ancientest kind—who lived on the edge of a flat desert; and could never—alive or dead—go to a mountain without crossing miles of blazing sand. If he happened, at the same time, to be a King (_and he did_), with thousands of slaves to work for him, he might set them to work to build him a mountain. And what shape would it be when it was done?”

“What?” asked the Kitten.

“I know what I think,” said Phyllisy, “maybe.”

“Say it, Miss Phyllisy. I think so, too.”

“A pyramid?”

“Would it?” asked Pat.

“_What_ shape would it?” repeated the Kitten.

The Princess didn’t answer directly. “Let’s just once more suppose. Suppose there were a little girl, who wanted to draw the picture of a mountain. (_And I saw the picture._)”—“M-m-mm” purred the Kitten.—“Her pencil went up one side—so,” the Princess slanted up with her finger, and the Kitten did the same with hers, “and down the other,”—their fingers slid down again—“like a letter ‘A,’ very much spread out and without any cross-piece. Now: could there well be three kinds of people more different than an Indian Squaw, an Ancient Egyptian, and a Kitten—I mean a little girl? And yet they agree precisely about how a mountain ought to look. Doesn’t it seem as if they must be right?”

The Others thought it did—looking at the Pyramid picture over the glass cabinet. Then the Princess leaned forward, with the lace all falling away, and her voice grew more impressive:—

“There is Some One else who thinks just as they do; and she doesn’t stop with thinking, she takes the best of care that there shall be one perfect example of a truly symmetrical mountain.”

“Oh-h,” said Phyllisy. “Was that what it was all for? I thought it was just conversation.”

“Not at all,” said the Princess. “It was designed to lead you gradually up to that especial mountain.”

“Are you going to tell us?” asked Pat.

“If you don’t think it will tire you.” She said it very politely, like a question. And they all shook their heads—one great, vigorous shake. So the Princess began to tell it:—

“Sometimes, on her voyages, the Jane Ellen passes near a coast where there is a long line of white surf edging the blue water; then just as long a line of white sand; and back of both, the level forest extending back to the line of the coast mountains. And back of this coast range—so far away that it looks as if it were painted flat on the pale blue sky, with paint only a shade darker—rises the great triangle that, Taffy says, is the most satisfactory mountain in the world.

“And that is Xyntli’s mountain.”

“Did Taffy see it?” asked Pat.

“He did,” said the Princess, “from the sea. He sometimes thought he would like to go inland and see what it was like, near at hand. But the Jane Ellen never stopped there—there was nothing to stop for—and he never went. And that’s all he and the Jane Ellen had to do with it.

“If he had left the ship and gone ashore to climb to the top of the range of hills, he would have seen that they sloped down again; and far away, over miles of green, rolling country, the great cone of the mountain lifts its bare slope out of the forest. And on the southern side, almost at the top, his sailor eyes might have made out the hole (with the peak of the mountain, like a pointed hood, behind it) that leads down into the depths where Xyntli sleeps—long naps that keep her young and beautiful in spite of her age.

“No one can tell how beautiful she is, because she wraps herself in a veil when she looks out; but her splendid, fiery-gold hair streams out of it, and floats and sparkles in the wind when she stands on tiptoe inside, to look out and see that the mountain is just as she wants it to be,—an even slope from top to bottom; clean rocks, with no creeping green things and trees littering up its sides.

“It must be trying to her (and she is a nervous person, too) to lie down to peaceful slumber for a hundred years or more, leaving her mountain the pink of perfection; and to wake and look out—only to see that the waters that run down its sides have collected into streams, and dug irregular channels for themselves (like scratches on the mahogany table!), and to listen and hear the winds whispering in the leaves of the forest:—

Creeping, creeping,
Forward stealing—
Up the mountain
Follow, follow;
Tiny rootlets,
Thrusting, feeling
Every crevice
(S-s-ssh!),
Silence keeping—
In the hollow
Of her mountain
Xyntli’s sleeping!

Silence keeping—
Soft gray mosses
Cover rocks,
And, onward creeping,
Claim the mountain!
Forward leaping,
Winged seeds!
You’ll soon be peeping
O’er the rim,
Where, in the hollow
Of the mountain,
Xyntli’s sleeping.

—and then to see that the forest actually is marching up the sides of her own fortress! Wouldn’t that be discouraging?

“But Xyntli is not discouraged. Not she! She calls up her fiery snakes from below, and sends them crawling down the sides of the mountain, while she stands on the top, waving her wonderful smoky veil, and urging them on.

“Down they glide,—filling up the channels the streams have dug, hissing with hatred as they swallow the streams themselves, and devouring the advancing forest.

“At last the mountain stands once more, smooth and polished—the green army driven back to the valley.

“Then Xyntli is satisfied, and cuddles down in her hollow for another nap.

“It was during one of these naps—after it had lasted a very long time—that the Bee Baby was born.

“Year after year, the forest had marched steadily on; so the people who lived in the valley seldom thought how the snakes had come down and driven it back in the old days. The very old people occasionally shook their heads, and said: ‘When Xyntli wakens she will have her own.’ But the young people didn’t listen, and followed the forest, building their curious houses fairly upon the slope of the mountain.

“They were very strange houses indeed—a good deal like willow bird-cages. In a snowstorm they would have been about as useful for a house as a mosquito net for an overcoat. But there came never a snowstorm; and the house where the Bee Baby lived was built of slender branches of trees, set in the ground, side by side, and interwoven with palm-fibre—the light glimmered through it in little flecks. The roof went up to a point in the middle and sloped four ways. That was woven even closer, of the palm leaves, so the rain couldn’t come through. The house had only one room, and nearly the whole of one side was the doorway—with the roof extended over it a little way, like an awning. There was no floor but the earth, and no door. So, when the Bee Baby woke in the morning, all he had to do was to rub his big brown eyes with his little brown fists, and trot through the open doorway, to be in the warm sunshine, where there wasn’t a fence nor a bar between him and the whole enchanting world.

“There was no one to watch him very closely, either, because he had no mother. He did have a father; but he spent a great deal of his time driving a pair of drowsy oxen in a cart with two solid, wooden wheels. Such a queer cart!

“Of course his father knew that one of the brown babies that played and tumbled about in the village of bird-cage huts was his. But when babies wear only their own shining skins to cover them, it isn’t easy for a father who spends most of his time driving an ox-cart to pick out his particular baby.”

“Not any clothes—didn’t they wear?” asked Pat.

“Most of the little children didn’t. A few of them—who were very fashionable—wore one garment. It was a straight piece of cloth that covered their plump little bodies in front; the ends were gathered up in the back, and tied in a bow between the shoulders. It looked very stylish—but the Bee Baby was more comfortable. Stand up a minute, Kitten, and I’ll show you how it was.”

So the Kitten came and stood before her, and she showed them how the fashionable little children dressed, using a piece of Chinese embroidery for the straight piece of cloth. Then they settled down once more to listen.

“If an owl had looked through a chink in the wall, very early one morning, he might have seen the Bee Baby’s family—his aunts and his grandmother and four or five brown babies and children—all asleep on flat straw mats on the ground. But nobody but an owl could have counted exactly how many there were, it was still so dark.

“Then the first sunbeam slipped in at a chink, and put its finger on one of the poles in the side of the hut. It felt its way slowly down, until it touched a small, dark heap at the foot of it.

“And that was the Bee Baby.

“He sat up on his mat and looked around him at the other heaps.

“Not one of them stirred; and that was pretty stupid.

“Then he saw something interesting; his own little foot with the sunbeam resting on it, as he sat with his toes pointing straight up at the roof. He looked at it for a moment, and frowned as if he were anxious. Then he leaned forward and felt of it.

“It was a perfectly good foot; and feet are made to be walked on; and it is much more amusing to be walking than sitting on a mat in a dusky hut like a bird-cage. That, probably, is the idea that came into the Bee Baby’s head when he found his foot was so satisfactory; and a big dimple came in his cheek, but he didn’t make any noise.

“To get up, he rolled over on to his face and planted his feet firmly, only when they were quite solid, lifting his hands from the ground. And there he was, all dressed and ready to go out. He trotted over to the doorway and stopped a minute, looking out.

“The hut stood on the edge of a grove of tall cocoanut trees. There were bananas growing among them; and vines with gorgeous orange and red flowers creeping everywhere. Black and spotted pigs ran grunting through the vines and about the huts of the little village; it all looked clean and fresh in the early sunlight. The Bee Baby’s was the last hut of the village, at the edge of the grove, that stretched on beyond it, up the slope of Xyntli’s mountain.

“When one is not much over two years old, one can’t think of everything, and the Bee Baby didn’t notice that which the older people had been watching for a month—Xyntli was awake!

“After a sleep of two hundred years—and more—one night she had stirred and turned herself, shaking her mountain and the village on its slope. The next morning a thin, gray streamer floated from the top of the cone; and the old people said: ‘Xyntli’s veil! Oh, when she sees—’ And they shook their heads.

“Since that day the veil had floated, sometimes like a broad banner, then again Xyntli drew it in until it was gathered down inside. But yet, she had not looked out and seen how the forests and streams were defacing her mountain.

“And the Bee Baby didn’t look up at the great blue triangle. The kitchen was at the right of the house; and he had a feeling that said: ‘Breakfast.’ So those good little feet carried him over to the big stone where the women ground corn to make the flat cakes that he liked to nibble with his brand-new teeth. The stone oven where they were baked was there too; and the Bee Baby found some cakes lying on the grinding-stone. He had to stand on his tiptoes and feel over the stone, to find them; but he knew where to feel, and where to find a banana, too. So why should he wake the cook?

“With the flat cakes in one hand and the bitten banana in the other, he set out, following the level sunbeams into the green grove. He knew just where he wanted to go, and trotted straight on until he came to an old tree.

“If it had been a _tree_ that he was looking for, it wasn’t much to see. It hadn’t a green leaf on it, and only a few scraggly branches. But he was not a bird, nor a squirrel; he was a Bee Baby. And considered as a beehive, it left nothing to wish for. There was the fine hollow trunk to store the honey; and a round knot-hole near the ground, for the bees to pass in and out, all day long, in sunshiny weather. And that funny brown baby never seemed tired of watching them—hurrying off, and coming back dusty with pollen, and with masses of it in the pockets on their legs, or laden with clear, sweet honey. Sometimes a bee lit on his finger. Then the wise baby sat quite still, and never brushed it off; so he didn’t find out that it carried a needle in its tail—as sharp as its temper. (But he was careless about letting the dimple come in his cheek. It’s a wonder the bees didn’t fly in, it was so deep and red and sweet.)

“When the baby came to the tree this morning, even he could see that something was different. The bees were not going about the business of the day—gathering honey—in their usual orderly fashion. No, indeed! They were running in and out of the knot-hole, helter-skelter; and such a humming as there was inside the tree!

“He came close to the trunk to listen, and a gray cockatoo sat on a tree near by and watched. And it’s a pity there was no one else to see what a quaint little figure he was, with one arm clasping the tree-trunk, as far as it would go, with a cake still grasped in his chubby hand, and his ear pressed against the rough bark—listening—listening—

“‘Buzz-z-z-z,’ hummed the bees; and the baby listened, with lips apart,—serious and wondering.

“Then that soulless cockatoo ‘squawked’ as if it were the funniest thing in the world, and swung herself, head down, around the branch where she had been sitting; and then worked her way into the next tree, clutching the vines with beak or claw, squawking all the way. She had neither manners nor dignity; and she was a grandmother, too.

“Her noise startled the Bee Baby so he toppled over; but he didn’t mind, and sat where he fell, to finish his cake and to watch.

“The buzzing in the hive was louder now, and there were very few bees outside. Then—all at once—they began to come out in numbers, and flew wildly about before they collected on a low branch near by. You can’t imagine how many there were—all in a dark cluster clinging to the vine. The baby never had seen anything like it, and his eyes were round with amazement. He got up from the hummock, to see more plainly.

“Perhaps because he disturbed them, as he came near, the whole mass rose together in the air, and flew up a natural path through the forest. And straight after them went the Baby!

“But it was not a fair race; for they had wings to fly, and several thousand eyes apiece to see where they were going; and he had only his two small feet to carry him, and his one pair of eyes to watch the bees. So he couldn’t look where his feet were going; and the next thing that happened—he tripped and fell on his nose.

“It didn’t hurt him, and he picked himself up; but the bees were gone, and he could only follow on in the direction they had flown.

“He was such a baby, it isn’t likely he even remembered what he was looking for; but there were other things to see beside bees; and a green forest, with birds and monkeys and all kinds of little living creatures in it, is a fine place to be in.

“So he strayed on, amusing himself in his baby way, until he had gone really a considerable distance from the village, and was on a ridge of high land that ran up the mountain.

“Suddenly, something was the matter with the ground, and try as he would, he couldn’t stand up on it—it was swaying—and the forest was full of strange noises; and a black cloud covered the sun so that it grew dark all in a moment. The great trees groaned and waved their branches, as if they too were trying to balance themselves on the rocking Earth. Those that were young and supple held their own; but a few that were old and dry fell crashing, and carried others down in their fall.

“But though the trees cried and shrieked in their distress and amazement,—and the monkeys and birds too,—the Bee Baby never made a sound. He lay pressed close against the ground in the awful darkness; as chickens cower when the mother hen sees the hawk’s shadow, and sounds her warning to them.

“He was like a little frightened animal, too, when the rocking stopped, and the forest gradually grew quiet around him; and he crept along the ground, through the green tangle, to where a tree had fallen against a cleft in the rocky ledge, carrying a mass of vines down with it, and making a sort of den or shelter.

“The brown baby crawled into the farthest corner, and huddled down close under the rock, to wait helplessly for whatever was to come.”

The Princess paused. “Poor little soul!” said Phyllisy. “Please go on, Dearie.” And after a moment, she began to speak again:—

“Of course you know—though the Bee Baby didn’t—what was making all this disturbance; and if he hadn’t left home so early that morning, before his people were awake, they wouldn’t have forgotten all about him. But when they were awake, they found enough to think of in watching Xyntli.

“There stood the giant cone of the mountain, with the thin gray streak of her veil floating from the top.

“It looked very peaceful.

“Suddenly—without further warning—Xyntli stood, straight and tall, in the top of the mountain, borne up on the servant-winds that live with her inside!

“Her veil wrapped her from head to foot, and its loose folds were blown upward by the breath of the winds. Her hair streamed through its topmost folds like gleaming flames; and the blue flashes that shot forth from the veil might have been the anger that flared in her blue eyes when she saw the outside of her mountain!

“Now, for the snakes!

“She gave a strange, wailing cry—like the wind, or flames rushing up the black throat of the chimney—and down in the depths of the mountain her fiery serpents came writhing out of their caverns, obedient to her call. The blue cone and the whole countryside shuddered with their motion; and as their hot breath scorched the inside of the mountain, thick black smoke arose like thunderclouds, and blotted out the sun. Then the heads of the fiery monsters peered over the rim at the mountain’s top, and they came crawling, gliding down its sides.

“And the very fiercest, hungriest of them all was rushing straight to the village of bird-cage huts, nestling in the hollow upon the slope of the mountain!

“It was a splendid sight—the mighty cone, purple in the midday darkness, with the green forest at its base, and the serpents, like rivers of fire, pouring down its sides. Smoke and flame rose, streaming upward, where they passed.

“And in the midst of the murky clouds, on the mountain-top, stood Xyntli, beautiful exceedingly, in her iridescent, gray veil, with her glittering, red-gold hair. Swaying lightly on the shoulders of her servant-winds, waving her arms and crying, she urged on her fiery snakes, that were to restore her kingdom to her as she would have it—clean, smooth, unbroken;—the pattern of a perfect mountain!

“But the people in the village saw the terror, not the beauty; and they thought only of their flight from it.

“They huddled the babies and the old people who couldn’t walk and their few poor possessions onto the ox-carts. Some of them tried to drive the spotted pigs before them; and any one who has tried to drive _one_ pig (a plain one at that) can imagine how much confusion it made when there were dozens and dozens. And it’s not to be wondered at, that the aunts and the grandmother didn’t count correctly. So they didn’t miss the Bee Baby until they were far away; and the body of Xyntli’s hideous snake lay stretched across the blackened hollow where the little huts had stood in the green grove.

THEY THOUGHT ONLY OF THEIR FLIGHT
]

“There is a curious thing about a snake. It has a habit of slipping out of its skin, and squirming away, leaving the old one behind, looking quite like itself.

“Xyntli’s snakes were unusual in many ways; but in this they certainly did something very like the rest of their tribe. When they had gone down the mountains and filled up the hollows with their bodies, their fiery hearts seemed to die out of them where they lay. One might think they were asleep, or dead; but I believe it was only their cast-off skins they left behind, while the real snakes stole back into the mountain, to be ready when Xyntli wanted them again.”

“I believe it, too; that’s what they did,” said Pat.

“If they didn’t, they wouldn’t be there always, when she called,” agreed Phyllisy.

“It seems so to me,” said the Princess. Then she took up the story again: “At last Xyntli stopped her wild motion and looked down on her mountain.

“The snakes had done their work well this time. There were no hollows left, and no green thing but one slender spur of forest, like a finger pointing up the slope, and that was hardly worth noticing.

“The smoke was thin now, and blue. Xyntli stood, swaying softly on the mountain-top. Then she sank slowly, drawing her veil after her. Now she was nearly gone; now, only a gleam of her red hair flickered against the sky; now—she was quite gone—

“When—suddenly she shot up, straight, towering above the cone, and flung a long fold of her veil wide over the land; and from it fell a shower of fine powder, soft as snow, that filled all the cracks and crevices and covered the horrid bodies of the snakes, and choked every green thing left in its track.

“Then—as suddenly—Xyntli vanished! and in her hollow mountain, slept once more.”

The Princess’s voice died away in a hush that lasted a long moment, as if some one really were sleeping.

Then Pat drew a deep breath: “Well! I should say! For pitysakes! I hope she’s done mischief enough for once!”

“She didn’t mean it for mischief. She had to make the mountain clean, didn’t she, Dearie? She couldn’t help it if they were in the way,” said Miss Phyllisy, with the wise little mind the Princess loved in her, clear and fair and earnest.

“But she wouldn’t be sorry,” Pat insisted.

“No; she went straight off to sleep,” Phyllisy admitted. “And that poor little baby!—We’re ready to go on, Dearie, whenever you’re rested.”

And after a few minutes the Princess was ready also.

“There isn’t much that goes on on Mother Earth that the Star People don’t know about,” she began, whisking them away to Starland without any warning. “On clear nights, when they are standing still to be looked at, they watch—and watch. And Old Sol keeps watch by day. So there is not much that escapes them: certainly not Xyntli and her naps, and particularly her wakings!

“She was a tantalizing person in this way: though they might look at her naps—that were nothing to see but a place!—as much and as long as they liked, no sooner was she fairly awake than the clouds would gather thick, and the Star People had to seize every chance to look through chinks. Any one who had a good sight had to tell it over to the others, again and again. But they did have glimpses, and Sol too; and after it was all over they could see what had been done. So they had a pretty clear idea of her and her actions.”

Pat nodded her head, as if she had, too; but she didn’t speak.

“When Xyntli vanished in her mountain the sky was full of heavy clouds; so when night came the Star People stationed themselves wherever there seemed the chance for a tiny gap, through which they might look.

“Now, Old Sol dearly loved the Bee Baby; and he had told the Zodiac People all about the quaint little child who was so happy by himself, in the sunshine, watching the bees. So the Star People understood just what Andromeda meant when she exclaimed, from her chink in the cloud:—

“‘The Bee Baby is left all alone by himself in that strip of forest on the ridge!’

“‘Are you thure? I didn’t thee him,’ said Draco, at another chink.

“‘You’re always imagining things,’ said Orion.

“‘I didn’t imagine this,’ insisted Andromeda. ‘The light from Lady Moon’s lantern shone through for a moment, and I saw him plainly—standing in front of a dark hole in the rock. Then he ran back, as if he were frightened.’

“‘Well, I’d like to know what his people are made of!’ said Cassiopeia. ‘They don’t deserve to have a child, if they can’t take better care of him than that!’

“‘Maybe they aren’t so bad,’ said Hercules. ‘I don’t believe Xyntli asked ’em which way they’d rather be chased out. When they saw those snakes coming they hadn’t any time to go back for stray babies! I don’t mind snakes, myself, big or little, but I want ’em cold! They are, too—mostly.’

“‘Too what?’ asked Perseus.

“‘Cold,’ answered Hercules; ‘toads, too.’

“‘I thought you said you’d rather have them cold?’

“‘I would. And they are—mostly.’

“‘Then why did you say they were _too_ cold?’

“‘I didn’t. I want ’em that way. And they are, too.’

“‘But you’—

“‘There’s a conundrum about that,’ interrupted Orion. (He couldn’t stand it, to have them go on arguing.) ‘I’ve forgotten what it is; but the answer is: Because a hot snake is better than a cold hop.’

“‘Why! that isn’t it—at _all_!’ said Andromeda.

“‘I should think you were all cold snakes and toads yourselves!’ broke in Cassiopeia, indignantly. ‘Arguing like that, with that poor child all alone in the middle of desolation! What do you propose to do about it?’

“‘There isn’t anything we can do,’ said Cepheus. ‘It isn’t our place.’

“‘Xyntli is the one who ought to do something. She made all the trouble,’ said Andromeda.

“‘Don’t you be so silly,’ said Cassiopeia. ‘This is a serious matter.’

“‘I thouldn’t like her to bring up _my_ child,’ said Draco. ‘The ’th too exthitable.’

“‘We can decide about yours when you have one!’ said Cassiopeia. ‘Now, who is going after that baby? Because I think they’d better be starting.’

“‘What over the sun are you talking about?’ asked Orion. ‘Going where?’

“‘We are going to adopt that Bee Baby. If some one doesn’t start at once, I shall go myself!’

“‘_Adopt the Bee Baby!_’ cried every one in chorus. They were too much astounded to say anything original; they could only repeat her words—though they knew it was rude.

“‘That was what I said,’ said Cassiopeia.

“‘But you can’t,’ said Orion. ‘No one ever thought of doing such a thing. It isn’t the Rule of the Sky.’

“‘Do you know any Rule that _says_ we can’t?’ asked Cassiopeia.

“‘No,’ answered Orion; and that disposed of him.

“‘How could you take care of him?’ asked Perseus. ‘He’d keep getting lost; and he mightn’t like it.’

“‘It’s a pity if I can’t take care of one small child, and make him happy!’ said Cassiopeia. ‘I’ll learn.’

“‘Wouldn’t he just love to watch Sol’s bees!’ said Andromeda. ‘It would be a good thing to have some one to watch them; there’s always such a fuss when they swarm.’

“‘Yeth, indeed!’ said Draco. ‘Don’t you remember latht time?—when they got away when no one wath notithing, and every one thought they were a comet?’

“‘Yes,’ said Cassiopeia. ‘It might have made a great deal of trouble. I think we really need him. I’m going now. Is any one coming with me?’

“‘_No!_’ exclaimed Cepheus. ‘I forbid it! I am your husband, Cassiopeia; and I will be obeyed!’

“Every one looked at him—startled to hear him speak like that. He stood holding up his sceptre in a magnificent attitude, and looked absolutely majestic. Cassiopeia was too much astonished to speak for a moment, but Andromeda slipped her fingers into his and laid her cheek against his shoulder; and when he bent his head to listen to her pretty coaxing in his ear, his crown tilted a trifle, and he looked like his usual, cloudy-night self. So no one was surprised to hear him say:—

“‘Yes, I suppose so. But your mother needn’t go.’

“‘I’ll go,’ said some one who hadn’t spoken before.

“It was Lady Moon.”

(“Oh-h,” said the Others, softly, and very glad; and the Princess smiled back at them.)

“The moment she spoke, the Star People felt every perplexity smoothed away, and it all became simple and plain. There wasn’t the slightest reason in the Heavens, why they should not take that lonely little baby for their own, to care for and to love.

“The clouds in piled-up masses lay low on Xyntli’s mountain; and it was an easy matter for the Star People to follow Lady Moon down from level to level. When they reached the limit of the cloud-stairway, they could see once more; how right it was that they should wait—their blazing glory hidden—while Lady Moon, her lantern darkened, should slip unseen down the bare shoulder of the mountain, to the strip of forest, left like a dark finger pointing up the slope.

“Ah, but think of a helpless, frightened little child—only two years and a scrap over—alone in a dark cave in that awful desolation!

“How must he have felt—that little Bee Baby—when, suddenly, a soft light shone into the cave, and he looked into the face of the loveliest of ladies, who was holding her lantern so that it disclosed to her—huddled into the farthest corner of the cave—a small brown heap. Only the eyes, like a little frightened animal’s, looking out of it, showed that it was alive.

“And the baby?

HIS WONDERING EYES LOOKED FROM LADY MOON’S SHOULDER
]

“When he looked into that pitying face, and saw the tender arms held out to him, his own went out in answer; and then he was held close—nestled like a young bird or a tired baby—as he was—in the shelter of that loving breast.

“Then, what baby king had ever such a royal progress as that brown little child?

“His wondering eyes looked from Lady Moon’s shoulder, as she carried him up the stately stairway of mass upon mass of cloud, whose lowest step was the mighty mountain, and whose highest led to the measureless Heavens! And grouped along its heights were the radiant Star People, whose splendors might have frightened him if their faces had not been so kind with loving welcome. All those of whom we have talked, and many more, assembled to welcome one little helpless child.

“It was worth it, to see his eyes shine and the happy dimple come in his cheek. He clasped one arm, tight, around Lady Moon’s neck, and stretched out the other to these new friends, without a trace of fear. Why should he be afraid? Hadn’t he loved the shining sun, and all beautiful things, his whole two years of life?

“So he listened to the song Lady Moon sang low to him; and as they passed along, the Star People caught the refrain, and took it up:—

“The sorrow is over;
Thy Star life’s begun.
Hear the golden bees humming
For joy at thy coming,
Oh, little Bee Baby,
Dear child of the Sun!

“Listen!” said the Princess.

There was a sound, very small and clear and silvery:—One—two—three—four—and _One more!_

And that was a Bewitchment! Everybody must vanish at once!

VII
LADY MOON’S LANTERN

On the terrace there was a Pergola—that was two rows of white columns with criss-cross bars overhead and vines growing over it. There were built-in seats between the columns, but there were always chairs besides.

There was no one in it. Down below, in the garden, there were Shapes flitting about in the dusk. They came up out of it, to the Pergola, all together; and they were the Princess and the Others.

A large spider was spinning down, with a clear yellow sky behind it, at the far end of the Pergola. They were obliged to watch it. It dropped and sprung, elastic, on the end of its thread—then dropped—and sprung; and then it clawed up again, working its legs. They could see them distinctly against the sky, though it was quite a distance away. Out at their end, the sky was cool, with a white moon in it; so there were two kinds of shadows: large, blurred ones from the last daylight; and in them, moon-shadows of the vines on the long white seats and on the floor and down one side of the Princess’s dress—sitting in a chair. The moon-shadows were very faint, but they were a clear pattern, and the daylight shadows had no edges; soon there would be only moon. It was very interesting.

And the slide of Lady Moon’s lantern was about three quarters open.