And he came soon to Ithaca and the hall that Athene knew, and opened the door and saw there famous Odysseus, with his white locks bending close over the fire, trying to warm his hands. And the wind through the open door blew bitterly on Odysseus. And Death came up behind him, and suddenly shouted. And Odysseus went on warming his pale hands. Then Death came close and began to mouth at him. And after a while Odysseus turned and spoke. And "Well, old servant," he said, "have your masters been kind to you since I made you work for me round Ilion?" And Death for some while stood mute, for he thought of the laughter of Love. Then "Come now," said Odysseus, "lend me your shoulder," and he leaning heavily on that bony joint, they went together through the open door. DEATH AND THE ORANGE Two dark young men in a foreign southern land sat at a restaurant table with one woman. And on the woman's plate was a small orange which had an evil laughter in its heart. And both of the men would be looking at the woman all the time, and they ate little and they drank much. And the woman was smiling equally at each. Then the small orange that had the laughter in its heart rolled slowly off the plate on to the floor. And the dark young men both sought for it at once, and they met suddenly beneath the table, and soon they were speaking swift words to one another, and a horror and an impotence came over the Reason of each as she sat helpless at the back of the mind, and the heart of the orange laughed and the woman went on smiling; and Death, who was sitting at another table, tete-a-tete with an old man, rose and came over to listen to the quarrel. THE PRAYER OF THE FLOWERS It was the voice of the flowers on the West wind, the lovable, the old, the lazy West wind, blowing ceaselessly, blowing sleepily, going Greecewards. "The woods have gone away, they have fallen and left us; men love us no longer, we are lonely by moonlight. Great engines rush over the beautiful fields, their ways lie hard and terrible up and down the land. "The cancrous cities spread over the grass, they clatter in their lairs continually, they glitter about us blemishing the night. "The woods are gone, O Pan, the woods, the woods. And thou art far, O Pan, and far away." I was standing by night between two railway embankments on the edge of a Midland city. On one of them I saw the trains go by, once in every two minutes, and on the other, the trains went by twice in every five. Quite close were the glaring factories, and the sky above them wore the fearful look that it wears in dreams of fever. The flowers were right in the stride of that advancing city, and thence I heard them sending up their cry. And then I heard, beating musically up wind, the voice of Pan reproving them from Arcady-- "Be patient a little, these things are not for long." TIME AND THE TRADESMAN