The Princess laughed suddenly, because Miss Phyllisy was so earnest and
so funny; but she nodded, “Yes.”
“And the ‘House’ just means that part of the sky where they are?”
The Princess nodded again.
“And Old Sol has put a Bewitchment around it so they can’t get
out—instead of bars,” Phyllisy added, going back of her own accord to
the make-believe, because she preferred it. And that was one of the ways
she was wise. What was plainly true could very well wait until she was
older and had more time to think about it.
“Here, in Mr. Crab’s House, Sol keeps a beehive.” The Princess went back
to her drawing where she had left off the Crab to draw the Goat; and the
Others found very tiny yellow shells that looked like them, for the
bees.
“Now, here is a Lion who doesn’t have to be any lion in particular
because he’s so splendid just being himself. He’s like ‘Terrible as an
army with banners,’ not because he’s terrible, but he’s like a heraldry
lion. Right next him is Mlle. Virgo, very ladylike and not a bit
afraid.”
“What is she for?” asked Pat, while the Princess was drawing her.
“She does ‘poses plastiques’—which means that she looks perfectly lovely
being all kinds of statuary on top of a pedestal, and when she doesn’t
do that she does remarkable juggling with a pair of great scales that
are carefully kept in the cage next hers, so they shan’t get out of
order.”
“Could they weigh anything?” asked the Kitten.
“Yes, indeed! The Star People may go in and be weighed on them, if Mlle.
Virgo goes with them. But the Scorpion really does the weighing—puts on
the weights for her—because she’s so ladylike. He lives next door, on
the other side, and he’s very handy with his claws.”
“The Orion one?” asked Pat.
“The Orion one,” said the Princess, beginning in the middle to draw him.
“Somebody will have to find a splendiferous red something for the star
he wears above his fiery heart.” She drew down his body into his
curled-up tail; then she put on his lobstery claws.
“And this gentleman is Mr. Sagittarius, with a head and body like a man
joined to the body of a horse; and he is a better shot with a bow and
arrow than a Red Indian. Then, there’s the Goat—we’ve done, and the
Fishes—we’ve done. And there’s just one more House I haven’t told you
about. An old man lives in it. He’s like Orion in one thing, he’s very
fond of gardening. But he hasn’t any garden, only a watering-pot. And
that’s the part of him we’ll draw, because that’s where he wears his
stars.”
“You’re making two spouts,” said the Kitten.
“Because it has. If you want to _garden_, and have no garden but a
watering-pot, you can’t have too many spouts. The Ancients said the two
streams that flowed from it watered all the gardens of the world.”
“It must have felt funny to be an Ancient,” said Pat.
“Why?” asked Phyllisy.
“With those queer ideas in them,” said Pat.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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