Half -Hours with Mercury and Vulcan 



pink geraniums, and is replenishing 

 the bird-bath yonder underneath our 

 best white oak. And he is not using 

 a graceful Grecian urn; just a common 

 old watering-pot with a broken spout! 

 And the goddess herself is not inside. 

 That is no whirring spinning wheel you 

 seem to hear. It is Kate and the 

 vacuum cleaner hard at work. That's 

 all. In fact Calypso really spread her 

 wings early in the day and flew away 

 to town on perfectly good shock- 

 absorbers and sound cord tires to get 

 a golf skirt altered. The parsley 

 though, of which we read, is growing 

 there by Mary's kitchen door. Praise 

 be to the gods for that much anyhow! 

 We had our fire that night all right, 

 and needed it. In the first place Calyp- 

 so came home not in the best of humor. 

 Even goddesses, you know, are priv- 

 ileged to show temper at the very 

 throne of high Olympus itself! Field's 

 were so busy and so "fussed up" with 

 inexperienced war help that she had 



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