The Unwilling Vestal

econd sunrise Brinnaria controlled herself. Then the good lady endured her overgrown niece for some strenuous days, suffered impa

e meal. Chicken-breast is good, hot or cold, but aunty would never let me have a second helping. She wouldn't even let me have as much bread as I wanted and only one little dish of straw

slept a sound

ne to the shortest cut to peace on all occasions, acquiesc

t memories of Italy. She was the most placid and acquiescent creature imaginable. Her little mistress led he

case she was especially complaisant, since opposite the sieve-maker's was a fascinating embroidery shop, the keeper of which was entirely willing, when he had no customers, to let Utta lounge on one of his sofas and inspect embroideries to her heart's content. So lounging, rapt in the contemp

wizened man, his seamed and wrinkled face brown as berry in spite of his lifelong habit of indoor labor and compar

by the end of the counter was closed by a solid little gate. Behind the counter was the low stool from which Truttidius rose to chaffer with customers, and on which, when not occupied in trading, he sat at work, his bench and brazier by his side, his tools hanging on the wall by his hand, orderly in their neat racks or on their neat rows of hooks. Except for the trifling wall-space which they occupied, the walls were hidden under sieves hanging close together; bronze siev

, surveyed her surroundings and sighed happily, entirely at home. Trut

Brinnaria chatted, "and I had an awful scare before they se

la?" Truttidius qu

d, "but I got off; my, b

Vestal?" Truttidius asked

. "I can't think of anythin

Most girls would be wild with delight at the idea. But there w

stals ever since Daddy threatened me and scared me so; I've been thinking about

n exclaimed. "Not anybody that

e and walked down to the river, right by the end of the Sublician bridge, where the stairs are on the right-hand side. And the five other Vestals, and the flamens, and all the priests, and the Pontifex, and the consuls went with her. And she stood on the lowest step with her toes in the water and prayed out loud to the Goddess to help her and show that she had told the truth and then she stooped

ory. Had you e

" Truttidius said,

pursued, "is this: Is it a made

s impious to doubt the truth of pious

ia. "What I want you to tell me is to say right out plain do y

stess, most pleasing in the eyes of her Goddess, that she was in dire straits and that she

vorites. There are lots and lots of things no god ever did for any votary or ever will. What I want to know is this: Is car

work and regarded his guest, his face serious after the fading of his brief smile. The soft-footed sandalled throng that packed the narr

er head about so subtle a problem? What other child would perceive the verity at the heart of the puzzle and put it so neatly in so few words? To you an old man ca

ious, hardly breathed in her intentness, wa

he special ordinance of the gods of what might happen even without their mandate, but which does not happen because it is only once in countless ages that all the circumstances necessary to bring about that sort of happening concur to produce so unusual an effect. What folks call

ying water

ve that will hold water and not let it through. For an actual breathing woman of flesh and blood to carry water in a real ordinary sieve of rush-fibres, or linen thread or horsehair or metal wire, in such a sieve as pastry-cooks use to sift their finest flour; for that to happen in broad day

woman could actually carry water in a sieve and in

Truttidius counted, "and

en first scrubbed with natron or embalmers' salt or wood-ashes or fullers' earth. Water would run through such a sieve, did even all the gods will that it be retained. No one ever d

, if into such a sieve water were slowly and carefully poured, as you say that Tuccia in the story ladled water into her sieve with her libation-dipper, then that water might spread evenly over the meshes to the rim all arou

sieve of water or could even so hold it th

at all?" queried Brinnaria the pr

led up his face

u have seen a drop of it or a splash of it fall on a sofa-c

nnaria agreed, "

oth and curved, bright as a star. Well, the retaining of water in a sieve by the open meshes is like the momentary holding up of spilt wine on a woven fabric. I can't explain any better, but the two happenings are similar, only t

have made me see that. Now, next p

man smil

kled. "You talk like a grandmother of co

wer my question,"

t somehow, if all the conditions are right, little bags of water form on the underside of a sieve, one to each mesh, like drops after a rain hanging from the edge of my shop-shutters, or from the mutules on the cornice of a temple. They are capable of sustaining one or even two finger-thicknesses of water on the upper side of the sieve-web. But if the sieve-web is unevenly woven or unevenly stretched, it will not retain water an instant, and if the sieve-web bags anywhere the water, even if the rest of the sieve-web promises to retain it, will run through at that point. And even if the sieve is perfect, the slight

tent was she on the old man's words. "Now,

ed, their attention is readily called away from any definite task. Even a woman usually steady-handed would find her hand tremble if she were conscious of guilt,

so forget herself, could so concentrate all her faculties on the receptacle she held, could so perfectly control her muscles or could s

d times ten thousand chances. I understand. It is a possibility in the ordinary course of events. It was a miracle if it ever took place; it

the sieve-mak

quit bothering me. I've thought about it day and night ever