She gazed at me with her sincere and wondering eyes. "What is marriage?" she said, in much the same tone as she had inquired what a boat was.
I told her something of the marriage ceremonies existing in my own country, and she was very much amused.
"But why?" she asked; "that is a very great to-do about very little. If a man loves a woman and the woman also loves the man, what more is there to say? Why write down things in books and call many people to a feast?"
"Dream," I said, "you are an immoral heathen."
"Those also are words that I do not know. You will tell me about them."
I did not tell her about them. I had already been rather struck by the curious simplicity of her own speech. Her phrases were at times biblical, though she knew nothing of any religion, and could not have read a bible if she had possessed one.
"And when, as you say, a man and woman love one another, is it customary with you for them to live together for the rest of their lives?"
Dream yawned. I was wearying her.
"It is so strange," she said, "to have to tell you the things that everybody knows. Also what you ask is so funny. Of course people who love live together. Is not that right?"
I hardly knew what to tell her. She had the innocence of the first garden. After all it may be that the notions of right and wrong which are very properly accepted in my own country are not to be imposed upon every people in every form of civilisation. I did not wish to judge her. I therefore changed the subject.