“Women doing farm work and baby-tending? That seems incredible;” we exclaimed.
With a peal of happy laughter that proved contagious, and a quickly executed, waltz-like whirl of amusement, they preceded the explanation: “Until children pass their first birthday, they accompany their mothers daily to these fields, to roll about on the sod, dig in the soil or sleep in their baskets, while their mothers plant, prune, graft, harvest or cultivate according to the season; meanwhile, the Applicants are attending to the house and preparing for the noon home-coming; after which they share the Yearling duties.”
“Who are the Applicants?”
“Young men and maidens, who desire to marry, after having passed with honor through several departments of Education and Preparation; and, by the State Records, have proved their ability to provide for the material and spiritual needs of a family; and have received, from the Board of Public Health their Certificates of physical fitness, are granted the Applicant’s degree.
“This entitles them to assist and relieve Fathers and Mothers in their home and field duties, until they pass their twenty-fifth birthdays and have selected life partners. If they can then show records of at least one year’s satisfactory administration of such duties, the Government issues their Marriage-license.
“This is, in every family, a period of great rejoicing; each licensed child being then honored by visits and gifts from all relatives and friends; and, if he or she happens to have merited special recognition from the city or State, by any act of peculiar heroism or self-sacrifice, the Officials add a generous tribute.
“In some notable cases, the bride or groom must build a house in which to store the Ante-wedding presents.”
“You make as much of the license-granting as of the wedding?”
“The public is not expected to take cognizance of the wedding day. It would be regarded on Reinstern, as grossly immodest and cruel, to call general attention to the exact hour wherein the young couple are legally empowered to exercise the marital privileges. It is the culmination of the most sacred desires of the human heart.”
As with curtained eyes, they bowed modestly before us, we felt unaccountably ashamed of our crude practices, though but dimly comprehending the mystic purity of which we were thus vouchsafed a brief glimpse.