Uduma turned. “Hail, woman! Come within the sunny ring.”
Vana came, and laid before the seer the wheat wrapped in fine cloth. “Gift from one who would gain knowledge!”
“It is only to be gained,” said Uduma, “by those who would gain it.—The wheat is good and the cloth is fine. Sit in the sun and rest from the shadows.”
Vana sat, cross-limbed, upon the short grass. Uduma became silent, and Vana, as was manners, held as quiet. The sun poured down its rays, but the dry and aromatic air was in motion, and the heat not oppressive. The light burned clear gold over the open round, the small hut and the deep, surrounding wood. Time passed.
At last said Uduma the seer: “To love children of one’s body is well. To think for children of one’s body is well. To hold the flower of the vine before the eyes is well. But it is not well to hide therewith earth and the ripened grape, the moon, the sun, and the stars.”
“O Uduma!” said Vana, “we are all flower of the vine for so many years that we live! Will it not be well for all to take goods from our fathers as well as our mothers?”
“I do not say that it will not be well.... Observe my ewe and her lamb. See, wherever she turns, the lamb turns with her.”
Vana nodded. “She is all the lamb’s good.”
“You say well.— But now if the ram came and made magic so that the lamb got much good from him and then more good and more? Would the lamb any more look wholly to the ewe?”
Vana sat with an arrested look in the sunny round. At last she spoke. “Fathers as well as mothers have praise from children.... I do not know—I do not remember—if it was ever otherwise.”