“In the first place, no god, not all the gods together, could give any votary power to carry water in a sieve, be it rush or linen or horse-hair or metal, of which the meshes had been 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 dipped a sieve into water and brought it up with water in it and saw that water retained by the meshes. Once wet the under side of a sieve and water will run through to the last drop. “But if a sieve were ever so little greasy or oily, not dripping with oil or clogged with grease, but greasy as a working slave’s finger is greasy on a hot day; if such a sieve were free of any drop of water on the underside, 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 around, might deepen till it was as deep as the width of two fingers or of three, and might be retained by the meshes even for an hour, even while the sieve was carried over a rough road, up hill and down, through crowded streets. “But few are the women who could so carry a sieve of water or could even so hold it that the water would not run through at once.” “How could the water be retained at all?” queried Brinnaria the practical. “What is the explanation?” Truttidius wrinkled up his face in deep thought. “You have seen wine spilled at dinner,” he illustrated. “You have seen a drop of it or a splash of it fall on a sofa-cover, and you have seen it soak in and leave an ugly stain?” “Of course,” Brinnaria agreed, “often and often.” “And then again, not very often,” the sieve-maker went on, “you see a patch of spilt wine stand up on a perfectly dry fabric and remain there awhile without soaking in, its surface shining wet and its edges gleaming round and smooth 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 the not soaking in of the splashed liquid is far, oh, far more frequent, countless, uncountable times more frequent, than the sustaining of fluid in a sieve. But as the one can happen and does, so the other could happen and might.” “I see,” Brinnaria breathed. “You have made me see that. Now, next point: How must the sieve be held?” The old man smiled again. “You keep close to the subject,” he chuckled. “You talk like a grandmother of consuls. You have a head on your shoulders.” “That does not answer my question,” Brinnaria persisted.