Sieve

“ Rigid as a statue, the sieve in her hand as unmoving as if clamped in a vise, Brinnaria spoke:
“If I take my eyes off the sieve,” she rebuked him, “it will tilt in my hand and the water will run through. If you make me look round you’ll destroy me. ”

“ THE DEAN'S ANSWER In reading your letter alone in my hackney, Your damnable riddle my poor brains did rack nigh. And when with much labour the matter I crack'd, I found you mistaken in matter of fact. A woman's no sieve, (for with that you begin,) Because she lets out more than e'er she takes in. And that she's a riddle can never be right, For a riddle is dark, but a woman is light. But grant her a sieve, I can say something archer; Pray what is a man? ”

“ Closely akin to the Bible and key is the sieve-driving or sieve-turning by which criminals were detected by the tilting or falling of a sieve when, in repeating the names of those suspected, that of the culprit was mentioned. The sieve required to be an heirloom in the family ”

“ In India the sieve is the first cradle of the baby, and in [188] Bombay the winnowing fan in which a newly-born child is laid is used on the fifth day for the worship of Satvâî. This makes it impure, and it is henceforward used only for the house sweepings. In Northern India, when a mother has lost a child, she puts the next in a sieve and drags it about, calling it Kadheran or Ghasîtan, “the dragged one,” so as to baffle the Evil Eye by a pretence of contempt. ”

“ They went to sea in a sieve, they did;
In a sieve they went to sea: In spite of all their friends could say,
On a winter's morn, on a stormy day,
In a sieve they went to sea. ”

“ Because, in some communities like the Bhātiās, the bride’s mother, when receiving the bridegroom in the marriage booth, carries in a dish a lamp covered with a sieve.44
The flour collected by Brāhmans by begging from door to door is supposed to be polluted. But it is considered purified when it is passed through a sieve.45
The sambelu is considered so sacred that it is not touched with the foot. If a woman lie down during day time, she will not touch it either with her head or with her foot. ”

“ If the excellence of the pastry demonstrates the virtue of the sieve let us consider it proved. I do not see, however, what the cakes have to do with it. But I am entirely willing to agree that Brinnaria is to use a horse-hair sieve made by Truttidius. ”

“ He took the sieve in his hand and went over to the river, but as often as ever he would stoop and fill it with water, the moment he raised it the water would run out of it again, and sure, if he had been there from that day till this, he never could have filled it. A crow went flying by him, over his head. "Daub! daub!" ”

“ For she thought she would never be able to find the Well of the World's End, and, if she did, how could she bring home a sieve full of water?
Well, the girl started off, and asked every one she met to tell her where was the Well of the World's End. But nobody knew, and she didn't know what to do, when a queer little old woman, all bent double, told her where it was, and how she could get to it. So she did what the old woman told her, and at last arrived at the Well of the World's End. But when she dipped the sieve in the cold, cold water, it all ran out again. ”

“ To conclude this group of divinatory instruments, chance or the operator’s direction may determine the action of one of the most familiar of classic and mediæval ordeals, the so-called coscinomancy, or, as it is described in Hudibras, ‘th’ oracle of sieve and shears, that turns as certain as the spheres.’ The sieve was held hanging by a thread, or by the points of a pair of shears stuck into its rim, and it would turn, or swing, or fall, at the mention of a thief’s name, and give similar signs for other purposes. ”

“ They are caught by putting up a sieve, or a square open box, made of boards, in the places they frequent. The people strew some oats under the sieve, and lift it up on one side by a little stick; and as soon as the partridges are got under the sieve, in order to pick up the oats, it falls, and they are caught alive. ”

“ The girl took the sieve and carried it to the well as her sister had done; but no little birds came to help her, and after dipping it in the well two or three times she brought it back empty.
‘I thought as much,’ said the old woman angrily; ‘she that is useless in one thing is useless in another.’
Perhaps the mistress may have thought that the girl had learnt a lesson, but, if she did, she was quite mistaken, as the work was no better done than before. By-and-by she sent for her again, and gave her maid the black and the white yarn to wash in the river ”

“ A sieve should not be allowed out of the house after dark, and no meal unless it be sprinkled with salt. Otherwise, the Fairies may, by means of them, take the substance out of the whole farm produce. For the same reason a hole should be put with the finger in the little cake (bonnach beag ’s toll ann) , made with the remnant of the meal after a baking, and when given to children, as it usually is, a piece should be broken off it. A nail driven into a cow, killed by falling over a precipice, was supposed by the more superstitious to keep the elves away. ”

“ In the case of the wursol, this sacred personage may associate with the women themselves if the three objects which seem to be emblematic of womanhood are removed. [586]
The pounder, sieve, and broom are burnt at the funerals of women, who use the pounder on their journey to the other world. A special kind of sieve called kudshmurn is also burnt at the azaramkedr, but I believe that this is burnt at all funerals, both of males and females. ”

“ The pounder, sieve, and broom are widely endowed with magical properties, and this is especially the case in India,6 but I do not know of any other instance in which they are especially regarded as the emblems of woman. ”

“ It appears that sieves of horse-hair were first used by the Gauls, then those of linen by the Spaniards. The mode of applying a sieve in the form of an extending bag to catch the meal as it fell from the stones, and of causing it to be turned and shaken, was first made known in the beginning of the sixteenth century.
The best bolting cloths are universally allowed to be manufactured in England; they are made of wool of the longest and the best kind, peculiarly prepared; being first well washed and spun to a fine and equal thread ”

“ PROTESTANT SISTERHOODS. At an early age we catch glimpses of that thought which, in the secret depths of her heart, Miss Sieveking cherished as her possible future vocation. In 1819, she writes in her diary:—“Has not God different vocations for His different creatures, and has not each its own joys? ”

“ What is there wrong about Miss Van Siever?"
"I won't deny that Clara Van Siever has a certain beauty of her own. To me she is certainly the most unattractive woman that I ever came near. She is simply repulsive!" Hereupon Miss Demolines held up her hand as though she were banishing Miss Van Siever for ever from her sight, and shuddered slightly. "Men think her handsome, and she is handsome. ”

“ They made sieves of horse-hair or of leather, iron nails, and similar small ironware, or mended kettles. They appear to be very poor, and the men go almost naked, unless the cold compels them to put on warmer clothing. ”

“ He was drawing water to his own mill in the matter; he knew that whoever would catch the thief and bring him to justice would be well paid for it. And he knew that no one could have better help in the work than Sive's help, so long as she was in that determined humour. He gave her her head.
"'I'll take you into the presence of the King,' said he, 'but take care not to do anything that would get me into a fix. You have often heard the proverb, "to go into the King's house is not the same as to get out," and "the flags of a great house are slippery." ”

“ Sivi then addressed the king thus, I am, O king, Sivi by name, the son of Usinara. O father, are there in the firmament or in heaven any worlds for me to enjoy? Thou knowest every region that one may enjoy as the fruit of his religious merit.’
“Yayati said, ‘Thou hast never, by speech or in mind, disregarded the honest and the virtuous that applied to thee. There are infinite worlds for thee to enjoy in heaven, all blazing like lightning.’ Sivi then said, ‘If thou regardest their purchase as improper, I give them to thee. ”

“ A few of the men sought fresh pastures, but most of them took on the wife of a man they knew well in the other Section. On the day that the departing Section left Siwa all the ladies assembled on the road that they would pass, carrying their boxes and belongings, and when the camels came by they shrieked and wept, throwing dust on their heads, beating their breasts, pretending to tear their clothes, and showing signs of the most frantic sorrow at the departure of the men. ”

“ Siva bids him ask any boon and it should be granted. The royal ascetic desires to have a son. Then says Siva: "For thy long penance we grant thy request. Choose then—a son who shall always be with thee till death, but shall be the greatest fool in the whole world, or four daughters who shall live with thee for a short time, then leave thee and return before thy death, but who shall be the incarnation of learning. To thee is left to choose which thou wilt have," and so saying, the deity gives him a mango fruit for his wife to eat, and then disappears. ”

“ Brothers, my blood is red with Siwash, but my heart is white. To the faults of my fathers I owe the one, to the virtues of my friends the other. A great truth came to me when I was yet a boy. I learned that to your kind and you was given the earth; that the Siwash could not withstand you, and like the caribou and the bear, must perish in the cold. ”

“ High amongst the Himalayas tower the great snow-mountains, and here, on the still, cold heights, is Siva throned. Silent—nay, rapt in silence—does He sit there, absorbed and lost in one eternal meditation. When the new moon shines over the mountain-tops, standing above the brow of the Great God, it appears to worshipping souls as if the light shone through, instead of all about Him. ”

“ King Sivi had a severe struggle with himself, but he conquered his weakness, and when he feels the scale sink under him he is filled with indescribable joy and heaven and earth shake, which always happens when a Buddha is coming into existence. A crowd of gods descended and rested on the air: the sight of Sivi’s endurance caused them to weep tears that fell like rain mingled with divine flowers, which the gods threw down on the voluntary victim. ”

“ The Siwy are superstitious, though, perhaps, not more so than the ignorant masses in all countries; nearly all the men have amulets sewed to their caps, or hung round their necks; every house is defended from the evil eye by an earthen pot well blackened in the fire, which is built mouth downwards over the doorway, or at one corner ”

“ SIVA, in Hindu mythology, a god who forms the supreme trinity with Brahma and Vishnu. As Brahma is the creator and Vishnu the preserver, so Siva is the destroyer. His name does not occur in the Vedas, but in later Hinduism he is an important divinity. Though Siva's personal appearance is fully described in the Puranas, it is in the form of the linga (phallic emblem) that he is almost universally worshipped. Death being a transition to a new form of life, the destroyer is really a re-creator, and thus Siva is styled the Bright or Happy One. ”

“ Laughing, Shiv made answer, "All have had their part,
Even he, the little one, hidden 'neath thy heart."
From her breast she plucked it, Parbati the thief,
Saw the Least of Little Things gnawed a new-grown leaf!
Saw and feared and wondered, making prayer to Shiv,
Who hath surely given meat to all that live. ”

“ Lifting up the weighty tins and drawing up the skins of water gives the girls an opportunity for coquettish displays of neat arms and ankles, but an infinitely more modest expanse is exhibited by these Arabs than by the average young woman in England to-day. But in Siwa if one rode past a spring where women were washing clothes they would run off into the gardens as fast as they could, and even when a Siwan man came to the pool they retired hurriedly with shawls pulled over their faces, and waited some distance away. ”

“ If the worship of Siva, despite the purport of his chief symbol, seems on the whole less liable to produce these undesirable effects than that of the rival deity, it is doubtless due partly to the real nature of that emblem being little realized by the common people, and partly to the somewhat repellent character of the “great god,” more favourable to evoking feelings of awe and terror than a spirit of fervid devotion. ”

“ Sibyl admired the pictures, flowers, and grasses on her tea-cup with the naïve interest of a child; for one often remarks, in intercourse with her sect, how the æsthetic sense, unfrittered and unworn by the petting of self-indulgence, is prompt to appreciate beauty.
Eva felt a sort of awed pleasure in Sibyl's admiration of her pretty things, as if an angel guide were stooping to play with her. She felt in her presence like one of earth's unweaned babies. ”

“ Siva holds in his back hands the axe and the trident. In his right fore-arm is the arrow Pāsupata, the left fore-arm resting freely on the waist. To the left of Siva stands the goddess Pārvati with two hands, holding a lotus flower in her right. In front of both, is Arjuna in the modest posture of receiving with both hands the divine gift offered him. A pigmy figure standing between Siva and Arjuna in the illustration may be one of the attendants of Siva. The Kāranāgama gives the same description but makes Siva wear both the arrow and the bow and hold the antelope instead of the trident. ”

“ The physical interpretation of this mythos is entitled to some attention. Sif is a personification of the earth, “the wife of Thor, the heaven or atmosphere: her hair is the trees, bushes, and plants, that adorn the surface of the earth. Loke is the fire-god, that delights in mischief, bene servit, male imperat. When by immoderate heat he has burned off the hair of Sif, her husband compels him so by temperate heat to warm the moisture of the earth, that its former products may spring up more beautiful than ever. ”