--- In [email protected], TurquoiseB <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > --- In [email protected], "Patrick Gillam" <jpgillam@> > wrote: > > > > In skimming the newsletter, I saw reference to > > the fences around the "fortune-creating" > > homes. The vastuu fences reminded me of > > something in a book I just finished, *The Ladies' > > No. 1 Detective Agency." Apparently, in Botswana, > > it's customary for a home to have a knee-high > > fence around it. When visitors approach the home, > > they stop at the fence and hail the inhabitants, > > rather than walk up to the door and knock. I > > detected a similarity between this African fencing > > custom and the vastuu fences of Sthapatya-vedic homes. > > ...the Prince Prospero was happy and dauntless and > sagacious. When his dominions were half depopulated, > he summoned to his presence a thousand hale and light- > hearted friends from among the knights and dames of > his court, and with these retired to the deep > seclusion of one of his castellated abbeys. This was > an extensive and magnificent structure, the creation > of the prince's own eccentric yet august taste. A > strong and lofty wall girdled it in. This wall had > gates of iron. The courtiers, having entered, brought > furnaces and massy hammers and welded the bolts. They > resolved to leave means neither of ingress or egress > to the sudden impulses of despair or of frenzy from > within. The abbey was amply provisioned. With such > precautions the courtiers might bid defiance to > contagion. The external world could take care of > itself. In the meantime it was folly to grieve, or > to think. The prince had provided all the appliances > of pleasure. There were buffoons, there were > improvisatori, there were ballet-dancers, there > were musicians, there was Beauty, there was wine. > All these and security were within. Without was > the "Red Death." > > -- from "The Masque of the Red Death," by Edgar Allen Poe
Gosh, that would be devastating, Barry, if it weren't for the fact that the fences in question are either picket fences about three feet high, or posts spaced at intervals with only a bar connecting them at the top, and a gap in the fence in front of the house's entrance that doesn't even have a gate to close it. Oopsie!
