Bit by Bit - Chapter 14, Part 8

Trey Smith

"Have you never seen a well sweep? Pull it, and down it comes; let go, and up it swings. It allows itself to be pulled around by men; it doesn't try to pull them. So it can go up and down and never get blamed by anybody.
~ Burton Watson translation ~

I had a bit of a problem getting a handle on this snippet because, in all honesty, I didn't know what a well sweep is. (Hah! It shows what a "city boy" I am!) If you don't know what a "well sweep" is either, here's the definition from Dictionary.com.

a device for raising buckets from and lowering them into a well, consisting of a long pivoted pole, the bucket being attached to one end by a long rope

It is much like the way a jack works when you find you must change a flat tire. To make the jack go up, you ratchet downward. To make the jack go down, you ratchet upward.

To view the Index page for this series, go here.