On the next clearing they saw a group of girls and boys sitting on richly decorated mats in the flower-strewn grass, playing with grains. ”Do you have a fir?” one of them asked her neighbour.
“Let me see,” replied the other, reaching into a big basket, filled with all sorts of seeds.
As if by chance he picked one seed from the depth and showed it to the girl.

“How many branches does the fir have in its twentyfourth year?” his neighbour now asked. ”Fourtyfive,” was the answer, ”nine rings, and five on each of them.” ”And how many twigs?” the beautiful girl continued to ask. ”On each branch I see ten, which makes 450.”
“Can you also tell me the number of needles of the fir in its twentyfourth year?” asked the girl. ”With or without wind and weather?” he asked. ”Without.” ”9,457,875.”

“Well, prove it.” The young man in green-silvery festive robes threw the seed three yards before him into the grass and blew at it, and immediately a splendid fir, decorated with green needles, grew up.

Around its trunk ivy was ranking upward, so that the trunk was clothed completely in delicate green leaves. When they counted the branches and twigs, they found out that the statements made earlier were correct.

“Now let us count the needles,” said another participant, and blew into the tree. Immediately it stood in bright flames.

Many, many small blue flames burst forth from the redgolden glowing fir. From each of the needles a light shot out, and each little blue flame was followed by a red-white spark, which dragged a redgolden glowing trail behind it.

It appeared as if the whole tree stood in a shower of shooting stars which rushed at it from all sides.
Like a very subtle thunder this shower of rays touched Mani's ear.

In the midst of this fire-work suddenly the trunk and branches glowed up once more, so that they shone bright silvery-golden through the blue-red golden rain of stars.

In the middle of the silvery full-moon night it seemed as if the bright sun wanted to rise in the shape of the tree; but then it sank, just as it had risen, with a burst of sparks, in which the sparkling glow poured down from the height of the radiant fir to the ground.

The group of those practising was left in the calm, white-shimmering clearing. ”Correct,” said the flame-thrower to the seed-thrower. ”I have heard the sounds of 9,457,875 sparks.”

“These students practise the perception of details of the lively on the level of its smallest common diversity,” Sol explained to his sister.
“If they want to govern the enlivened nature, they first of all have to explore the relationship between cause and effect in the living.

“Letting something grow fast is of secondary significance; the main thing in this exercise is to see the fully grown living being in the fertile seed already.
Later, in the “rings of the cognitive exercises” the students learn to actually seize power over growth, they learn to master and to direct the details of the structure of growth.

“Here again you see twelve judges of Agni assembled around the place; they guard the interplay of the divine forces within the elements,” Sol continued his explanations. “And the wise alf, who sits behind those practising on the golden-silvery chair, is the teacher of this exercise.”

“He is a relative of the goddess Sif, Ivaldi's daughter, who has invented the seed, as you know.”
Sol pointed out to his sister that it was time to continue, and so they merrily went further up the mountain.