Aphrodite By Pierre Louys (1896) free porn video

Aphrodite by Pierre Louys

1896

TO ALBERT BESNARD The homage of profound admiration and of respectful friendship

APHRODITE

AUTHOR'S PREFACE

The erudite Prodicos of Ceos, who flourished toward the end of the first century before our era, is the author of the celebrated apologue which St. Basil recommended to Christian meditation: "Herakles between virtue and voluptuousness." We know that Herakles decided for the first, and was thus enabled to accomplish a certain number of great crimes against the Hinds, the Amazons, the Golden Apples and the Giants. If Prodicos had limited himself to that, he would have written only a fable of readily comprehended symbolism, but he was a clever philosopher and his repertory of tales, "The Hours," which was divided into three parts, presented the moral truths under their three different aspects which correspond to the three ages of life. For little c***dren he was pleased to propose as an example the austere choice of Herakles; to youths he doubtless related the voluptuous choice of Paris; and I imagine that, to ripe men, he said nearly this:
"Odysseus was wandering in the chase one day, at the foot of the mountains of Delphi, when he met on his path two virgins who held each other by the hand. The one had hair of violets, transparent eyes, and grave lips; she said to him: 'I am Arete.' The other had softly tinted eyelids, delicate hands and tender breasts; she said to him: 'I am Tryphe.' And they said together: 'Choose between us.' But the subtle Odysseus responded wisely: 'How could I choose--you are inseparable. The eyes which have seen you pass--one without the other--have glimpsed but a sterile shadow. Just as sincere virtue does not deprive itself of the eternal joys which voluptuousness brings to it, so luxury would go ill without a certain grandeur of soul. I will follow you both. Show me the way.' As he finished, the two visions melted together and Odysseus knew that he had spoken with the great goddess Aphrodite."
* * *
The feminine personage who occupies the principal place in the romance whose pages you are about to turn, is an antique courtesan; but be reassured: she will not convert herself.
She will be loved neither by a monk, a prophet, nor a god. In present-day literature, this is an originality.
Rather she will be a courtesan, with all the frankness, the ardor and the pride of every human being who has a vocation and who holds in society a freely chosen place; she will aspire to raise herself to the highest point; she will not even imagine a need for excuse or mystery in her life. And this requires explanation.
Up to this day, the modern writers who have addressed themselves to a public free from the prejudices of young girls and school boys have employed a laborious stratagem whose hypocrisy displeases me: "I have depicted voluptuousness as it is," they say, "in order to exalt virtue." But I, at the beginning of a romance whose intrigue develops at Alexandria, refuse absolutely to commit this anachronism.
Love, with all its consequences, was, for the ancient Greeks, the sentiment most virtuous and most fecund in grandeurs. They did not attach to it those ideas of shamelessness and immodesty which Israelite tradition, along with the Christian doctrine, has handed down to us. Herodotos (1.10) says to us, quite naturally:--"Among some barbarous races it is considered disgraceful to appear naked." When the Greeks or the Latins wished to insult a man who frequented "daughters of love," they called him or Moechus, which merely signifies "adulterer." On the other hand, a man and a woman who, being free from other bonds, united themselves, even though this were in public and whatever their youth might be, were considered as injuring no one and were left at liberty.
One sees that the life of the ancients could not be judged after the moral ideas which come to us at the present time from Geneva.
As for me, I have written this book with the simplicity an Athenian would have brought to a relation of the same adventures. And I hope that it will be read in the same spirit.
Judging the ancient Greeks by the ideas actually received, not one exact translation of their greatest writers could be left in the hands of a young student. If M. Mounet-Sully should play his role of ###140###dipos without cuts, the police would suspend the representation. If M. Leconte de Lisle had not prudently expurgated Theocritos, his version would have been suppressed the same day it was put on sale.
One considers Aristophanes exceptional? Yet we possess important fragments of f******n hundred and forty comedies, due to one hundred and thirty-two other Greek poets, some of whom, such as Alexis, Philetor, Strattis, Eubolos and Cratinos, have left us admirable verse, and no one has yet dared translate this shameless and sublime collection.
One quotes always, for the purpose of defending Greek customs, the teachings of some philosophers who condemned the sexual pleasures. There is confusion here. Those s**ttered moralists reproved all excesses of the senses indiscriminately, without the existence, for them, of a difference between the debauch of the bed and that of the table.
He who, today, at a restaurant in Paris, orders with impunity a six-louis dinner for himself alone, would have been judged by them as guilty and no less so than another who would give a too intimate assignation in the middle of the street, being for that condemned by the existing laws to a year of prison. Moreover, these austere philosophers were generally regarded by antique society as abnormal and dangerous madmen; they were mocked on the stage, treated with blows in the streets, seized by tyrants to serve as court buffoons and exiled by free citizens who judged them unworthy of submitting to capital punishment.
It is then by a conscious and voluntary deceit that modern educators from the Renaissance to the present time have represented the antique moral system as the inspiration of their narrow virtues. If this moral system were great--if it merited indeed to be taken for a model and to be obeyed--it is precisely because no system has better known how to distinguish the just from the unjust according to a criterion of beauty: to proclaim the right of every man to seek individual happiness within the limits set by the rights of others and to declare that there is nothing under the sun more sacred than physical love--nothing more beautiful than the human body.
Such was the morality of the people who built the Acropolis; and if I add that it has remained that of all great minds, I will but state the value of a common-place, so well is it proven that the superior intelligences of artists, writers, warriors or statesmen have never held its majestic tolerance to be illicit. Aristotle began life by dissipating his patrimony in the company of debauched women; Sappho gave her name to a special vice; Caesar was the moechus calvas:--nor can we imagine Racine avoiding girls of the theater and Napoleon practicing abstinence. The romances of Mirabeau, the Greek verses of Chemier, the correspondence of Diderot and the minor works of Montesquieu equal in boldness even the writings of Catullus. And, of all French authors the most austere, the most pious, the most laborious--Buffon--does one wish to know by what maxim he guides his counsel of sentimental intrigues? "Love! Why dost thou form the happy state of all beings and the misfortune of man?--It is because, in this passion, only the physical is good, and because the moral side is worthless."
* * *
Whence comes this? And how does it happen that across the upsetting of antique ideas the great Greek sensuality remains like a ray of light upon the noblest foreheads?
It is because sensuality is a condition, mysterious but necessary and creative, of intellectual development. Those who have not felt to their limit the strongest demands of the flesh, whether as a blessing or as a curse, are incapable of understanding fully the demands of the spirit. Just as the beauty of the soul illumines the features, so only the virility of the body nourishes the brain. The worst insult that Delacroix could address to men--that which he threw indiscriminately at the railers of Rubens and at the detractors of Ingres--was this terrible word: "Eunuchs!"
Better yet, it seems that the genius of races, like that of individuals, is, before all, sensual. All the cities which have reigned over the world--Babylon, Alexandria, Athens, Rome, Venice,' Paris--have been, by a general law, all the more licentious as they were more powerful, as though their dissoluteness were necessary, to their splendor. The cities where the legislator has attempted to implant artificially narrow and unproductive virtue have been, from the first day, condemned to absolute death. It was thus with Lacedaemonia which, in the midst of the most prodigious flight to which the human soul has ever risen--between Corinth and Alexandria, between Syracuse and Miletus--has left us neither a poet, a painter, a philosopher, an historian nor a scientist; barely the popular renown of a sort of Bobillot who, with his three hundred men, met death in a mountain pass without even gaining a victory. For this reason, after two thousand years measuring the emptiness of this Spartan virtue, we can, according to the exhortation of Renan: "Curse the soil where this mistress of sombre errors existed and insult her because she is no more."
* * *
Shall we ever see a return of the days of Ephesos and Cyrene? Alas! the modern world succumbs under an invasion of ugliness; the civilizations move toward the North and enter into the fog, the cold, the mud. What darkness! People clothed in black circulate through infected streets. Of what are they thinking?--we know not; but our twenty-five years shudder at being thus exiled among old men.
As for those who ever regret that they knew not this earth-intoxicated youth which we call antique life, let them be permitted to live again, through a fecund illusion, in the time when human nudity--the most perfect form, since we believe in the image of God, which we can know or even conceive--could reveal itself through the features of a sacred courtesan before the twenty thousand pilgrims upon the strands of Eleusis; where the most sensual love--the divine love whence we are born--was without stain, without shame and without sin; may they be permitted to forget eighteen barbarous, hypocritical and ugly centuries; to move from the marsh to the spring; to return piously to original beauty; amidst the sound of enchanted flutes to rebuild the Great Temple; and to consecrate enthusiastically to the sanctuaries of the true faith their hearts ever enthralled by the immortal Aphrodite.
Pierre Louys.

BOOK ONE
APHRODITE


Chapter One

CHRYSIS
LYING upon her bosom, her elbows forward, her feet apart and her cheek resting in her hand, she pierced little symmetrical holes in the pillow of green linen with a long golden pin.
Since she had awakened, two hours after mid-day, and quite tired from having slept too much, she had remained alone upon the disordered bed, one side covered by a vast flood of hair.
This mass of hair was deep and dazzling, soft as a fur, longer than a wing, supple, numberless, full of life and warmth. It half-covered her back, spread itself under her body and glittered to her very knees in thick and rounded ringlets. The young woman was rolled up in this precious fleece whose golden brown, almost metallic, reflections had caused the women of Alexandria to name her Chrysis.
It was not the smooth hair of the Syrians of the court, nor the tinted hair of the Asiatics, nor the brown and black hair of the daughters of Egypt. It was that of an Aryan race, of the Galilaeans from beyond the desert.
Chrysis. She loved that name. The young men who came to see her called her Chryse like Aphrodite in the verses which they left, with garlands of roses, at her door in the mornings. She did not believe in Aphrodite but she was pleased that they should compare her to the goddess, and she went sometimes to the temple to give her, as to a friend, boxes of perfume and blue veils.
She was born on the banks of the lake of Gennesaret in a country of shadow and of sun, over-run with rose-laurels. Her mother went in the evenings to wait upon the road to Jerusalem for travelers and merchants, in the midst of the pastoral silence. She was a woman much respected in Galilee. The priests did not avoid her door for she was charitable and pious; the lambs of the sacrifice were always paid for by her, the benediction of the Eternal extended over her house. But when she became enceinte, her condition was a matter of gossip--for she lived alone. A man who was celebrated for the gift of prophecy said that she would bear a daughter who would one day wear at her throat "the wealth and the faith of a nation." She did not quite understand how that could be but she named the c***d Sarah--this is to say Princess, in Hebrew. And this silenced the scandals.
Of this Chrysis had never known, the diviner having told her mother how dangerous it is to reveal to people prophecies of which they are the objects. She knew nothing of her future; wherefore she often thought of it. She recalled but little of her c***dhood and did not like to speak of it. The only very clear sentiment which had remained with her was of the fright and the. vexation which were caused every day by the anxious surveillance of her mother who, the hour being come to go forth upon the road, shut her up in their room for interminable hours. She recalled also the round window through which she saw the waters of the lake, the mist-blue fields, the transparent sky, the light air of the Galilaean country. The house was surrounded by pink flax and tamarisks. Thorny caper bushes raised their green heads at hazard over the fine mist of the blue-grass. Little girls bathed in a limpid brook where red shells could be found under tufts of laurel blossoms. And there were flowers on the water, flowers in all the meadow and great lilies on the mountains.
She was twelve years old when she escaped to follow a troop of young riders who were going to Tyre as merchants of ivory and whom she had chanced to meet beside a well. They had adorned their long-tailed horses with many-colored tufts. She recalled well how they carried her away, pale with joy, on their mounts, and how they had halted later for the night--a night so bright that not a star could be seen.
Neither had she forgotten their entry into Tyre, she at the head, on the panniers of a pack horse, holding to the mane by her fists, flaunting her bare calves to the townswomen, proud now to be a woman herself. The same evening they departed for Egypt. She followed the sellers of ivory to the market of Alexandria.
There they left her two months later, in a little white house with a terrace and little columns, with her bronze mirror, soft rugs, new cushions and a handsome Hindu slave-girl, skilled in dressing the hair.
As she dwelt in the extreme Eastern Quarter which the young Greeks of Bruchion scorned to visit, she met for a long time only travelers and merchants, as did her mother. She did not see again her passing callers; she could please herself with them and then leave them quickly, before loving them. However, she had inspired lasting passions. Masters of caravans had been known to sell their merchandise at a beggarly price, bankrupting themselves in order to remain near her a few days. With these men's gifts she had bought jewels, bed-cushions, rare perfumes, flowered robes and four slaves.
She had come to understand many foreign tongues and knew tales of all countries. Assyrians had told her the love-story of Douzi and Ishtar, Phoenician tales of Ashtaroth and Adonis. Greek girls of the isles had told her the legend of Iphis, and she knew also the love-story of Atalanta. Finally her Hindu slave-girl, patiently during seven years, had taught her to the last detail the complex art of the priestesses of Palibothra.
For love is an art, like music. It gives emotion of the same order, as delicate, as vibrant, perhaps even more intense; and Chrysis, who knew its every rhythm and subtlety, felt herself, and rightly, a greater artist than Plango herself, who was a musician in the temple.
Seven years she lived thus, without dreaming of a life more happy or more diversified than hers. But a little before her twentieth year, when from a young girl she became a woman, ambition suddenly awoke in her with maturity.
And one morning as she came out of a deep sleep, two hours past mid-day, quite tired from having slept too much, she turned over on her breast across the bed, her feet apart, rested her cheek in her hand and with a long golden pin pierced with little symmetrical holes her pillow of green linen.
She reflected profoundly.
There were at first four little points which made a square and a point in the middle. Then four other points to make a larger square. Then she tried to make a circle--but that was a little difficult.
Then she pierced points at random and began to call, "Djala! Djala!"
Djala was her Hindu slave whose name was Djalantachtchandrapchapala, which means: "Changeful-as-the-image-of-the-moon-upon-the-water." Chrysis was too lazy to say the entire name.
The slave entered and stood near the door without quite shutting it.
"Djala, who came yesterday?"
"Dost thou not know?"
"No. I paid no attention to him. I was weary. I was drowsy the whole time, and I remember nothing. Was he pleasing? When did he leave? Early? What was it he brought me? Is it valuable? No--don't tell me. I don't care. What did he say? Has no one come since his departure? Will he return? Give me my bracelets."
The slave brought a casket but Chrysis did not even glance at it and, raising her arms as high as she could, "Ah! Djala," she said, "Ah! Djala!... I would like to have extraordinary adventures."
"Everything is extraordinary," said Djala, "or nothing. The days are like each other."
"Not at all. Formerly it was not so. In every country in the world the gods have come down upon earth and have loved mortal women. Ah! in what manner must they be awaited, in what forests must they be sought, they who are a little more than men? What prayers must be said that they come, they who would teach one something or make me forget everything? And if the gods will descend no more, if they are dead or if they are too old, Djala, will I also die without having seen a man who will bring tragic events into my life?"
She turned over on her back and interlaced her fingers.
"If someone should adore me, it seems to me that I would find much pleasure in making him suffer until he died of it. Those who come to me are not worthy of being wept for--and then, it . is my fault too--it is I who call them, why should they love me?"
"What bracelet today?"
"I will wear them all. But leave me. I need no one."
"Thou wilt not go out?"
"Yes, I will go out alone--I will dress myself alone. I will not come back. Go!--Go!"
She let one foot drop on the rug and stretched herself erect. Djala had gone out softly.
She walked very slowly through the room, her hands clasped behind her neck, absorbed in the delight of applying her bare feet. moist with perspiration, to the cool pavement. Then she entered her bath. To regard herself through the water gave her great pleasure. She saw herself like a great shell of pearl open upon a rock. Her skin became harmonious and perfect; the lines of her body lengthened in a blue light; her whole figure was more supple; she recognized her hands no longer. The lightness of her body was such that she raised herself upon two fingers, let herself float for an instant and fall back softly upon the marble amidst a light stirring which lapped under her chin. The water flowed into her ears like a kiss.
The hour of the bath was that where Chrysis commenced to adore herself. The loveliness of her body became the object of tender contemplation and admiration. With her hair and her hands she made a thousand charming plays; now and then she laughed softly, like a c***d.
The day drew to a close. She rose up in the basin, came out of the water and walked toward the door. The marks of her feet glistened upon the stones. Swaying and as though exhausted, she opened the door wide and paused, her arm stretched out on the latch, then entered. Standing, still wet, near her bed, she commanded the slave, "Dry me."
The Malabar woman took a large sponge in her hand and passed it into the soft golden hair of Chrysis, which streamed backward laden with water; she dried it, s**ttered it, shook it gently, and then, plunging the sponge into a jar of oil, passed it gently over her mistress's body before rubbing her with a rough cloth, which made the pliant skin glow.
Chrysis buried herself shudderingly in the coolness of a marble seat and murmured, "Dress my hair."
In the level rays of the evening, the hair, still damp and heavy, shone like a shower luminous in the sun. The slave took it in handfuls and twisted it; she made it turn upon itself like a great serpent of metal which the pins of gold pierced like arrows. She rolled it about with a green band, thrice crossed, in order to enhance the gloss by contrast with the silk. Chrysis held at arm's length her polished copper mirror. Idly she watched the dark hands of the slave move in the heavy hair, round the clusters, gather in the straying locks and sculpture the head-dress like a vase of moulded clay. When this was done Chrysis said in a low voice, "Tint me."
A little box of rosewood, brought from the isle of Dioscoris, contained tints of all colors. With a brush of camel's hair the slave took a little black paste which she placed on the long finely curved lashes in order that the eyes should appear more blue. Two decided strokes of a crayon lengthened them, softened them; a bluish powder leadened the lids; two spots of bright vermilion accentuated the corners of the tears. Then, to fix the tints, the face must be covered with ointment. With a soft feather dipped in white pigment, Djala drew white streaks along the arms and on the neck; with a little brush full of carmine she ensanguined the mouth; her fingers spread over the cheeks a light cloud of red powder. Then with a pad of tinted leather she colored the elbows faintly and revived the luster of the ten nails. The toilette was finished.
Then Chrysis began to smile, and said to the Hindu, "Sing to me."
She sat with arched back in her marble armchair. Her pins were like golden rays behind her face. Her hands,

resting upon her breast, spaced between the shoulders the red necklace of her painted nails, and her small
white feet were reunited upon the stone.
Djala crouched near the wall and recalled love songs of old India:
"Chrysis..."
She sang in monotone:
"Chrysis, thy hair is like a bee-swarm, at rest upon a tree. The warm south wind blows through it with the dew

of love and the moist perfume of the night flowers."
The young girl, with her slower and softer voice, took up the song:
"My hair is like an infinite river in the plain where the flaming evening flows away."
And they sang, one after the other:
"Thine eyes are like blue water-lilies, stemless and still on the pools."
"Mine eyes in the shadow of my lashes are like deep lakes under dark branches."
"Thy lips are two delicate dowers where the blood of the deer has fallen."
"My lips are the burning edges of a wound."
"Thy tongue is the bloody dagger which has made the wound of thy mouth."
"My tongue is encrusted with precious stones. It is red from mirroring my lips."
"Thine arms are rounded like two bars of ivory and thine armpits are two mouths."
"My arms reach out like two lily stems whereon my fingers cling like five petals."
"Thy limbs are the trunks of two white elephants which carry thy feet like two rosy flowers."
"My feet are two water-lily petals upon a pool; my limbs are two swollen water-lily buds."

"Thy bosom is a shield of silver."
"It is the moon--and the moon's gleam on the water."
A deep silence fell. The slave raised her hands and bowed forward. Chrysis went on:
"I am a crimson blossom, full of sweet scents and honey.... I am like the sea-hydra, soft, living dower of the night.... I am a well, in an ever-warm shelter."
The prostrate one murmured very low:
"Thou art awesome as the face of Medusa."
Chrysis placed her foot upon the slave's neck and said, trembling, "Djala..."
Little by little the night had come, but the moon was so luminous that the room was filled with blue radiance.
Chrysis, naked, gazed at the still gleaming of her skin, and on her body where the deep shadows fell upon it.
She rose abruptly. "Djala, of what are we thinking? It is night and I have not yet gone out. Only sleeping sailors will be on the Heptastadion. Tell me, Djala, am I beautiful?
"Tell me, Djala, am I more beautiful this night than ever? I am the most beautiful woman in Alexandria; dost thou know it? Will he not follow me like a dog, he who will presently pass into the oblique regard of mine eyes? Will I not make of him what pleases me--a slave if it is my caprice; and can I not expect from the first who comes the most abject obedience? Dress me, Djala."
Around her arms two silver serpents twined, upon her feet were fixed sandals attached to her brown ankles by crossed leather thongs. She herself buckled around her waist a young girl's girdle. In her ears she placed great circular hoops, on her fingers rings and seals, on her neck three necklaces of golden images, chiseled at Paphos by the hierodules.
She studied herself for some time, wearing only her jewels; then drawing from a coffer where she had folded it a vast garment of sheer yellow linen, she wrapped it around her, dr****g herself from head to foot. Its diagonal folds furrowed that little of her figure which could be seen through the light tissue; one of her elbows thrust out under the close tunic, and the other arm, which she had left bare, carried a long train so that it would not drag in the dust.
She took in her hand her fan of plumes and went out nonchalantly.
Standing on the steps of the threshold, her hand resting against the white wall, Djala alone watched her mistress depart.
She walked slowly along the houses in the deserted street where the moonlight fell. A little dancing shadow frisked behind her steps.

Chapter Two

ON THE JETTY
ON the jetty of Alexandria, a girl stood singing. Beside her, seated on the white pa****t, were two
flute-players.
"Deep to the woods the satyrs drove
The oreads;
And helpless to the mountains fled
The water nymphs.
Hot forms, wet-eyed, with flying hair,
Were seized and bent
Grasswards, their bodies half-divine
Quivering, spent.
Eros finds always on the lips of women,
Painful and sweet desire."
The flute-players repeated: "Eros! Eros!..." and sighed into their doubled reeds.
"Cybele, seeking Attys, sped
Across the plains.
Eros had pierced her heart with love
Which he disdained,
For Eros ever matches scorn
Against desire.
She drew the icy gentle breath
Of welcome death.
Eros finds always on the lips of women,
Painful and sweet desire."
"Eros! Eros!... " Shrill cries leaped from the flutes.
"Syrinx ran weeping to the shore-.
And then beyond...
Cheating the Goat-Foot's lusty will.
Her trembling shade
Whispered in reeds beside the stream.
So breaking these,
Pan bound the dead soul in the pipes
and crying flute.
Eros finds always on the lips of women,
Painful and sweet desire."
While the flutes continued the slow refrain of the last stanza, the singer held out her hand to the passers-by

who stood in a circle around her and received four oboli which she slid into her footgear. Little by little, the crowd dispersed, curious to watch the passing of its numberless self. The noise of steps and of voices covered even the sound of the sea. Sailors drew, with bent shoulders, merchandise upon the quay. Girls who sold fruit passed by, their full baskets in their arms. Beggars besought with a trembling hand. Asses laden with full leathern bottles trotted before the sticks of their drivers. But it was the hour of sunset, and an idle throng, more numerous than the active crowd, covered the jetty. Here and there groups formed, between
which women wandered. One heard well known silhouettes called by name. The young looked at the philosophers who contemplated the women. These were of every order and of every condition: from the most celebrated, dressed in light silks and shod
with gilded leather, to the most miserable who walked barefoot. The poor ones were not less beautiful than the others but less fortunate only, and the attention of the sages dwelt by preference on those whose grace was not altered by the artifice of girdles and the encumberment of jewels. As it was the eve of the festival of Aphrodite, these women had full license to choose the garment which became them best and some of the youngest had even risked wearing none at all. But they shocked no one, for they would not have thus exposed themselves to the sun if any one of them had been marked by the least defect which could lead to mockery.
"Tryphera! Tryphera!"
And a young woman of joyous aspect elbowed some passers-by to rejoin a friend she had seen among the
crowd.
"Tryphera! Art thou invited?"
"Where, Seso?"
"To Bacchis's."
"Not yet. She gives a dinner?"
"A dinner? A banquet, my dear. She is freeing her handsomest slave, Aphrodisia, on the second day of the

festival."

"At last! She has perceived that they come to her no longer except for her slave."

"I think she has seen nothing. It is a fancy of old Cheres, the ship captain of the quay. He wanted to buy the
girl for ten minae; Bacchis refused. Twenty minae; she still refused."
"She is mad."
"What wouldst thou have her do? It was her ambition to have a freed slave. Besides, she was right to bargain.

Cheres will give thirty-five minae and for that price the girl will be free."

"Thirty-five minae? Three thousand, five hundred drachmae? Three thousand, five hundred drachmae for a
negress?"
"She is the daughter of a white."
"Yes, but her mother is black."
"Bacchis declared she would not give her for less and old Cheres is so much in love that he has consented."
"Is he invited, he at least?"
"No! Aphrodisia will dance at the banquet as the last course after the fruit and it is only the next day they must

deliver her to Cheres, but I am afraid she will be fatigued..."
"Don't pity her! With him she will have time to recover. I know him, Seso. I have watched him sleep."
They laughed together at Cheres. Then they complimented each other.
"Thou hast a pretty dress," said Seso. "Didst thou have it embroidered at home?"
Tryphera's robe was of a thin glaucous stuff entirely worked with large iris flowers. A carbuncle mounted in

gold gathered it in folds on the left shoulder; the robe fell like a scarf as far as the metal girdle; a narrow slit

which opened and closed at each step alone revealed the whiteness of the skin.
"Seso!" said another voice. "Seso and Tryphera, come, if you don't know what to do. I am going to the
Ceramic Wall to look for my name written there."

"Mousarion! Whence comest thou, little one?"
"From the Pharos. There is no one down there."
"What meanest thou? One needs but to throw in a line, it is so full."
"No turbots for me. So I am going to the wall. Come."
On the way, Seso recounted again the banquet project at the house of Bacchis.
"Ah! At Bacchis's!" cried Mousarion. "Thou rememberest the last dinner, Tryphera: all the things they said

about Chrysis?"
"Thou must not repeat it. Seso is her friend."

Mousarion bit her lip, but already Seso was uneasy.
"What? What did they say?"
"Oh!... Slanders."
"People can talk," declared Seso. "She is worth more than all three of us. On the day she will be willing to

leave her quarter and show herself at Bruchion, I know some of our lovers who will return to us no more."
"Oh! Oh!"
"Certainly. I would commit follies for that woman. There is no one more beautiful here, believe me."
The three young girls had arrived before the Ceramic Wall. From one end to the other of the immense white

rampart inscriptions written in black succeeded each other. When a lover desired to present himself to a young

woman it was sufficient for him to write their two names with the gift which he proposed; if the man and the

gift were approved, the woman remained standing under the writing until the author returned.
"Look, Seso," said Tryphera, laughing. "What nasty joker has written that?"
And they read, in big letters:
BACCHIS
THERSITES
TWO OBOLI
"To mock women so should not be permitted. As for me, were I the one named I would already have made an

inquiry." But farther on Seso paused before a more serious inscription.
SESO OF KNIDOS
TIMON SON OF LYSIAS
ONE MINA
She paled slightly.
"I remain," she said.
And she backed against the wall under the envious looks of the passing women.
Some steps farther, Mousarion found a demand which was acceptable if not so generous. Tryphera returned

alone to the jetty.

As the hour was advanced the crowd was less compact. However, the three musicians continued to sing and to play the flute. Becoming aware of an unknown whose stoutness and garments were a little ridiculous, Tryphera tapped him
on the shoulder.
"Well! little father! I wager thou art an Alexandrian, eh!"

"True, my daughter," replied the good man, "and thou hast guessed it. Thou seest me quite surprised at the
town and the people."
"Thou art from Bubastis?"
"No. From Cabira. I came here to sell grain and I will return tomorrow richer by fifty-two minae. Thanks be

rendered to the gods, the year has been good."
Tryphera suddenly became full of interest in this merchant.
"My c***d," he continued timidly, "thou canst give me a great pleasure. I would not like to return tomorrow to

Cabira without being able to tell my wife and my three daughters that I have seen-some celebrated men. Thou

must know some celebrated men?"
"Some few," she said, laughing.
"Good. Name them to me as they pass by. I am sure that I have met in the street, within the last two days, the
most illustrious philosophers and the most influential functionaries. It is my despair not to know them."

"Thou shalt be satisfied. Here is Naucrates."

"Who is this Naucrates?"

"He is a philosopher."

"And what does he preach?"

"That one must be silent."

"By Zeus, there is a doctrine which does not demand a great genius and this philosopher does not please me at

all."
"Here is Phrasilas."
"Who is this Phrasilas?"
"He is a dunce."
"Then why dost thou not let him pass?"
"Because others consider him eminent."
"And what does he say?"
"He says everything with a smile, which permits him to let his mistakes be understood as voluntary and his

banalities as exquisites. He has all the advantage. The world has allowed itself to be deceived."
"This is too much for me and I do not quite understand thee. Besides, the face of this Phrasilas is marked with
hypocrisy."

"Here is Philodemos."
"The strategian?"
"No. A Latin poet who writes in Greek."
"Little one, he is an enemy. I wish I had not seen him."
Here the whole crowd made a movement; a murmur of voices pronounced the same name:
"Demetrios . . Demetrios..."
Tryphera mounted upon a stone and in her turn she said to the merchant, "Demetrios... there is Demetrios,

thou who wanted to see some celebrated men."
"Demetrios? The lover of the queen? Is it possible?"
"Yes, thou hast had luck. He never goes out. Since I have been at Alexandria, this is the first time I have seen

him on the jetty."
"Where is he?"
"There he is, leaning over to see the shipping."
"There are two leaning over.
"He is the one in blue."
"I do not see him well. He turns his back to us."
"Dost thou know he is the sculptor to whom the queen gave herself as model for the Aphrodite of the temple."
"They say he is the royal lover. They say he is the master of Egypt."
"And he is handsome as Apollo."
"Ah! there he is turning around. I am glad I came. I will say that I have seen him. I have heard many things

about him. It appears that no woman has ever resisted him. He has had many adventures, has he not? How

does it happen that the queen has not been informed of them?"
"The queen knows of them as well as we do. She loves him too much to speak to him about them. She is
afraid lest he return to Rhodes, to his master, Pherecrates. He is as powerful as she and it is she who desired
him."

"He does not appear happy. Why does he look so sad? It seems to me I would be happy if I were he. I would

like very much to be he, were it but for one evening...."
The sun had set. The woman looked at this man who was the dream of them all. He, without appearing to be
conscious of the stir which he inspired, remained leaning on the pa****t, listening to the flute-players.

The little musicians made one more round: then they gently threw their light flutes over their backs; the singer
passed her arms around their necks and all three returned toward the town.

As darkness had come, the other women re-entered, in little groups, the immensity of Alexandria and the troop of men followed them; but as they went all looked back toward Demetrios. The last one who passed softly threw him her yellow flower and laughed. Silence fell upon the quays.

Chapter Three

DEMETRIOS
ON the plaza abandoned by the musicians Demetrios remained alone, resting on his elbows. He heard the sea murmur, the vessels creak slowly, the wind pass beneath the stars. The whole town was lighted by a little dazzling cloud which had lingered over the moon and the light in the sky was softened.
The young man looked about him; the tunics of the flute-players had left two imprints in the dust. He recalled their faces; they were two Ephesians. The eldest had seemed pretty to him, but the youngest was without charm; and, as ugliness made him suffer, he avoided thinking of her.
At his feet shone an object of ivory. He picked it up; it was a writing tablet whence hung a silver stylus. Its wax was almost used up but the letters must have been traced over several times so that, the last time, they were cut into the ivory.
He saw but three words written there:
MYRTIS LOVES RHODOCLEIA
And he asked himself to which of the two women this belonged and whether the other were the loved woman or, indeed, some unknown, abandoned at Ephesos. Then he thought a moment of rejoining the musicians to give back what was, perhaps, the souvenir of some dead beloved; but he could not have found them again without trouble and as he was already ceasing to be interested in them he turned around idly and threw the little object into the sea.
It fell rapidly, gliding like a white bird, and he heard the splash the distant black water made. This little noise made him feel the vast silence of the port.
Leaning with his back against the cold pa****t, he tried to drive away every thought and began to look about him.
He had a horror of life. He left his dwelling only at the hour when life ceased and returned when the first dawn drew the fishermen and the kitchen gardeners toward the town. The pleasure of seeing in the world only the shadow of the town and his own figure became such a delight to him that, for several months, he no longer remembered having seen the sun at mid-day.
He was wearied. The queen was fastidious.
He could hardly understand, this night, the joy and the pride which had filled him when, three years before, the queen, seduced perhaps more by the rumor of his beauty than by the reports of his genius, had ordered him invited to the palace and announced at the Gate of Evening by the blowing of silver trumpets.
This entrance enlightened his memory sometimes with one of those souvenirs which, by reason of too much sweetness, become more and more acute in the soul to the point of becoming intolerable. The queen had received him alone in her private apartments which were composed of three little rooms enviably soft and soundless. She was lying on her left side and as though buried in a cavern of greenish silks which bathed the black locks of het head-dress in purple reflections. Her young body was robed in a fantastically embroidered costume.
Demetrios, kneeling respectfully, had taken in his hand the little bare foot of the queen Berenice, as a precious and sweet object, to be kissed.
Then she had risen.
Simply, like a handsome slave who serves as a model, she had undone her corselet, her little bands--taken even the circlets from her arms, even the rings from her toes, and she had stood, hands open before her shoulders which lifted her head beneath the coral ornaments that swayed in long strings by her cheeks.
She was the daughter of a Ptolemy and of a Syrian princess descended from all the gods through Astarte, whom the Greeks called Aphrodite. Demetrios knew this and that she was proud of her Olympian lineage. Therefore he was not troubled when the sovereign, without moving, said to him: "I am Astarte. Take marble and thy chisel and reveal me to the people of Egypt. I wish my image to be adored."
Demetrios gazed at her, and guessing beyond all doubt what simple and fresh emotion moved this young girl, he said, "I am the first to adore it."
The queen was not angry at this precipitancy, but demanded, drawing back, "Dost think thyself Adonis, to touch the goddess?"
He replied, "Yes."
She gazed at him, smiled a little, and concluded, "Thou art right."
It was for this reason that he became insupportable and that his best friends were lost to him; but the hearts of all women doted upon him.
When he passed into a hall of the palace the slaves stopped, the women of the court became silent, the strangers listened to him also, for the sound of his voice was ravishing. If he retired to the queen they came even there to importune him under pretexts always new. If he wandered through the streets, the folds of his tunic became filled with little papyri on which the passers-by had written their names with anguished words but which he, tired of such matters, crumpled without reading. When they had put his work in place in the temple of Aphrodite the enclosure was filled at every hour of the night by the crowds of adoring women who came to read his name in the stone and to offer to their living god all the doves and all the roses.
Soon his house was encumbered with gifts which he at first accepted indifferently but which later he invariably refused when he understood. Even his slaves besought him. He had them whipped and sold. Then his male slaves, bribed by presents, opened the door to unknown women. The little objects of his toilette and of his table disappeared one after another. More than one woman in the town had a sandal or a girdle of his, a cup from which he had drunk, even the kernels of fruit he had eaten. If he dropped a flower while walking he found it no more behind him. They would have gathered up even the dust crushed by his feet.
Beyond the fact that this persecution became dangerous and threatened to kill all his sensitiveness he had arrived at the epoch of youth where the man who thinks believes it necessary to make two parts of his life and to mingle no longer the affairs of the spirit with the necessities of the senses. The statue of Aphrodite-Astarte was for him the sublime pretext for this moral conversion. All that the queen had of beauty, all that could be invented of ideals around the supple lines of her body, Demetrios had evoked from the marble and from that day he imagined no other woman on earth would ever again attain the level of his dreams. His statue became the object of his desire; henceforth he adored nothing save it alone, and madly separated from the flesh the supreme Idea of the goddess, all the more immaterial if he had attached it to life.
When he again saw the queen herself, he found her despoiled of all which had constituted her charm. She was at once too different from the Other One and too similar, as though an intruder had taken the semblance of the admired woman. Her arms were slighter, her hips narrower, than those of the True One. In the end he tired of her.
His adorers knew it and though he continued his daily visits it was known that he had ceased to love Berenice. And around him the ardor redoubled. He did not notice it. In fact, the change which he needed was of another nature.
It is rare that, between two mistresses, a man should not have an interval of life where vulgar debauch tempts and satisfies him. Demetrios abandoned himself to it. When the necessity of going to the palace displeased him more than usual, he went at night to the garden of the sacred courtesans which surrounded the temple on all sides. The women who were there did not know him at all. They had no more cries or tears, and there at least he was not troubled by the amorous whining with which the queen enervated him. The conversation that he held with these beautiful calm persons was idle and without research. The visitors of the day, the weather of the morrow, the sweetness of the grass and of the night, were its charming subjects. They did not beseech him to expose his theories on sculpture and did not give their opinions of the Achilles of Skopas. If they happened to thank the visitor, to find him well made and to tell him so, he had the right not to believe in their disinterestedness.
Leaving them, he would mount the steps of the temple and fall into ecstasy before the statue.
Between the slender columns topped with Ionian volutes, the goddess, on a pedestal of rosy stone laden with pendent treasures, appeared as though living. She was nude, softly tinted in feminine tones; she held in one hand her symbolic mirror, and with the other adorned her beauty with a seven-fold necklace of pearls. One pearl, larger than the others, silvery and elongated, shone upon her bosom like a crescent moon between two snowy clouds.
Demetrios contemplated her tenderly and longed to believe, like the people, that those were the true sacred pearls born of the water drops which had rolled in the shell of the Anadyomene.
"O divine sister," he said, "O flowering, O transfigured one! thou art no longer the little Asiatic whom I made thine unworthy model. Thou art her immortal Idea, the terrestrial Soul of the Astarte who was the progenitor of her race. Thou didst shine in her ardent eyes, thou didst burn in her somber lips, thou didst faint in her soft hands, thou didst pant in her swelling bosom, in former times, before thy birth; and that which would please the daughter of a fisherman would delight thee also, thee, goddess, thee--mother of gods and men--the joy and the sorrow of the world! But I have seen, evoked, seized thee, O marvelous Cytheraea! I have revealed thee to the earth. It is not thine image, it is thyself to whom I have given thy mirror and whom I have covered with pearls as on the day when thou wert born of the bleeding sky and the foamy smile of the waters, and Aurora, dripping with dew, with a cortege of blue tritons, acclaimed thee to the shores of Cypros."
He had adored her thus when he entered upon the jetty at the hour when the crowd was dispersing and heard the sorrowful song of the flute-players. But this evening he had refused to visit the women of the temple. because a couple, half seen under the branches, had filled him with disgust and revolted his very soul.
Little by little, the gentle influence of the night worked upon him. He turned his face toward the wind which had passed over the sea and seemed to draw toward Egypt the scent of the roses of Amathus.
Lovely feminine forms sketched themselves in his thought. He had been requested to make, for the garden of the goddess, a group of the three Charities enlaced; but his youth revolted at copying conventions and he dreamed of uniting on the same block of marble three gracious movements of woman: two of the Charities would be clothed, one holding a fan and half closing her eyelids at the breath of the swaying plumes; the other dancing among the folds of her robe. The third, behind her sisters, would be nude and her raised arms would twist upon the nape of her neck the mass of her rolled hair.
He engendered in his spirit still other projects--as to attach to the rocks of the Pharos an Andromeda of black marble before the rough monster of the sea; to enclose the hill of Bruchion between the four horses of the rising sun, each one a mettlesome Pegasus--and with what intoxication did he not exult at the idea which was coming to birth in him of a Zagreus terrified before the approach of the Titans. Ah! how he was seized by all beauty! How he tore himself from love! How he "separated from the flesh the supreme Idea of the goddess!" How free he felt, at last!
Now he turned his head toward the quays and saw, shining in the distance, the yellow veil of a sauntering woman.

Chapter Four

THE PASSER-BY
SHE came slowly with her head on one side, over the deserted jetty where the moonlight fell. A little flickering shadow frisked before her steps.
Demetrios watched her advance.
Diagonal folds furrowed the little that could be seen of her body through the light tissue; one of her elbows thrust out under the close tunic and the other arm, which she had left bare, carried the long train so it would not drag in the dust.
He recognized by her jewels that she was a courtesan; to spare himself a salute from her he crossed over quickly.
He did not wish to look at her. Wilfully he occupied his thought with the great sketch of Zagreus. And yet his eyes returned toward her who passed.
Then he saw that she did not stop at all, that she did not concern herself with him, that she did not even pretend to look at the sea nor to raise her veil before her face nor to be absorbed in her reflections; but that she was simply walking alone and sought nothing there but the coolness of the wind, solitude, freedom, the light quiver of the silence.
Without stirring, Demetrios did not turn his gaze from her and lost himself in a singular astonishment.
She continued walking like a yellow shade in the distance, indifferent and preceded by the little black shadow.
He heard at each step the gentle sound of her foot-wear in the dust of the way.
She walked to the isle of the Pharos and mounted among the rocks.
Suddenly, and as though long ago he had loved this unknown, Demetrios ran after her, then stopped, retraced his steps, trembled, grew angry at himself, attempted to leave the jetty; but he had never employed his will except to serve his own pleasure and when it was time to make it act for the welfare of his character and the ordering of his life he felt himself filled with impotence and nailed to the spot where he stood.
As he could no longer avoid thinking of her he tried to find an excuse for the preoccupation which distracted him so violently. He imagined his admiration for her gracious passing was purely an esthetic sentiment. And he said to himself that she would be an ideal model for the Charity with the fan which he proposed to sketch on the morrow. Then suddenly all his thoughts were upset and a crowd of anxious questions flowed into his spirit around this woman in yellow.
What was she doing on the island at this hour of the night? Why, for whom, had she come our so late? Why had she not accosted him? She had seen him, certainly she had seen him as he crossed the jetty. Why, without a word of greeting, had she continued on her way? The rumor ran that certain women sometimes chose the cool hours before the dawn to bathe in the sea. But no one bathed at the Pharos. The sea was too deep there. Besides, how unlikely that a woman would thus have covered herself with jewels to go only to the bath.... Then, what drew her so far from Rhacotis? A rendezvous, perhaps? With some young man--to be courted, on the great wave-polished rocks?
Demetrios wished to assure himself. But already the young woman was returning, with the same soft and tranquil step, lighted full in the face by the slow lunar brightness and sweeping the dust of the pa****t with the tip of her fan.

Chapter Five

THE MIRROR, THE COMB AND THE NECKLACE
SHE had a special beauty. Her hair seemed two masses of gold but it was too abundant and weighted her forehead with two deep shadow-laden waves which swallowed up the ears and wound seven-fold upon the nape of the neck. The nose was delicate with slender nostrils which sometimes palpitated above the rounded, mobile corners of the full and tinted mouth. The pliant line of the body undulated with each step, animated by the balancing of the beautiful hips under the rounded, swaying waist.
When she was no more than ten steps from the young man she turned her gaze toward him. Demetrios trembled. They were extraordinary eyes, blue, but deep and brilliant at the same time, moist, weary, in tears and in fire, almost closed under the weight of the lashes and the lids. They looked, these eyes, as the sirens sing. He who passed into their light was inevitably taken. She knew it well and used them skilfully; but she counted more on indifference affected toward the man whom so much unfeigned love had not been able to touch sincerely.
The navigators who have sailed over the purple seas beyond the Ganges tell that they have seen, under the waters, rocks which are of lodestone. When vessels pass near them, the nails and the ironwork tear themselves away toward the submarine cliff and unite with it forever. And that which was a rapid ship, a dwelling, a living being, becomes no more than a flotilla of planks dispersed by the wind, driven by the tides. Thus Demetrios himself was lost before two great magnetic eyes and all his strength fled from him.
She lowered her eyelids and passed near him.
He could have cried out with impatience. His fists clenched; he was afraid that he could not recover a calm attitude, for he must speak to her. However, he accosted her with the customary words.
"I salute thee," he said.
"I salute thee also," replied the passing one.
Demetrios continued, "Whither goest thou, so little hurried?"
"I return."
"All alone?"
"All alone."
And she made a movement to resume her promenade.
Then Demetrios thought that perhaps he was deceived in judging her a courtesan. For some time past the wives of the magistrates and of the functionaries had dressed and tinted themselves like the daughters of pleasure. This one might be a person very honorably known and it was without irony that he finished his questions thus: "To thy husband?"
Resting her hands on the pa****t behind her, she began to laugh.
Demetrios bit his lip and hazarded, almost timidly, "Seek him not. Thou hast begun too late. There is no longer any one here."
"Who told thee I was seeking? I am walking alone and seek nothing."
"Whence camest thou, then? For thou hast not put on all these jewels for thyself--and here is a silken veil..."
"Wouldst thou have me go out naked or dressed in wool like a-slave? I dress myself only for my pleasure; I love to know that I am beautiful and, while walking, I look at my fingers to see all my rings."
"Thou shouldst have a mirror in thine hand and look at nothing but thine eyes. They were not born at Alexandria, those eyes. Thou art a Jewess, I hear it in thy voice which is softer than ours."
"No, I am not a Jewess. I am a Galilaean."
"How dost thou call thyself--Miriam or Noemi?"
"My Syrian name... thou shalt not know it. It is a royal name which no one bears here. My friends call me Chrysis, which is a compliment thou mightest have paid me."
He put his hand on her arm.
"Oh! no, no," she said mockingly, "it is much too late for those pleasantries. Let me return quickly. It is almost three hours since I arose; I am dying of fatigue."
Leaning over she took her foot in her hand.
"See how my little thongs hurt me. They were pulled much too tight. If I do not loosen them in an instant I will have a mark on my foot and that will be pretty indeed when someone embraces me! Let me go quickly. Ah! what a nuisance! If I had known, I would not have stopped. My yellow veil is all crumpled at the waist--look!"
Demetrios passed his hand over his forehead; then with the disengaged tone of a man who condescends to make his choice, he murmured, "Show me the way."
"I will certainly not!" cried Chrysis with an astonished air.
"Thou dost not even ask if it is my pleasure. 'Show me the way!'.
How he says that! Dost thou take me for a girl of the porneion? Dost thou know if I am free? Hast thou followed me in the streets? Hast thou noticed the doors where I am welcome? Hast thou counted the men who believe themselves loved of Chrysis? 'Show me the way!' I will not show it to thee, so please thee! Remain here or go, but elsewhere than with me!"
"Thou dost not know who I am...."
"Thou? Come, come! Thou art Demetrios of Sais; thou hast made the statue of my goddess; thou art the lover of my queen and the master of my city. But for me thou art but a handsome slave because thou hast seen me and because thou lovest me."
She drew nearer and pursued with a coaxing voice, "Yes--thou lovest me. Oh! do not speak--I know what thou wilt tell me; thou lovest no one, thou art loved. Thou art the Well-Beloved, the Cherished, the Idol. Thou hast refused Glykera who had refused Antiochos. Demonassa who had sworn to die virgin would have entrapped thee if thy two Lybian slaves had not thrust her from the door. Callistion the well-named, despairing of approaching thee, bought the house which is opposite thine and in the morning shows herself in the opening of the window. Thou thinkest I do not know all that? But everything is told, among women. The night of thine arrival at Alexandria they spoke to me of thee; and since then not a single day has passed on which thy name has not been pronounced before me. I know even the things thou hast forgotten. Poor little Phyllis hanged herself day before yesterday at the bar of thy door, did she not? Well--it is a fashion which spreads. Lydia has done like Phyllis; I saw leer this evening as I passed; she was quite blue but tears on her cheeks were not yet dry. Thou dost not know who Lydia is?... A c***d of fifteen years whom her mother had sold last month to a ship captain of Samos who passed the night at Alexandria before going up the river to Thebes. She carne to me. I gave her advice; she knew absolutely nothing, not even how to play at dice. I often took her in my bed, because she had no place to sleep. And she loved thee! If thou couldst have heard her call thy name!... She wished to write to thee. Dost thou understand? I told her it was not worth the trouble..."
Demetrios watched her without hearing.
"Yes, it is all the same to thee, is it not?" continued Chrysis. "Thou didst not love her. It is I whom thou lovest. Thou hast not even heard what I have just told thee. I am sure thou couldst not repeat a word of it. Thou art well occupied wondering how my eyelids are made, how good my mouth must be, how soft my hair. Ah! how many others know that! All, all have desired my beauty: men, young men, old men, c***dren, women, young girls. Last year I danced before twenty thousand persons and I know thou wert not one of them. Dost thou believe that I hide myself? Ah! why that! All women have seen me at the bath.
All men have seen me. Thou alone thou shalt never again see me. I refuse thee--I refuse thee! Of what I am, of what I feel, of my beauty, of my love, thou shalt know nothing, ever--ever! Thou art an abominable man, a coxcomb, cruel, insensitive and cowardly! I do not know why one of us has not had hate enough to kill you both, one with the other, thou the first and thy queen next."
Demetrios calmly seized her by the arms without a word of reply.
She had a moment of anguish; but suddenly straightened her back and said in a low voice, "Ah! I do not fear that, Demetrios! Let me rise, thou art hurting my arms."
They were silent for a few moments; then Demetrios continued, "This must stop, Chrysis. Thou knowest well I will not injure thee. But let me follow thee. So proud as thou art, it is a glory which will cost thee dear--to refuse Demetrios."
Chrysis remained silent.
He continued more gently, "What dost thou fear?"
"Thou art accustomed to the love of others. Dost thou know what one should give to a woman who does not love?" He grew impatient.
"I will give thee the gold of the world. I have it here in Egypt."
"I have it in my hair. I am tired of gold. I do not want gold. I wish for but three things. Wilt thou give them to nee?"
Demetrios felt that she was going to demand the impossible. He looked at her anxiously. But she began to smile and said in a slow voice, "I wish for a silver mirror to reflect my eyes in my eyes.
"Thou shalt have it. What more wishest thou? Say quickly."
"I wish a comb of carved ivory to plunge into my hair like a net into the sunlit water."
"Then?"
"Thou wilt give me my comb?"
"Surely. Finish."
"I wish a pearl necklace to spread over my breast when I shall dance for thee the nuptial dances of my

country."
He raised his eyebrows.
"That is all?"
"Thou wilt give me my necklace?"
"The one which shall please thee."
Her voice became very tender. "The one which shall please me? Ah! that is exactly what I wished to ask thee.

Wilt thou let me choose my presents?"
"Of course."
"Thou swearest it?"
"I swear it."
"What oath dost thou make?"
"Name it."
"By the Aphrodite which thou hast sculptured."
"I swear by the Aphrodite. But why this precaution?"
"Well... I was not quite sure. Now I am."
She raised her head. "I have chosen my gifts."
Demetrios became restless once more and asked, "So soon?"
"Yes... Dost thou think that I would accept any silver mirror bought from a merchant of Smyrna or from some

unknown courtesan? I wish that of my friend Bacchis who cheated me last week and who derided me evilly at

a little party which she had with Tryphera, Mousarion and some other young fools who brought the whole

thing to me. It is a mirror of which she is very fond because it once belonged to Rhodopis--she who was a

slave with Aesop and was brought back by the brother of Sappho. Thou knowest that she is a very celebrated

courtesan. Her mirror is magnificent. They say that Sappho has gazed in it and because of that Bacchis keeps

it jealously. She has nothing more precious in the world; but I know where thou wilt find it. She told me one

night when she was drunk. It is under the third stone of the altar. It is there she puts it every evening when she

goes out at sunset. Go tomorrow to her house at that hour and fear nothing; her slaves go out with her."
"It is madness!" cries Demetrios. "Dost thou wish me to steal?"
"Dost thou not love me? I thought that thou didst love me. And then, hast thou not sworn? I thought that thou hadst sworn. If I am mistaken, let us speak no more of it."
He understood that she would ruin him but let himself be drawn away without a struggle, almost voluntarily. "I will do what thou sayest," he replied.
"Oh! I know very well thou wilt do it. But thou didst hesitate at first. I can understand that. It is not an ord