“Yes. Well, institute a competition between a pure beauty, as you say, and Gnathène, who is old and plain. Dress the former in a tunic covered with holes and set her in the last row at the theatre, and put the latter in her star-embroidered robe in the places reserved by her slaves, and note their prices at the end of the performance: the pure beauty will get eight obols and Gnathène two minæ.” “Men are stupid,” Seso concluded. “No, simply lazy. They do not take the trouble to choose their mistresses. The best-loved women are the most mendacious.” “But if,” suggested Phrasilas, “but if, on the one hand, I should willingly applaud . . .” And he delivered himself, with great charm, of two set discourses entirely devoid of interest. One by one, twelve dancing girls appeared, the two first playing the flute and the last the timbrel, the others manipulating castanets. They arranged their bandelets, rubbed their little sandals with white resin, and waited with extended arms for the music to begin . . . A note . . . two notes . . . a Lydian scale, and the twelve young girls shot forward to the accompaniment of a light rhythm. Their dance was voluptuous, languorous, and without apparent order, although all the figures had been settled beforehand. They confined their evolutions to a small space: they intermingled like waves. Soon they formed in couples, and without interrupting the step, unfastened their girdles and let their pink tunics glide to the ground. An odour of naked women spread about the men, dominating the perfume of the flowers and the steam of the gaping viands. They threw themselves backwards with brusque movements, with their bellies tightly drawn, and their arms over their eyes. Then they straightened themselves up again and hollowed their loins, and touched one another, as they passed, with the points of their dancing breasts. Timon’s hand received the fugitive caress of a hot thigh. ill-049 _Soon they formed in couples._ “What does our friend think about it?” said Phrasilas with his piping voice. “I feel perfectly happy,” answered Timon. “I have never before so clearly understood the supreme mission of women.” “And what is it?” “Prostitution, either with or without art.” “That is only an opinion.” “Phrasilas, once again, we know that nothing can be proved: worse still, we know that nothing exists, and that even that is not certain. This being conceded and in order to satisfy your celebrated mania, permit me to hold a theory at once contestable and antiquated, as all of them are, but interesting to me, who affirm it, and to the majority of men, who deny it. In the ease of thought, originality is an ideal still more chimerical than certitude. You are aware of that.” “Give me some Lesbian wine,” said Seso to the slave. “It is stronger than the other.”