“Who is there?--I am the merchant of women. Open the door, Sostrata, I offer thee two opportunities. This is the first. Approach, Anasyrtolis, and strip thyself.--She is a trifle large.-- “She is a beauty. Besides, she dances the Kordax and she knows eighty songs.--Turn thyself. Raise the arms. Lift the hair. Give me thy foot. Smile. It is good.-- “Now this one.--She is too young!--Not at all, she was twelve years old the day before yesterday and thou wilt teach her nothing.--Remove thy tunic. Let me see? No, she is thin.-- “I demand but one mina.--And the first?--Two minæ, thirty.--Three minæ for the two?--It is said.--Enter here and bathe yourselves. And thou, farewell.” CXXXV THE STRANGER Stranger, go not farther into the city. Thou wilt not find elsewhere than with me girls younger or more expert. I am Sostrata, celebrated even beyond the sea. See this one whose eyes are green as water in the grass. Thou wouldst not have her? Here are other eyes which are black as violets, and hair three cubits long. I have better still. Xantho, open thy cyclas. Stranger, these breasts are hard as quinces; touch them. And her fair belly, thou seest, carries the three folds of Cypris. I bought her with her sister who is not yet of the age for love, but who will second her usefully. By the two goddesses! thou art of a noble race. Phyllis and Xantho, follow the illustrious one! CXXXVI THE REMEMBRANCE OF MNASIDIKA They danced, one before the other, with rapid, flying movements; they seemed always wishing to entangle, and yet touched not at all, unless with the tips of their lips. When they turned their backs in dancing, they looked at each other, the head upon the shoulder, the perspiration gleaming upon their lifted arms, and their fine hair passing over their breasts. The languor of their eyes, the fire of their cheeks, the gravity of their faces, were three ardent songs. They grazed each other furtively, they bent their bodies upon their hips. And suddenly they fell, to finish the soft dance upon the earth.... Remembrance of Mnasidika, it was then thou camest to me, and all, except thy dear image, troubled me. CXXXVII THE YOUNG MOTHER Believe not, Myromeris, that, in becoming a mother, thou hast lessened thy beauty. See how thy body, beneath thy robe, has drowned its slim form in a voluptuous softness. Thy breasts are two vast flowers, reversed upon thy chest, whose cut stems give out a milky sap. Thy softened belly swoons beneath the hand. And now consider the tiny babe born of a quiver which thou didst feel, one evening, in the arms of a passer-by whose name thou dost not even know. Dream of her distant destiny.