us the foxes,
The little foxes
That spoil the vines:
For our vines have tender grapes.

In this manner does she reach the very wall, and, without noticing the
king, turns about and walks on, climbing the hill lightly, along the
neighbouring row of vines. Now her song sounds less distinctly:

Make haste, my beloved,
And be thou like to a roe or a young hart
Upon the mountains of spices.

But suddenly she grows silent and bends so low to the ground that she
can not be seen behind the vines.

Then Solomon utters in a voice that caresses the ear:

"Maiden, show me thy face; let me hear thy voice anew."

She straightens up quickly and turns her face to the king. A strong wind
arises at this second and flutters the light garment upon her, suddenly
making it cling tightly around her body and between her legs. And the
king, for an instant, until she turns her back to the wind, sees all of
her beneath the raiment, as though naked,--tall and graceful, in the
vigorous bloom of thirteen years; sees her little, round, firm breasts
and the elevations of her nipples, from which the cloth spreads out in
rays; and the virginal abdomen, round as a bason; and the deep line that
divides her legs from the bottom to the top, and there parts in two,
toward the rounded hips.

"For sweet is thy voice, and thy countenance comely," says Solomon.

She draws nearer and gazes upon the king with trembling and with
rapture. Her swarthy and vivid face is inexpressibly beautiful. Her
heavy, thick, dark-red hair, into which she has stuck two flowers of the
scarlet poppy, covers her shoulders in countless resilient ringlets and
spreads over her back, and, transpierced by the rays of the sun, glows
in flame, like aureate purple. A necklace which she had made herself out
of some red, dried berries, naively winds twice about her long, dark,
slender neck.

"I did not notice thee!" she says gently, and her voice sounds like the
song of a flute. "Whence didst thou come?"

"Thou sangst so well, maiden!"

She bashfully casts down her eyes and turns red, but beneath her long
lashes and in the corners of her lips trembles a secret smile.

"Thou sangst of thy dear. He is as light as a roe, as a young hart upon
the mountains. For he is very fair, thy dear,--is not that the truth,
maiden?"

Her laughter is ringing and musical, as though silver were falling upon
a golden platter.

"I have no dear. It is but a song. I have yet had no dea