What is thy beloved more than other men, sweet maiden!
Shut thy eyes, and thou canst not tell me apart from him. I am even
better, for, of a certainty, I am more experienced than he."

They clutch at her bosom, her shoulders, her arms and raiment. But
Sulamith is lithe and strong, and her body, anointed with oil, is
slippery. She tears herself away, leaving in the hands of the watchmen
her outer vail, and runs back still faster along the same road. She has
experienced neither offense nor fear,--she is all swallowed up in
thoughts of Solomon. Passing by her house, she sees the door out of
which she had just gone still left open, a gaping black quadrangle in
the white wall. But she merely catches her breath, shrinks within
herself, like a young cat, and runs by on her tip-toes with never a sound.

She crosses the bridge of Kidron, avoids the outskirt of the village of
Siloam, and by a stony road gradually climbs the southern slope of
Beth-El-Khav, into her vineyard. Her brother is still sleeping among the
vines, wrapped up in a woolen blanket all wet from the dew. Sulamith
rouses him, but he can not awaken, enchained by the morning sleep of
youth.

As yesterday, the dawn is flaming over Anaze. A wind springs up. The
fragrance of the grape in blossom streams through the air.

"I shall come away and look upon that place of the wall where my beloved
hath stood," Sulamith is saying. "I shall feel with my hands the stones
that he hath touched; I shall kiss the ground beneath his feet."

She glides lightly between the vines. The dew falls from them, chilling
her feet and spattering her elbows. And now a joyous cry from Sulamith
fills the vineyard! The king is standing beyond the wall. With a radiant
face he stretches out his arms to meet her.

More lightly than a bird Sulamith surmounts the enclosure, and, without
words, with a moan of happiness, entwines the king.

Several minutes pass thus. Finally, tearing his lips away from her
mouth, Solomon speaks, enraptured, and his voice trembles:

"Behold, thou art fair, my love; behold, thou art fair!"

"O, how fair art thou, my beloved!"

Tears of delight and gratefulness,--blessed tears,--sparkle upon
Sulamith's pale and beautiful face. Languishing with love, she sinks to
the ground and whispers words of madness in a barely audible voice.

"Our bed is green. The beams of our house are cedars.... Kiss me with
the kisses of thy mouth--for thy love is better than wine...."