ad?
Why do ye start at me? and why not speak?

CHAER. O happy, happy day!--Save you, dear friend!
There's not a man on earth I'd rather see
This moment than yourself.

ANTI. Come, tell me all!

CHAER. Tell you! I will beseech you give me hearing.
D'ye know my brother's mistress here?

ANTI. Yes: Thais,
Or I'm deceiv'd.

CHAER. The same.

ANTI. I do remember.

CHAER. To-day a girl was sent a present to her.
Why need I speak or praise her beauty now
To you, that know me, and my taste so well?
She set me all on fire.

ANTI. Is she so handsome?

CHAER. Most exquisite: Oh, had you but once seen her,
You would pronounce her, I am confident,
The first of womankind.--But to be brief,
I fell in love with her.--By great good luck
There was at home an Eunuch, which my brother
Had bought for Thais, but not yet sent thither.
--I had a gentle hint from Parmeno,
Which I seiz'd greedily.

ANTI. And what was that?

CHAER. Peace, and I'll tell you.--To change dresses with him,
And order Parmeno to carry me
Instead of him.

ANTI. How? for an Eunuch, you?

CHAER. E'en so.

ANTI. What good could you derive from that?

CHAER. What good!--why, see, and hear, and be with her
I languish'd for, my Antipho!--was that
An idle reason, or a trivial good?
--To Thais I'm deliver'd; she receives me,
And carries me with joy into her house;
Commits the charming girl----

ANTI. To whom?----to you?

CHAER. To me.

ANTI. In special hands, I must confess.

CHAER. --Enjoins me to permit no man come near her;
Nor to depart, myself, one instant from her;
But in an inner chamber to remain
Alone with her alone. I nod, and look
Bashfully on the ground.

ANTI. Poor simple soul!

CHAER. I am bid forth, says she; and carries off
All her maid-servants with her, save some few
Raw novices, who straight prepar'd the bath.
I bade them haste; and while it was preparing,
In a retiring-room the Virgin sat;
Viewing a picture, where the tale was drawn
Of Jove's descending in a golden show'r
To Danae's bosom.----I beheld it too,
And because he of old the like game play'd,
I felt my mind exult the more within me,
That Jove should change himself into a man,
And steal in secret through a stranger-roof,
With a mere woman to intrigue.--Great Jove,
Who shakes the highest heav'ns with his thunder!
And I, poor mortal man, not do the same!----
I did it, and with all my heart I did it.
--While thoughts, like these, possess'd my soul, they ca