"From my grandmother Rhodopis."
"Very well, then I will tell you you are better than any other maiden in the whole world."
"How can you say such things, when you don't know me at all? Oh, sometimes I am very naughty and disobedient. If I were really good I should be indoors now instead of talking to you here. My grandmother has forbidden me ever to stay in the garden when visitors are here, and indeed I don't care for all those strange men who always talk about things I cannot understand."
"Then perhaps you would like me to go away too?"
"Oh no, I can understand you quite well; though you cannot speak half so beautifully as our poor Phanes for example, who was obliged to escape so miserably yesterday evening, as I heard Melitta saying just this minute."
"Did you love Phanes?"
"Love him? Oh yes,—I was very fond of him. When I was little he always brought me balls, dolls ninepins from Memphis and Sais; and now that I am older he teaches me beautiful new songs."
[Jointed dolls for children. Wilkinson II. 427. Note 149. In the
Leyden Museum one of these jointed toys is to be seen, in very good
preservation.]
"As a parting gift he brought me a tiny Sicilian lapdog, which I am going to call Argos, because he is so white and swiftfooted. But in a few days we are to have another present from the good Phanes, for . . . There, now you can see what I am; I was just going to let out a great secret. My grandmother has strictly forbidden me to tell any one what dear little visitors we are expecting; but I feel as if I had known you a long time already, and you have such kind eyes that I could tell you everything. You see, when I am very happy, I have no one in the whole world to talk to about it, except old Melitta and my grandmother, and, I don't know how it is, that, though they love me so much, they sometimes cannot understand how trifles can make me so happy."
"That is because they are old, and have forgotten what made them happy in their youth. But have you no companions of your own age that you are fond of?"