In her pavilion: on each side her
Stood pretty dimpled boys, like smiling Cupids,
With divers-coloured fans....
Her gentlewomen, like the Nereïdes,
So many mermaids tended her. At the helm
A seeming mermaid steers: the silken tackle
Swell with the touches of those flower-soft hands.
Shakespeare (Antony and Cleopatra).
This and the next three quotations are word-pictures ([see p. 85]).