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her feel that soothing ecstacy of bliss she evidently longed to taste?
"'I swear to you,' said I, 'that I shall do you no harm; so do not be afraid, only keep quiet.'
"I pulled up her thick linen chemise, and I perceived the tiniest slit that could be seen, with two lips of a coralline hue, shaded by a soft, silky, black down. They had the colour, the gloss, the freshness of those pink shells so plentiful on Eastern strands.
"Leda's charms, which made Jupiter turn into a swan, or Danæ's, when she opened her thighs to receive far into her womb the burning golden shower, could not have been more tempting than the lips of this young girl.
"They parted of their own inward life, displaying, as they did so, a tiny berry, fresh with healthy life—a drop of dew incarnadined within the crimson petals of a budding rose.
"My tongue pressed it closely for a second, and the girl was madly convulsed with that burning pleasure she had never dreamt of before. A moment afterwards we were again in each
