Page:Teleny, or The Reverse of the Medal, t. I.djvu/89

 "These painted-up Jezebels, cadaverous or bloated, are the Paphian maids, the splendid votaresses of Venus, whose magic charms make the senses thrill with delight, the houris on whose breasts you swoon away and are ravished into paradise.

"My friends seeing my utter bewilderment began to laugh at me. I thereupon sat down and tried stupidly to smile.

"Three of those creatures at once came up to me, one of them putting her arms round my neck kissed me, and wanted to dart her filthy tongue into my mouth; the others began to handle me most indecently. The more I resisted, the more bent they seemed on making a Laocoon of me."

"But why were you singled out as their victim?"

"I really do not know, but it must have been because I looked so innocently scared, or because my friends were all laughing at my horror-stricken face.

"One of those poor women—a tall dark girl, an Italian, I believe—was evidently in the very