It seemed to make active thought impossible, to dull all her senses save the one luxurious sense of enjoyment.

That was always present, slumbrous, almost cloying in its unfailing sweetness, the fruit of the lotus which assuredly she was eating day by day.

All her nerves seemed dormant, all her energies lulled.

Sometimes she wondered if the sound of running water had this stultifying effect upon her, for wherever they went it followed them.
The snow-fed streams ran everywhere, and since leaving Srinagar she could not remember a single occasion on which they had been out of earshot of their perpetual music.

It haunted her like a ceaseless refrain, but yet she never wearied of it.