At moments she dropped her eyes; then again she raised her clear glance to Vinicius, timid and also inquiring, as if she wished to say to him, "Speak on!" The sound of the music, the odor of flowers and of Arabian perfumes, began to daze her.

In Rome it was the custom to recline at banquets, but at home Lygia occupied a place between Pomponia and little Aulus.

Now Vinicius was reclining near her, youthful, immense, in love, burning; and she, feeling the heat that issued from him, felt both delight and shame.

A kind of sweet weakness, a kind of faintness and forgetfulness seized her; it was as if drowsiness tortured her.
But her nearness to him began to act on Vinicius also.

His nostrils dilated, like those of an Eastern steed.