Her daughter
stood in the midst of a group of maids who were dressing her hair.
"Arria, will you come to me?" said the Lady Lucia.
The girl came quickly--a dainty creature of sixteen, her dark hair
waving, under jewelled fillets, to a knot behind. From below the knot
a row of curls fell upon the folds of her outer tunic. It was a filmy,
transparent thing--this garment--through which one could see the white
of arm and breast and the purple fillets on her legs.
"She is indeed beautiful in the yellow tunic. I should think that
scarlet rug had caught fire and wrapped her in its flame," said the
poet Ovid.
"Nay, her heart is afire, and its light hath the color of roses," said
an old philosopher who sat by. "Can you not see it shining through her
cheeks?"
"Young sirs," said the Lady Lucia, with a happy smile, as she raised
her daughter's hand, "now for your offers."
It was a merry challenge, and shows how lightly they treated a sacred
theme those days.
First rose the grave senator, Aulus Valerius Maro by name.
"Madame," said he, stepping forward and bowing low, "I offer my heart
and my fortune, and the strength of my arms and the fleetness of my
feet and the fair renown of my fathers.
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