ed on her
graceful movements. Once, when the ball had fallen into the water, the
king sprang in after it, regardless of his costly apparel. Nitetis
screamed on seeing his intention, but Cambyses handed her the dripping
toy with the words: "Take care or I shall be obliged to frighten you
again." At the same time he drew from his neck a gold chain set with
jewels and gave it to the blushing girl, who thanked him with a look
which fully revealed her feelings for her future husband.

Croesus, Kassandane and Atossa soon noticed that Nitetis loved the king.
Her former fear of this proud and powerful being had indeed changed into
a passionate admiration. She felt as if she must die if deprived of his
presence. He seemed to her like a, glorious and omnipotent divinity, and
her wish to possess him presumptuous and sacrilegious; but its fulfilment
shone before her as an idea more beautiful even than return to her native
land and reunion with those who, till now, had been her only loved ones.

Nitetis herself was hardly conscious of the strength of her feelings, and
believed that when she trembled before the king's arrival it was from
fear, and not from her longing to behold him once more. Croesus, however,
had soon discovered the truth, and brought a deep blush to his favorite's
cheek by singing to her, old as he was, Anacreon's newest song, which he
had learnt at Sais from Ibykus

"We read the flying courser's name
Upon his side in marks of flame;
And by their turban'd brows alone
The warriors of the East are known.
But in the lover's glowing eyes,
The inlet to his bosom lies;
Through them we see the tiny mark,
Where Love has dropp'd his burning spark"
--Paegnion 15

And thus, in work and amusement, jest, earnest, and mutual love, the
weeks and months passed with Nitetis. Cambyses' command that she was to
be happy in his land had fulfilled itself, and by the time the
Mesopotamian spring-tide (January, February and March), which succeeds
the rainy month of December, was over, and the principal festival of the
Asiatics, the New Year, had been solemnized at the equinox, and the May
sun had begun to glow in the heavens, Nitetis felt quite at home in
Babylon, and all the Persians knew that the young Egyptian princess had
quite displaced Phaedime, the daughter of Otanes, in the king's favor,
and would certainly become his first and favorite wife.