In a typically Ovidian change of register, this highly worked passage is the prelude to some smart and sharply observed social realism, as we move from the shores of mythology to the dining rooms of imperial Rome. Take care not to drink too much, Ovid advises, but use the wine that is set before you as an instrument in your courtship. Wine will allow you to insinuate your passion to the woman you love: "Here you may say many things by innuendo, so that she may feel that they are said to her, and you may trace light flatteries in thin characters of wine ("Blanditiasque leves tenui perscribere vino"), so that on the table she may read herself your mistress." The rituals of drinking, too, create openings for delicate compliments and significant gestures:

Fac primus rapias illius tacta labellis

  Pocula, quaque bibet parte puella, bibas.

Ensure you are the first to seize the cup her lips have touched,

  And drink from the spot from which she drank.

Wine may be a shield for the lover as well as a sword. Wary husbands can be disarmed by drink, Ovid tells us. And when it comes to elopement, here again wine is the lover's friend — although on this occasion it would be wasteful to use up your best vintages:

Fallitur et multo custodis cura Lyaeo,

  Illa vel Hispano lecta sit uva iugo

A guardian's watchfulness will be deceived by much wine,

  Even though the grapes were gathered on Spanish slopes

Spanish wine was not greatly esteemed in imperial Rome.