A House of Pomegranates | Page 2

have
so great an influence over his life. Those who accompanied him to the
suite of rooms set apart for his service, often spoke of the cry of
pleasure that broke from his lips when he saw the delicate raiment and
rich jewels that had been prepared for him, and of the almost fierce joy
with which he flung aside his rough leathern tunic and coarse sheepskin
cloak. He missed, indeed, at times the fine freedom of his forest life,
and was always apt to chafe at the tedious Court ceremonies that
occupied so much of each day, but the wonderful palace--Joyeuse, as
they called it--of which he now found himself lord, seemed to him to be
a new world fresh-fashioned for his delight; and as soon as he could
escape from the council-board or audience-chamber, he would run

down the great staircase, with its lions of gilt bronze and its steps of
bright porphyry, and wander from room to room, and from corridor to
corridor, like one who was seeking to find in beauty an anodyne from
pain, a sort of restoration from sickness.
Upon these journeys of discovery, as he would call them--and, indeed,
they were to him real voyages through a marvellous land, he would
sometimes be accompanied by the slim, fair-haired Court pages, with
their floating mantles, and gay fluttering ribands; but more often he
would be alone, feeling through a certain quick instinct, which was
almost a divination, that the secrets of art are best learned in secret, and
that Beauty, like Wisdom, loves the lonely worshipper.
Many curious stories were related about him at this period. It was said
that a stout Burgo-master, who had come to deliver a florid oratorical
address on behalf of the citizens of the town, had caught sight of him
kneeling in real adoration before a great picture that had just been
brought from Venice, and that seemed to herald the worship of some
new gods. On another occasion he had been missed for several hours,
and after a lengthened search had been discovered in a little chamber in
one of the northern turrets of the palace gazing, as one in a trance, at a
Greek gem carved with the figure of Adonis. He had been seen, so the
tale ran, pressing his warm lips to the marble brow of an antique statue
that had been discovered in the bed of the river on the occasion of the
building of the stone bridge, and was inscribed with the name of the
Bithynian slave of Hadrian. He had passed a whole night in noting the
effect of the moonlight on a silver image of Endymion.
All rare and costly materials had certainly a great fascination for him,
and in his eagerness to procure them he had sent away many merchants,
some to traffic for amber with the rough fisher-folk of the north seas,
some to Egypt to look for that curious green turquoise which is found
only in the tombs of kings, and is said to possess magical properties,
some to Persia for silken carpets and painted pottery, and others to
India to buy gauze and stained ivory, moonstones and bracelets of jade,
sandal-wood and blue enamel and shawls of fine wool.
But what had occupied him most was the robe he was to wear at his
coronation, the robe of tissued gold, and the ruby-studded crown, and
the sceptre with its rows and rings of pearls. Indeed, it was of this that
he was thinking to-night, as he lay back on his luxurious couch,

watching the great pinewood log that was burning itself out on the open
hearth. The designs, which were from the hands of the most famous
artists of the time, had been submitted to him many months before, and
he had given orders that the artificers were to toil night and day to carry
them out, and that the whole world was to be searched for jewels that
would be worthy of their work. He saw himself in fancy standing at the
high altar of the cathedral in the fair raiment of a King, and a smile
played and lingered about his boyish lips, and lit up with a bright lustre
his dark woodland eyes.
After some time he rose from his seat, and leaning against the carved
penthouse of the chimney, looked round at the dimly-lit room. The
walls were hung with rich tapestries representing the Triumph of
Beauty. A large press, inlaid with agate and lapis- lazuli, filled one
corner, and facing the window stood a curiously wrought cabinet with
lacquer panels of powdered and mosaiced gold, on which were placed
some delicate goblets of Venetian glass, and a cup of dark-veined onyx.
Pale poppies were broidered on the silk coverlet of the bed, as though