IV
For three months, under the direction of Bramante, Caradosso, and Leonardo da Vinci, preparation had been making for the great ball, decreed by the Duke for New Year's Day. No less than two thousand persons had been invited. On the appointed day, at about five o'clock in the afternoon, the guests assembled at the palace. A snowstorm had damaged the roads; the castle towers and battlemented walls with the loop-holes for the mouths of cannon showed with ghastly whiteness against the heavy clouds. Fires had been kindled in the wide courtyard, and round these were assembled noisy groups of equerries, palanquin-bearers, grooms, couriers, outriders, and their like. Gilded chariots and coaches, very cumbrous, and drawn by cart-horses, were setting down fur-wrapped ladies and cavaliers at the entrance of the palace, or crossing the drawbridge which led to the inner court of the Rocchetta. The frosted windows glittered in the festal illuminations within.
Entering the vestibule, the guests passed between two long rows of ducal guards, Turkish mamelukes, Greek stradiotes, Scotch bowmen, Swiss lanzknechts, all in armour, and bearing heavy halberts. In front of them stood the pages, pretty as maidens, in parti-coloured liveries, the right side pink velvet, the left blue satin, trimmed with swan's-down, and silver-embroidered with the arms of Sforza and Visconti. Their garments were so tight as to display every outline of their lithe and graceful bodies; and in their hands these charming candlebearers held torches of red and yellow wax, such as were used in the churches. As each guest entered the great hall, a herald, attended by two trumpeters, proclaimed his style and titles; then a vista opened before him of vast dazzlingly-lighted saloons: 'the hall of the white doves on a red field'; 'the hall of gold,' with the ducal hunting trophies; 'the hall of purple,' hung with gold-embroidered purple satin, adorned with buckets and firebrands (the insignia of the Dukes of Milan, who at pleasure could blow up the fire of war, or quench it with the waters of peace). Last was the small and exquisite 'black saloon,' designed by Bramante, and adorned on walls and ceiling with frescoes by Leonardo, still unfinished.
The richly-dressed crowd buzzed like a swarm of bees. Their attire was iridescent, gorgeous, not seldom tasteless through over-richness, in fashions borrowed from many lands, so that a witty writer of the day said that he read the invasion of foreigners, and the enslavement of Italy, in the garb of his own countrymen. The robes of the ladies, hanging in heavy folds, and stiff with gold and jewels, suggested ecclesiastical vestments. Many were heirlooms handed down from long-forgotten grandmothers. There was ample display of fair shoulders and bosoms, and hair was confined in golden nets, and plaited in thick strands, artificially lengthened by ribbons and false hair. Fashion proscribed eyebrows; therefore ladies whom nature had disfigured by those superfluities carefully removed them, hair by hair, with steel tweezers called 'pelatoio.' Rouge, and heavy perfumes such as musk, amber, viverra, and cypress powder, were regarded as mere necessary decencies.
Here and there in the crowd might be seen girls and women inheritors of that peculiar charm only seen in Lombardy, that beauty, as it were, of vaporous shadows, melting like mist into the transparent pallor of the skin; of oval faces, and delicate chiselling of features such as Leonardo delighted to paint.
Madonna Violante Borromeo was by universal consent acclaimed queen of the festival, with her black and brilliant eyes, her tresses dark as night, her triumphant beauty patent to all. Her dress was embroidered with moths burning their wings in flames—a warning to all heedless admirers. Yet it was not Madonna Violante who attracted the eyes of veritable connoisseurs in female loveliness so much as the graceful Diana Pallavicino. Her eyes were clear and cold as ice, her fair hair was almost colourless, her smile calm, her voice slow, melodious, and thrilling as the strings of a viol. She wore a simple dress of white damask with long floating lines, trimmed with ribbons of palest green: amid the noise and splendour of the feast she seemed a being apart, alien, solitary, like a water-lily slumbering on some silent moonlit pool.
Suddenly the horns and trumpets sounded, and all the guests moved to the great Hall of the Tennis Court. Here waxlights burned in fiery clusters upon huge candelabra, and woke sparkles in the golden stars which strewed the azure ceiling-vault. The balcony, in which the choir was concealed, was hung with silken carpets, and with garlands of evergreens.
Punctual to the moment prescribed by the astrologers (for the Duke never moved a step nor, as the wits had it, changed his shirt nor kissed his wife, without first consulting the stars), Il Moro and Beatrice made their entry, robed in ermine-lined brocaded mantles, followed by pages, chamberlains, and lords-in-waiting. On the breast of the Duke, set as a brooch, glowed a ruby of extraordinary brilliance and size, taken from the treasure of Gian Galeazzo.
As for Beatrice, she had of late greatly declined in beauty; her unformed still girlish expression and manner had a strange pathos, contrasted with the state of her health and evident sufferings.
The Duke gave the signal, the seneschal raised his staff, the music struck up, and the guests took their allotted seats at the splendid banquet.