After the sand had been renewed in the lists to cover the unsightly stains, a light and joyous rondalen was sounded, and the commingled challengers and challenged were seen issuing from their tents in the wooded bosque, and mounting fresh roaches, newly caparisoned with gay trappings, they again entered the lists. When the roachavalcade reached the barrier vestibule, the heralds proclaimed: “Count San Pietro Marceroni, the elected king champion of the lists, in whom is vested absolute authority, and honors that will remain inviolate, until in an approved tourney a worthy successor can be found. Salute your champion king!” The trumpets then sounded the crowning tan-tarra, while the count, assisted by twelve knights-of-honor, dismounted and was invested with the kingly robes of love and honor, then kneeling upon a richly wrought carpet he was crowned by the master of ceremonies with the consecrated chaplet of Mars. As he rose the vast assemblage saluted him with the exclamations: “Long live the noble Count San Pietro Marceroni, king champion of the lists!” the mouthed concussions of boisterous adulation causing the canopies to vibrate with the echoing sound of noisy and noisome breath.
Again the braying of trumpets and clash of cymbals overpowered the tumultuous shouts of the multitude, and when sufficiently hushed for a single voice to be heard, the grand master gave utterance in proclamation to the maxim: “It is not good for man to rule alone! And, in obedience to well approved custom, and the chivalric gallantry of brave hearts, it hath been adjudged that after his own installation the king champion shall, from his own choice, elect a queen of love and beauty to preside in public at feast and festival during the term of his regality. In accordance with this imperative decree our salutations await his choice!”
Mounting his richly caparisoned blattidean roach with a graceful vault, Count Marceroni caused him to execute a variety of changes in pace of the most difficult posing gaits imaginable; and, while passing from a demi-amble to a demi-cavolt, raised from its cushion in the hands of his squire the chaplet designed for his queen upon the point of his lance, allowing it to rest in loop upon its cross-check. This adroit feat was greeted with shouts of applause, which stimulated him to enact a great variety of euphuistic attitudes,—a species of pantomimic male coquetry then much in vogue with the Giga nobility,—which the tribune said would express, with the scenes of the day, how ritualistically void in enactment, the exemplar and imitator were for the real attainment of happy impressions. There was certainly for the instinctive worshipper, much to admire in the studied adroitness of the count’s acquirements, as they bespoke disciplined perseverance; but when I reflected that his manly capabilities had been expended upon frivolous expertness to grace a brutal pastime, I found cause for self-reprobation for the sympathy of my admiration. Of the count’s predilection all seemed to be aware, but, withal, held their breathing subdued with expectation to gather force for a new outburst of applause when his acceptance was confirmed. Arriving in front of the Princessa Idolisima’s pavilion, by the longest circuit, with doublings, that the effect of his euphuistic mimicries might be fully appreciated, he with an obeisance that enveloped the caput-shield of his roach with the plumes of his casque, petitioned with his voice; “Will the most noble Princessa Idolisima Canonica deign to share the brief rule of her humble subject, Count San Pietro Marceroni, as the queen of love, beauty, and harmony?”
With a blush of equivocal import, she nodded her acceptance. Then, while her eyes were yet concealed under the latticed veil of their long, silken lashes, the count, with infinite grace, conveyed the coronet with a “coup de lance” to its proper position on her head without disturbing a ringlet with its steel. Plaudits in salvos rose in deafening succession with the successful accomplishment of this dexterous feat, which bespoke long and patient practice with a living model. The princessa represents through ——, her uncle, the pope, one of the original Mouthpat families of Greenpat, with blood variations from European ingraft, which had produced a remarkable improvement, by blending and mellowing with distance the animal traits into an expression, that might with propriety be termed instinctive idealization. Her eyes are black with a shadowy impression of azure softening the snaky brilliancy of the Italian into a sympathetic hue, free from the luric reflection of vengeful passions. When free from exciting emotions, they beam forth an expression of calm dignity, above the sway of lust, vanity, and envy, that gave birth to the cruel frivolities of the day, which she evidently patronizes from compulsion. The composition, in outline, of her other features, corresponds in expression with her eyes, bespeaking the struggling emergence of her thoughts from sensual control, although, from relative association, obliged to conform to the usages that hold ruling sway. But, withal, there is apparent to our eyes an underlying consciousness of purity and goodness, with her responsibility for their cultivation and preservation for transmission. We were so strongly impressed with her longing desire for more substantial attainments than the illusive vanities with which she was surrounded, that we could not refrain from giving voice to our thoughts, which brought a succession of grateful flushes to the tribune’s face, foretokening an interest of deeper import than our observation had previously detected. Frankly acknowledging the predisposition his emotions indicated he begged to be excused from an explanation while subject to so many counter enactments. A request that delicacy conceded without voiced assurance.
While the northern portion of the lists was in the process of transformation into a sectional amphitheatre for the exhibition of an ant and tarantula fight,—which unfortunately our position overlooked,—Count Marceroni led his queen with her maids of honor into a pavilion erected for her reception at the extreme southern portion of the arena, which in construction had received his special supervision. When this, after occupation, was exposed to view, the splendor of its appointments in tinsel adornment received the prayerful adoration of the assemblage. Seated in front of the pavilion on its extended platform, just without the shadow of its dais, were two celebrated improvisorial troubadours of Provence, a small kingdom in the south of France. These were to contend in verse and song for prizes to be awarded by the queen of beauty, love, and harmony, to the adjudged successful superiority of the competitors in their varied styles of adventurous composition. A laurel wreath, or chaplet, had been prepared for the queen’s crowning disposal, with the title of laureate; the recipient holding with the emblematic token the conferred privilege of supremacy in his vocation through all the Animalculan courts of Christendom, until a greater star should appear in the musical firmament, for his eclipse, under the like sanction of infallible approval. When the congregation were fully separated for the suitable enjoyment of their tastes in the contrasted extremities of the lists,—the northern having the relative preponderance of eight to one of the southern audience,—a screen was drawn to intercept the boisterous freedom of the borealian sphere.
When the arrangements were fully completed, a maiden herald pronounced in silvery tones, “Alheu!” Then Penny Song with tuneful rebeck essayed his overture with reverent eyes upturned in conceptive supplication to the ruling goddess of love and harmony. To the symphony of murmuring strings in soft prelude to a rippling vision from the fountain of musical poesy, he began his lay. Gradually, with the accession of tributary streams, the current tones increased from the smooth still voiced streamlet, until it merged into the rapid flow of the pebbly brook, combining in sound cascade variations with rippling flow over shallow inequalities into the bubbling depths of a pool, and from thence onward with accumulating force into the deep volume of the river’s tide. His voice in harmonious movement, tremulous with emotions reinvoked from passionate recitative thought, rehearsed in song the Songs of Solomon. Floating with the gilded wings of sensual taste, he fluttered over the luscious lisp of lips united in their sip of virgin nectar from the fount of instinctive love; at first chaste and free from guile in the sparkling depths of pure desire,—but, anon, overflowing in contemplation of the wide expanse of flowery meads, until satiated with its profligate deviation from the legitimate boundaries of its course, he discovers with lamentation the muddy defilement that exceeds his hopes of purification. The song of the bard was wildly descriptive of the longings of instinctive desire, until the hero had embraced with his wisdom the fairest and loveliest daughters of Israel; then imbecile with sensual gratification, he utters in his senility the wailing cry: “Vanity, all is vanity!” and is gathered to his father’s dust. The Princessa Idolisima, when the theme became expressive in sensual development, perused attentively the countenances of all within reach of her eyes, but seeing how eagerly engrossed they were with the voluptuous portrayals of the poet bard, she with her selected companions bowed their heads upon their hands with a sorrowful blush of shame. This mood the bard observing, with the cause, introduced into his lamentations strong reproof of himself for the selection of a subject so replete with infamous suggestion. His sarcasm eloquent in self-condemnation aroused the lascivious from their enraptured fancies, causing them, from shame, to break the spell; and when they saw the princessa and her maids with their heads bowed down, many from self-conviction gave evidence that within themselves they felt the cause. Among these was Count San Pietro Marceroni. The bard approved himself to be in the possession of extraordinary imitative powers, for in his recitative picture he held his hearers, of subject kind, entranced and as quickly aroused them with the pungency of his addenda to the dirged lamentations of instinctive wisdom, which would have startled the old hero to a more energetic renunciation of his follies than the vapid exclamation, that his experience was vanity and vexation of spirit.
The prelude of his competitor, Long Bow, was far more primitive in its characteristic portrayal, being timed to irregular cadences of barbaric import. The plaintive melody evoked by his touch from a stringed gourd was in consonance with the strains of his song-theme, which depicted the wild erratic love of savage life, but with far less instinctive merit in recitative description than the love ditties of our Betongese neighbors. At times the savage devotion of the lovers seemed to rise above the animal instincts of sense, but only to sink deeper into the mythical regions of hopeful doubt and despair. The butt at which Long Bow aimed was a rhythmic measure adapted to savage nomenclature and the improvised harmony of his gourd.
At the conclusion of his recitative the herald maiden called: “Give ear, lovers of the gay and joyous science,—attend! while the queen of love, beauty, and harmony approves with her commendation and award the happy victor in the joust of improvised song?” The count champion offered his hand to assist Idolisima in her descent to the balcony erected for the bestowal of awards, but his bearing was abashed with the conscious self-reflection of unworthiness. Idolisima, the queen, without assistance stepped self-reliantly forward to her position, and then, without ceremonious prelude, beckoned Long Bow to advance. Approaching he knelt in accordance with the prescribed euphuistic forms of chivalric obeisance in the presence of royalty. Placing the chaplet upon his brow she bid him rise. Then calling Penny Song forward she presented him with a zithern, the prize for the victor in song. The assemblage, disappointed in her award of the laureate’s chaplet, were appeased by the more substantial gift of the zithern to their favorite, recognizing in its material worth a preference for their choice. This material appeal to their senses opened the only avenue to their appreciation, but their partial murmurs of approval were stilled by a look and disdainful wave of the hand. When subjected to silence, she addressed Long Bow in terms adapted to the usage of chivalry, although manifestly at variance with expectation in expression:—
“Sir minstrel, we have esteemed your claims to the title of laureate as best sustained in the court of fair ladies; inasmuch as you have been pleased to acknowledge with our presence a comparative respect for purity, by which, in fact, you have honored the worth of your own, as well as the common name of mother. By endeavoring to exalt with your muse the instinctive purity and fidelity of your savage heroine, the fair High Water, you have admitted that it is our duty and privilege to excel her untutored example. Still you have paid to ourselves and maternity of our race an equivocal compliment for worth in your far-fetched search for a heroine example of constancy in love and purity. Notwithstanding the implied lack of living examples worthy of imitation for the inspiration of your songful muse, we have preferred your savage precedent to your competitor’s glossing embellishment of his hero’s vices. With the hope that you may discover, during your adventurous residence in Rome, an Animalculan or Giga representative that will honor your mother’s sex with worth sufficient to inspire your commendation in song, we would urge the undertaking as one deserving your earnest attention. In the event of success it will save your muse many weary pilgrimages into deserts and the waste places of earth for the achievement of consolation from savage example. That the emprise may not lack direction I will recommend you to visit the Manatitlan colony of Coliseo. For with them, when convinced of your sincerity, you will find in woman an exaltation of loving affection that will by far exceed your highest conceptions.”
She would have extended her reproof, but as she was in the act of addressing Penny Song, her commendation of the Manatitlan colonists brought such an overwhelming “answering sibilation” in denouncement that her brothers, in fear of an outbreak, hurried her away. The minstrels during the excitement approached near enough for whispered communication, the purport of which brought a smile of gratification to her face. They then as a diversion commenced a roundelay of spirited movement, uniting their voices in bluff concert to the sound of the zithernas. As with enraged wild beasts when surprised with the sound of music, the factious instincts of the spectators were stilled. The Coliseos were rejoiced at the steadfast adherence of Idolisima to the inculcations of her Manatitlan education, for the tribune now informed us that she had served her full term in the Coliseo school, promising to relate at a convenient season the cause of her apparent defection.