At length the broad walls and towers of the city came in sight,—a city set in a fair land of meadow and stream. The morning sun shone bright over it, and the priest, looking up, perceived how it glittered upon a great building of many white towers, whose gilt pinnacles gleamed like so many crowns of gold.
"Look, your Majesty," he said, with a sad attempt at gaiety, "yonder is your palace."
And the duke looked up from a deep reverie, and saw his palace, and groaned aloud.
But presently there came a sad twinkle in his sad eyes, as he descried another building of many peaks and pinnacles glittering in the sun.
"Look up, my Lord Archbishop," he said, turning to his friend, "yonder is your palace."
And as the good priest looked, his face was all sorrow, and the tears overflowed his eyes, as he thought of the simple souls once in his keeping, in his parish far away.
But presently the king, looking again toward the palace, descried a flag floating from one of the towers, covered with heraldic devices.
As he looked, it seemed that ten years of weariness fell from his face, and a great joy returned.
"Look," he said, almost in a whisper, to the priest, "those are not my arms!..."