Don Tarquinio: A Kataleptic Phantasmatic Romance (Valancourt eClassics) (3 page)

IIII

When the barge had swung free of the shoal of smaller boats by the quay, and had attained mid-stream, Ippolito anon emerged from his thoughts. I also emerged from mine. There was a gleam of hilarity in his black-eyed glance. I returned it. It was understood that we were setting trouble aside for the moment, and engaging each other in some feat of daring, as our manner was.

Having cast off his vermilion robes, Ippolito blessed his body; and forthwith smoothly plunged into the river, strongly swimming with a huge leap sideways and a circular sweep of alternate arms and a double downward thrust of his mighty haunches. I for a few moments watched him, while I strengthened my proper arms by swinging the heavy arm-shields, wooden, cylindrical, studded with square knops, which we had used in our game of great-ball. Anon, having made ready, I climbed on the high shoulders of the steersman, standing there till Ippolito saw my whiteness; and so
I
dived into the barge’s wake, and swam.

The oarsmen diminished their speed to ours; and we swam between the right bank, where our Lord the Paparch kept His court in the Castle of Santangelo, and the left bank, where the army of the Keltic king inravished half the City. We continued swimming together under the new Xystine Bridge, and under the Cestian Bridge, and by the Island,
[1]
until the barge was moored by the Estense quay in Trastevere.

Gigantic jatraleiptai,
[2]
which Ippolito got out of Morocco, attended us when we climbed inboard. Their chestnut-coloured bodies were girdled with azure-green. Using pure oil of olives in which violets were macerated, they imparted friction with their hands to our chilled flesh. When my skin had the rosy glow of pomegranates, they robed me in a cloak of vair of nut-brown squirrels: but Ippolito muffled himself in the ermine and vermilion of his great-cloak, covering his head with a coif of the same. Chamberlains with
vj
torches went before him,
iij
went before me, when we left the barge and entered the palace. Our teeth chattered with cold, preventing articulate speech: but our bodies were warm.

There was an immense crowd of familiars along the quay and by the water-gate, freelances from Ferrara, Gothic halberdiers, Dacian slingers, red-haired Skythian wrestlers very gigantic, roe-footed runners from Utter Britain, North African Moors, Ethiopic athletes, Indian acrobats, all selected for some singular physical beauty or capability. The crowd, as I have said, seemed to be immense: but considering that Ippolito was a prince as well as a cardinal, a family of merely
cccc
persons was by no means over-abundant. Many barons and many sacredly purpled persons are well known to keep much larger families: but Ippolito cared more for quality than for quantity, and he cared nothing at all for ostentation or display. This trait of his character was very pleasing to me: for I myself at all times would rather have those exquisite things which no other prince hath, than a superfluity of those things which are common to all.

The water-gate, iron-barred, iron-shielded, clanged behind us. Armed footmen lined the stair. Slight vermilion pages, patrician on this side, plebeian on that, made obeisance in the
xv
antechambers. A bevy of delicate youngsters, whose hair glittered like cocoons in candlelight, joined our progress. Ippolito was wont to pay
cccmd
golden sequins
[3]
for one of these specimens of The Creator’s handiwork; and he had collected no more than
viiij.
He told me this, seeing how greatly I admired them; and he described the difficulty which his agents had had in finding them, for there was no blemish on them from sole to crown. Thus conversing, we passed the wardrobe, where the master waited with his grooms and our gentlemen; and so we parted to go to our bathing-chambers. From this description, o Prospero, thou shalt know how a cardinal kept state in the days of thy father’s youth. But I will continue, that no single thing which I did on that day may be hidden from thee.

Well-grown pages, girt with white napkins, spread the floor-sheets and sponged my flesh with warm water, rubbing me with lupin-meal, alkaline, emollient. Having poured cold jasmine-water over me, and dried me with fine flax, they indued me with knitted undergarb of soft wool, swathing my wet hair with cloths. Wrapped in a woollen night-gown, I encountered Ippolito similarly arrayed in the wardrobe. The grooms produced various habits; and our pages deftly did them on us. Ippolito’s grand legs were sheathed in silk hosen, tyrianthine-coloured. A loose doublet of the same covered his body. It was open on the breast and the long wide sleeves, shewing the laces and embroidery of his smock. His poignard dangled from a golden belt formed of linked dryades and naiades. His cap and his shoes were vermilion. His pectoral cross was hidden in his smock; and his chain was set with those periapts which procure fearlessness and avert drowning, passion, incubi and succubi,
videlicet
carnelian, jasper, topaz, coral. And I must not omit to record that the sapphire of his ring, worth
dc
sequins,
[4]
was engraved with a figure of the Heroic Herakles strangling the Nemean Lion, which inchanteth against colic and gaineth favour. But I, on my part, chose to wear no smock that night, preferring a certain habit of white silk which clung to my contours. It was shaped like an inverted chevron on breast and back, with broidered bands of pearls on silver; and I chose it by cause that I could breathe more freely when my throat was bare, for mine heart was very full of the joy which cometh to him who hath done well with his body. Indeed I hardly could stand still while the pages very carefully rubbed the delicate fabric on me, smoothing the wrinkles: but, when this was done, I knew that I had chosen rightly, for this habit was no restraint to me. A pointed belt of linked silver medals engraved with the loves of Leykippe and Kleitophonta bound a brief close flounce of silver-banded silk round my loins; and my boots were of white buckskin, clasped with silver at an handsbreadth below my knees. They also brought me a white silk cap proud with plumes, and a thick cloak of white velvet reversed with ermine.

So I stood, while Ippolito praised me, saying that I resembled Messer Verrocchio’s lithe thalerose image of David carven of shimmering mother o’ pearl. Concerning which same image, and concerning also the other image of David by Messer Donatello, I took occasion to narrate the tragicomedy of the said images, and of the
ij
adolescents of Deira named Baldonero Fioravanti and Rufo Drudodimare, and of their doings with the white-faced cardinal.
[5]
And the same history I shall put in an appendix,
[6]
seeing that no more than the mention of it is pertinent to this present history. But my discourse was so pleasing to Ippolito that, when I had made an end of speaking, he sent to me a page with a tray of rings for mine acceptance. Wherefrom I chose
vj
for the adornment of my thumbs and my first-fingers and my third-fingers:
videlicet
a cockatrice, intagliate in green jasper, for averting the evil eye: a fair boy’s head well-combed, intagliate in smaragd, for preserving joy: an Apollino with a necklace of herbs, intagliate in heliotrope, which conferreth invisibility when anointed with marigold-juice: the Kythereia and Ares, intagliate in chalcedonyx, for gaining victories: the Anadyomene, intagliate in sea-blue beryl, fine, brilliant, very large, also for gaining victories: a silver ring set through on all sides with toadstone and ass-hoof, for augmenting manlihood and for protection against venom; and, having thanked Ippolito, I sent him the rest in the tray.

The patrician pages, who stood in our shadows, quietly quarrelled among themselves while they filled our burses with perfumes, comfit-boxes, kerchieves, combs, mirrors, amulets, tablets, rosaries, and other gear. We struck them in the rear with spatulas from time to time. Nor would we permit them to affix the said burses to our belts: for our forms would have been falsified thereby. Wherefore, they perforce were compelled to carry them, attending us closely, buffeted as occasion served. But we sat resting in arm-chairs, while the grooms covered us with sheets with fringes, drying and combing and scenting our raven-hued and yellow-silver hair.

For our solace, a chamberlain admitted a pair of chaplains in black cymars with an arch-luth and a book of hours. They kneeled, and intoned vespers with completorium. At the Sign and Et fidelium animae, the bells of the City began to sound in a new manner, strange then to me, but familiar enough to thee, o Prospero,
videlicet iij
strokes,
iiij
strokes,
v
strokes,
i
stroke,
xiii
strokes in all.

I looked with inquiry toward Ippolito. He smiled: for he had been at the heart of things that day; and he said that it was the new ordinance of our Lord the Paparch.

Our coverings instantly were removed. Two vermilion cushions were placed before us. All sank on the knees. The Cardinal of Ferrara intoned, in honour of the Fructiferous Incarnation; and we responded to him, saying

V.
Angelus Domini nuntiavit Mariae:

R
. Et concepit de Spiritu Sancto.

Aue Maria, etc.

V
. Ecce ancilla Domini:

R
. Fiat michi secundu’ Verbu’ Tuu’

Aue Maria, etc.

V
. Et Verbu’ Caro factu’ est:

R
. Et habitauit i’ nobis.

Aue Maria, etc.

V
. Ora pro nobis, Sancta Dei Genitrix:

R
. Ut digni efficiamur promissionibus Christi.

V
. Oremus. Gratia’ Tua’, quaesumus, Domine, métibus nostris infunde, ut Qui, angelo nuntiante, Christ Filj Tui Incarnatione’ cognovimus, per Passione’ Ejus et Cruce’ ad Resurrectionis Gloria’ perducamur. Per Eunde’ Christu’ Dominu’ nostru’:

R
. Amen.

V
. Et fideliu’ animae per Misericordia’ Dei requiescant i’ pace:

R
. Amen.

It was the first hour of night.
[7]

Now, the day which for me for ever is marked with a white stone, fortune-bringing, the great day of my life was begun.

V

I will tell thee, o Prospero, of the Estense Palace: for it is impossible for thee to see it with thy proper sea-blue eyes, by cause that it was pulled down in the year before thy birth, after the miraculous picture appeared on the garden-wall; and hath given place to the new church of Theotokos with the new streets.
[1]

It was a gigantic oblong, extending from the river-bank to the said garden-wall, having the grove of the Divine Furina on the one side, and Saint Cecilia and Saint Mary of the Chapel on the other. It was neither so fine nor so large as that new palace which my cousin and our baron Marcantonio is about to build on Catinari: but it was fine and large enough for a foreign cardinal. One end of the oblong abutted on Tiber, where was the great barbacan and the water-gate; and it was divided into
iiij
equal-sided courts by the hall and the audience-chamber and the chapel. The exterior walls were fortifications
v
braccie
[2]
in thickness, where little window-slits lighted only galleries and stairs. Who builded it, I do not know: but, when it was pulled down we recognized it as the work of a master-builder, cyclopean, absolute. All the chief apartments were on the first floor. Below were kitchens, cellars, prisons, store-houses, military quarters. Above were
iij
floors for the familiars and the athletes. The first court from the gate was allotted to the soldiers and servitors: the second, to the gentlemen and pages: the third to the men of letters and to the illustrious, nobilities, supernities, celsitudes, tranquillities, magnificences, sublimities: the fourth was the court of the women, where the wives and daughters of the familiars cooked the food and made or mended clothes, pent from boys and adolescents savage or military, in suitable seclusion beyond the ruota.
[3]
A flat roof, with machicolated battlement, crowned the pile, chiefly fortified, but also providing a terrace,
d
braccie
[4]
in total length,
l
braccie
[5]
in width, for Ippolito’s recreations.

These things being understood, I will continue the history.

When we stood up ready to proceed from the wardrobe, all the people came and made their genuflections. The pages with the cardinalitial double-cross and the Estense gonfalon went before. The gentlemen followed after, playing with their budding upper-lips. These were quite useless persons, not even showy, and only included in the family in order that they might learn manners. I never have had gentlemen in my proper family: for I prefer pages and servitors to whom I can speak and who will respond to me in turn. I would rather be surrounded by barbarians, as Ippolito generally was, than by these silent simpering youths who are merely noble. And as for myself, rather than be a gentleman in another baron’s family, I would prefer to be a farmer. And, as I will for myself, so also I will for my dear son. Note it, o Prospero.

The chamberlains preceded us with the
vj
torches and the
iij.
As we passed down the
iiij
stairs which led into the first gallery, a chamberlain slipped on a patch of tallow, which had dropped from a rush-light badly placed in the sconce on the wall. He was a very fat man; and his hosen split on the ham-bone: at whose discomfiture we laughed, but Ippolito was promising a thrashing for someone.

In the private dining-room, I was moved to give an inkling of mine hopes to Ippolito, continuing to whisper until we had passed through the state withdrawing-room into the hall. He sighed when I spoke of my maid; and suddenly smiled, as one who locketh the box of his trouble when his friend unlocketh his box of joy. It appeared to me that Ippolito was not ignorant of an experience similar to mine: but the importance of my proper affairs prevented me from placing inquiries concerning his.

My discourse was interrupted by the pages at the door of the hall presenting the embossed gold basin with the ewer of tepid rose-water and diapered towels, while we washed our fingers reciting the Psalm
I will wash mine hands in innocency
. Our seats on the dais were canopied by the vermilion baldaquin, Ippolito’s being on a step above mine. Below on our right, was the table of the chaplains and the men of letters who knew the
iiij
human languages,
videlicet
Greek, Roman, Tuscan, Hebrew. Below on our left, was the table of the general comptroller of estates, the secretaries, the chief steward, the auditor, the notary, the datary, the captain and lieutenants of the guard, the herald, the physician, and the barber-chirurgeon. Lower down the hall were tables, large and long. At the middle table, where the salt-cellar divided patrician from plebeian, the gentlemen sat and the bevy of pages. The rest of the family was at the end of the hall. The plebeians each brought their daily portions from the canteen,
videlicet xvj
ounces of beef,
xx
ounces of fine or coarse bread according to condition, a pint and a half of wine, pieces of their monthly pounds of cheese. All through the meal, they looked lickerishly toward the dais, thinking of their chances of our gentle leavings.

Wax torches,
v
in number, escorted each dish from the ruota to the carving-table;
v
others illumined the tables of the patricians: cool, dim, twinkling wicks floating on oil in brazen lamps, and the blaze of the logs on the hearth, gave light to the rest. The reflections of these in the panels of the walls and roof, oaken, wax-shining, resembled golden stars in a brown sea.

As I and Ippolito spread the napkins on our breasts for tying, there was some commotion at the pages’ table. It was seen that, not content with their own napkin, they had stolen also the one pertaining to the gentlemen, which napkin one of the last retrieved with a little violence. We only saw the short struggle, and we only heard the indignant advice to the robbers that they should use their caps and sleeves like the plebeians.

Ippolito demanded of me whether, in my judgment, such advice was suitable for young boys. I responded saying that it was indecorous, and that the adviser ought to be dismissed. I forget whether this last was done.

While the wan nervous venom-taster in black, who stood at Ippolito’s left hand, was performing his office on the viands and on the wine, my flesh glowed with the stinging cold of my swim in Tiber and the subsequent ministrations of my pages. Ippolito was in a muse. But I looked at my face in my mirror; and saw happiness trying to shine there. I smoothed mine hair. I stretched my legs and arms. I felt strong. My bowels yearned to do some violent deed. But what deed? Ah, I did not know what deed to do. And I instantly slid from the height of bliss to the depth of misery. Oh, I indeed was properly unhappy.

As soon as the chaplains had finished intoning the prayers, I drank beef-and-barley broth from a silver bowl. It did not comfort me. I ate the beef from which the broth had been made. It was fibrous and dry. The brigands of the Campagna who, in those old days, used to steal half all imports sent to the City, must have been employed elsewhere that day: for roast pig and venison appeared on the carving table.
I
ate of both, being ravenously hungry and unwilling to waste time in talking to Ippolito about a stranger who was sitting at the table of the men of letters. But I said that a man who had an olive-coloured skin ought not to wear a pink and green gown; and I have forgotten all else about the said stranger. The venison suited my taste, being fat and full of blood; and I signed for a third platterful. Nor did I neglect the fried things,
videlicet
minced chicken livers in paste balls, goose-breasts in batter, cockscombs on lettuce, leeks parboiled and fried in oil, a dish of quails farced with figs. The goose-breasts and the cockscombs were the best. Every time when I paused to wash mine hands, I seemed to be sinking deeper in the mire of my melancholy.

I was plunging, sighing, into a gigantic salad: for I remembered that green-meat is as efficacious for whitening the skin as are blood-meats for rendering supple the sinews. But we heard the sudden ringing of horse-hooves in the court, and the champing of bitts, and the noise of an arrival. Then indeed the human tide at the end of the hall swept sideways, as Tiber surges when cloven by a galley’s prow. A pursuivant and two vermilion chamberlains, each with a handful of lighted torches snatched from anywhere, precipitated themselves at the dais, announcing:

“The Exalted Potency of Prince Gioffredo Borgia of Squillace.”

This prince, o Prospero, was then of mine own age: but he already had commanded
dccxl
free-lances in the war, and he already was
xj
months a benedick: while I, who could do nothing but fight and swim and run and speak Greek and write it and look much more like the David of Messer Verrocchio than Baldonero Fioravanti or than Rufo Drudodimare, I, I say, had no opportunity of doing anything. And I was most miserable. But I smiled, welcoming the guest: for he seemed to be a merry lad; and I admired the hardy contours of his form, precocious, voluptuous. Sulphur-coloured silk defined each line of him. The silver hands at his throat and wrists and hips were set with great cabochon emeralds no greener than his eyes which flashed between long lashes. His curly hair was as black as night. His flesh had the rosy clearness of carnation. His laughing mouth was as red as beef. He used himself with lively dignity as became the veritable son of our Lord the Paparch; and he came to greet us with a certain gesture. He said:

“Salute the father of a lovely girl, born a month ago at Naples, whom Our Most Holy Father yesterday hath baptized by the name Antonia.”

The cellarers served a rich red wine of Nemi, full-bodied, well-sunned. Ippolito commanded them to bring moss-agate cups: in order that the Paparch’s son might have security against venom.
[6]
While we drank, those
ij
began to chatter of matters unknown to me.

I threw a cupful of wine in the face of the page with my basin, that I might make him as unhappy as I. He looked so meekly furious that
I
laughed as I washed my fingers before tasting the sweetmeats. But anon, remembering that the said page was noble and that I had hurt his honour, I sent him to fetch my two best swords. And, having slipped into the state withdrawing-room, I made him proud and happy by disarming him twice, scratching the back of his right hand. He was a bold boy, fearful of the blood of the grape, not of his own. But I returned to the cheese, more unhappy than before.

Chaplains intoned the long action of graces,
✠
Memoria’ fecit mirabiliu’ suoru’ etc. I lingered over a conserve of quinces, which, said Ippolito, disperseth fumes and preventeth vapours from striking upwards; and I chatted in Greek with Messer Pierettore Arrivabene below the dais, while Ippolito and the Borgia prince eagerly whispered. When the familiars were gone out by the lower door, we
iij
washed our hands; and went to take our ease in the secret chamber. Singing boys followed our progress, mingling voices with archluths, quiet, clear, and low, music delightful to hear.