As we approached the town, signs of life began to
appear. At intervals we passed a wretched cabin,
with a thatched roof, and about it small fields and
garden patches in an indifferent state of cultivation.
There were people, too; brawny men, with long, coarse,
uncombed hair that hung down over their faces and made
them look like animals. They and the women,
as a rule, wore a coarse tow-linen robe that came
well below the knee, and a rude sort of sandal, and
many wore an iron collar. The small boys and
girls were always naked; but nobody seemed to know
it. All of these people stared at me, talked
about me, ran into the huts and fetched out their
families to gape at me; but nobody ever noticed that
other fellow, except to make him humble salutation
and get no response for their pains.
In the town were some substantial windowless houses
of stone scattered among a wilderness of thatched
cabins; the streets were mere crooked alleys, and
unpaved; troops of dogs and nude children played in
the sun and made life and noise; hogs roamed and rooted
contentedly about, and one of them lay in a reeking
wallow in the middle of the main thoroughfare and
suckled her family. Presently there was a distant
blare of military music; it came nearer, still nearer,
and soon a noble cavalcade wound into view, glorious
with plumed helmets and flashing mail and flaunting
banners and rich doublets and horse-cloths and gilded
spearheads; and through the muck and swine, and naked
brats, and joyous dogs, and shabby huts, it took its
gallant way, and in its wake we followed. Followed
through one winding alley and then another,—and
climbing, always climbing—till at last
we gained the breezy height where the huge castle
stood. There was an exchange of bugle blasts;
then a parley from the walls, where men-at-arms, in
hauberk and morion, marched back and forth with halberd
at shoulder under flapping banners with the rude figure
of a dragon displayed upon them; and then the great
gates were flung open, the drawbridge was lowered,
and the head of the cavalcade swept forward under
the frowning arches; and we, following, soon found
ourselves in a great paved court, with towers and
turrets stretching up into the blue air on all the
four sides; and all about us the dismount was going
on, and much greeting and ceremony, and running to
and fro, and a gay display of moving and intermingling
colors, and an altogether pleasant stir and noise
and confusion.
CHAPTER II
KING ARTHUR’S COURT
The moment I got a chance I slipped aside privately
and touched an ancient common looking man on the shoulder
and said, in an insinuating, confidential way:
“Friend, do me a kindness. Do you belong
to the asylum, or are you just on a visit or something
like that?”
He looked me over stupidly, and said:
“Marry, fair sir, me seemeth—”
“That will do,” I said; “I reckon
you are a patient.”
