Volume I Part 30 (1/2)

This Moon of wives was lodged in two spacious seraglios, which few rove; so overpowered with verdure; so overrun with vines; and so hazy with the incense of flowers; that they were almost invisible, unless closely approached Certain it was, that it deacity, to explore the e, sweet, hu of war roses, at last hinted the royal honey at hand High in air, toward the sulen, a narrow ledge of rocks ht have been seen, froular peep at the tip of the apex of the roof of the nearest seraglio But this wild report had never been established Nor, indeed, was it susceptible of a test For was not that rock inaccessible as the eyrie of young eagles? But to guard against the possibility of any visual profanation, Donjalolo had authorized an edict, forever tabooing that rock to foot of man or pinion of fowl Birds and bipeds both tre a wide circuit to avoid the spot

Access to the seraglios was had by corresponding arbors leading froht was denominated ”Ravi”

(Before), that to the left ”Zono” (After) The n the queen wended her way to the Zono; there tarrying with her predecessors till the Ravi was erated back whence they caain

In due order, the queens reposed upon mats inwoven with their respective ciphers In the Ravi, the mat of the queen-apparent, or next in succession, was spread by the portal In the Zono, the need queen reposed furthest from it

But alas for allthese excellent arrangeressive ilios in Willamilla, it must needs be related, that at times the order of precedence became confused, and was very hard to restore

At intervals, soht of the remainder; but to their equal vexation her place would soon after be supplied by so the denoht of the Moon, thenceforth co's infallible calendar

In constant attendance, was a band of old rateful task it was, to tarry in the garden of Donjalolo's delights, without ever touching the roses

Along with innuoing upon ten thousand errands; for they had it in strict charge to obey the slightest behests of the dainable expedition to run, fly, swim, or dissolve into impalpable air, at the shortest possible notice

So laborious their avocations, that none could discharge theiving up the ghost out of pure exhaustion of the locomotive apparatus It was this constant drain upon the stock of len, that so bethinned its sray-beards and hoary-heads And any old man hitherto exempted, who happened to receive a summons to repair to the palace, and there wait the pleasure of the king: this unfortunate, at once suspecting his doom, put his arbor in order; oiled and suppled his joints; took a long farewell of his friends; selected his burial-place; and going resigned to his fate, in due time expired like the rest

Had any one of theht possibly have derived soh a slave to the whiuardians, and as such, he eniously have concluded, their superior But small consolation this For the damsels were as blithe as larks,sad and senti clandestine escapes But supplied with the thirtieth part of all that Aspasia could desire; glorying in being the spouses of a king; nor in the reree anxious about eventual dowers; they were care-free, content, and rejoicing, as the rays of the

Poor old men, then; it would be hard to distill out of your fate, one drop of the balm of consolation For, commissioned to watch over those who forever kept you on the trot, affording you no tiravation of hard ti to the steel in your souls?

But much yet remains unsaid

To dwell no more upon the eternal wear-and-tear incident to these attenuated old warders, they were intensely hated by the damsels

Inasmuch, as it was archly opined, for what ulterior purposes they were retained

Nightly couching, on guard, round the seraglio, like fangless old bronze dragons round a fountain enchanted, the old htily, by reason of sore pinches and scratches received in the dark: And tri-trebly-tri-triply girt about as he was, Donjalolo hih his ten thousand corridors; at last bursting all dizzy a his twenty-nine queens, to see what under the seventh-heavens was the matter When, lo and behold! there lay the innocents all sound asleep; the dragonsover their e fahts of Donjalolo

And in one special matter was he either eminently miserable, or otherwise: for all his multiplicity of wives, he had never an heir

Not his, the proud paternal glance of the Grand Turk Soly round upon a hundred sons, all bone of his bone, and squinting with his squint

CHAPTER LxxxI Wherein Babbalanja Relates The Adventure Of One Karkeke In The Land Of Shades

At ourrepast on the second day of our stay in the hollow, our party indulged in much lively discourse

”Samoa,” said I, ”those isles of yours, of whose beauty you so often ood Samoa, furnish a valley in all respects equal to Willaht be endurable enough for a sojourn, but as a perlen of his own natal isle was unspeakably superior

”In the great valley of Savaii,” cried Sarows a stately tree; and for every tree here waving, in Savaii flourishes a goodly warrior”

Iust of the Upoluan for the enervated subjects of Donjalolo; and for Donjalolo hi reception at the hands of the royalty of Jua to do with his disdain