It was the night before the day fixed for his coronation, and the young King was sitting alone in his beautiful chamber. His courtiers had all taken their leave of him, bowing their heads to the ground, according to the ceremonious usage of the day, and had retired to the Great Hall of the Palace, to receive a few last lessons from the Professor of Etiquette; there being some of them who had still quite natural manners, which in a courtier is, I need hardly say, a very grave offence.
The lad-for he was only a lad, being but sixteen years of age-was not sorry at their departure, and had flung himself back with a deep sigh of relief on the soft cushions of his embroidered couch, lying there, wild eyed and open mouthed, like a brown woodland Faun, or some young animal of the forest newly snared by the hunters.
And, indeed, it was the hunters who had found him, coming upon him almost by chance as, bare limbed and pipe in hand, he was following the flock of the poor goatherd who had brought him up, and whose son he had always fancied himself to be. The child of the old King?s only daughter by a secret marriage with one much beneath her in station-a stranger, some said, who, by the wonderful magic of his lute-playing, had made the young Princess love him; while others spoke of an artist from Rimini, to whom the Princess had shown much, perhaps too much honour, and who had suddenly disappeared from the city, leaving his work in the Cathedral unfinished-he had been, when but a week old, stolen away from his mother’s side, as she slept, and given into the charge of a common peasant and his wife, who were without children of their own, and lived in a remote part of the forest, more than a day’s ride from the town.
Oscar Wilde
A House of Pomegranates [EPUB ebook]
A House of Pomegranates [EPUB ebook]
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Langue Anglais ● Format EPUB ● Pages 120 ● ISBN 9783749432929 ● Taille du fichier 0.6 MB ● Maison d’édition Books on Demand ● Publié 2019 ● Édition 1 ● Téléchargeable 24 mois ● Devise EUR ● ID 7420474 ● Protection contre la copie DRM sociale