Custer weekly chronicle. [volume] (Custer City, S.D.) 1890-1931, 1896-10-17

IA JackeL Oh raised EOAd, tDe placdru em-
broidered with diamonds and other rich
stones, and a great bauderike about his
neck OF large balasses." The favorites Of
James ] wore earrings Of cmcralds set in
gold fligraEe. Edward II. gave to Piers
Galveston q suit Of red-Gold armor studded
with jacinths, and a collar OF gold roses set
with turquois stones, and a skull-cap var
seme with pearls. Henry III. wore jeweled
gloves reaching TO the elbow, and had q
hawk-glove set with twelve rubies and fifty
two great pearls. The ducal hat of Charles
the Rash. the last Duke Of Burgundy Of
his race, was studded with sapphires and
hung with pear-shaped pearls.
How exquisite life had once been How
gorgeous in its pomp and decoration! Even
TO read the luxury Of the dead was wonder
ful.
Then he turned his attention 10 embroid.
cries, ana 20 the tapestries that performed
the Office Of ~frcscocs in the chill rooms Of
the northern nations Of Europe. As be in
vestigatcd the subject-and he always had
an extraordinary faculty Of becoming abso-
lutely absorbed for a moment in whatever
he took up-he was almost saddened by the
reflection Of the ruin that time brought on
beautiful and wonderful things. He at any
rate, had escaped that. Sumner followed
summer, and the yellow ionquils Dloomed
and died many times, and nights Of horror
repeated the story Of their shame, but he was
unchanged. No winter marred his face or
stained his fower-like bloom. How differ
ent 1t was with material things! Where
had they gone to, Where was the great
crocus -colored robe, on which the gods
So..bt a,.sYyt tb, ,,.,n.r ,l,4 IA Nnon
worked for Athena! Where the huge vela-
rum that Nero had stretched across the
Colosseum at Rome, on which were repre-
scented the starry sky. and Apollo driving a
chariot drawn by white gilt-reined steedsl
He longed 20 see the curious table-napkins
wrought for Elagabalus, on which were dis
played all the dainties and viands that could
be wanted for a feast; the mortuary cloth
OF King Chilperic, with its three hundred
golden bees the fantastic robes that excited
the Indignation Of the Bishop Of Pontus,
and were figured with 'lions, panthers,
bears, dogs, forests, rocks, hunters-all, in
fact that a painter can copy from nature, :"
and the coat hat Charles Of Orleans once
wore, on the sleeves of which were en-
broidered the verses Of a song beginning
"lf1dame, je suis tout ~joyctp," the musical
accompaniment Of the words being wrought
In gold thread, and each note, Of square
shape in those days, formed with four pearls.
He read ot the room that was prepared at
the palace at Rheims for the use of Queen
Joan of Burgundy, and was decorated with
thirteen hundred and twenty-one parrots,
made in broidery, and blazoned with the
kings arms, and five hundred and sixty one
butterflies, whose wings were similarly
~ornamented with the arms Of the queen, the
whole worked in gold.n Catherine de
hedicis had a mourning-bed made for her
Of black velvet powdered with crcscents
and suns. Its curtains were Of damask,
with leafy wreaths and garlands, figured
upon a gold and silver ground, and frirged
along the edges with broideries Of pearls,
and it stood in a room hung with rows OF
the queens devices in cut black velvet up
OF cloth or silver. Louis XIV. had gold
embroidered caryatides fifteen feet high in
his apartment. The state bed of Sobieski,
King Of Poland, was made Of Smyrna gold
brocade embroidered in turquoises with
verses from the Koran. It's supports were
Of silver gilt, beautifully chased aud pro
fusely set with cnameled and icweled mo
d~allions. 1t had been taken from tho Turk
ish camp before Vienna, and the standard
Of Mohammed had stood under il.
And so. for a whole year, ne sought to ac-
cumulate the most exquisite specimens that
he could find of textile and embroidered
work, getting tho dainty Delhi muslins,
finely wrought, with gold-thread palmates,
and stitched over with iridescent beetles
wings; tho Dacca gauzes, that from their
transparency are known in the East as
'wo,sn air." and running water" and
evening dew strange figured clothes
from Java elaborate yellow Chinese hang
ing; books bound in tawny satins Of fair
blue silks and wrought with reuTs 10 ms,
birds, and images wells of ldcis worked in
Hungary paint; Siciiian hrocades, and stiff
Spanish ~velvets: Georgian work with its
gilt coins, and Japanese Foukousas with
their green-toned Colds and their marvel
ously plumaged birds.
The hero Of the dangerous novel that had
so influenced his life had himself had this
curious fancy. In a chapter Of the book he
tells how, crowned with laurel, lest light
ming might strike him, he had sat, as Tiber-
Jus, In a garden at Capri. reading the shame
full books Of Elephants, while dwarfs and
peacocks strutted round him and the flute
player Knocked the swinger Of the censor;
and, as Caligula, had caroused with the
green-shirted jockeys in their stables, and
supped in an ivory manger with a jewell
frontleted horse; and, as Domitian, had
wandered through a corridor lined with
marble mirrors. looking round with haggard
eyes for the reflection Of the dagger that
was 10 end his days. and sick with that
ennui. that tGdium ritG, hat comes on those
TO whom life denies nothing and had peer
ed through a clear emerald at the red
shameless Of the circus. and then. In q litter
of pearl and purple drawn by silver-shod
mules, been carried through the Street OF
Pomegranites TO a House Of Gold. and heard
men cry on Nero Caesar as he passed by;
and. as E~lagabalus, had painted his face
with colors, and piled the distaff among the
women. and brought the moon from Garth
age, and given her q mystic marriage 10 the
Sun.
Over and over again Dorian used to read
this fantastic chapter, and the chapter inn
mediately following in which the hero de-
scribes the curious tapestries that he had
woven for him from Gustave Moreau's de-
signs. and on which were pictured the aw-
| Iul anu Utdutllul ioIHlS VI thOoc "uOuH NNc
and Blood and WEAKNESS had made mon
strous or mad: Filippo, Duke Of Milan, who
slew his wife, and painted her lips with q
scarlet poison; Pietro Barbi, the Venetian,
known as Paul the Second, who sought in
his vanity TO assume the title of Formosus.
and whose tiara, valued at two hundred
thousand forms. was bought at the price Of
. terrible sin; Clan Maria Visconti, who
used hounds to chase living men, and whose
murdered body was covered with roses oy q
harlot who had loved him; the Borgia or
his white horse, with Fratridide riding be-
side him, and his mantle stained with the
blood Of Perotto; Petro Riario, the young
Cardinal Archbishop Of Florence. child and
minion Of Sixtus ~, whose beauty was
equaled only by his debauchery, and who
received Leonora Of Aragon in u pavilion OF
white and crimson silk, filled with nymphs
and centaurs, and gilded q boy that he
might serve her at the feast as Ganymede
or Hylas; Ezzelin, whose melancholy could
be cured only by the spectacle of death, ano
who had q passion for red blood, rs other
men have for red wine-the son Of the fiend,
as was reported, ard enc who had cheated
his father OF dice when gambling with him
for his own soul; Giambattista Cibo who ir
$1,000 -