198 THE VA11ANGIANS. 



were eminently possessed by her. These qualities were destined to 

 be severely proved. Her patroness, though not herself a profligate 

 woman, could number amongst her acquaintaince many of both sexes 

 who were so, and her house was often the resort of gay and dissolute 

 courtiers. The display of wealth and luxury which she now daily 

 witnessed, astonished Evadne, who, though herself a native of the 

 capital, was a stranger to the court, and had indeed, since the death 

 of her mother, when she was still a child, been educated by her fa- 

 ther, as much from necessity as choice, in comparative seclusion. 

 But young and artless as she was, her good sense and feeling per- 

 ceived, and revolted from, much of what she observed in the manner 

 of her new friend's guests, and she would have absented herself from 

 company, had she been permitted to do so; but this Lesbia, proud of 

 her young charge, constantly resisted. In the absence, therefore, of 

 her lover, Evadne was not only exposed to much of flattery from 

 those whom she despised, but more than one profligate, bolder than 

 the rest, had ventured to hint (propose openly they dare not) that 

 she might attain wealth and power at the expense of honour. If our 

 heroine understood these insinuations, she for the present contented 

 herself with avoiding those who uttered them ; for Lesbia, though 

 she would have protected her from any positive and undoubted in- 

 sult, laughed at much of what she considered prejudice in her young 

 ward ; and she knew Redwald's temper too well to risk the conse- 

 quences which might have ensued to him from a quarrel with those 

 who possessed the favour of royalty. 



It was now about the commencement of autumn, and Alexius, 

 after the custom of his predecessors, was witnessing the revels of the 

 populace, usually allowed to celebrate the beginning of a new sea- 

 son. Placed on a splendid throne, elevated to a considerable height 

 above one of the principal courts of the palace, he overlooked a large 

 basin which, adorned with a margin of silver, was filled, not with 

 water, as on ordinary occasions, but with the choicest fruits, which 

 were abandoned indiscriminately to the people. The magnificent 

 dress of the emperor, attired in his red buskins and glittering tiara, 

 the scarcely less gorgeous apparel of the numerous courtiers who 

 surrounded him, with the gay and motley appearance of the multi- 

 tude below, produced a rich combination of colours which, with the 

 perpetual mobility of the crowd, in some degree resembled the 

 changes produced to the eye by the kaleidescope. Nor were the enter- 

 tainments confined to feasting : robes of scarlet and purple were dis- 

 tributed to the people; musicians, singers, dancers, and jugglers 

 contributed to the gaiety of the scene, which resembled in many 

 respects an Italian carnival. Meanwhile, such of the guards as were 

 off duty mingled with the crowd, and shared in their various amuse- 

 ments. Most of them, however, were collected in circles at the rear 

 of the dense mass which surrounded the basin, and indulged in those 

 athletic sports in which they principally delighted, and for which 

 their taste at once a cause and effect of their great muscular strength, 

 contributed to increase their efficiency as soldiers. Nor were they al- 

 ways without competitors in these exercises amongst the natives of 

 the country. The Greeks, though never at any period equal to the 



