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The bride-cup was passed round, according to ancient usage, for the company to drink to a happy union; every one's feelings seemed to break forth from restraint. Master Simon had a world of bachelor pleasantries to utter; and as to the gallant general, he bowed and cooed about the dulcet Lady Lillycraft, like a mighty cock-pigeon about his dame.
Surely, O my lady, the angels appointed to attend upon the sons of Adam, knew that the cock-pigeon was wronged of us, because we blamed him for deserting his mate; so they embraced his cause and made manifest his excuse; and now for the first time we see him in the hawk's pounces a dead bird."
Mr. Gourlay passed on to the inner yard, which was close to the scullery door. The paved little court, within its high wooden walls, was curiously fresh and clean. A cock-pigeon strutted round, puffing his gleaming breast and rooketty-cooing in the sun. Large, clear drops fell slowly from the spout of a wooden pump, and splashed upon a flat stone. The place seemed to enfold the stillness.
Except for the chanting of the nuns and the braggadocio booming of a big cock-pigeon, which had flown down from the church tower to forage for spilt grain almost under my feet, the place was quiet.
Then quoth the Wazir to him, "Thou saidst to me, 'Why wilt thou repair the pavilion?; and I replied, 'Thou shalt presently see the issue thereof. And behold, now its issue thou seest; for it was I did this deed and bade the painters pourtray the Princess's dream thus and paint the male bird in the pounces of the falcon which eateth his flesh and drinketh his blood; so that when she cometh to the pavilion, she will behold her dream depicted and see how the cock-pigeon was slain and excuse him and turn from her hate for men."
His fortress being finished, it would have done any man's heart good to behold the swelling dignity with which the general would stride in and out a dozen times a day, surveying it in front and in rear, on this side and on that; how he would strut backwards and forwards, in full regimentals, on the top of the ramparts, like a vain-glorious cock-pigeon, swelling and vaporing on the top of a dovecote.
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