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Ministers, dignitaries of the Court, Councillors of State; majordomos, stewards, butlers, body-servants; they all came one by one or in groups of twos or threes. As the afternoon wore on these arrivals grew less and less furtive; the carriages arrived with greater clatter and to-do, with finer liveries and more gorgeous harness.
"The edifice," he wrote, "is quadrilateral, and about one hundred and fifty metres long in front. The church occupies one of the wings. The interior forms a court, adorned with flowers and planted with trees. Opening on the gallery which runs round it are the rooms of the monks, majordomos, and travelers, as well as the workshops, schoolrooms, and storehouses.
Having had experience in these matters, Dade was able to do his part and do it like a veteran, although he tactfully left to the other majordomos all those little details that would make of the various camps one orderly company.
Further down, dressed in black, with vast pointed perukes and shaven faces, are the bailiff, Thomas Arnoton, and the notary, Master Ambroy, two grave objects among the flowing silks and figured damasks. Then come the fat majordomos, the pages, the grooms, the attendants; dame Barbe, all her keys suspended at her side on a ring of thin silver.
For you old men remember, and you young men have heard, that the Pantler was the father and benefactor of you all. Whom did he send as manager to his Pinsk estates? A Dobrzynski. Who were his accountants? Dobrzynskis. He chose none for majordomos and none for butlers except Dobrzynskis; his house was full of Dobrzynskis.
"The mission to Ku Su," he explained, "to find tutors, to purchase servant girls, and to obtain musical instruments, and theatrical properties and the like, my uncle has confided to me; and as I'm to take along with me the two sons of a couple of majordomos, and two companions of the family, besides, Tan P'ing-jen and Pei Ku-hsiu, he has, for this reason, enjoined me to come and see you, uncle."
He stood aside, in his maroon velvet and gold lace, holding the three-cornered hat under his arm, bowing his gray, woolly head the most venerable and deferential of majordomos. His attendants, backing against the wall, grounded their halberds heavily at my approach. He stepped out to intercept me, and, with great discretion, "Señor, a word," he said in his subdued voice.
He is a hero-worshipper, and if you are a Tuan Besar great man he will double his attentions, and spread your fame far and wide among his brother majordomos. But a description of each member of the ménage and their duties would be in a large measure the description of the odd, complex life of the East.
It all belongs to you, and what convenient possessions! Keepers and majordomos are here to keep things in order, well dusted and intact; it is not even necessary to give orders; matters go on of themselves without jar or confusion, nobody giving himself the slightest concern; it is an ideal world such as it ought to be.
Nicholas ice-skating rink, to a thorough round of the theatres and to a miscellany of entertainments from small, staid dances to the great affairs that Gloria loved, held in those few houses where lackeys with powdered wigs scurried around in magnificent Anglomania under the direction of gigantic majordomos.
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