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Updated: May 2, 2025
Popes were there, with triple crown and keys, and fanned by peacock tails; scarlet-matted and caped cardinals, mitred and crosiered bishops, crowned and sceptred kings, ermined dukes, steel-clad knights, gowned lawyers, square-capped priests, cowled monks, and friars of every degree nay, the mechanic with his tools, the peasant with his spade, even the beggar within his dish; old men, and children of every age; and women too of all grades the tower-crowned queen, the beplumed dame, the lofty abbess, the veiled nun, the bourgeoise, the peasant, the beggar; all were there, moving in a strange shadowy wild dance, sometimes slow, sometimes swift and mad with gaiety, to the music of an unseen band of clashing kettle-drums, cymbals, and other instruments, that played fast and furiously; while above all a knell in the church tower rang forth at intervals a slow, deep, lugubrious note; and all the time there glided in and out through the ring a grisly being skull-headed, skeleton-boned, scythe in hand Death himself; and ever and anon, when the dance was swiftest, would he dart into the midst, pounce on one or other, holding an hour-glass to the face, unheeding rank, sex, or age, and bear his victim to the charnel-house beside the church.
The slight, agile, square-capped stryelki spun round until their full-plaited black tunics stood out from their tightly belted waists like the skirts of ballet dancers. The slender, graceful hussars, with their yellow-laced scarlet jackets and tight blue trousers, flitted to and fro like gay birds.
Nevertheless, in right of his age, his former reputation, and his sufferings, his place was full in the midst of the square-capped, black-robed ministers who sat herded on a sort of platform together, to address the Almighty and the congregation in prayers and discourses, interspersed with psalms sung by the whole assembly. There was no want of piety, depth, force, or fervour.
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