United States or Monaco ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
The pair of bays engaged to tow the museum, and traps and wares from Field Hill to Corner Stone had been so upset by the eccentric conduct of a frenzied inebriate, who fled along the stone road in a woman's nightdress, being pursued by purely imaginary griffins, dodoes, unicorns and dragons, all in primary colours, that they wheeled and bolted with the whole caboodle, and running into a bridge railing upset Professor Thunder and Professor Thunder's Museum of Marvels into Billy's Creek, greatly to the detriment of the show, and to the serious discomfort of the Professor who was pulled from under Ammonia, the gorilla, just when that amusing animal had almost succeeded in stifling him in the slurry for which Billy's Creek was famous.
Colonel Sziszkinski eagerly expressed his willingness to join a party, and Lethbridge was altogether too keen a sportsman to let slip such an opportunity; but Mildmay seemed rather disposed to be lazy that morning, and linger with the ladies, while it soon became evident that the professor could not be satisfied with any game other than unicorns.
But the unicorns and lions took flight, the griffins spread their wings, the Sphinx fell asleep. There was no answer to her appeal. Behind the sepulchre the moon rose; it dropped a beam near by. There is light somewhere, it seemed to say; and in that telegram from Above, she thought of Rome. She remembered now, in Rome was Tiberius, and in him Revenge. She smiled at her own forgetfulness.
The next question was, would Mildmay be so very obliging as to go back to the ship and bring her to the spot where the fallen unicorns lay?
The effect of these scenes on his nerves was very severe; still he climbed on, and was much cheered at last by the sight of a primrose, the only familiar thing he had seen for hours, but it whistled and skipped away. He saw the unicorns in their secret valley.
In the great banqueting-hall of the ancient palace, whose cedarn-roof of magnificent timber-work, brought by crusading counts from the Holy Land, had rung with the echoes of many a gigantic revel in the days of chivalry an apartment one hundred and fifty feet long and forty feet high there had been arranged an elevated platform, with a splendid chair of state for the "absolute" governor, and with a great profusion of gilding and velvet tapestry, hangings, gilt emblems, complimentary devices, lions, unicorns, and other imposing appurtenances.
Sheikh Said Djinblat inquired of Lord Montacute whether there were hyenas in England, but was immediately answered by the lively and well-informed Kais Shehaab, who apprised him that there were only lions and unicorns.
Suddenly a sound like a low growling roar, closely followed by a shrill scream, came floating down to the hunters upon the wings of the almost stagnant breeze, and, springing hastily to their feet, they saw that a magnificent leopard had sprung upon the back of one of the hornless unicorns, and was tearing savagely at its neck and throat with its teeth and claws, the rest of the herd, with one exception, being in full flight.
Now its ancient walls, dating as far back as the year 900, had been freshly decorated with frescoes, and the long arcades and loggias, with their massive pillars and Byzantine capitals of grey marble, were enriched with shields carved with the unicorns and lilies of the house of Este.
They thought I was strange and that I was not worthy of the name of the unicorns. But I cannot help what I am. I yearn to see all that there is to see of this Land of Oz in which I live. And I wanted to find someone who could understand my philosophies, too. None of the stallions of my breed took me seriously, and I have never once felt true love. At least, not until I met MacDonald Lindsay."
Word Of The Day