advancing procession sent the people before it, the trumpets rang high
and clear again, and the bright breastplates of the trumpeters gleamed
like dancing fire before the lofty standard that swayed with the slow
pace of its bearer's horse. Brighter and nearer came the colours, the
blazing armour, the standard, the gorgeous procession of victorious
men-at-arms; louder and louder blew the trumpets, higher and higher the
clouds were lifted from the lowering sun. Half the people of Madrid went
before, the rest flocked behind, all cheering or singing or shouting.
The stream of colour and light became a river, the river a flood, and in
the high tide of a young victor's glory Don John of Austria rode onward
to the palace gate. The mounted trumpeters parted to each side before
him, and the standard-bearer ranged his horse to the left, opposite the
banner of the King, which held the right, and Don John, on a grey Arab
mare, stood out alone at the head of his men, saluting his royal brother
with lowered sword and bent head. A final blast from the trumpets
sounded full and high, and again and again the shout of the great throng
went up like thunder and echoed from the palace walls, as King Philip,
in his balcony above the gate, returned the salute with his hand, and
bent a little forward over the stone railing.

Dolores de Mendoza forgot her father and all that he might say, and
stood at the open window, looking down. She had dreamed of this moment;
she had seen visions of it in the daytime; she had told herself again
and again what it would be, how it must be; but the reality was beyond
her dreams and her visions and her imaginings, for she had to the full
what few women have in any century, and what few have ever had in the
blush of maidenhood,--the sight of the man she loved, and who loved her
with all his heart, coming home in triumph from a hard-fought war,
himself the leader and the victor, himself in youth's first spring, the
young idol of a warlike nation, and the centre of military glory.