laughed; a Dresden mirror was tripping about, crowned with
flowers, and a Japanese bonze was riding along on a griffin; a
slim Venetian rapier had come to blows with a stout Ferrara sabre,
all about a little pale-faced chit of a damsel in white
Nymphenburg china; and a portly Franconian pitcher in gres gris
was calling aloud, "Oh, these Italians! always at feud!" But
nobody listened to him at all. A great number of little Dresden
cups and saucers were all skipping and waltzing; the teapots, with
their broad round faces, were spinning their own lids like
teetotums; the high-backed gilded chairs were having a game of
cards together; and a little Saxe poodle, with a blue ribbon at
its throat, was running from one to another, whilst a yellow cat
of Cornelis Lachtleven's rode about on a Delft horse in blue
pottery of 1489. Meanwhile the brilliant light shed on the scene
came from three silver candelabra, though they had no candles set
up in them; and, what is the greatest miracle of all, August
looked on at these mad freaks and felt no sensation of wonder! He
only, as he heard the violin and the spinnet playing, felt an
irresistible desire to dance too. No doubt his face said what he
wished; for a lovely little lady, all in pink and gold and white,
with powdered hair, and high-heeled shoes, and all made of the
very finest and fairest Meissen china, tripped up to him, and
smiled, and gave him her hand, and led him out to a minuet. And he
danced it perfectly--poor little August in his thick, clumsy
shoes, and his thick, clumsy sheepskin jacket, and his rough
homespun linen, and his broad Tyrolean hat! He must have danced it
perfectly, this dance of kings and queens in days when crowns were
duly honored, for the lovely lady always smiled benignly and never
scolded him at all, and danced so divinely herself to the stately
measures the spinnet was playing that August could not take his