now felt
the rebuke, though severe, was just. The silence enabled Gerard to treat
with the porter.

"I am a competitor, sir."

"What is your name?" and the man eyed him suspiciously.

"Gerard, the son of Elias."

The janitor inspected a slip of parchment he held in his hand:

"Gerard Eliassoen can enter."

"With my company, these two?"

"Nay; those are not your company they came before you."

"What matter? They are my friends, and without them I go not in."

"Stay without, then."

"That will I not."

"That we shall see."

"We will, and speedily." And with this, Gerard raised a voice of
astounding volume and power, and routed so that the whole street rang:

"Ho! PHILIP, EARL OF HOLLAND!"

"Are you mad?" cried the porter.

"HERE IS ONE OF YOUR VARLETS DEFIES YOU."

"Hush, hush!"

"AND WILL NOT LET YOUR GUESTS PASS IN."

"Hush! murder! The Dukes there. I'm dead," cried the janitor, quaking.

Then suddenly trying to overpower Gerard's thunder, he shouted, with all
his lungs:

"OPEN THE GATE, YE KNAVES! WAY THERE FOR GERARD ELIASSOEN AND HIS
COMPANY! (The fiends go with him!)"

The gate swung open as by magic. Eight soldiers lowered their pikes
halfway, and made an arch, under which the victorious three marched
in triumphant. The moment they had passed, the pikes clashed together
horizontally to bar the gateway, and all but pinned an abdominal citizen
that sought to wedge in along with them.

Once past the guarded portal, a few steps brought the trio upon a scene
of Oriental luxury. The courtyard was laid out in tables loaded with
rich meats and piled with gorgeous plate. Guests in rich and various
costumes sat beneath a leafy canopy of fresh-cut branches fastened
tastefully to golden, silver, and blue silken cords that traversed the
area; and fruits of many hues, including some artificial ones of gold,
silver, and wax, hung pendant, or peeped like fair eyes among the green
leaves of plane-trees and lime-trees. The Duke's minstrels swept their
lutes at intervals, and a fountain played red Burgundy in six jets that
met and battled in the air. The evening sun darted its fires through
those bright and purple wine spouts, making them jets and cascades of
molten rubies, then passing on, tinged with the blood of the grape,
shed crimson glories here and there on fair faces, snowy beards, velvet,
satin, jewelled hilts, glowing gold, gleaming silver, and sparkling
glass. Gerard and his friends stood dazz