mir of Tadmor. Curtains were looped on either side. Above were
panels; they separated, and flowers fell. On a little stool next to the
couch on which the emir lay was a beautiful boy with curly hair. The couch
of the procurator was covered with a dim Babylonian shawl. That of the
tetrarch was of ivory incrusted with gold. All three were cushioned.

As the guests entered they were sprinkled with perfume. Throughout the
length of the hall other tables extended, and at these they found seats
and food: Syrian radishes, melons from the oases near the Oxus, white
olives from Bethany, honey from Capharnahum, and the little onions of
Ascalon. There were candelabra everywhere, liquids cooled with snow,
cheeses big as millstones, chunks of fat in wooden bowls, and behind the
tables, slaves with copper platters. On the platters were quarters of red
beef, breams swimming in grease, and sunbirds with their plumage on. In
the semicircular gallery musicians played, three notes, constantly
repeated.

The tetrarch's table was spread with a cloth of byssus striped with
Laconian green. On it were jars of murrha filled with balsam, Sidonian
goblets of colored glass, jasper amphorae, and water-melons from Egypt.
Before the procurator was a dish of oysters, lampreys, and boned barbels,
mixed well together, flavored with cinnamon and assafoetida; mashed
grasshoppers baked in saffron; and a roasted boar, the legs curled inward,
the eyes half-closed. The emir ate abundantly of heron's eggs whipped with
wine into an amber foam. When his fingers were soiled, he wiped them in
the curls of the beautiful boy who sat near by.

The smell of food filled the hall, mounted to the roof. The atmosphere was
that of a bath, and the wines were heady. Already discussions had arisen.
A mountaineer and a Galilean skiffsman had been dragged away, the one
senseless, the other with features indistinguishable and masked in blood.
It was a great festival, and the tetrarch was entertaining, as only he
could, his friends, his enemies, and whoever chanced that way.

"As a child he rubbed his body with the leaves of the cnyza, which is a
preservative of chastity." It was a little man with restless eyes and a
very long white beard detailing the virtues of Iohanan. "But," he added,
"he must have found cold water better."

His neighbors laughed. One pounded the table.

"Jeshua--" he began, but everyone was talking at once.

"Jeshua--" he continued; yet, as no one woul