"For oft at festes have I wel herd say,
That Tregetoures, within an halle large,
Have made come in a water and a barge,
And in the halle rowen up and doun.
Somtime hath semed come a grim leoun;
* * * * *
Somtime a Castel al of lime and ston,
And whan hem liketh, voideth it anon."
- The Franklin's Tale, II. 454.
Performances of this kind at Chinese festivities have already been spoken
of in note 9 to ch. lxi. of Book I. Shah Rukh's people, Odoric, Ysbrandt
Ides, etc., describe them also. The practice of introducing such
artistes into the dining-hall after dinner seems in that age to have
been usual also in Europe. See, for example, Wright's Domestic Manners,
pp. 165-166, and the Court of the Emperor Frederic II., in Kington's
Life of that prince, I. 470. (See also N. et E. XIV. 410; Cathay,
143; Ysb. Ides, p. 95.)
CHAPTER XIV.
CONCERNING THE GREAT FEAST HELD BY THE GRAND KAAN EVERY YEAR ON HIS
BIRTHDAY.
You must know that the Tartars keep high festival yearly on their
birthdays. And the Great Kaan was born on the 28th day of the September
moon, so on that day is held the greatest feast of the year at the Kaan's
Court, always excepting that which he holds on New Year's Day, of which
I shall tell you afterwards.[NOTE 1]
Now, on his birthday, the Great Kaan dresses in the best of his robes, all
wrought with beaten gold;[NOTE 2] and full 12,000 Barons and Knights on
that day come forth dressed in robes of the same colour, and precisely
like those of the Great Kaan, except that they are not so costly; but
still they are all of the same colour as his, and are also of silk and
gold.
