Leonardo's Swans Read Online Free PDF Page B

entertaining Beatrice, she sends her pet dwarf, Mathilda, to make Beatrice laugh by lifting up her skirts and chasing Beatrice’s greyhound puppy around the room, shooting little squirts of pee in his direction. Mathilda reports that Beatrice has laughed at no jokes, but cannot stifle her delight at this routine. “I ran after that little dog ’til I was bone dry and out of breath. The princess finally passed out on her bed, and the servants had to come in and clean so she wouldn’t have to wake up to the stink of piss, God bless her little soul.”
    Isabella has also become very devout in recent weeks, attending Mass daily, much to her mother’s happy surprise. She does not reveal the reason, but it is this: she gives thanks to God for the celestial secretary who arranged the schedules of all parties so that Francesco Gonzaga’s ambassador from Mantua arrived in the nick of time to save her from a betrothal to Ludovico, who would have humiliated her as he is doing to her sister.
    Isabella knows that Beatrice inquires daily whether their father has received correspondence from Ambassador Trotti in Milan. Finally, on one of the frigid, last days of January, Trotti returns from Milan, and asks for an immediate audience with the duke and his family.
    The family, minus the three little brothers, Alfonso, Ferrante, and Ippolito, who are already sent to bed, gather in the small drawing room that is easiest to warm to a crisp by its large fireplace. The ceiling is not so very high, and the room has an intimate feel, conducive for spilling gossip, for that was the main product that the Ferrarese ambassadors brought back from their missions.
    Trotti is as puffed up as a pig’s bladder with his news. Impatient to get through the small talk and the niceties, he turns to Duke Ercole. “Your Excellency, how I wish you had been there to see it! It was the most magnificent spectacle in the world. All of Italy is talking of it.”
    The family looks at him mutely.
    “So, you have not heard?”
    No one says a word. Ercole and Leonora, practiced at receiving the most devastating news without reaction, remain as inscrutable as ever while Isabella guesses that Trotti will announce some magnificent ceremony at which Ludovico has married his mistress after all. Beatrice anticipates his words like a poor starved dog waiting outside a tavern for scraps.
    “The Masque of the Planets? The Feast of Paradise?” Trotti looks at them as if their very knowledge of the Italian language is in question. “Don’t be surprised if you soon receive dozens of letters describing the wonders. It was the most magical, spectacular thing I have ever witnessed, and all designed by the painter and engineer Leonardo the Florentine. Picture this: a gigantic dome built under the ceiling of a great hall. All night long, there was music and dancing and processions of gigantic murals of Italy’s most glorious battles, from the days of the Romans all the way to the days of Ludovico’s father’s great victories for Milan. The scenes were so detailed and so gloriously violent, I felt as if I was thrown into the midst of battle.
    “Then, when the bells rang at midnight, Ludovico presented himself costumed as an Oriental pasha. I must say, he looked every bit the magician. He ordered the music stopped and the curtain to rise. Suddenly, all the foliage fell away from the dome, revealing it to be a replication of the sky itself. The entire sphere was gilded, a great golden universe, if you can fathom it. Live players representing all seven of the planets and the twelve signs of the zodiac began to orbit, exactly as they do in the sky! Everything was lit by dozens of torches. The players, each dressed according to character—Mars, Venus, Neptune, and the like—spun around the sky so many times it made us all dizzy. Then, one by one, they floated in front of the stage and delivered fine orations. They hung in the air, as if by magic! No one knows how it was done, but