Читать книгу The Legend of the Glorious Adventures of Tyl Ulenspiegel in the land of Flanders and elsewhere - Charles de Coster - Страница 3

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On his return from the wars, the Emperor wanted to know why his son Philip was not there to welcome him.

The Archbishop—the royal Governor—said that the child had refused to leave his solitude and the books which were the only things he loved.

The Emperor asked where he was to be found at the moment. The Governor did not know exactly, but said they had better go and look for him somewhere where it was dark. This they did.

When they had looked through a good number of rooms they came at last to a kind of closet, unpaved and lit only by a skylight. There they found a stake stuck into the ground, and a dear little monkey bound to the stake by a cord round the waist. (Now this monkey had been sent from the Indies as a present to His Highness to amuse him with its youthful gambols). … Round the bottom of the stake were some smoking sticks still glowing, and the closet was filled with a foul smell as of burning hair.

Philip and the Monkey

The poor animal had suffered so much pain while being burnt to death that its little body no longer looked the body of a living animal, but seemed rather like the fragment of some root, all wrinkled and distorted. And its mouth, still open with the death-cry, was filled with froth mixed with blood; and the face was wet with tears.

“Who has done this?” said the Emperor.

The Governor did not dare to answer, and the two men stood there silent, sad, and angry.

All at once, in the silence, there was heard a sound of feeble coughing that came from a corner in the shadow behind them. His Majesty turned and beheld Philip, his son, dressed all in black, sucking an orange.

“Don Philip,” he said, “come and greet your father.”

The child did not move, but gazed at his father with timid eyes that showed no spark of love.

“Is it you,” asked the Emperor, “who have burnt alive in the fire this little animal?”

The child bowed his head.

But the Emperor: “If you have been cruel enough to do such a deed, at least be brave enough to own up to it.”

The child made no answer.

His Majesty seized the orange from the child’s hands, threw it to the ground, and was about to beat his son, who was shaking with terror, when the Archbishop restrained him, whispering in his ear:

“The day will surely come when His Highness shall prove a mighty burner of heretics.” The Emperor smiled, and the two of them went away, leaving Philip alone with the monkey.

But others there were, not monkeys, that were destined to meet their death in the flames. …