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The Book of Ser Marco Polo : vol.2 |
CHAP. LXX II. THE GREAT CITY OF KINSAY
207
gold, with a profusion of precious stones ; for they tried
to outdo each other in the splendour and richness of their
appointments. Behind this great Pavilion that faced the
great gate, there was a wall with a passage in it shutting
off the inner part of the Palace. On entering this you
found another great edifice in the form of a cloister
surrounded by a portico with columns, from which
opened a variety of apartments for the King and the
Queen, adorned like the outer walls with such elaborate
work as we have mentioned. From the cloister again
you passed into a covered corridor, six paces in width, of
great length, and extending to the margin of the lake.
On either side of this corridor were ten courts, in the form
of oblong cloisters surrounded by colonnades ; and in each
cloister or court were fifty chambers with gardens to each.
In these chambers were quartered one thousand young
ladies in the service of the King. The King would
sometimes go with the Queen and some of these maidens
to take his diversion on the Lake, or to visit the Idol-
temples, in boats all canopied with silk.
The other two parts of the enclosure were distributed
in groves, and lakes, and charming gardens planted with
fruit-trees, and preserves for all sorts of animals, such as
roe, red-deer, fallow-deer, hares, and rabbits. Here the
King used to take his pleasure in company with those
damsels of his ; some in carriages, some on horseback,
whilst no man was permitted to enter. Sometimes the
King would set the girls a-coursing after the game with
dogs, and when they were tired they would hie to the
groves that overhung the lakes, and leaving their clothes
there they would come forth naked and enter the water
and swim about hither and thither, whilst it was the
King's delight to watch them ; and then all would return
home. Sometimes the King would. have his dinner
carried to those groves, which were dense with lofty trees,
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