Trumpets, however, sounded, and all rose from their seats, as up the
nave swept Queen Anne, her black mantilla descending over her fair
hair from a little diamond crown, her dress--white satin--with a huge
long blue velvet train worked with gold fleurs-de-lys, supported by
four pair of little pages in white satin. Most regal did she look,
leading by the hand the little Duke of Anjou; while the young King,
who was now old enough to form the climax of the procession, marched
next after in blue and gold, holding his plumed hat in his hand, and
bowing right and left with all his royal courtesy and grace, his
beautiful fair hair on his shoulders, shining with the sun. And
there was my little Marquis among the boys, who immediately followed
him in all his bright beauty and grace.
Most glorious was the High Mass that followed. Officer after officer
marched up and laid standard after standard before the Altar, heavy
with German blazonry, or with the red and gold stripes of Aragon, the
embattled castles of Castille, till they amounted to seventy-three.
It must have been strange to the Spanish Queen to rejoice over these
as they lay piled in a gorgeous heap before the high Altar, here and
there one dim with weather or stained with blood. The peals of the
Te Deum from a thousand voices were unspeakably magnificent, and yet
through them all it seemed to me that I heard the wail not only of
the multitudes of widowed wives and sonless parents, but of the poor
peasants of all the nation, crying aloud to Heaven for the bread
which they were forbidden to eat, when they had toiled for it in the
sweat of their brow.
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