The air was heavy with the scented odour of this
light, and the fumes of the narcotic _cannabis sativa_--the base of the
_bhang_ of the Mohammedans--in which I knew it to be the habit of my
friend to assuage himself. The hangings were of wine-coloured velvet,
heavy, gold-fringed and embroidered at Nurshedabad. All the world knew
Prince Zaleski to be a consummate _cognoscente_--a profound amateur--as
well as a savant and a thinker; but I was, nevertheless, astounded at
the mere multitudinousness of the curios he had contrived to crowd into
the space around him. Side by side rested a palaeolithic implement, a
Chinese 'wise man,' a Gnostic gem, an amphora of Graeco-Etruscan work.
The general effect was a _bizarrerie_ of half-weird sheen and gloom.
Flemish sepulchral brasses companied strangely with runic tablets,
miniature paintings, a winged bull, Tamil scriptures on lacquered
leaves of the talipot, mediaeval reliquaries richly gemmed, Brahmin
gods. One whole side of the room was occupied by an organ whose thunder
in that circumscribed place must have set all these relics of dead
epochs clashing and jingling in fantastic dances. As I entered, the
vaporous atmosphere was palpitating to the low, liquid tinkling of an
invisible musical box.
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