"Howard Waldrop - The Ugly Chickens" - читать интересную книгу автора (Waldrop Howard)

from R├йunion, comes from its place under the table and joins the circle
with the others.

It is most graceful of all, making complete turns where the others only
sway and dip on the edge of the circle they have formed.

The music rises in volume; the first violinist sees the dodos and nods to
the King. But he and the others at the table have already seen. They are
silent, transfixed-even the servants stand still, bowls, pots and, kettles
in their hands forgotten.

Around the dodos dance with bobs and weaves of their ugly heads. The
white dodo dips, takes half a step, pirouettes on one foot, circles again.

Without a word the King of Holland takes the hand of the Queen, and
they come around the table, children before the spectacle. They join in
the dance, waltzing (anachronism) among the dodos while the family,
the guests, the soldiers watch and nod in time with the music.



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Then the vision fades, and the afterimage of a flickering fireplace and a
dodo remains.




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The dodo and its kindred came by ships to the ports of civilized men.
The first we have record of is that of Captain van Neck who brought
back two in 1599-one for the King of Holland, and one which found its
way through Cologne to the menagerie of Emperor Rudolf II.

This royal aviary was at Schloss Neugebau, near Vienna. It was here
the first paintings of the dumb old birds were done by Georg and his
son Jacob Hoefnagel, between 1602 and 1610. They painted it among
more than ninety species of birds which kept the Emperor amused.

Another Dutch artist named Roelandt Savery, as someone said, "made a
career out of the dodo." He drew and painted them many times, and
was no doubt personally fascinated by them. Obsessed, even. Early on,
the paintings are consistent; the later ones have inaccuracies. This
implies he worked from life first, then from memory as his model went
to that place soon to be reserved for all its species. One of his drawings
has two of the Raphidae scrambling for some goodie on the ground. His