Lights were being brought in and a new company were entering.

They talked in high-pitched affected voices and giggled like bona-robas.

There were young men with them, dressed in the height of the fashion; a woman or two, and a man who from the richness of his dress seemed to be one of the princely merchants who played Maecenas to the New Learning.

But what caught Philip's sight was a little group of Byzantines who were the guests of honour.

They wore fantastic headdresses and long female robes, above which their flowing dyed beards and their painted eyebrows looked like masks of Carnival time.