IT
WAS late afternoon and the place looked
sublime, as the reddish sun-rays slipped through the window panes
falling on the various carved figures that filled the room,
invigorating their lifelike quality. Among the innumerable little
wooden wonders one could easily distinguish a few larger ones; a bear
standing on hind legs with its fangs exposed, a pack of African
elephants carved along a huge oak limb, a brown falcon majestically
spreading its wings, and a chessboard carved on the stump of a large
tree rooted in the middle of the room, with the figurines resembling
exotic animals; the king a lion, the queen a cheetah, the bishop a
buffalo, the knight a rhinoceros, the rook an elephant, and the pawns
resembled monkeys, all unique in posture and grimace.
