A pageant of a more elaborate description followed the next day. It began with a romantic prologue. A herald presented himself at Charles’s apartments in the castle, and having been led into the king’s presence, he related how, during a recent journey, he had fallen in with a gallant company of knights, who, unable to decide on the superiority of LOVE or VIRTUE, had agreed to refer the difference to the arbitration of his Majesty of France. A deputation from the supporters of each opinion was waiting below, desirous to plead their cause. The knights were admitted, they made their speeches; but the matter in dispute was so knotty that Charles declared it could only be settled by arms. A tournament was proclaimed, and all proceeded to the lists, the two queens taking their seats in a gallery hung with velvet. And now the pageant began. First came VIRTUE, seated on a rock, and attended by six nymphs. She wore an azure robe, and carried a lighted torch in her hand. After making the circuit of the arena, the car stopped before Queen Isabella, when VIRTUE, reciting some appropriate verses, presented her and each of her ladies with a massive gold chain. As soon as the goddess had retired, LOVE entered the lists in a chariot drawn by four piebald horses. He too halted before the Queen of Spain and sang some verses in praise of the joys and triumphs of love. The tournament now commenced, Charles maintaining the cause of VIRTUE, the Duke of Anjou that of LOVE. The two troops first engaged hand to hand, the king and his brother breaking a lance together. Then they divided into fours, until at last the _mêlée_ became general. At the end of about half an hour, the trumpets sounded, the combatants retired to their own side of the list, and Charles and the duke, riding forward, embraced each other, to show “that, VIRTUE and LOVE being brother and sister, the triumph of each was the glory of the other.” On another occasion, Isabella was entertained at a rural _fête_, where the collation was spread under the leafy branches of an oak-tree, from whose root issued a fountain, the construction of which cost a sum equivalent to £400 sterling. Another day the pageant took the singular form of a whale fishery. A turtle, on which sat six Tritons, floated down the Adour; then came Neptune in a car drawn by sea-horses, with Arion on a dolphin. When the company landed, there followed a pastoral ballet, in which the dancing of the French ladies and gentlemen so delighted the Spaniards that it was repeated again and again until midnight.[363]