Free The Legacy of Grazia dei Rossi by Jacqueline Park Page A

mosque. And, yes, I take my Torah with me to the stables and read to him. I do not believe it matters to God where or with whom we do our study. Do you have thoughts on this?
Your most respectful son,
Danilo del Medigo
P.S. As you warned me, the discipline is strict, even harsh. But there are no picky quarrels or tattle-telling between us in this school, only friendship and loyalty, because we stand or fall as a team.
I thank you every day for allowing me to be here and I thank God every day for bestowing on me such good fortune.

6
    A WISH COME TRUE
    Strict? Harsh? In writing about the School for Pages to his masters in the Venetian Senate, their bailo reported that discipline was enforced with an austerity and a relentlessness that rivaled a Capuchin monastery. For Danilo del Medigo, it represented a way of life unlike any other he had ever known. Having lived through the sack of Rome, he was no stranger to violence and cruelty. And certainly his residence in Topkapi, where every event unfolded with scrupulous obedience to protocol, had acquainted him with the formality of the Oriental style. But the impersonal, calculated punishment meted out by the school’s eunuch overseers stationed night and day on the balcony overlooking his dormitory was something new in his experience. Monitored by the eunuchs for their behavior, by teachers for their academic performance, and by a mullah for their religious observance, the young pages were constantly subject to severe punishments for the slightest infringement — lateness, dirty shoes, a misspelled word, a whisper during prayers.
    One hour before dawn, the sleeping pages were summoned by three strikes of a gong suspended from the ceiling of their dormitory. Half an hour later the Chief Aga came around to inspect their beds. Any page discovered still in his bed was pulled out and scolded. Always an early riser, Danilo did not find this onerous. But when one of his mates overslept for the third time and was punished with ten strokes of the bastinado that crippled him for a week, the screams of the offender when the cane cut into the soles of his feet seemed to bite into Danilo’s own flesh as well.
    The routine was unvarying. Lessons began at sun-up. At four hours after sunrise, the first meal was served, consisting of boiled mutton without sauce, a thin loaf of bread and a bowl of cheese, lentil or cream soup thickened with rice, honey, and saffron or currants. No salad, no sherbet, no melons, and no variation except for the currants.
    Next came school work and athletic training followed by the second meal — the same monotonous repast as the first, day after day. With his already healthy appetite stimulated by daily bouts of physical exercise, Danilo would have been ready to gobble down the thinnest shepherd’s gruel had it been the only dish on offer. But most of the pages — some more picky, others hungrier — complained bitterly about the food.
    At sunset, prayers were attended in the mosque — from which the Jewish page was excused — followed by a quiet hour of Koran study and ablutions. The presiding eunuch announced bedtime by striking a cane on the floor. Lights out. No talking. In the morning while the pages were at the mosque, the caregivers searched through their trunks for groceries and love letters.
    This regimen was followed six days a week, punctuated by the mandatory five prayer breaks each day. The only deviation was a serving of pilafat the second meal every Thursday.
    But twice a year two official Bayram festivals were celebrated: the Bayram of sacrifice that marks the sacrifice of Isaac and the Bayram of sweets at the end of Ramadan. On these two occasions, the pages dressed up in their finest clothes and attended a baisemain held by the Sultan where they kissed the hem of his garment and, with his blessing, received his permission to spend the next four days pleasuring themselves day and night.
    Uninhibited by any thought of rules or punishment during