Lord Frederick Leighton Leighton Idyll

Lord Frederick Leighton Leighton IdyllLord Frederick Leighton The Painter's HoneymoonLord Frederick Leighton Leighton Mother and ChildLord Frederick Leighton Leighton Music Lesson
Dibbler peered at the down forgotten walls.
He walked down several narrow flights of steps and along a passage to a door, which he unlocked. It swung back on well-oiled hinges.
It was not, exactly, a dungeon; the room on the other side was quite airy and well lit by several large but high windows. It had a smell of wood shavings and glue.
'Look out!'
The Patrician ducked.broken remains of the cart. His lips moved as he calculated.'Here!' he shouted. 'You owe – hey, you owe me for three rats!' Lord Vetinari had felt slightly ashamed when he watched the door close behind Captain Vimes. He couldn't work out why. Of course, it was hard on the man, but it was the only way . . .He took a key from a cabinet by his desk and walked over to the wall. His hands touched a mark on the plaster that was apparently no different from a dozen other marks, but this one caused a section of wall to swing aside on well-oiled hinges.No-one knew all the passages and tunnels hidden in the walls of the Palace; it was said that some of them went a lot further than that. And there were any amount of old cellars under the city. A man with a pick-axe and a sense of direction could go where he liked just by knocking

Marc Chagall The Concert

Marc Chagall The ConcertPaul Gauguin When Will You MarryPaul Gauguin What Are You JealousPaul Gauguin Two Tahitian Women
the weight of all them rhinestones.'
'I expect it was.'
'They let me do pretty much as I like,' said Gaspode.
'I can see that.'
'Sometimes I don't go home for, oh, days at a time.'
'Right?'
'Weeks, sometimes.'
'Sure.'
'But Gaspode whimpered a little.
'You want to be careful, you know. A young bitch like you can meet real trouble in this dog's city.'
They had reached the wooden jetty behind Hammer-hock's workshop.
'How d'you—' Angua paused.
There was a mixture of smells here, but the overpowering one was as sharp as a saw.
'Fireworks?'they're always so glad to see me when I do,' said Gaspode.'I thought you said you slept up at the University,' said Angua, as they dodged a cart in Rime Street.For a moment Gaspode smelled uncertain, but he recovered magnificently.'Yeah, right,' he said. 'We-ell, you know how it is, families . . . All them kids picking you up, giving you biscuits and similar, people pattin' you the whole time. Gets on yer nerves. So I sleeps up there quite often.''Right.''More often than not, point of fact.''Really?'

Rene Magritte Homesickness

Rene Magritte HomesicknessArthur Hughes PhyllisFranz Marc Zwei KatzenFranz Marc yellow cow
brass plaque beside the gates said: The Ankh-Morpork Sunshine Sanctuary for Sick Dragons.
There was a small and hollow and pathetic dragon made out of papier-mache and holding a collection box, chained very heavily to the But they'd been thrown together like twigs in a whirlpool, and had yielded to the inevitable . . .
When he was a little boy, Sam Vimes had thought that the very rich ate off gold plates and lived in marble houses.
He'd learned something new: the very very rich could afford to be poor. Sybil Ramkin lived in the kind of poverty that was only available to the very rich, a poverty approached from the other side. Women who were merely well-off saved up and bought wall, and bearing the sign: Don't Let My Flame Go Out.This was where Lady Sybil Ramkin spent most of her days.She was, Vimes had been told, the richest woman in Ankh-Morpork. In fact she was richer than all the other women in Ankh-Morpork rolled, if that were possible, into one.It was going to be a strange wedding, people said. Vimes treated his social superiors with barely concealed distaste, because the women made his head ache and the men made his fists itch. And Sybil Ramkin was the last survivor of one of the oldest families in Ankh.

George Frederick Watts Charity

George Frederick Watts CharityFrancisco de Goya Nude MajaFrancisco de Goya Clothed MajaEdgar Degas The Rehearsal
Magrat down. “I won’t say she wasn’t good. But she wasn’t
good enough. And you certainly aren’t.”
Slowly and inexorably, Magrat was forced downward.
“Why don’t Queen’s face
was level with hers, “you’re nothing. It’s all in the mind,
isn’t it? Without the glamour, you’re—“
l an almost triangular face, a tiny mouth, the nose hard-ly existing at all, but eyes larger than human eyes and now focused on Magrat in pinpoint terror.

“Iron,” whispered the Queen. Her hands gripped Magrat’s arms. There was no strength there. An elfs strength lay in persuading others they were weak.
Magrat could feel her desperately trying to enter her mind, but it wasn’t working. The helmet—
l was lying several feet away, in the mud.you try some magic?” said the Queen.Magrat kicked. Her foot caught the Queen on the knee,and she heard a crack. As she staggered back Magratlaunched herself forward and caught her around the waist,bearing her to the ground.She was amazed at the lightness. Magrat was skinnyenough, but the Queen seemed to have no weight at all.“Why,” she said, pulling herself up until the

Edmund Blair Leighton Stitching the Standard

Edmund Blair Leighton Stitching the StandardFrancois Boucher Nude on a SofaFrank Dicksee La Belle Dame Sans MerciBenjamin Williams Leader The Last Gleam, Wargrave on Thames
various terrified daughters-in-law.
“It must be especially lonely at night,” said Casanunda, out of habit as much as anything else.
“Well, there’s . But wasps
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were adept at finding the odd chink in the woodwork around the back somewhere and the sleek little devils’d be in and robbing the hive before you knew it. Funny. The bees in the hive’d let them do it, too. They guarded the entrance, but if a wasp found another way in, they didn’t know what to do.
He gave the plunger a push. A stream of liquid bubbled out and left a smoking streak on the floor.Greebo,” said Nanny “He keeps my feet warm.”“Greebo—““The cat. I say, do you think there’s any pudding?”Later, she asked for a doggy bottle.Mr. Brooks the beekeeper ladled some greenish, foul-smelling liquid out of the saucepan that was always simmer-ing in his secret hut, and filled his squirter.There was a wasps’ nest in the garden wall. It’d be a mortuary by morning.That was the thing about bees. They always guarded theentrance to the hive, with their lives if necessary

Mark Spain Dance I

Mark Spain Dance IMark Spain Crescendo IIMark Spain Crescendo I
Being Queen? It’s all tapestry and walking around in unsuitable dresses! I know Granny. She doesn’t like anything that’s . .. that’s got style and grace. She’s so sour.”
“I daresay she’s got her reasons,” said Nanny amiably. “Well, that’s got the girl patched up. What shall we do with her now?”
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Terry Pratchett
“We’ve got dozens of spare bedrooms,” said Magrat, “and they’re all ready for the guests. We can put her in one of them. Um. Nanny?”
“Yes?”.
The cook here isn’t much good at canapes and things.”
Nanny looked carefully at the ceiling.
“And what about after that?” she said. “If you catch my meaning.”
“I’m getting a lot of girls in to do the clearing up. Look, don’t worry. I’ve thought “Would you like to be a bridesmaid?”“Not really, dear. Bit old for that sort of thing.” Nanny hovered. “There isn’t anything you need to ask me, though, is there?”“What do you mean?”“What with your mum being dead and you having no female relatives and everything...”Magrat still looked puzzled.“After the wedding, is what I’m hinting about,” said Nanny.“Oh, that. No, most of that’s being done by a caterer

Mark Spain Reflection

Mark Spain ReflectionMark Spain Pure EleganceMark Spain Only You
happens then is, the two queens—that’s the old queen,
right? and the new queen—the two queens start astalkin’
one another among the combs, with the rain adrummin’ on
the roof of the hive, and the business of the hive agoin’ on
all around them,” Mr. Brooks moved his hands graphically,
and Magrat the look of beehives, up until now.
“Many’s the time I’ve found a dead queen in front of the hive after a spell of wet weather,” said Mr. Brooks, happily. “Can’t abide another queen around the place, you know. And it’s a right old battle, too. The old queen’s more cun-nin’. But the new queen, she’s really got everything to fight for.”
“Sorry?”
“If she wants to be mated.”leaned forward, “all among the combs, thedrones all hummin’, and all the time they can sense oneanother, ‘cos they can tell, see, and then they spots oneanother and—““Yes? Yes?” said Magrat, leaning forward.“Slash! Stab!”Magrat hit her head on the wall of the hut.“Can’t have more’n one queen in a hive,” said Mr.Brooks calmly.Magrat looked out at the hives. She’d always liked

Cao Yong Freedom

Cao Yong FreedomCao Yong Day of LoveCao Yong COOL WATER
this the same consideration as would a nuclear physicist who’d just been told that someone was bang-ing two bits of sub-critical uranium together to keep warm.
“They never,” she said.
“They have. And another thing ...”
It was hard to imagine what other thing there could be, but Nanny Ogg said “Yes?” anyway.
“Not that many wizards were aware of this. For roost of the wizards of Unseen University their lunch was the first meal of the day. They were not, by and large, breakfast people. The Archchancellor and the Librarian were the only two who knew what the dawn looked like from the front, and they tended to have the entire campus to themselves for several hours.
The Librarian was always up early because he was an orang-utan, and they are naturally early risers, although in his case he didn’t bellow a few times to keep other males off his territory. He just unlocked the Library Someone got killed up here.”“ “Oh, no,” moaned Nanny Ogg. “Not inside the circle too.”“Nope. Don’t be daft. It was outside. A tall man. He had one leg longer’n the other. And a beard. He was probably Terry Pratchett“How’d you know all that?”“I just trod on ‘im.”The sun rose through the mists.The morning rays were already caressing the ancient stones of Unseen University, premier college of wizardry, five hun-dred miles away.

Claude Monet Monet Spring Flowers

Claude Monet Monet Spring FlowersClaude Monet The Red Boats ArgenteuilClaude Monet Poplars on the Epte
remembered Didactylos saying the world was a funny place. And, he thought distantly, it really was. Here people were about to roast someone to death, but they'd left his loin-cloth on, out of respectability. You had to laugh. Otherwise you'd go mad.
"You know," he said, turning to Simony. "Now I know Vorbis is evil. He burned my city. Well, the Tsorteans do it sometimes, and weI'm sure of-maybe four hundred on our side. So I give the signal and a few hundred of us attack thousands of them? And he dies anyway and we die too? What difference does that make?"
Urn's face was gray with horror now.
"You mean you don't know?" he said.
Some of the crowd looked round curiously at him.
"You don't know?" he said. burn theirs. It's just war. It's all part of history. And he lies and cheats and claws power for himself, and lots of people do that, too. But do you know what's special? Do you know what it is?""Of course," said Simony. "It's what he's doing to-”"It's what he's done to you.""What?""He turns other people into copies of himself."Simony's grip was like a vice. "You're saying I'm like him?""Once you said you'd cut him down," said Urn. "Now you're thinking like him . . ."So we rush them, then?" said Simony. "

Joseph Mallord William Turner The Slave Ship

Joseph Mallord William Turner The Slave ShipJoseph Mallord William Turner The fighting Temeraire tugged to her last berth to be broken upJoseph Mallord William Turner The Burning of the Houses of Parliament
Brutha awoke with the smell of the sea in his nostrils. At least it was what people think of as the smell of the sea, which is the stink of antique fish and rotten seaweed.
He was in someplace inside our head? What did you go and do that for?"
"I . . . don't know. It seemed like . . . the next thing to do. Where are you?"
"Your soldier friend has got me in his pack. Thanks for looking after me so carefully, by the way."
Brutha managed to get to his feet. The world revolved round him for a moment, adding a third astronomical theory to the two currently occupying the minds of local thinkers. sort of shed. Such light as managed to come through its one unglazed window was red, and flickered. One end of the shed was open to the water. The ruddy light showed a few figures clustered around something there.Brutha gently probed the contents of his memory. Everything seemed to be there, the Library scrolls neatly arranged. The words were as meaningless to him as any other written word, but the pictures were interesting. More interesting than most things in his memory, anyway.He sat up, carefully."You're awake, then," said the voice of Om, in his head. "Feel a bit full, do we? Feel a bit like a stack of shelves? Feel like we've got big notices saying "SILENCIOS!" all over the

Frederic Edwin Church Twilight in the Wilderness

Frederic Edwin Church Twilight in the WildernessJulius LeBlanc Stewart At HomeTitian Sacred and Profane Love
desert. After death, a desert. The desert. No hells, yet. Perhaps there was hope.
He remembered a story from his childhood. Unusually, it wasn't about smiting. No one was trampled underfoot. It wasn't about Om, dreadful in His rage. It was worse. It was about what happened when you died . . . the journey of your soul.
They said: you must walk a desert . . .
"Where is this place?" he said hoarsely.
THIS IS AND NOW, IF YOU WILL EXCUSE ME-
Fri'it took a deep breath, purely out of habit. Perhaps he could find a couple of rocks out there. A small rock to hold and a big rock to hide behind, while he waited for Vorbis . . .
And that thought was habit, too. Revenge? Here?
He smiled.NO PLACE, said Death .. . . all alone . . ."What is at the end of the desert?"JUDGEMENT .. . . with your beliefs . . .Fri'it stared at the endless, featureless expanse."I have to walk it alone?" he whispered. "But . . . now, I'm not sure what I believe-”YES?

Joseph Mallord William Turner Rain, Steam and Speed - The Great Western Railway

Joseph Mallord William Turner Rain, Steam and Speed - The Great Western RailwayGustave Courbet MarineGustave Courbet Woman with a Parrot
many talking tortoises have you met?" it said sarcastically.
"I don't know," said Brutha.
"What "Novice, not priest. They won't let me-”
"Get him!"
"But I don't think the Cenobiarch ever comes into our vegetable garden," said Brutha. "I don't think he even knows what a melon is. "
"I'm not bothered about that," said the tortoise. "Fetch him now, or there d'you mean, you don't know?""Well, they might all talk," said Brutha conscientiously, demonstrating the very personal kind of logic that got him Extra Melons. "They just might not say anything when I'm there.""I am the Great God Om," said the tortoise, in a menacing and unavoidably low voice, "and before very long you are going to be a very unfortunate priest. Go and get him.""Novice," said Brutha."What?"

Lord Frederick Leighton Wedded

Lord Frederick Leighton WeddedLord Frederick Leighton The Fisherman and the SyrenJean Auguste Dominique Ingres Perseus and Andromeda
thinking philosophers because it did not explain, among other things, signposts. After years of wrangling the whole thing was then turned over to Ly Tin Wheedle, arguably the Disc's greatest philosopher[22], who after some Well, everything, for a start. It was unthinkable that the Library should be burned. It was the largest accumulation of magic on the Disc. It underpinned wizardry. Every spell ever used was written down in it somewhere. Burning them was, was, was ...
There weren't any ashes. Plenty of wood ashes, lots of chains, lots of blackened stone, lots of mess. But thousands of books don't burn easily. They would leave bits of cover and piles of feathery ash. And there wasn't any.thought proclaimed that although it was indeed true that all places were one place, that place was very large.And so psychic order was restored. Distance is, however, an entirely subjective phenomenon and creatures of magic can adjust it to suit themselves.They are not necessarily very good at it. Rincewind sat dejectedly in the blackened ruins of the Library, trying to put his finger on what was wrong with them.

Andrea Mantegna Adoration of the Shepherds

Andrea Mantegna Adoration of the ShepherdsAndrea Mantegna Adoration of the MagiThomas Moran Entrance to the Grand Canal, Venice
'I mean, I wouldn't like to cause offence.'
Well?'
'It's just that I can't help noticing-’
'Hmmm?'
'You have this certain way with strangers.' Rincewind ducked, but nothing happened.
What are you doing down there?' said Conina, testily.
,Sorry.,a father,' she added. 'Even you, I imagine.'
She peered around a corner.
'All clear. Come on,' she said, and then when they were striding along the damp cobbles she 'I know what you're thinking. I can't help it, I take after my father.'Who was he, then? Cohen the Barbarian?' Rincewind grinned to show it was a joke. At least, his lips moved in a desperate crescent.'No need to laugh about it, wizard.''What?''It's not my fault.'Rincewind's lips moved soundlessly. 'Sorry,' he said. 'Have I got this right? Your father really is Cohen the Barbarian?''Yes.' The girl scowled at Rincewind. 'Everyone has to have 'I shouldn't think so,' said Rincewind. 'Wizardry isn't allowed to run in families

Alphonse Maria Mucha Morning Star

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low priest threw down his cards.
‘Double Onion’ he said.
The High Priest looked down suspiciously.
The low priest consulted a scrap of paper.
‘That’s three hundred thousand, nine hundred and sixty-four pebbles you owe me,’ he said.
There was the sound of footsteps.
The priests exchanged glances.
‘Haven’t had one for poisoned dart alley for quite some time,’ said the High Priest.
‘Five says he makes it,’ said the low priest.
‘You’re on.’
There was a faint clatter of metal points on stone.
‘It’s ‘Hey,’ said the one who was not High. ‘You don’t think it could be -‘ ‘Here? Oh, come on. We’re in the middle of a godsdamn jungle.’ The High Priest tried to smile. ‘There’s no way it could be -‘ The footsteps got nearer.a shame to take your pebbles.’There were footsteps again.‘All right, but there’s still the -‘ a creak, a splash ‘ - the crocodile tank.’There were footsteps.‘No-one’s ever got past the dreaded guardian of the portals -‘ The priests looked into one another’s horrified faces.
The priests clutched at one another in terror.

Caravaggio Sleeping Cupid

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Still fast asleep,’ she said.
Carey’s Fire,’ said Miss Flitworth. ‘It’s an omen.’
AN OMEN OF WHAT?
‘What? Oh, don’t ask me. Just an omen, I suppose. Just basic omenery.
Where are we going?’
INTO THE TOWN.
‘To be near the scythe?’
YES.
He disappeared into the barn. After a while he came out leading Binky, saddled and harnessed. He mounted up, then leaned down and pulled both her and the sleeping child on to the horse in front of him. IF I’M WRONG, he added, THIS HORSE WILL TAKTHAT’S NOT SLEEP.The rain had stopped, but the storm still marched around the hills. The air sizzled, still seemed oven-hot.Bill Door led the way past the henhouse, where Cyril and his elderly harem were crouched back in the darkness, all trying to occupy the same few inches of perch.There was a pale green glow hovering around the farmhouse chimney.‘We call that Mother E YOU WHEREVER YOU WANT

John William Waterhouse Hylas and the Nymphs

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knocking. ‘I know you’re in there,’ came the voice of Windle Poons.’You must let us in. It’s vitally important.’
‘Oook.’
‘You won’t open the doors?’
‘Oook!’
‘Then you a noticeable effect on a person’s rate of progress, but Windle wore him like a collar.
‘I think we need Ancient History,’ he said. ‘I wonder, could you stop trying to twist my head off?’
The Librarian looked around wildly. It was a technique that normally never failed.
Then his nostrils flared.
The Librarian hadn’t always been an ape. A magical library is a dangerous leave me no choice . . .’Ancient blocks of masonry moved aside slowly.Mortar crumbled. Then part of the wall fell in, leaving Windle Poons standing in a Windle Poons-shaped hole. He coughed on the dust. ‘I hate having to do that,’ he said. ‘I can’t help feeling it’s pandering to popular prejudice.’The Librarian landed on his shoulders. To the orangutan’s surprise, this made very little difference.A 300-pound orangutan usually had

Georges Seurat Le Chahut

Georges Seurat Le ChahutWilliam Blake NebuchadnezzarWilliam Blake Jacob's Ladder
That man is a skelington,’ and had turned to see a small child in a nightdress watching him over the top of the bar, without terror but with a sort of fascinated horror.
The in their senses, which they filled in some- where inside their heads with something they preferred to encounter. But the adults’ inability to see him clearly wasn’t proof against this sort of insistent declaration, and he could feel the puzzlement around him. Then, just in time, its mother had come in from the back room and had taken the child away. There’d been muffled complaints on the lines of ‘ - a skelington, with all bones on -‘ disappearing around the bend in the stairs. And all the time the ancient clock over the fireplace had been ticking, ticking, chopping seconds off his life. There’d seemed so many of them, not long ago . . .
landlord, who by now Bill Door knew to be called Lifton, had laughed nervously and apologised.‘That’s just her fancy,’ he said.’The things children say, eh? Get on with you back to bed, Sal. And say you’re sorry to Mr Door.’ ‘He’s a skelington with clothes on,’ said the child.’Why doesn’t all the drink fall through?’He’d almost panicked. His intrinsic powers were fading, then. People could not normally see him - he occupied a blind spot
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Pino DANCING IN BARCELONA

Pino DANCING IN BARCELONAPino close to my heartUnknown Artist Albert Edelfelt VirginieUnknown Artist Albert Edelfelt male nude 1George Stubbs Lion Devouring a Horse
there is any more of this,’ growled Ridcully, ‘anymore at all, d’you hear, I shall get very angry!’
He was dropped to the floor at the same time as the big doors opened. One of the college porters bustled in, curiously around the hall. The students were all cowering down the far end. Splashed food covered most of the walls to ceiling height. Bits of furniture lay around the wreckage of the chandelier like trees around ground zero of a meteor strike. Then he spoke with all the distaste of someone whose own further education had stopped at age nine, but who’d heard stories . . . ‘Indulging in a bit of youthful high spirits, were we?’ he said.’Throwin’ a few bread rolls around, that kind of thing?’
‘May I ask the meaning of this intrusion?’ said Ridcully, coldly.
The guard captain leaned on his spear.followed by a squad of the Patrician’s palace guard.The guard captain looked the Archchancellor up and down with the expression of one to whom theword ‘civilian’ is pronounced in the same general tones as ‘cockroach’.‘You the head chap?’ he said.The Archchancellor smoothed his robe and tried to straighten his beard.‘I am the Archchancellor of this university, yes,’ he said.The guard captain looked