The Ringed Neck

A long exhibition room in London on a winter evening, walls hung with dark crimson damask, many wax candles in brass sconces, on a low velvet pedestal a life-size swan of bright polished silver with finely scaled plumage and a long neck of stacked silver rings curved downward, sitting on a rectangular pool of densely ranked twisted glass rods glittering in the candlelight, small silver fish with dark eyes among the rods, the pool framed by a wreath of large silver leaves, gilded show pieces behind as soft gleams, in the foreground a gentleman in a plum frock coat and powdered wig seen from directly behind, face turned fully away.