“Then, why deny those theories yourself?  Babbalanja, you almost affect my immortal serenity.  Must you forever be a sieve for good grain to run through, while you retain but the chaff?  Your tongue is forked.  You speak two languages:  flat folly for yourself, and wisdom for others.  Babbalanja, if you have any belief of your own, keep it; but, in Oro’s name, keep it secret.”

“Ay, my lord, in these things wise men are spectators, not actors; wise men look on, and say ‘ay.’”

“Why not say so yourself, then?”

“My lord, because I have often told you, that I am a fool, and not wise.”

“Your Highness,” said Mohi, “this whole discourse seems to have grown out of the subject of Necessity and Free Will.  Now, when a boy, I recollect hearing a sage say, that these things were reconcilable.”

“Ay?” said Media, “what say you to that, now, Babbalanja?”

“It may be even so, my lord.  Shall I tell you a story?”

“Azzageddi’s stirring now,” muttered Mohi.

“Proceed,” said Media.

“King Normo had a fool, called Willi, whom he loved to humor.  Now, though Willi ever obeyed his lord, by the very instinct of his servitude, he flattered himself that he was free; and this conceit it was, that made the fool so entertaining to the king.  One day, said Normo to his fool,—­’Go, Willi, to yonder tree, and wait there till I come,’ ‘Your Majesty, I will,’ said Willi, bowing beneath his jingling bells; ’but I presume your Majesty has no objections to my walking on my hands:—­I am free, I hope.’  ‘Perfectly,’ said Normo, ’hands or feet, it’s all the same to me; only do my bidding.’  ’I thought as much,’ said Willi; so, swinging his limber legs into the air, Willi, thumb after thumb, essayed progression.  But soon, his bottled blood so rushed downward through his neck, that he was fain to turn a somerset and regain his feet.  Said he, ’Though I am free to do it, it’s not so easy turning digits into toes; I’ll walk, by gad! which is my other option.’  So he went straight forward, and did King Normo’s bidding in the natural way.”

“A curious story that,” said Media; “whence came it?”

“My lord, where every thing, but one, is to be had:—­within.”

“You are charged to the muzzle, then,” said Braid-Beard.  “Yes, Mohi; and my talk is my overflowing, not my fullness.”

“And what may you be so full of?”

“Of myself.”

“So it seems,” said Mohi, whisking away a fly with his beard.

“Babbalanja,” said Media, “you did right in selecting this ebon night for discussing the theme you did; and truly, you mortals are but too apt to talk in the dark.”

“Ay, my lord, and we mortals may prate still more in the dark, when we are dead; for methinks, that if we then prate at all, ’twill be in our sleep.  Ah! my lord, think not that in aught I’ve said this night, I would assert any wisdom of my own.  I but fight against the armed and crested Lies of Mardi, that like a host, assail me.  I am stuck full of darts; but, tearing them from out me, gasping, I discharge them whence they come.”