Hieroglyphic Tales | Page 8

home by the time the council broke up. Nothing could equal the
surprise of his majesty and the courtiers, when the dear little creature
arrived with the elephant's proboscis hanging out of its divine little bill.
However, after the first astonishment was over, his majesty, who to be
sure was wisdom itself, and who understood natural philosophy that it
was a charm to hear him discourse of those matters, and who was
actually making a collection of dried beasts and birds in twelve
thousand volumes of the best fool's-cap paper, immediately perceived
what had happened, and taking out of the side-pocket of his breeches a
diamond toothpick-case of his own turning, with the toothpick made of
the only unicorn's horn he ever saw, he stuck it into the elephant's snout,
and began to draw it out: but all his philosophy was confounded, when
jammed between the elephant's legs he perceived the head of a
beautiful girl, and between her legs a baby-house, which with the wings
extended thirty feet, out of the windows of which rained a torrent of

sugar-plumbs, that had been placed there to make room. Then followed
the bear, who had been pressed to the bales of gingerbread and was
covered all over with it, and looked but uncouthly; and the monkey
with a doll in every paw, and his pouches so crammed with
sugar-plumbs that they hung on each side of him, and trailed on the
ground behind like the duchess of ----'s beautiful breasts. Solomon,
however, gave small attention to this procession, being caught with the
charms of the lovely Pissimissi: he immediately began the song of
songs extempore; and what he had seen--I mean, all that came out of
the humming-bird's throat had made such a jumble in his ideas, that
there was nothing so unlike to which he did not compare all Pissimissi's
beauties. As he sung his canticles too to no tune, and god knows had
but a bad voice, they were far from comforting Pissimissi: the elephant
had torn her best bib and apron, and she cried and roared, and kept such
a squalling, that though Solomon carried her in his arms, and showed
her all the fine things in the temple, there was no pacifying her. The
queen of Sheba, who was playing at backgammon with the high-priest,
and who came every October to converse with Solomon, though she
did not understand a word of Hebrew, hearing the noise, came running
out of her dressing-room; and seeing the king with a squalling child in
his arms, asked him peevishly, if it became his reputed wisdom to
expose himself with his bastards to all the court? Solomon, instead of
replying, kept singing, "We have a little sister, and she has no breasts;"
which so provoked the Sheban princess, that happening to have one of
the dice-boxes in her hand, she without any ceremony threw it at his
head. The enchantress, whom I mentioned before, and who, though
invisible, had followed Pissimissi, and drawn her into her train of
misfortunes, turned the dice-box aside, and directed it to Pissimissi's
nose, which being something flat, like madame de ----'s, it stuck there,
and being of ivory, Solomon ever after compared his beloved's nose to
the tower that leads to Damascus. The queen, though ashamed of her
behaviour, was not in her heart sorry for the accident; but when she
found that it only encreased the monarch's passion, her contempt
redoubled; and calling him a thousand old fools to herself, she ordered
her post-chaise and drove away in a fury, without leaving sixpence for
the servants; and nobody knows what became of her or her kingdom,
which has never been heard of since.

TALE IV.
_The Peach in Brandy. A Milesian Tale._
Fitz Scanlan Mac Giolla l'ha druig,[1] king of Kilkenny, the thousand
and fifty-seventh descendant in a direct line from Milesius king of
Spain, had an only daughter called Great A, and by corruption Grata;
who being arrived at years of discretion, and perfectly initiated by her
royal parents in the arts of government, the fond monarch determined
to resign his crown to her: having accordingly assembled the senate, he
declared his resolution to them, and having delivered his sceptre into
the princess's hand, he obliged her to ascend the throne; and to set the
example, was the first to kiss her hand, and vow eternal obedience to
her. The senators were ready to stifle the new queen with panegyrics
and addresses; the people, though they adored the old king, were
transported with having a new sovereign, and the university, according
to custom immemorial, presented her majesty, three months after every
body had forgotten the event, with testimonials of the excessive sorrow
and excessive joy they felt on losing one monarch and getting another.
Her