_Is it too late?_

There it stands yet with its green emeralds winking.

[_He clutches it and looks down into it._

How like to wine it is, which is full of dreams. It is silent and dreamy
like the gods, whose dreams we are.

Only a moment in their deathless minds: then the dream passes.

[_He lifts up his arm and drinks it seated upon his throne with his head
back and the great cup before his face. The audience begin to wonder
when he will put it down. Still he remains in the attitude of a drinker.
The acolytes begin to peer eagerly. Still he remains upright with the
great cup to his lips. The acolytes patter away and the_ KING _is left
alone._

[_Enter the_ KING'S POLITICIAN _hurriedly._ _He goes up to the_ KING
_and seizes his right arm and tries to drag the cup away from his lips,
but the_ KING _is rigid and his arm cannot be moved. He steps back
lifting up his hands._

POLITICIAN: Oh-h!

[_Exit. You hear him announcing solemnly_

King Hamaran ... is dead!

[_A murmur is heard of men, at first mournful. It grows louder and
louder and then breaks into these clear words._

Zarabardes is King! Zarabardes is King! Rejoice! Rejoice! Zarabardes is
King! Zarabardes! Zarabardes! Zarabardes!

CURTAIN.

THE FLIGHT OF THE QUEEN

_DRAMATIS PERSONAE_

THE PRINCE OF ZOON.
PRINCE MELIFLOR.
QUEEN ZOOMZOOMARMA.
LADY OOZIZI.
OOMUZ, _a Common Soldier._
THE GLORY OF XIMENUNG.
THE OVERLORD OF MOOMOOMON.
PRINCE HUZ.

SCENE I

_Time: June._

_Scene: In the Palace of Zoorm; the Hall of the Hundred Princes._

_The Princes sit at plain oaken tables with pewter mugs before them.
They wear bright grass-green cloaks of silk; they might wear circlets of
narrow silver with one large hyacinth petal rising from it at intervals
of an inch._

OOMUZ, _a Common Soldier, huge and squat, with brown skin and dense
black beard, stands just inside the doorway, holding a pike, guarding
the golden treasure._

_The golden treasure lies in a heap three or four feet high near the
right back corner._

SENTRIES, _also brown-skinned and bearded, carrying pikes, pass and
repass outside the great doorway._

THE GLORY OF XIMENUNG: Heigho, Moomoomon.

THE OVERLORD OF MOOMOOMON: Heigho, Glory of Ximenung.

XIMENUNG: Weary?

MOOMOOMON: Aye, weary.

ANOTHER: Heigho.

PRINCE MELIFLOR (_sympathetically_): What wearies you?

MOOMOOMON: The idle hours and the idle days. Heigho.

OTHERS: Heigho.

MELIFLOR: Speak n