stupid genius, Thetel, had not interfered with his awkward
remedies. It is true that, in his passion, the genius put his hand into
the saltbox, which he is used to carry at his girdle when he travels,
like Pantagruel, and flung a good handful at the Leech-Prince; but it
is quite false that he killed him in so doing. All the salt fell into
the marsh; not a single grain hit the prince, whom the thistle,
Zeherit, slew with his thorns; and, having thus avenged the murder of
Gamaheh, devoted himself to death. It is the genius only,--who
interfered in matters not concerning him,--that is the cause of the
princess lying so long in the sleep of flowers; the Thistle awoke much
earlier; for the death of both was but the same sleep, from which they
revived, although in other forms. You will have completed the measure
of your gross blunders, if you suppose that the Princess Gamaheh was
formed exactly as Doertje Elverdink now is, and that it is you who
restored her to life. It happened to you, my good Leuwenhock, as it did
to the awkward servant in the remarkable story of the Three
Pomegranates; he freed two maidens from the fruit, without having first
assured himself of the means of keeping them in life, and in
consequence saw them perish miserably before his eyes. Not you, but
_he_, who has escaped from you, whose loss you so deeply feel and
lament;--he it was who completed the work, which you began so
awkwardly."

"Ha!" cried the flea-tamer, quite beside himself--"ha! 'twas so I
suspected!--But you, Pepusch, you, to whom I have shown so much
kindness, you are my worst enemy: I see it well now. Instead of
advising me, instead of assisting me in my misfortunes, you amuse me
with all manner of nonsensical stories."

"Nonsense yourself!" cried Pepusch, quite indignant: "you'll rue
your folly too late, you dreaming charlatan! I go to seek Doertje
Elverdink--but that you may no longer mislead honest people----"

He grasped at the screw which set all the microscopic machinery in
motion----

"Take my life at the same time!" roared the flea-tamer; but at the
instant all crashed together, and he fell senseless to the ground.--

"How is it," said George Pepusch to himself, when he had got into the
street,--"how is it that one, who has the command of a nice warm
chamber and a well-stuffed bed, wanders through the streets at night in
the rain and storm?--Because he has forgotten the house key, and he is
driven moreover by love."

He