'll see about
that!" Then he took the naughty Prince by the ear and led him into the
palace, where he locked him up in a room from which he could not
escape.

The King now sat himself down in an easy chair and began to think on
how he could best punish the Prince, but after an hour of deep thought
he was unable to decide on anything that seemed a sufficient
chastisement for so great an offense.

At last he resolved to consult the Wise Donkey.

The Wise Donkey lived in a pretty little house away at the end of the
Valley, for he didn't like to mix with the gay life at the court. He
had not always been wise, but at one time was a very stupid donkey
indeed, and he acquired his wisdom in this way.

One Friday afternoon, just as school was letting out, the stupid donkey
strayed into the school-house, and the teachers and scholars were all
so anxious to get home that they never noticed the donkey, but locked
him up in the school-house and went away without knowing he was there.

No one came into the building from Friday afternoon until Monday
morning; so the donkey got very hungry, and certainly would have
starved had he not chanced to taste of a geography that was sticking
out from one of the desks. The hungry donkey decided it was not so
very bad, so he ate it all up. Then he ate an arithmetic, an algebra,
and two first readers. After that he lay down and went to sleep; but
becoming hungry again he awoke and commenced on the school library,
which he completely devoured. This library comprised all the solid and
substantial wisdom in the Valley of Mo, and when the janitor opened the
school-house door on Monday morning, all the books of learning in the
whole land had been eaten up by the stupid donkey.

You can readily understand that after he had digested all this
knowledge he became very wise, and thereafter the King and the people
often consulted the Wise Donkey when their own intelligence was at
fault.

So now the monarch went to the donkey's house and told him of the
Prince's wickedness, asking how he could best punish him.

The Wise Donkey thought about the matter for a moment and then replied:

"I do not know a worse punishment than a pain in the stomach. Among the
books I ate in the school-house was a trigonometry, and before I had
digested it I suffered very severe pains indeed."

"But I can not feed the Prince a trigonometry," returned the King. "You
ate the last one yourself."

"True," answered the don