HINZE.

From what country do you come?

JACKPUD.

Unfortunately, only Germany.  My countrymen became so wise about a certain time that they finally forbade all jokes on pain of punishment; wherever I was seen, I was called by unbearable nicknames, such as:  Absurd, indecent, bizarre—­whoever laughed at me was persecuted like myself, and so I was compelled to go into exile.

HINZE.

Poor man!

JACKPUD.

There are strange trades in the world, Sir Hunter; cooks live by eating, tailors by vanity, I, by the laughter of human beings; if they cease to laugh I must starve.

[Murmuring in the pit:  A Jackpudding!  A Jackpudding!]

HINZE.

I do not eat that vegetable.

JACKPUD.

Why?  Don’t be bashful, help yourself.

HINZE.

I tell you, white cabbage does not agree with me.

JACKPUD.

It will taste all the better to me.  Give me your hand!  I must become better acquainted with you, Sir Hunter.

HINZE.

Here!

JACKPUD.

Take here the hand of an honest German fellow; I am not ashamed of being German, as many of my countrymen are. (He presses the cat’s hand very tightly.)

HINZE.

Ow!  Ow! (He resists, growls, clutches JACKPUDDING.)

JACKPUD.

Oh!  Hunter!  Are you possessed of the devil? (He rises and goes to the king weeping.) Your majesty, the hunter is a perfidious man; just look at the remembrance of his five fingers he has left on me.

KING (eating).

Strange!  Now sit down again; wear gloves in the
future when you give him your hand.

JACKPUD.

One must guard against you.

HINZE.

Why did you take such a hold on me?  The deuce take your
pretended honesty!

JACKPUD.

Why, you scratch like a cat!

[HINZE laughs maliciously.]

KING.

But what’s the trouble today, anyhow?  Why is there no intelligent conversation carried on at the table?  I do not enjoy a bite unless my mind has some nourishment too.  Court scholar, did you perhaps fall on your head today?

LEANDER (eating).

May it please your majesty—­

KING.

How far is the sun from the earth?

LEANDER.

Two million four hundred thousand and seventy-one-miles.

KING.

And the circle in which the planets revolve?

LEANDER.

A hundred thousand million miles.

KING.

A hundred thousand million!  There’s nothing in the world I like better to hear than such great numbers—­millions, trillions—­that gives you—­something to think about.  It’s a good deal, isn’t it, a thousand million, more or less?

LEANDER.

Human intelligence grows with the numbers.