way been made an outcast from all literary honor,—­and a sort of wild recklessness grew up within him,—­a bitter mirth, arising from curiously mingled feelings of scorn for himself and tenderness for Sah-luma,—­and it was in this spirit that he loudly cheered the triumphant robber of his stores of poesy, and even kept up the plaudits long after they might possibly have been discontinued.  Never perhaps did any poet receive a grander ovation, . . but the exquisitely tranquil vanity of the Laureate was not a whit moved by it, . . his dazzling smile dawned like a gleam of sunshine all over his beautiful face, but, save for this, he gave no sign of even hearing the deafening acclamations that resounded about him on all sides.

“A new Ilyspiros!” cried the King enthusiastically, and, detaching a magnificently cut ruby from among the gems he wore, he flung it toward his favored minstrel.  It flashed through the air like a bright spark of flame and fell, glistening redly, on the pavement just half-way between Theos and Sah-luma...Theos eyed it with faintly amused indifference, . . the Laureate bowed gracefully, but did not stoop to raise it,—­he left that task to his harp-bearer, who, taking it up, presented it to his master humbly on one knee.  Then, and only then Sah-luma received it, kissed it lightly and placed it negligently among his other ornaments, smiling at the King as he did so with the air of one who graciously condescends to accept a gift out of kindly feeling for the donor.  Zabastes meanwhile had witnessed the scene with an expression of mingled impatience, malignity, and disgust written plainly on his furrowed features, and as soon as the hubbub of applause had subsided, he struck his staff on the ground with an angry clang, and exclaimed irritably: 

“Now may the god shield us from a plague of fools!  What means this throaty clamor?  Ye praise what ye do not understand, like all the rest of the discerning public!  Many is the time, as the weariness of my spirit witnesseth, that I have heard Sah-luma rehearse,—­but never in all my experience of his prolix multiloquence, hath he given utterance to such a senseless jingle-jangle of verse-jargon as to-night!  Strange it is that the so-called ‘poetical’ trick of confusedly heaping words together regardless of meaning, should so bewilder men and deprive them of all wise and sober judgment!  By my faith! ...  I would as soon listen to the gabble of geese in a farmyard as to the silly glibness of such inflated twaddle, such mawkish sentiment, such turgid garrulity, such ranting verbosity...”

A burst of laughter interrupted and drowned his harsh voice,—­ laughter in which no one joined more heartily than Sah-luma himself.  He had resumed his seat in his ivory chair, and leaning back lazily, he surveyed his Critic with tolerant good-humor and complete amusement, while the King’s stentorian “Ha, ha, ha!” resounded in ringing peals through the great audience-chamber.