The King's Mirror

"You'll be a real king when you grow up," she said.

A thought struck me--a rapturous thought, born of the Arabian Nights. (In the archbishop lay no comfort at all.)

"Yes," I cried, "and then I'll bastinado Krak!" With this comforting thought I fell asleep.

A strange day, this of my coronation, odd to pass through, to the highest degree illuminating in retrospect. I did not live to bastinado Krak; nor would I now had I the power. What they did was perhaps a little cruel, a little Styrian, as Victoria and I used covertly to say of such harsh measures; but how valuable a lesson on the state and fortune of kings! The King is one, the man another. The King is crowned, the man is lashed; they give us greatness in words: in fact, we are our servants' servants. Little as I liked the thing at the t