. St. Nicholas [serial]. veral important matters were awaiting hisattention, when it was suddenly discovered thatthe book of the law was nowhere to be found. So the cases before him had to be dismisseduntil the lost volume could be recovered. chance to advance his own fortunes, took theVice-King aside and confidentially suggested thatwhat he needed was a competent adviser, withfull power to act. ? The exasperated Vice-King was only too will-ing to adopt any means of getting out of hisdifficulties, and appointed the courtier Chief Ad-viser upon the spot. He soon had cause enough to regret his d
. St. Nicholas [serial]. veral important matters were awaiting hisattention, when it was suddenly discovered thatthe book of the law was nowhere to be found. So the cases before him had to be dismisseduntil the lost volume could be recovered. chance to advance his own fortunes, took theVice-King aside and confidentially suggested thatwhat he needed was a competent adviser, withfull power to act. ? The exasperated Vice-King was only too will-ing to adopt any means of getting out of hisdifficulties, and appointed the courtier Chief Ad-viser upon the spot. He soon had cause enough to regret his de-cision, however, for the crafty courtier, whosename was Bpunterwin, immediately took every-thing into his own vigorous hands, leaving theVice-King nothing to do but sit on the throne andlook wise. When the pages started in as usual, snappingpaper wads at the courtiers and each other, Boun-terwin ordered them sent out to weed the royalonion beds, where, under severe taskmasters, theyworked and shed tears all day THE KING NEARLY TURNED A BACK SOMERSAULT IN HIS ASTONISHMENT. The next morning, things were no better; forthe pages, having decided to go upon a picnic,had departed early with their lunch-baskets andfishing-rods, and there was no one to deliver theVice-Kings commands. So things went irom bad to worse; until oneday a wily courtier, who thought he saw a good The housemaids, who had decided that if agardener could be Vice-King, they could, at least,be fine ladies, were all sent back to their places;the farmers, who had all set up fc*r country gen-tlemen, with horses and hounds, were orderedback to their plows; while the millers, who had allgone into politics and were making more trouble 1088 THE KINGS VACATION [Oct., than anybody else, were giventhe choice of start-ing their water-wheels to turning or of going tothe royal dungeons. So there was no longer danger of starvation inthe land. Bounterwin next turned his attention to publicimprovements. Roads were built, a
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Keywords: ., bookauthordodgemar, bookcentury1800, bookdecade1870, bookyear1873
