Page:Frank Stockton - Vizier of the two-horned Alexander.djvu/79

TWO-HORNED ALEXANDER in her domains. This delighted me, for before coming to Jerusalem I had allowed my hair and beard to grow, and had dispensed with as much as possible of my ordinary erect mien and lightness of step; for I was very much afraid, if I were not careful, that the wise king would find out that there was something irregular in my longevity, and an old man may continue to look old much longer than a middle-aged man can continue to appear middle-aged.

"It was a great advantage to me to find myself admitted to a certain intimacy with both the king and his visitor the queen, As I was a subject of neither of them, they seemed to think this circumstance allowed a little more familiarity than otherwise they would have shown. Besides, my age had a great deal to do with the freedom with which they spoke to me. Each of them seemed anxious to know everything I could tell about the other, and I would sometimes be subjected to embarrassing questions.

"There is a great deal of extravagance and perversion in the historical and traditional accounts of the tricks which these two