The next day, when Platoff presented himself to the Emperor to wish him good-morning, the latter said to him: "Let the two-seated carriage be put to immediately, and let us look at more museums."

Platoff went so far as to suggest: "Had they not seen enough foreign products, and would it not be better to betake themselves to Russia?" but the Emperor says: "No, I desire to behold still other novelties. They have boasted to me that they make the very finest sort of sugar here."

They drove off.

The Englishmen kept showing the Emperor the different prime products they had, but Platoff stared and stared, and suddenly said: "Show us your manufactures of molva sugar."[11]

But the Englishmen did not even know what molva was. They whispered together, and winked at one another, and kept repeating "Molva, molva" but they could not understand that such a sugar was made in our parts, and were obliged to confess that they had all sorts of sugar, but not molva.

Platoff says: "Well, then, you have nothing to brag about. Come to us, and we will treat you to tea with real molva from the Bobrinsky factories."[12]

But the Emperor plucked him by the sleeve, and said softly: "Please don't ruin my politics."

Then the Englishmen invited the Emperor to the last museum of all, where were collected all the mineral stones and nymfozoria[13] from the whole world, beginning with the hugest Egyptian Keramids,[14] and going down to the subcutaneous flea, which cannot be seen by the eye, though its bite is between the skin and the body.

The Emperor went.

They had inspected the Keramids and all sorts of stuffed animals, and were on their way out, and Platoff thinks to himself: "Now, glory to God, all is well—the Emperor admires nothing!"

But no sooner had they reached the very last room, when lo! there stood workmen in their every-day waistcoats and aprons, holding a salver on which there was nothing at all. And the Emperor began to wonder what they were giving him on the empty salver.

"What is the meaning of this?" he asks.

And the English artisans reply: "This is a respectful gift from us to Your Majesty."

"But what is it?"

"Here," they say, "please to observe this tiny speck."

The Emperor looked and saw that the tiniest sort of a speck really was lying upon the salver.

The workmen say: "Please spit on your finger, and take it in your palm."

"But what am I to do with this speck?"

"It is not a speck," they answer, "but a nymfozoria."

"Is it alive?"

"Not at all," they reply; "it is not alive, but it has been forged by us in the image of a flea, out of pure English steel, and in the middle of it are works and a spring. Please wind it up with the little key; it will immediately begin to dance."

The Emperor's curiosity was aroused, and he asked: "And where is the little key?"

And the Englishmen said: "Here is the key, right before your eyes."

"Why do not I see it?" says the Emperor.

"Because," they reply, "a melkoscope is necessary."

They gave him the melkoscope, and the Emperor saw that, beside the flea, on the silver salver, there actually lay a tiny key.

"Please take it in your palm," said they. "There is a hole in its little belly to wind it, and the key must be turned seven times, and then it will begin to dance."

With difficulty did the Emperor grasp the tiny key, and with difficulty did he hold it between his finger and thumb; and with the other forefinger and thumb he gripped the flea. And no sooner had he applied the little key than it began to move its feelers; next it began to wriggle its legs, and at last it gave a sudden skip, and in one bound it made a straight dance and two variations to one side, then to the other, and thus danced out an entire quadrille in three figures.

The Emperor immediately commanded that a million be given to the artisans, in any money they preferred—in silver five-kopek pieces, if they liked, or in small bank-bills, if they liked that.

The Englishmen requested that silver money be issued to them because they did not understand paper money;[15] and then they immediately exhibited another cunning device of theirs: they had made a present of the flea, but had brought no case for it. But without a case it was impossible to keep either the flea or the key, because they would get lost, and be thrown out into the dust-heap. Yet they had made a case for it, fashioned out of a solid diamond, the size of a walnut, and its place was hollowed out in the centre. This they did not present, because, said they, the case was the property of the Crown, and they were held to strict account for Crown property, and they could not make a gift of it even to the Emperor.

Platoff came near getting into a great rage, because, says he: "Why such rascality? They have made a gift, and received a million for it, and all that is not enough! The case always goes with every article."

But the Emperor said: "Stop that, please," says he. "This is no business of thine; don't spoil my politics. They have their own customs." And he inquires: "What is the value of this walnut, in which the flea is lodged?"

The Englishmen rated it at five thousand more.

"Pay them," said the Emperor Alexander Pavlovitch; and himself dropped the tiny flea into the little nut, and the key with it; and in order that he might not lose the walnut itself, he placed it in his gold snuff-box, and ordered the snuff-box to be placed in his travelling-casket, which was all encrusted with mother of pearl and fish-bone.[16] And the Emperor dismissed the English workmen with honor, and said to them: "You are the finest artisans in the world, and my people can do nothing in comparison with you."

They were highly pleased with this, and Platoff could utter nothing contrary to the Emperor's words. Only, he took the melkoscope, and without uttering a syllable, he dropped it into his pocket, "because it belongs here, also," says he, "and you have taken enough money from us already, anyway."

The Emperor did not know of this until his arrival in Russia, but they went away speedily, because melancholy had seized upon the Emperor on account of military affairs, and he desired to make his spiritual confession to Priest Feodot in Taganrog.[17]

During the journey there was very little agreeable conversation between him and Platoff, because they had formed entirely different opinions; the Emperor thought that Englishmen had no equals in art, while Platoff insisted that our men had only to look at a thing and they could make everything,—only, they lacked good instruction. And he expounded to the Emperor that the English workmen had entirely different rules of life for everything, and different sciences and materials, and that each man of them had all absolute circumstances before him, and hence a wholly different understanding of things.

The Emperor was not willing to listen long to this, but Platoff would get out at every posting-station, and drink a beer-glass of vodka through vexation, and eat a little round salted cracknel, and light his birch-root pipe, which held a whole pound of Zhukoff tobacco at one filling.[18] And then he would take his place, and sit in silence beside the Tzar in the carriage. The Emperor gazed in one direction, while Platoff thrust his pipe out of the opposite window and smoked away in the breeze. And thus they journeyed until they reached Petrograd; and the Emperor did not take Platoff to Priest Feodot with him.

"Thou art intemperate in spiritual converse," said he, "and thou smokest so excessively that soot has settled in my head from thy fumes."

Platoff was offended, and lay upon the couch of vexation at home. And there he lay incessantly, and smoked Zhukoff tobacco without intermission.