ON THE METHOD OF ZADIG. 137 



edge could tend to nothing but the increase of a man's 

 own welfare and the good of his fellow-men. But Zadig 

 was fated to experience the vanity of such expectations. 



One day, walking near a little wood, he saw, hastening that 

 way, one of the Queen's chief eunuchs, followed by a troop of offi- 

 cials, who appeared to be in the greatest anxiety, running hither 

 and thither like men distraught, in search of some lost treasure. 



44 Young man," cried the eunuch, " have you seen the Queen's 

 dog?" Zadig answered modestly, u A bitch, I think, not a dog." 

 " Quite right," replied the eunuch; and Zadig continued, " A very 

 small spaniel who has lately had puppies ; she limps with the left 

 foreleg, and has very long ears." " Ah ! you have seen her then," 

 said the breathless eunuch. " No," answered Zadig, " I have not 

 seen her ; and I really was not aware that the Queen possessed a 

 spaniel." 



By an odd coincidence, at the very same time, the handsomest 

 horse in the King's stables broke away from his groom in the Baby- 

 lonian plains. The grand huntsman and all his staff were seeking 

 the horse with as much anxiety as the eunuch and his people the 

 spaniel ; and the grand huntsman asked Zadig if he had not seen 

 the King's horse go that way. 



"A first-rate galloper, small-hoofed, five feet high; tail three 

 feet and a half long ; cheek pieces of the bit of twenty-three carat 

 gold ; shoes silver? " said Zadig. 



" Which way did he go ? Where is he ? " cried the grand hunts- 

 man. 



" I have not seen anything of the horse, and I never heard of 

 him before," replied Zadig. 



The grand huntsman and the chief eunuch made sure that Zadig 

 had stolen both the King's horse and the Queen's spaniel, so they 

 haled him before the High Court of Desterham, which at once con- 

 demned him to the knout, and transportation for life to Siberia. 

 But the sentence was hardly pronounced when the lost horse and 

 spaniel were found. So the judges were under the painful necessity 

 of reconsidering their decision ; but they fined Zadig four hundred 

 ounces of gold for saying he had seen that which he had not 

 seen. 



The first thing was to pay the fine ; afterwards Zadig was per- 



