minute representative of the popular will, emerged cautiously into view.

The King was gifted with good sight; and though the figure appeared but
as a tiny speck, it was unmistakably that of a man bearing a burden upon
his back and ascending steadily toward the highest point of all. In a
word it was a steeplejack. As the name passed through the King's mind it
evoked recollection; and he said to himself again, "I wonder whether
they call _me_ Jack,--I wonder."

With a curious increase of interest and fellow-feeling he watched the
distant figure mounting to its airy perch. And as he did so a yet
further similitude and parable flashed through his mind. For the man's
presence at that dizzy height he knew that the Board of Public Works was
responsible: as a single item in the general expenditure the weathercock
of the Palace of Legislature had had voted to it a new coat of gilt, and
this steeplejack was now engaged in putting it on. He was there in the
words of a certain morning journal, "to add fresh luster to that supreme
symbol of the popular will which crowned the constitutional edifice."

As the words with their caressing rhythm flowed across the King's brain
he discerned the full significance of the scene which was being enacted
before him. This weathercock--the highest point of the constitutional
edifice--requiring to be touched up afresh for the public eyes--was
truly symbolical of the crown in its relation to the popular will;
twisting this way and that responsive to and interpretative of outside
forces, it had no will of its own at all, and yet to do its work it must
blaze resplendently and be lifted high, and to be put in working trim
and kept with luster untarnished it required at certain intervals the
attentions of a steeplejack--one accustomed to being in high places,
accustomed to isolation and loneliness, accustomed to bearing a burden