twenty-three carat gold; shoes silver?' said Zadig.

"'Which way did he go? Where is he?' cried the grand huntsman.

"'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
condemned 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
permitted to open his defence to the court, which he did in the
following terms:

"'Stars of justice, abysses of knowledge, mirrors of truth,
whose gravity is as that of lead, whose inflexibility is as that
of iron, who rival the diamond in clearness, and possess no
little affinity with gold; since I am permitted to address your
august assembly, I swear by Ormuzd that I have never seen the
respectable lady dog of the Queen, nor beheld the sacrosanct
horse of the King of Kings.

"'This is what happened. I was taking a walk towards the little