'So the lion roared, "The King of beasts and thy King!"

'Then that monkey cried, "Homage to the King of beasts and my King!
Allah keep him in his seat, and I would he were visible."

'So the lion roared, "He sitteth here acknowledged, thou graceless
animal! and he's before thee apparent."

'Then the monkey affected eagerness, and gazed about him, and peered on
this beast and on that, exclaiming like one that's injured and under
slight, "What's this I've done, and wherein have I offended, that he
should be hidden from me when pointed out?"

'So the lion roared, "'Tis I where I sit, thou offensive monkey!"

'Then that monkey in the upper pitch of amazement, "Thou! Is it for
created thing to acknowledge a king without a tail? And, O beasts of the
forest and the wilderness, how say ye? Am I to blame that I bow not to
one that hath it not?"

'Upon that, the lion rose, and roared in the extreme of wrath; but the
word he was about to utter was checked in him, for 'twas manifest that
where he would have lashed a tail he shook a stump, wagging it as the dog
doth. Lo! when the lion saw that, the majesty melted from him, and in a
moment the plumpness of content and prosperity forsook him, so that his
tawny skin hung flabbily and his jaw drooped, and shame deprived him of
stateliness; abashed was he! Now, seeing the lion shamed in this manner,
my heart beat violently for Shagpat, so that I awoke with the strength of
its beating, and 'twas hidden from me whether the monkey was punished by
the lion, or exalted by the other beasts in his place, or how came it