“Be it so,” wearily said the Rajah.
Thus it happened that the Angora was incorporated into the royal household. The Princess took a violent fancy to White Lotus, as she named him; nothing was too exquisite or too rare for him, and he was much more important an individual than the Prime Minister or even her own mother.
Every morning three white-turbaned bearers would offer him a beautiful crystal bowl teeming with the fattest and most picturesquely variegated gold-fishes; then followed three other bearers, who, humbly salaaming, would present him a gorgeous silver bowl with milk from the fairest of Cashmere goats.
And while he was eating and drinking to his content, a numerous band of court musicians would softly play on stringed instruments.
When he had finished his repast, and while he was busy licking his paws, the court poet would appear and, salaaming profoundly, address him with befitting titles and denominations, which had no limit but the poet’s fervid imagination, and certain of which were:
“O Lord of the Milk!
Perfumed Almond Flower!
O Little Rajah of the Moon!
Whisper from the Milky Way!
Thou Pearl from the Green Sea!”