"The king," said Vyner, shutting his box, "is the strongest. König, Könning, or canning: he is the one who can rule."
"But," replied Cecil, "I maintain he can't rule: no man was ever strong enough to rule men. The true solution of the problem is, that the first king was a woman."
"This is fuwiously widiculous!"
"Laugh! laugh! I am prepared to maintain that woman is weak, and omnipotent because of her weakness. She is girt with the proof armour of defencelessness. A man you knock down, but who dares raise a hand against a woman?"
"Very true," suggested Vyner, "very true. What says Anacreon, whom Plato calls 'the wise?' Nature, he says, gave horns to bulls, and a 'chasm of teeth to lions;' but when she came to furnish woman with weapons,
τι ουν δίδωσι; κάλλοϛ
Beauty, beauty was the tremendous arm which was to surpass all others."
"And formidably she uses it," continued Cecil. "To man's violence she opposes her 'defencelessness'—and nails; to his strength she opposes her 'weakness'—and tongue."
"In support of your theory," said Vyner, "the French call a queen a reine; and we say the king reigns."
He chuckled prodigiously at this pun, which Cecil pronounced admirable.