"You see, ladies and gentlemen, and above all your Imperial Majesty, that with the real Nightingale, you can never predict what may happen, but with the artificial bird, everything is settled beforehand; so it remains and it cannot be changed. One can account for it. One can rip it open, and show the human ingenuity, explaining how the cylinders lie, how they work, and how one thing is the result of another."
"That is just what we think," they all exclaimed, and the bandmaster received permission to exhibit the bird to the people on the following Sunday. The Emperor said they would hear it sing. They listened and were as much delighted as if they had been drunk with tea, which is Chinese, you know, and they all said: "Oh!" and stuck their forefingers in the air, and nodded their heads. But the poor fisherman who had heard the real Nightingale, said: "It sounds quite well, and a little like it, but there is something wanting, I do not know what."
The real Nightingale was banished from the Kingdom.
The artificial bird had its place on a silken cushion close to the Emperor's bed. All the presents it had received, the gold and precious stones, lay all round it, and it had been honored with the title of High-Imperial-Bed-Room-Singer—in the first rank, on the left side, for even the Emperor considered that side the grander on which the heart is placed, and even an Emperor has his heart on the left side.
The band-master wrote twenty-five volumes about the wonderful artificial bird. The book was very learned and very long, filled with the most difficult words in the Chinese language, and everybody said they had read and understood it, for otherwise they would have been considered stupid, and would have been trampled upon.
And thus a whole year passed away. The Emperor, the Court, and all the Chinamen knew every little gurgle in the artificial bird's song, and just for this reason, they were all the better pleased with it. They could sing it themselves—which they did.
The boys in the street sang "Zi-zi-zi," and, "cluck, cluck," and even the Emperor sang it. Yes, it was certainly beautiful!
But one evening, while the bird was singing, and the Emperor lay in bed listening to it, there was a whirring sound inside the bird, and something whizzed; all the wheels ran round, and the music stopped.
The Emperor sprang out of bed and sent for the Court Physician, but what could he do? Then they sent for the watch-maker, and after much talk and examination, he patched the bird up, but he said it must be spared as much as possible, because the hammers were so worn out—and he could not put new ones in so that the music could be counted on. This was a great grief. The bird could only be allowed to sing once a year, and even that was risky, but on these occasions, the band-master would make a little speech, full of difficult words, saying the bird was just as good as ever—and that was true.
Five years passed away, and a great sorrow had come to the country. The people all really cared for their Emperor, and now he was ill and it was said he could not live. A new Emperor had been chosen, and the people stood about the streets, and questioned the Lord-in-Waiting about their Emperor's condition.