The books went all over the world, and a few of them once came to the Emperor. He sat in his golden chair, and read, and read; every moment he nodded his head, for it pleased him to hear the fine things that were said about the city, the palace, and the garden. "But the Nightingale is the best of all!"--it stood written there.
"What's that?" exclaimed the Emperor. "The Nightingale? I don't know that at all! Is there such a bird in my empire, and in my garden to boot? I've never heard of that. One has to read about such things."
Hereupon he called his Cavalier, who was so grand that if any one lower in rank than he dared to speak to him, or to ask him any question, he answered nothing but "P!"--and that meant nothing.
"There is said to be a strange bird here called a Nightingale!" said the Emperor. "They say it is the best thing in all my great empire. Why has no one ever told me anything about it?"
"I have never heard it named," replied the Cavalier. "It has never been presented at court."
"I command that it shall come here this evening, and sing before me," said the Emperor. "All the world knows what I have, and I do not know it myself!"
"I have never heard it mentioned," said the Cavalier. "I will seek for it. I will find it."
But where was it to be found? The Cavalier ran up and down all the stairs, through halls and passages, but no one among all those whom he met had heard talk of the Nightingale. And the Cavalier ran back to the Emperor, and said that it must be a fable made up by those who write books.
"Your Imperial Majesty must not believe what is written. It is fiction, and something that they call the black art."
"But the book in which I read this," said the Emperor, "was sent to me by the high and mighty Emperor of Japan, and so it cannot be a falsehood. I will hear the Nightingale! It must be here this evening! It has my high favor; and if it does not come, all the court shall be trampled upon after it has supped!"