“Lo, now,” said the king, “I would that all my subjects would play as well as you.”
The king thought for a moment, looking out on all the savage angles and wild lines, while little Peter watched a bit of leaf mould becoming a green plant.
“Summon me my hundred heralds!” the king suddenly bade his servants.
So the servants summoned the hundred heralds, who hurried into their blue velvet and silver buckles and came marching, twenty abreast, across the grassy plateau, where the morning sun made patterns like wings, and among the wings they bowed themselves and asked the king his will.
“Hundred heralds,” said the king, “be it only that you do this willingly, I would that you go out into my kingdom, into its highways and even to its loneliest outposts, and take my people my message. Cry to them, until each one hears with his heart as well as his head: ‘The world is beginning. You must go and help the king.’”
Now, little Peter, when he heard the message, rose and stood beside the king, and in his breast something thrilled and trembled like a smitten chord. But as for the hundred heralds, they
