"I got it for a piece of advice," said Babo.
For a piece of advice! No, no--the king's officers knew butter from lard, and truth from t'other thing. It was just the same in that country as it is in our town--there was nothing in the world so cheap as advice. Whoever heard of anybody giving a pot of gold and silver money for it? Without another word they marched Babo and his pot of money off to the king.
"Come," said the king, "tell me truly; where did you get the pot of money?"
Poor Babo began to whimper. "I got it for a piece of advice," said he.
"Really and truly?" said the king.
"Yes," said Babo; "really and truly."
"Humph!" said the king. "I should like to have advice that is worth as much as that. Now, how much will you sell your advice to me for?"
"How much will you give?" said Babo.
"Well," said the king, "let me have it for a day on trial, and at the end of that time I will pay you what it is worth."
"Very well," said Babo, "that is a bargain"; and so he lent the king his piece of advice for one day on trial.
Now the chief councillor and some others had laid a plot against the king's life, and that morning it had been settled that when the barber shaved him he was to cut his throat with a razor. So after the barber had lathered his face he began to whet the razor, and to whet the razor.
Just at that moment the king remembered Babo's piece of advice.
" Think well!' said he; " think well! Before you do what you are about to do, think well!'"
When the barber heard the words that the king said, he thought that all had been discovered. Down he fell upon his knees, and confessed everything.
That is how Babo's advice saved the king's life--you can guess whether the king thought it was worth much or little. When Babo came the next morning the king gave him ten chests full of money, and that made the simpleton richer than anybody in all that land.
He built himself a fine house, and by-and-by married the daughter of the new councillor that came after the other one's head had been chopped off for conspiring against the king's life. Besides that, he came and went about the king's castle as he pleased, and the king made much of him. Everybody bowed to him, and all were glad to stop and chat awhile with him when they met him in the street.
One morning Babo looked out of the window, and who should he see come travelling along the road but Simon Agricola himself, and he was just as poor and dusty and travel-stained as ever.
"Come in, come in!" said Babo; and you can guess how the wise man stared when he saw the simpleton living in such a fine way. But he opened his eyes wider than ever when he heard that all these good things came from the piece of advice he had given Babo that day they had parted at the cross roads.
"Aye, aye!" said he, "the luck is with you for sure and certain.
But if you will pay me a thousand golden angels, I will give you something better than a piece of advice. I will teach you all the magic that is to be learned from the books."
"No," said Babo, "I am satisfied with the advice."
"Very well," said Simon Agricola, " Born a fool, live a fool, die a fool'"; and off he went in a huff.
That is all of this tale except the tip end of it, and that I will give you now.
I have heard tell that one day the king dropped in the street the piece of advice that he had bought from Babo, and that before he found it again it had been trampled into the mud and dirt. I cannot say for certain that this is the truth, but it must have been spoiled in some way or other, for I have never heard of anybody in these days who would give even so much as a bad penny for it; and yet it is worth just as much now as it was when Babo sold it to the king.
I had sat listening to these jolly folk for all this time, and I had not heard old Sindbad say a word, and yet I knew very well he was full of a story, for every now and then I could see his lips move, and he would smile, and anon he would stroke his long white beard and smile again.
Everybody clapped their hands and rattled their canicans after the Blacksmith had ended his story, and methought they liked it better than almost anything that had been told. Then there was a pause, and everybody was still, and as nobody else spoke I myself ventured to break the silence. "I would like," said I (and my voice sounded thin in my own ears, as one's voice always does sound in Twilight Land), "I would like to hear our friend Sindbad the Sailor tell a story. Methinks one is fermenting in his mind."
Old Sindbad smiled until his cheeks crinkled into wrinkles.
"Aye," said every one, "will you not tell a story?"
"To be sure I will," said Sindbad. "I will tell you a good story," said he, "and it is about--
