"The way to raise the wind. I've been in to see little Pop-Eye--_you_ know, the Astrologer Royal." "Xuriel? I haven't seen him since that--er--match I played with the Marshal." "I daresay not. The _Marshal_ saw him, though--and he hasn't been fit to be seen in public since. Well, it seems he's been pottering away at Magic all this time on the quiet--and quite lately he's come upon an old spell-book of his father's and tried some of the formulas in it. And he's turned out one little thing that's simply _it_. I bought it of him on the spot. I'll have it brought in here for you to see." When it was brought it was not much to look at, being just an ordinary round table of the plainest design. "Ah, but you wait," said Clarence. "Just say to it 'Little table, be laid.'" "Really, my boy," protested his father, who had evidently forgotten his Grimm's Fairy Tales, "I can't bring myself to----" "Try it, Guv'nor--and see what happens." "Oh well, it's all nonsense--all nonsense--but--er--'Little table be laid.'" Instantly the table was covered with a snowy linen cloth and laid with a daintily prepared meal for one person, including a small flagon of wine and a knife and even a two-pronged fork. "Neat, isn't it?" remarked Clarence. "The little joker wouldn't part with it at first--afraid of getting into more hot water about it." "I don't suppose for a moment the food's genuine," said the King. "Well," he pronounced, after trying it, "I'm bound to say it's quite tasty--really very tasty indeed. I think I'll have a little more--ate so little at lunch. The wine isn't at all bad either--sort of Moselle flavour. It would be awkward if your mother were to come in just now, eh?" "If you've done," said Clarence, "all you've got to say is: 'Little table, be cleared.'" The King repeated the words, and the table became bare as before. "Highly ingenious," he said; "but all the same, my boy, considering the _cuisine_ we have in the Palace already, it seems a waste of money to buy it." "But there's money in it, Guv'nor--money enough to make us all millionaires if we go the right way to work it! Listen to me. Xuriel says he could easily make any quantity of these tables--produce 'em in all styles and sizes, to dine any number, if you and the Mater will only give him a free hand." "I think you're forgetting, my boy," said King Sidney with dignity, "that there is a law--a law which your mother and I think a very wise and salutary one--against the practice of anything in the nature of--ah--Magic in our dominions." "Oh, I know _that_," said Clarence. "But you can alter it easily enough, can't you?" "No doubt we could. But why _should_ we?"