When the number had reached thirty-one a strange thing happened. A loud “boom!” sounded through the stillness, and then another, and another. Some one was tolling the great bell in the palace bell-tower, and people began saying to one another in awed whispers that the old king must be dead. The five high counselors, filled with furious anger but absolutely helpless, as they could not leave the gate, lifted up their five chubby fists and shook them violently in the direction of the bell-tower. Poor Jikki, finding himself left alone in the palace, could no longer resist the temptation to toll the bell; and it continued to peal out its dull, solemn tones while the chief counselor stood by the gate and shouted: “Thirty-two, thirty-three, thirty-four!” Only the mystery of this action could have kept the people quiet when they learned from the bell that their old king was dead. But now they began to guess that the scene at the east gate promised more of interest than anything they might learn at the palace; so they stood very quiet, and Jikki’s disobedience of orders did no great harm to the plans of the five high counselors. When Tullydub had counted up to forty the excitement redoubled, for every one could see big drops of perspiration standing upon the chief counselor’s brow, and all the other high counselors, who stood just behind him, were trembling violently with nervousness. A ragged, limping peddler entered the gate. “Forty-five!” shouted Tullydub. Then came Aunt Rivette, dragging at the bridle of the donkey. “Forty-six!” screamed Tullydub. And now Bud rode through the gate, perched among the bundles on the donkey’s back and looking composedly upon the throng of anxious faces that greeted him. [Illustration: “‘FORTY-SEVEN!’ CRIED THE CHIEF COUNSELOR. ‘LONG LIVE THE NEW KING OF NOLAND!’”] “_Forty-seven!_” cried the chief counselor; and then in his loudest voice he continued: “Long live the new King of Noland!” All the high counselors prostrated themselves in the dusty road before the donkey. The old woman was thrust back in the crowd by a soldier, where she stood staring in amazement, and Margaret, clothed in her beautiful cloak, stepped to the donkey’s side and looked first at her brother and then at the group of periwigged men, who bobbed their heads in the dust before him and shouted: “Long live the king!” Then, while the crowd still wondered, the lord high counselor arose and took from a soldier a golden crown set with brilliants, a jeweled scepter, and a robe of ermine. Advancing to Bud, he placed the crown upon the boy’s head and the scepter in his hand, while over his shoulders he threw the ermine robe. The crown fell over Bud’s ears, but he pushed it back upon his head, so it would stay there; and as the kingly robe spread over all the bundles on the donkey’s back and quite covered them, the boy really presented a very imposing appearance.