And thereupon there arose among all that were present such laughter that my master could hear me no longer, let alone ask me more questions; and 'twas not needful, for if he had, that honourable young maiden (forsooth) might have been put to shame. Thereafter the Controller of the Household told all at table how a little before I had come home from the ramparts and had said I knew now where the thunder and lightning came from: for I had seen great beams on half-waggons, which were all hollow inside: into these, men rammed in onion-seed with an iron turnip with the tail off, and then tickled the beams behind with a spit, whereupon there was driven out in front smoke and thunder and hell-fire. Then they told many more such stories of me, so that for the whole of that breakfast-time there was no other employ but to talk of me and laugh at me. And this was the cause of a general conclusion, to my destruction; which was that I should be soundly befooled. For with such treatment I should in time prove a rare jester, by whose means one could do honour to the greatest princes in the world and cause laughter to a dying man. _Chap. iv._: CONCERNING THE MAN THAT PAYS THE MONEY, AND OF THE MILITARY SERVICE THAT SIMPLICISSIMUS DID FOR THE CROWN OF SWEDEN: THROUGH WHICH SERVICE HE GOT THE NAME OF SIMPLICISSIMUS But now, as they began to carouse and to make merry as they had done the day before, the watch brings news, together with the delivery of letters to the Governor, of a commissary that was at the gate, which same was appointed by the war council of the Crown of Sweden to review the garrison and survey the fortress. Such news spoiled all jesting, and all jollity died away like the bellows of a bagpipe when the wind is gone out. The minstrels and the guests dispersed themselves even as tobacco-smoke, which leaves but a smell behind it: while my lord, with the adjutant who kept the keys, betook himself, together with a detachment from the Mainguard and many torches, to the very gates, himself to give admittance to the Blackguts, as he called him: he wished, he said, the devil had broke his neck in a thousand pieces ere ever he came to the city. Yet so soon as he had let him in and welcomed him upon the inner drawbridge it wanted but a little, or nothing at all, but he would hold his stirrup for him to shew his devotion; yea, the courtesy to all outward shew was between the two so great that the Commissary must dismount and walk on foot with my lord even to his lodging; and as they walked each would have the left-hand place. Then thought I, "Oh, what a wondrous spirit of falsehood doth govern all mankind, and so doth make one a fool through another's help."