Suppose you were to see a large city from the upper air; where, with your ears and eyes open, you could take in everything at once. What would it look like? How would you feel about it? I hardly know myself. Do you? Prince Dolor was as bewildered as a blind person who is suddenly made to see. He gazed down on the city below him, and then put his hand over his eyes. "I can't bear to look at it, it is so beautiful--so dreadful. And I don't understand it--not one bit. I wish I had some one to tell me about it." "Do you? Then pray speak to me." The voice that squeaked out this reply came from a great black and white bird that flew into the cloak and began walking round and round on the edge of it with a dignified stride. "I haven't the honor of your acquaintance," said the boy politely. "My name is Mag and I shall be happy to tell you everything you want to know. My family is very old; we have builded in this palace for many years. I am well acquainted with the King, the Queen, and the little princes and princesses--also the maids of honor, and all the inhabitants of the city. I talk a great deal, but I always talk sense, and I dare say I shall be very useful to a poor, little, ignorant boy like you." "I am a prince," said the other gently. "All right. And I am a magpie." She settled herself at his elbow and began to chatter away, pointing out with one skinny claw every object of interest, evidently believing, as no doubt all its inhabitants did, that there was no city in the world like the great capital of Nomansland. Mag said that it was the finest city in the world but there were a few things in it that surprised Prince Dolor. One half the people seemed so happy and contented and the other half were so poor and miserable. "I would try to make it a little more equal if I were king," he said. "But you're not the king," returned the magpie loftily. "Shall I show you the royal palace?" It was a magnificent palace covering many acres of ground. It had terraces and gardens; battlements and towers. But since the Queen died the windows through which she looked at the Beautiful Mountains, had been closed and boarded up. The room was so little that no one cared to use it. "I should like to see the King," said Prince Dolor, and as he spoke Mag flew down to the palace roof, where the cloak rested, settling down between the great stocks of chimneys as comfortably as if on the ground. Mag pecked at the tiles with her beak and immediately a little hole opened, a sort of door, through which could be seen distinctly the chamber below. "Now pop down on your knees and take a peep at his Majesty." [Illustration: HE LIFTED UP HIS THIN, SLENDER HAND, AND THERE CAME A SILENCE OVER THE VAST CROWD IMMEDIATELY. [PAGE 47.]]