Platoff said: "Here now, you thus-and-so, go yourself and make answer
before the eyes of the Emperor."
And the left-handed man replied: "Assuredly I will go and will make
answer."
So he goes, just as he is, in his voluminous trousers, one leg tucked
into his boot, the other flapping unrestrainedly, and his old kaftan,
whose hooks would not fasten because they were lost, and which had a
rent on the stomach; but he took no heed of this--he felt no confusion.
"What of it?" he said to himself. "If it pleases the Emperor to see me,
I must go; and if I have no tugament with me, I am not to blame, and I
will tell how the matter came about."
When the left-handed man entered and made his obeisance, the Emperor
immediately said to him: "What is the meaning of this, my good man,
that we have examined it thus and thus, and have placed it under the
melkoscope, and can descry nothing noteworthy?"
And the left-handed man replied: "Did Your Majesty deign to look at it
in the right way?"
The grandees made signs to him, "Don't speak so!" but he did not
understand that one must express one's self in the Court fashion,
flatteringly, or with craft, and he spoke simply.
The Emperor said: "Stop your prudent interference with him; let him
answer as he pleases."
And immediately he said to him: "This is the way we placed it," and
laid the flea under the melkoscope. "Look for yourself," said he,
"there is nothing to be seen."
The left-handed man replies: "In that manner it is impossible to see
anything, Your Majesty, because our work is far more secret, in
comparison with such proportions."