e the authentic kings. In the end they were cut
up and a bit given to everybody. They sprinkled the nations--with
Kingship.'

Firmin turned himself round and faced his royal master.

'What do you intend to do, sir?' he asked. 'If you will not listen to
me, what do you propose to do this afternoon?'

The king flicked crumbs from his coat.

'Manifestly war has to stop for ever, Firmin. Manifestly this can only
be done by putting all the world under one government. Our crowns and
flags are in the way. Manifestly they must go.'

'Yes, sir,' interrupted Firmin, 'but WHAT government? I don't see what
government you get by a universal abdication!'

'Well,' said the king, with his hands about his knees, 'WE shall be the
government.'

'The conference?' exclaimed Firmin.

'Who else?' asked the king simply.

'It's perfectly simple,' he added to Firmin's tremendous silence.

'But,' cried Firmin, 'you must have sanctions! Will there be no form of
election, for example?'

'Why should there be?' asked the king, with intelligent curiosity.

'The consent of the governed.'

'Firmin, we are just going to lay down our differences and take over
government. Without any election at all. Without any sanction. The
governed will show their consent by silence. If any effective opposition
arises we shall ask it to come in and help. The true sanction of
kingship is the grip upon the sceptre. We aren't going to worry people
to vote for us. I'm certain the mass of men does not want to be bothered
with such things.... We'll contrive a way for any one interested to join
in. That's quite enough in the way of democracy. Perhaps later--when
things don't matter.... We shall govern all right, Firmin. Government
only becomes difficult when the lawyers get hold of it, and since these
troubles began the lawyers are shy. Indeed, come to think of it, I
wonder where all the lawyers are.... Where are they? A lot, of course,
were bagged, some of the worst ones, when they blew up my legislature.
You never knew the late Lord Chancellor. . . .

'Necessities bury rights. And create them. Lawyers live on dead rights
disinterred.... We've done with that way of living. We won't have more
law than a code can cover and beyond that government will be free....

'Before the sun sets to-day, Firmin, trust me, we shall have made our
abdications, all of us, and declared the World Republic, supreme and
indivisible. I wonder what my august grandmother would have m