rds are, or fancy themselves, a warlike race: nowhere in those
distant seas are there any islanders so vain of their military power, the
consciousness of which they acquired chiefly by fighting one another. Many
years ago, however, they had a war with the people of another island
kingdom, called Wug. The Wuggards held dominion over a third island,
Scamadumclitchclitch, whose people had tried to throw off the yoke. In
order to subdue them--at least to tears--it was decided to deprive them of
garlic, the sole article of diet known to them and the Wuggards, and in
that country dug out of the ground like coal. So the Wuggards in the
rebellious island stopped up all the garlic mines, supplying their own
needs by purchase from foreign trading proas. Having few cowrie shells,
with which to purchase, the poor Scamadumclitchclitchians suffered a great
distress, which so touched the hearts of the compassionate Uggards--a most
humane and conscientious people--that they declared war against the
Wuggards and sent a fleet of proas to the relief of the sufferers. The
fleet established a strict blockade of every port in Scamadumclitchclitch,
and not a clove of garlic could enter the island. That compelled the
Wuggard army of occupation to reopen the mines for its own subsistence.

All this was told to me by the great and good and wise Jogogle-Zadester,
King of Ug.

"But, your Majesty," I said, "what became of the poor
Scamadumclitchclitchians?"

"They all died," he answered with royal simplicity.

"Then your Majesty's humane intervention," I said, "was not
entirely--well, fattening?"

"The fortune of war," said the King, gravely, looking over my head to
signify that the interview was at an end; and I retired from the Presence
on hands and feet, as is the etiquette in that country.

As soon as I was out of hearing I threw a stone in the direction of the
palace and said: "I never in my life heard of such a cold-blooded
scoundrel!"

In conversation with the King's Prime Minister, the famous Grumsquutzy, I
asked him how it was that Ug, being a great military power, was apparently
without soldiers.

"Sir," he replied, courteously shaking his fist under my nose in sign of
amity, "know that when Ug needs soldiers she enlists them. At the end of
the war they are put to death."

"Visible embodiment of a great nation's wisdom," I said, "far be it from
me to doubt the expediency of that military method; but merely as a matter
of econom