The King of the Crystal Sea

(A Fairy Tale)

Once upon a time there dwelt a great King on the Shores of the Crystal Sea. And his palace was filled with all the wonders of the world. Magicians came from all parts to entertain him. His day was one long song and his night a trance of delight. For it was said, “he carries the Heavens with him, whether he wakes or sleeps.”

Now on the bank of the river that runs into the Crystal Sea lived a Prince who was jealous. His heart was not filled with envy. He was not a wicked Prince. He was just ordinarily jealous—some Princes are. And whenever he heard of another wonder coming to the Palace of the great King, his voice would swell out to the wide skies with a chord of pain. Such a chord! Even the B.B.C. hadn’t a wave to broadcast it with. It was that kind of a painful chord—worse than jazz.

And every time he let his voice thrill out with that terrible pain, his beautiful little daughter, the Princess Volga, would look up at him and sigh, and say, “O, daddy, can’t you see I’m doing my home sums?”

Well, one day the great King had brought to his palace a Billiard Table. And this Billiard Table was erected with great solemnity on the black-purple marble floor of the central hall under the burning sapphire dome. Hassan, the minstrel, as he caressed the beautiful silky nap of the green cloth felt sweet love dripping in his mouth. Word pictures of such beauty formed in his mind as he luxuriated in the texture of the West of England Cloth that in a wild outgushing he sang a song of such passion and yearning, that he was knighted on the spot by the great King, and decorated with the Order of the Cam.

When the noble guests began to play they found the Cushions such a dream of delight that nobody would keep his place in the queue. Every royal Sheikh tried to do his neighbour down that he might get his game first. The traffic-cops lost their heads. The players wouldn’t cease playing once they got in. Break succeeded break, and break succeeded break.

Then the great King made a rule: “No two players shall occupy the table more than three days and three nights; and every player on scoring his second thousand break shall immediately give way to the next on the waiting list.” Dreamily Sir Hassan sang, “The Truth about the Ivory,” as he marked for the guests. The days passed in warm, languorous peace, break succeeding break, the balls tripping beautifully off the cushions like happy, merry maidens tripping to their lovers.

Now the Prince by the river also got him a Billiard Table, but different, and had it erected on a paleful marble floor under the dome of woeful riddles—and invited his guests. And behold! it was like a funeral feast and not a time of pleasantry. The breaks wouldn’t rise. You could no more raise a break on those cushions than you could raise the dead. The Prince got on the telephone and called up the makers. And his voice rang out and over the earth. And the B.B.C. shares went down. His language was awful. “O, daddy,” signed his beautiful little daughter, the Princess Volga, “can’t you see I’m doing my scripture homework?”. . . .

The Makers having failed him, the Prince called his Magicians and Scribes together and took counsel. The Chief Scribe opened his mouth and said, “Noble Prince, decry! Remember the proverb, ‘If in life you don’t succeed, decry, decry, decry again.’ The great thing is to create a new atmosphere. We have tried for big breaks on these cushions and can’t get ’em. Ergo: Big breaks are no use to anyone, and must be written down.

“We must reason thus: There are no big breaks, and if there are, there should not be, and if there must be, then they should be as small as possible. Prince, we shall launch a press campaign on these lines, and run it until breaks become unfashionable, and then when no one aspires to break building, this dud—the table on which nothing can be done—will rank with the best. For no one will then say, ‘ You cannot make a break on it’.” And the Prince laughed grimly and said, ” To Press! and give them columns and columns of it!! The slogan is ‘Decry’.”

But his beautiful little daughter, the Princess Volga, looked up at him and sighed, and said, “O, daddy, why don’t you stop all this nonsense and buy a set of cushions from the people who can make cushions. You know you make me tired, and I am so busy with my home-work.” And the Prince paused in the middle of his mighty yell of pain and said, “My Godfathers, the child is right! I will.” And he did. And the King and the Prince lived happy ever after, played nightly, and piled up enormous breaks.

—F.L.B.G.

The Burwat billiards view. May 1930