Chapter 8 jumping frog

jumping frog I really don't know anyone who is as good at jokes as the emperor.It looks like the emperor was born to make jokes.Whoever wants to tell a funny joke, tell it beautifully, and you are guaranteed to be favored.Coincidentally, the seven ministers in front of the imperial court are all well-known joke experts; and all of them are like the emperor, not only incomparable clowns, but also burly and fat-headed.Whether people gain weight just by joking, or if they are fat and big, they just like to joke in their bones. I am not at all capable of telling the exact picture; but needless to say, a clown who is skinny and bony is a rare treasure.

The emperor disdained to be elegant, in other words, he worked hard on the cleverness of the so-called "ghosts".He especially admired the dirty jokes, and he never tires of them.If it is too elegant, he will get bored.He would rather read Rabelais's "Gao Kang Da" (Rabelais, a famous French writer and philosopher, "Gao Kang Da" is the first of his long satirical novels.), Don't want to read Voltaire's "Gao Kang Da" Zadig: A thousand words and a sentence, verbal jokes are far less suitable to his taste than a prank. At the time of this story, professional jesters had not been completely abolished at court.Several "powerful countries" that claim to be kings and overlords on the European continent still keep "jesters".They wore colorful clothes and hats with bells on their heads. Whenever leftovers were given from the imperial table, they would immediately make jokes to thank the saint.

The Long Live Lord in our story naturally raised the "Jester".Seriously, Lord Long Live had to watch something stupid—to temper the overly clever minds of his seven wise ministers, not to mention the cleverness of Long Live himself. Having said that, Long Live Lord's jester, that professional clown, is not only a fool, but also a dwarf and a lame man, so his worth is three times higher in the eyes of the emperor.Back then in the court, dwarfs looked at fools as normal; many emperors would feel sad if they didn't have a clown to laugh with them, or a dwarf to make fun of them. In the court, the time was much longer than in other places Woolen cloth.It has already been explained in the previous article that nine out of ten clowns are fat and clumsy, so Long Live is not too proud to see Leaping Frog (that's the name of the jester) being worth three clowns.

In my opinion, the name "Leaping Frog" was definitely not given to the dwarf by his godfather and godmother when he was baptized. It is likely that the seven ministers agreed to give him this nickname because they saw that he walked differently than ordinary people.In fact, when the leaping frog walks, it can only look like a flower - half like jumping, half like twisting - and this way of walking makes the Lord Long Live very happy, and of course he also comforts himself, because the Lord Long Live has a belly like a bull and a head. As big as a fence, the civil and military officials of the Manchu Dynasty still regarded Long Live Lord as one of the best handsome men.

It can be said that although the legs of the jumping frog are deformed, it is always hard to walk. It seems that the Creator specially gave him infinite strength in his arms in order to make up for the defects of his lower limbs. He can perform a lot of nimble stunts on anything he climbs.This set of tricks is of course comparable to that of a squirrel monkey, not like a frog. Where Leapfrog was originally from is uncertain.He was born in an unheard of wild country, a long way from the palace.There was also a young girl, almost as short as he was, with a slender build, and an excellent dancer.The two people's hometowns are close to each other. At the beginning, there was a victorious general in front of the imperial court, who captured them separately and paid tribute to the emperor.

Since the two little captives felt sorry for each other, it was no wonder that they became intimate; naturally they soon became brothers and sisters.Leapfrog, though she plays tricks, is not popular at all unless she is of service to Trilipetai; though she is short, she is dignified and beautiful, and everyone is attracted to her, and everyone loves her; therefore she is very popular; no matter what Sometimes, whenever she could, she stood up for Leapfrog. Once, when there was a grand National Day—I can’t remember what festival—Long Live decided to hold a masquerade ball.Whenever there is a masquerade ball in the palace, Tiaowa and Qulipetai must go to show their talents according to the order; Leapfrog is especially ingenious, good at preparing ball programs, arranging novel roles, and arranging costumes, so without him Help, as if nothing can be done.

It was the night of the imperial festival.Under the supervision of Qu Lipetai, a resplendent and magnificent hall has already been decorated with various decorations, which is enough to make the masquerade ball shine.The civil and military officials of the Manchu Dynasty were waiting impatiently.When it comes to what clothes to wear and what role to play, it is not difficult to imagine, and the idea has already been decided.A lot of people had decided what role to play a week or even a month ago; in fact, except for the Long Live Lord and the seven ministers, no one was distracted anywhere.Long Live and the others, if they weren't joking, I can't say why.Most likely it's because you're too fat, so it's hard to make up your mind.In a word, the time passed in the blink of an eye; they tried their best, and at last they had to send an order to see Tripetet and Leapfrog.

The young couple came to wait on the order, and saw that Long Live God was drinking and having fun with seven cabinet ministers; but the emperor was angry.Long Live knows that Leaping Frog doesn't like drink; for drinking makes the wretched cripple almost drunken, and drunkenness is not pleasant.But Long Live is good at playing pranks, making fun of people, and forcing Leaping Frog to drink. According to Long Live, it is to "have fun" with wine. As soon as the clown and his companions entered the palace, the Lord Long Live said: "Come here, Leapfrog; first drink this for your old friend." Hearing this, Leapfrog couldn't help sighing, "Give us some more brains. We want to play Characters—characters, boy,—frequent—invented. Tired of the same old routine. Hey, drink up! Drink your brains."

As usual, Leaping Frog wanted to make a joke and thank the imperial gift; but he overwhelmed his brain and couldn't think of it.That day happened to be the birthday of the poor little man, and he couldn't help crying when he heard the edict of toasting his "old friend".In a low voice, he took the wine glass, and big bitter tears fell into the wine glass. "Ah! Ha! Ha! Ha!" The dwarf had no choice but to drink up the wine, and Long Live laughed loudly. "Look how strong a glass of wine is! Hey, your eyes are bright!" What a wretch!His big eyes would have been better said to be glowing than shining; because he was drunk when he drank, and the strength of the alcohol immediately took hold, which was really powerful.Nervously, he put the wine glass on the table, and glanced at the eight monarchs and ministers one by one in a half-foolish way.Seeing that Lord Long Live's "joke" worked, the ministers were all overjoyed.

"Well, let's get down to business," said the Prime Minister, who had a double neck. "Yes," said the Long Live Lord, "hey, Leapfrog, give us an idea. Roles, boy; we need roles--the United and the seven ministers all need--ha! ha! ha!" It was a joke at all, and the seven ministers laughed in unison with the Long Live Lord. Leaping Frog laughed, too, but weakly and somewhat hollowly. "Ah, ah," Long Live Lord said impatiently, "Couldn't you come up with an idea?" "The slave is trying to come up with something novel," the dwarf replied absently, half-drunk.

"Do your best!" Hunjun raised his eyebrows and stared, and shouted, "What do you mean? Ah, I understand, I understand. You are unhappy, and you need a glass of wine. Take it, drink this glass!" said Watching the Lord Long Live pour another full glass and give it to the cripple, the cripple just stared at the glass of wine in a daze, panting heavily. "Hey, drink!" The devil yelled loudly, "If you don't drink, you will go to hell..." The dwarf hesitated.Long live the face turned purple with anger.All the courtiers were laughing.Qu Lipetai's expression changed, she walked to the throne, and knelt down on her knees.She begged the emperor to show mercy and spare her partner what happened. Hun Jun opened his eyes and stared at her for a long time, clearly wondering how she dared to be so presumptuous.It looked like Long Live Lord didn't know what to do, and he didn't know what to say—how to properly express the nameless anger in his heart.At the end, he still didn't say a word, pushed her away vigorously, and poured a full glass of wine on her face. The poor girl tried her best to get up, not even daring to sigh, and stood under the imperial table again. There was a dead silence for a moment, and even the embroidery needles could be heard falling.In a blink of an eye, there was a low and piercing rattling sound, which sounded endlessly, as if it came from the four corners of the palace. "What are you——why—why are you making this weird noise?" Long Live Lord was furious.Turning to the dwarf, he asked. It looked like the dwarf was probably awake. He stared at the face of Hun Jun without changing his expression, and just cried out: "Slave-cai? How can you be a slave?" "It seems to have come from outside the palace," said a courtier. "According to the subject, I'm afraid it's a parrot in the window grinding its beak on the iron bars of the cage." "That's right," the emperor replied, he seemed to feel more at ease after hearing this, "But in the future, this scoundrel must be gnashing his teeth, and he can't be wrong." The dwarf laughed when he heard it, showing a pair of big steel teeth, which was really scary.Long live Lord is a real clown. He doesn't object to people laughing.The dwarf also agreed straight away, how much wine he wanted to drink.Just drink as much as you want.The emperor calmed down immediately; Leaping Frog drank another glass, but he didn't seem to be drunk, so he immediately cheered up and told his plan for the masquerade ball; "I don't know how this servant came up with this idea," he said, calmly, as if he had never had a sip of wine in his life, "Your Majesty just hit that servant girl and poured wine on her face - His Majesty did that, Just after that, the parrot made that strange noise outside the window, and the slave had a sudden whim, and came up with a brilliant idea-a game in the slave's hometown-the slave folks used to play around at masquerade parties: but, It's a new thing here. Too bad it's got to be eight, and—" "Isn't it obvious that there are eight people!" Seeing himself seeing such a coincidence at once, Long Live Lord couldn't help shouting with a smile, "I and the seven ministers, there are exactly eight people. Tell me! What's the trick?" "The slaves call it 'Eight Orangutans in Chains,'" returned the cripple, "and it's a wonderful thing to do well." "Okay, I must dress up," Master Long live straightened his back, lowered his eyes, and preached. "The trick is to scare women to death," continued Leapfrog. "Wonderful!" The eight monarchs and ministers shouted together. "Your Majesty and Your Excellency, come and dress up your Majesty and Your Excellency as orangutans," continued the dwarf, "and leave everything to your servant. Make sure you look as good as you can, so that your Majesty and Your Excellency will be treated as if they were at the ball." What a beast--indeed, they were not only amazed, but frightened." "That's wonderful! cried Long Live. "Leaping Frog!"I want to promote you well. " "I put on the iron chain, so that everyone could hear the rattle of the iron chain, making it even more chaotic. Your majesty and your lord escaped from the guards together. Your majesty can't imagine how effective this is. At the ball came eight chained orangutans, most of whom were real orangutans; yelling wildly, they rushed forward and were inserted among a group of men and women in silk and rich clothes. There is no match in the world It's a better comparison." "Okay," said Long Live; it was getting late, and the cabinet ministers hurriedly stood up, ready to follow Leapfrog's plan. Leaping Frog's method of dressing up the eight monarchs and ministers as orangutans is simple, but very effective.At the time of this story, it was rare to see orangutans in the civilized world; the fake orangutans dressed up by the dwarfs could be so fake that they frightened people to death, and they were sure to pass for real orangutans. Lord Long Live and the seven ministers first wrapped themselves in narrow elastic cloth shirts and drawers, and then soaked them in asphalt.At this time, one of the eight monarchs and ministers suggested that we might as well insert feathers; who knows that the dwarf immediately dismissed it, and immediately convinced them with reason that the animal hairs of animals like orangutans can be replaced by hemp, which is no longer similar.As a result, a thick layer of hemp was stuck on the asphalt.Then he took a long iron chain; first wrapped it around Long Live God's waist; tied it up; then wrapped it around the waist of a minister and tied it up;Putting on the iron chains like this, everyone stood as far away as possible and formed a circle.For the sake of realism, the jumping frog took the remaining iron chains as two diameters, intersected at right angles, and traversed the circumference according to the way people in Borneo capture great apes such as chimpanzees today. The main hall where the masquerade ball is held is a majestic circular hall, only a window on the top of the hall lets in sunlight; it is specially built for feasting at night, and at night, it is mainly illuminated by a huge candle lamp , an iron chain hangs from the middle of the skylight, and the lamp is suspended. As usual, it is pulled up and down by a counterweight, but for the sake of beauty, the pulleys pass through the vault and are installed on the roof. All the layout of the hall was originally entrusted to the supervision of Qu Lipetai; but some details seemed to be handled according to the good opinion of his partner, the dwarf.This time, according to his wishes, the candle lamp was removed.It was so hot that it was inevitable that there would be no tears from the candles. The hall was so crowded that some of the guests were bound to be crowded in the hall.In every corner of the hall, candlesticks are placed in places that are not in the way of hands and feet; there are rows of caryatid stone pillars against the wall, a total of fifty or sixty, with a torch in each right hand, exuding a strong fragrance. The eight orangutans obeyed Leapfrog's words and waited patiently until midnight. The hall was full of guests before they showed their faces.As soon as the bell stopped, they rushed over together, in fact, they might as well have rolled in, because the iron chain was in the way, most of them fell down, and all of them stumbled and fell into the hall. The chaos among the guests, let alone how old it was, made Long Live secretly happy to see it.Sure enough, most people regarded these blue-faced and painted-toothed beasts as orangutans, at least as real beasts.Many female guests fainted on the spot from fright; if the Lord Long Live had not taken precautions and removed all weapons and weapons in the hall, his gang would have paid for this nonsense with blood.In fact, everyone rushed to the door together; but as soon as the Long Live Lord entered the hall, he ordered the four doors to be locked; and according to the dwarf's intention, all the keys on the doors were hidden by the Long Live Lord. The hall was in a state of chaos, and the guests were all thinking of running for their own lives, because this group of frightened people pushed and shoved, it was really called hanging.When the candle lamp was removed, the lamp chain was pulled up, but now it is slowly lowered, and the chain hook is less than three feet from the ground. As soon as the iron chain was put down, Lord Long Live and his seven companions staggered in all directions in the hall, and finally broke into the middle of the hall, needless to say, right next to the lamp chain.The dwarf had followed them quietly at first, urging them to quarrel, and when they stood like that, he would hold the crossed part of the iron chain tied to them, which ran through the circumference; ;It was too late and then soon, no one was pulling, and the lamp chain went up by itself, so high that the hook could not be reached by hand, the eight orangutans couldn't help but pull tightly together, facing each other. Sooner or later, the guests were more or less relieved; they gradually regarded the matter as a cleverly choreographed farce, and laughed out loud when they saw the eight ape-men struggling to get up and down. "Give them to the little ones!" cried Leaping Frog, and his high-pitched voice could easily be heard amid the uproar. "Give them to the little ones. The little ones probably know them. You can tell who they are right away, just by looking at them." As he spoke, he pushed aside the crowd and managed to squeeze in front of the wall; he took a torch from a stone pillar of a caryatid, and returned to the main hall; Climb up a few feet with the lamp chain; hold the torch and look down at the group of orangutans, still yelling: "The little ones will see who they are right away." At this moment, all the people in the hall, including the ape-man, were all laughing. Unexpectedly, the clown let out a whistle; the chain of lights rose about thirty feet up—the eight orangutans were in a state of distress and struggled desperately. , dragged up together, hanging in the air, unable to reach the sky, unable to touch the ground.Leapfrog hugged the chain of lights.As we climbed up, we kept a certain distance from the eight masked ones, and as usual, took the torch down and shone on their faces as if nothing had happened, as if desperately trying to figure out who they were. Everyone saw the chain of lights going up, they couldn't help but turn pale with fright, and there was a dead silence.After a few minutes, there was a low and piercing rattling sound, which was heard together with the seven privy ministers when the Long Live Lord poured wine on Qu Lipetai's face.However, it is self-evident where the current sound came from.It turned out that it came from between the canine-like teeth of the dwarf. He spattered, gritted his teeth, his face was full of anger, he went mad, and stared fiercely at the upturned faces of the eight monarchs and ministers. "Ah, ha!" said the clown at last, furious. "Ah, ha! I can see who it is now!" As he spoke, he pretended to look at the Long Live Lord more carefully, and the torch moved closer to the layer of numbness wrapped around the Long Live Lord's body. flame.After a while, the crowd screamed from all around, and the eight orangutans were all on fire. The group of people stared blankly below, trembling with fear, but they were helpless. The fire became more and more intense, and suddenly reached the point where it was out of control.The clown had no choice but to climb up the lamp chain; the group below were silent for a moment.The dwarf took the opportunity to speak again; "The little ones can now see clearly what kind of people these masks are wearing," he said. "One of them is His Majesty the Emperor, and the other seven are Privy Councilors,——Long Live God beat a defenseless girl mercilessly, and the seven Privy Ministers were so sad for the tiger. Well, I am the clown jumping frog—" This is the last farce that will be performed next time." Both sticky flax and tar caught fire easily, so that the dwarf had his revenge before he had finished his short speech.The eight dead bodies were burnt into an indistinct mass of charcoal, the stench was overwhelming, and they were hideous and terrifying. They were hung on the lamp chain and swayed back and forth.The lame man threw the torch on top of the dead body, climbed to the top of the temple without haste, passed through the skylight, and disappeared. It is said that Trilipetai was on guard at the top of the hall at that time, and she was an accomplice in Leaping Frog's revenge, and it is said that the two finally fled back to their hometown together: because no trace of them was ever seen again.