Unfortunately, however, it requires a company of eight
persons and-"
"Here we are!" cried the king, laughing at his acute discovery of
the coincidence; "eight to a fraction- I and my seven ministers. Come!
what is the diversion?"
"We call it," replied the cripple, "the Eight Chained
Ourang-Outangs, and it really is excellent sport if well enacted."
"We will enact it," remarked the king, drawing himself up, and
lowering his eyelids.
"The beauty of the game," continued Hop-Frog, "lies in the fright it
occasions among the women."
"Capital!" roared in chorus the monarch and his ministry.
"I will equip you as ourang-outangs," proceeded the dwarf; "leave
all that to me. The resemblance shall be so striking, that the company
of masqueraders will take you for real beasts- and of course, they
will be as much terrified as astonished."
"Oh, this is exquisite!" exclaimed the king. "Hop-Frog! I will
make a man of you."
"The chains are for the purpose of increasing the confusion by their
jangling. You are supposed to have escaped, en masse, from your
keepers. Your majesty cannot conceive the effect produced, at a
masquerade, by eight chained ourang-outangs, imagined to be real
ones by most of the company; and rushing in with savage cries, among
the crowd of delicately and gorgeously habited men and women. The
contrast is inimitable!"
"It must be," said the king: and the council arose hurriedly (as
it was growing late), to put in execution the scheme of Hop-Frog.
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