The little prince also pulled up, with a certain sense of dejection,
the last little shoots of the baobabs. He believed that he would never want
to return. But on this last morning all these familiar tasks seemed very precious
to him. And when he watered the flower for the last time, and prepared to place
her under the shelter of her glass globe, he realised that he was very close to tears.
　　"Goodbye," he said to the flower.
　　But she made no answer.
　　"Goodbye," he said again.
　　The flower coughed. But it was not because she had a cold.
　　"I have been silly," she said to him, at last. "I ask your forgiveness.
Try to be happy..."
　　He was surprised by this absence of reproaches. He stood there all bewildered,
the glass globe held arrested in mid-air. He did not understand this quiet sweetness.
　　"Of course I love you," the flower said to him. "It is my fault that you have
not known it all the while. That is of no importance. But you-- you have been just
as foolish as I. Try to be happy... let the glass globe be. I don‘t want it any more."
　　"But the wind--"
　　"My cold is not so bad as all that... the cool night air will do me good. I am a flower."
　　"But the animals--"
　　"Well, I must endure the presence of two or three caterpillars if I wish to
become acquainted with the butterflies. It seems that they are very beautiful. And if
not the butterflies-- and the caterpillars-- who will call upon me? You will be far away...
as for the large animals-- I am not at all afraid of any of them. I have my claws."
　　And, na飗ely, she showed her four thorns. Then she added:
　　"Don‘t linger like this. You have decided to go away. Now go!"
　　For she did not want him to see her crying. She was such a proud flower...
[ Chapter 10 ]
　　　　 　　- the little prince visits the king
　　He found himself in the neighborhood of the asteroids 325, 326, 327, 328, 329, and 330.
He began, therefore, by visiting them, in order to add to his knowledge.
　　The first of them was inhabited by a king. Clad in royal purple and ermine, he was seated
upon a throne which was at the same time both simple and majestic.
　　"Ah! Here is a subject," exclaimed the king, when he saw the little prince coming.
　　And the little prince asked himself:
　　"How could he recognize me when he had never seen me before?"
　　He did not know how the world is simplified for kings. To them, all men are subjects.
　　"Approach, so that I may see you better," said the king, who felt consumingly proud of
being at last a king over somebody.
　　The little prince looked everywhere to find a place to sit down; but the entire planet
was crammed and obstructed by the king‘s magnificent ermine robe. So he remained standing
upright, and, since he was tired, he yawned.
　　"It is contrary to etiquette to yawn in the presence of a king," the monarch said to him.
"I forbid you to do so."
　　"I can‘t help it. I can‘t stop myself," replied the little prince, thoroughly embarrassed.
"I have come on a long journey, and I have had no sleep..."
　　"Ah, then," the king said. "I order you to yawn. It is years since I have seen anyone yawning.
Yawns, to me, are objects of curiosity. Come, now! Yawn again! It is an order."
　　"That frightens me... I cannot, any more..." murmured the little prince, now completely abashed.
　　"Hum! Hum!" replied the king. "Then I-- I order you sometimes to yawn and sometimes to--"
　　He sputtered a little, and seemed vexed.
　　For what the king fundamentally insisted upon was that his authority should be respected.
He tolerated no disobedience. He was an absolute monarch. But, because he was a
very good man, he made his orders reasonable.
　　"If I ordered a general," he would say, by way of example, "if I ordered a general
to change himself into a sea bird, and if the general did not obey me, that would not be
the fault of the general. It would be my fault."
　　"May I sit down?" came now a timid inquiry from the little prince.
　　"I order you to do so," the king answered him, and majestically gathered in a fold
of his ermine mantle.
　　But the little prince was wondering... The planet was tiny. Over what could this
king really rule?
　　"Sire," he said to him, "I beg that you will excuse my asking you a question--"
　　"I order you to ask me a question," the king hastened to assure him.
　　"Sire-- over what do you rule?"
　　"Over everything," said the king, with magnificent simplicity.
　　"Over everything?"
　　The king made a gesture, which took in his planet, the other planets, and all the stars.
　　"Over all that?" asked the little prince.
　　"Over all that," the king answered.
　　For his rule was not only absolute: it was also universal.
　　"And the stars obey you?"
　　"Certainly they do," the king said. "They obey instantly. I do not permit insubordination."
　　Such power was a thing for the little prince to marvel at. If he had been master of such
complete authority, he would have been able to watch the sunset, not forty-four times in
one day, but seventy-two, or even a hundred, or even two hundred times, with out ever
having to move his chair. And because he felt a bit sad as he remembered his little planet
which he had forsaken, he plucked up his courage to ask the king a favor:
　　"I should like to see a sunset... do me that kindness... Order the sun to set..."
　　"If I ordered a general to fly from one flower to another like a butterfly, or to write
a tragic drama, or to change himself into a sea bird, and if the general did not carry out
the order that he had received, which one of us would be in the wrong?" the king demanded.
"The general, or myself?"
　　"You," said the little prince firmly.
　　"Exactly. One much require from each one the duty which each one can perform,"
the king went on. "Accepted authority rests first of all on reason. If you ordered your
people to go and throw themselves into the sea, they would rise up in revolution.
I have the right to require obedience because my orders are reasonable."
　　"Then my sunset?" the little prince reminded him: for he never forgot a question
once he had asked it.
　　"You shall have your sunset. I shall command it. But, according to my science of
government, I shall wait until conditions are favorable."
　　"When will that be?" inquired the little prince.
　　"Hum! Hum!" replied the king; and before saying anything else he consulted a bulky
almanac. "Hum! Hum! That will be about-- about-- that will be this evening about twenty
minutes to eight. And you will see how well I am obeyed."
　　The little prince yawned. He was regretting his lost sunset. And then, too, he was
already beginning to be a little bored.
　　"I have nothing more to do here," he said to the king. "So I shall set out on my way again."
　　"Do not go," said the king, who was very proud of having a subject. "Do not go.
I will make you a Minister!"
　　"Minister of what?"
　　"Minster of-- of Justice!"
　　"But there is nobody here to judge!"
　　"We do not know that," the king said to him. "I have not yet made a complete
tour of my kingdom. I am very old. There is no room here for a carriage. And it tires me to walk."
　　"Oh, but I have looked already!" said the little prince, turning around to give one
more glance to the other side of the planet. On that side, as on this, there was nobody at all...
　　"Then you shall judge yourself," the king answered. "that is the most difficult thing
of all. It is much more difficult to judge oneself than to judge others. If you succeed in
judging yourself rightly, then you are indeed a man of true wisdom."
　　"Yes," said the little prince, "but I can judge myself anywhere. I do not need to live
on this planet.
　　"Hum! Hum!" said the king. "I have good reason to believe that somewhere on my planet
there is an old rat. I hear him at night. You can judge this old rat. From time to time you
will condemn him to death. Thus his life will depend on your justice. But you will pardon him
on each occasion; for he must be treated thriftily. He is the only one we have."
　　"I," replied the little prince, "do not like to condemn anyone to death. And now I think
I will go on my way."
　　"No," said the king.
　　But the little prince, having now completed his preparations for departure, had no wish
to grieve the old monarch.
　　"If Your Majesty wishes to be promptly obeyed," he said, "he should be able to give me a
reasonable order. He should be able, for example, to order me to be gone by the end of one
minute. It seems to me that conditions are favorable..."
　　As the king made no answer, the little prince hesitated a moment. Then, with a sigh, he
took his leave.
　　"I made you my Ambassador," the king called out, hastily.
　　He had a magnificent air of authority.
　　"The grown-ups are very strange," the little prince said to himself, as he continued
on his journey.
[ Chapter 11 ]
　　　　
　　- the little prince visits the conceited man
　　The second planet was inhabited by a conceited man.
　　"Ah! Ah! I am about to receive a visit from an admirer!" he exclaimed from afar,
when he first saw the little prince coming.
　　For, to conceited men, all other men are admirers.
　　"Good morning," said the little prince. "That is a queer hat you are wearing."
　　"It is a hat for salutes," the conceited man replied. "It is to raise in salute
when people acclaim me. Unfortunately, nobody at all ever passes this way."
　　"Yes?" said the little prince, who did not understand what the conceited man was
talking about.
　　"Clap your hands, one against the other," the conceited man now directed him.
　　The little prince clapped his hands. The conceited man raised his hat in a modest salute.
　　"This is more entertaining than the visit to the king," the little prince said to
himself. And he began again to clap his hands, one against the other. The conceited
man against raised his hat in salute.
　　After five minutes of this exercise the little prince grew tired of the game‘
s monotony.
　　"And what should one do to make the hat come down?" he asked.
　　But the conceited man did not hear him. Conceited people never hear anything but praise.
　　"Do you really admire me very much?" he demanded of the little prince.
　　"What does that mean-- ‘admire‘?"
　　"To admire mean that you regard me as the handsomest, the best-dressed, the richest,
and the most intelligent man on this planet."
　　"But you are the only man on your planet!"
　　"Do me this kindness. Admire me just the same."
　　"I admire you," said the little prince, shrugging his shoulders slightly, "but what
is there in that to interest you so much?"
　　And the little prince went away.
　　"The grown-ups are certainly very odd," he said to himself, as he continued on his journey.
[ Chapter 12 ]
　　　　 - the little prince visits the tippler
　　The next planet was inhabited by a tippler. This was a very short visit, but it
plunged the little prince into deep dejection.
　　"What are you doing there?" he said to the tippler, whom he found settled down
in silence before a collection of empty bottles and also a collection of full bottles.
　　"I am drinking," replied the tippler, with a lugubrious air.
　　"Why are you drinking?" demanded the little prince.
　　"So that I may forget," replied the tippler.
　　"Forget what?" inquired the little prince, who already was sorry for him.
　　"Forget that I am ashamed," the tippler confessed, hanging his head.
　　"Ashamed of what?" insisted the little prince, who wanted to help him.
　　"Ashamed of drinking!" The tippler brought his speech to an end, and shut
himself up in an impregnable silence.
　　And the little prince went away, puzzled.
　　"The grown-ups are certainly very, very odd," he said to himself, as he continued on his journey.
[ Chapter 13 ]
　　　　 - the little prince visits the businessman
　　The fourth planet belonged to a businessman. This man was so much occupied
that he did not even raise his head at the little prince‘s arrival.
　　"Good morning," the little prince said to him. "Your cigarette has gone out."
　　"Three and two make five. Five and seven make twelve. Twelve and three make fifteen.
Good morning. Fifteen and seven make twenty-two. Twenty-two and six make twenty-eight. I haven‘t
time to light it again. Twenty-six and five make thirty-one. Phew! Then that makes
five-hundred-and-one-million, six-hundred-twenty-two-thousand, seven-hundred-thirty-one."
　　"Five hundred million what?" asked the little prince.
　　"Eh? Are you still there? Five-hundred-and-one million-- I can‘t stop... I have so much to do!
I am concerned with matters of consequence. I don‘t amuse myself with balderdash. Two and five
make seven..."
　　"Five-hundred-and-one million what?" repeated the little prince, who never in his life had let
go of a question once he had asked it.
　　The businessman raised his head.
　　"During the fifty-four years that I have inhabited this planet, I have been disturbed only
three times. The first time was twenty-two years ago, when some giddy goose fell from goodness
knows where. He made the most frightful noise that resounded all over the place, and I made four
mistakes in my addition. The second time, eleven years ago, I was disturbed by an attack of
rheumatism.
I don‘t get enough exercise. I have no time for loafing. The third time-- well, this is it!
I was saying, then, five -hundred-and-one millions--"
　　"Millions of what?"
　　The businessman suddenly realized that there was no hope of being left in peace until he
answered this question.
　　"Millions of those little objects," he said, "which one sometimes sees in the sky."
　　"Flies?"
　　"Oh, no. Little glittering objects."
　　"Bees?"
　　"Oh, no. Little golden objects that set lazy men to idle dreaming. As for me,
I am concerned with matters of consequence. There is no time for idle dreaming in my life."
　　"Ah! You mean the stars?"
　　"Yes, that‘s it. The stars."
　　"And what do you do with five-hundred millions of stars?"
　　"Five-hundred-and-one million, six-hundred-twenty-two thousand, seven-hundred-thirty-one.
I am concerned with matters of consequence: I am accurate."
　　"And what do you do with these stars?"
　　"What do I do with them?"
　　"Yes."
　　"Nothing. I own them."
　　"You own the stars?"
　　"Yes."
　　"But I have already seen a king who--"
　　"Kings do not own, they reign over. It is a very different matter."
　　"And what good does it do you to own the stars?"
　　"It does me the good of making me rich."
　　"And what good does it do you to be rich?"
　　"It makes it possible for me to buy more stars, if any are ever discovered."
　　"This man," the little prince said to himself, "reasons a little like my poor tippler..."
　　Nevertheless, he still had some more questions.
　　"How is it possible for one to own the stars?"
　　"To whom do they belong?" the businessman retorted, peevishly.
　　"I don‘t know. To nobody."
　　"Then they belong to me, because I was the first person to think of it."
　　"Is that all that is necessary?"
　　"Certainly. When you find a diamond that belongs to nobody, it is yours.
When you discover an island that belongs to nobody, it is yours. When you get an idea
before any one else, you take out a patent on it: it is yours. So with me: I own the stars,
because nobody else before me ever thought of owning them."
　　"Yes, that is true," said the little prince. "And what do you do with them?"
　　"I administer them," replied the businessman. "I count them and recount them. It is
difficult. But I am a man who is naturally interested in matters of consequence."
　　The little prince was still not satisfied.
　　"If I owned a silk scarf," he said, "I could put it around my neck and take it away with me.
If I owned a flower, I could pluck that flower and take it away with me. But you cannot pluck the
stars from heaven..."
　　"No. But I can put them in the bank."
　　"Whatever does that mean?"
　　"That means that I write the number of my stars on a little paper. And then I put this paper
in a drawer and lock it with a key."
　　"And that is all?"
　　"That is enough," said the businessman.
　　"It is entertaining," thought the little prince. "It is rather poetic. But it is of
no great consequence."
　　On matters of consequence, the little prince had ideas which were very different from those
of the grown-ups.
　　"I myself own a flower," he continued his conversation with the businessman, "which I water
every day. I own three volcanoes, which I clean out every week (for I also clean out the one
that is extinct; one never knows). It is of some use to my volcanoes, and it is of some use to m
y flower, that I own them. But you are of no use to the stars..."
　　The businessman opened his mouth, but he found nothing to say in answer. And the little
prince went away.
　　"The grown-ups are certainly altogether extraordinary," he said simply, talking to
himself as he continued on his journey.
Chapter 14 ]
　　　　 - the little prince visits the lamplighter