All began to approach and look; the flea was actually shod with real shoes on all its feet, and the left-handed man declared that even this did not constitute the whole marvel.  
"If you had a better melkoscope," said he, "which would magnify five million times, then you might deign to perceive that the maker's name is stamped upon each shoe."
 
"And is your name there?" asked the Emperor.
 
"Not at all," replies the left-handed man. "I worked at something finer than those horse-shoes. I forged the tiny nails with which the shoes are[Pg 60] fastened on; for that no melkoscope whatever can be used."
 
The Emperor said: "Where is your melkoscope with which you could produce this marvel?"
 
And the left-handed man replied: "We are poor folk, and because of our poverty we have no melkoscope, but we have trained eyes."
 
Then other courtiers still, perceiving that the left-handed man's case had proved auspicious, began to kiss him, and Platoff gave him a hundred rubles and said: "Forgive me, good brother, for hauling you by the hair."
 
The left-handed man replied: "God forgives[24]—this is not the first time that that sort of thing has happened to me."
 
And he said no more, neither was there any time for him to speak at length, for............