B1087 <=> B1089 (BTG XLIII Beelzebub’s opinion of war, p. 1088)

“Such a question was evoked in me by the beings there who belong to the caste of the bureaucrats, yet nevertheless as regards them one might still explain this to you, at least ‘more or less.’ Although the series of experiencings in them is also very limited, yet at any rate they actually have them; they have them at least for every hour of the day and night.

“All the experiencings, however, of these aristocrats and zevrocrats there, according to my observation, can be reduced to only three series.

“The first concerns the question of food; the second consists of the recollections associated with the former functionings of their sexual organs; and the third relates to the memories of their first nurse.

“And how the beings, who have in all only three series of such experiencings, could have the length of their existence the same as other beings on the surface of your planet, will always be for me an insoluble puzzle.

“It is said that about this same puzzling question, that is, about how these terrestrial types manage to exist on the surface of the planet, even the great cunning Lucifer once grew very thoughtful, and he grew so intensely thoughtful that all the hairs of the tip of his tail turned quite gray.

“About these mentioned so to say ‘jokes of nature,’ it remains for me only to attempt to explain to you why such a sharp difference exists there in the names of one and the same kind of being.

“I said ‘attempt’ because I myself do not know exactly the cause of it, yet, knowing the roots of both words from which these names were formed, I think I can presume with great certainty that it was obtained thanks to a certain custom existing there.