B1159 <=> B1161 (BTG XLV Extraction of Electricity, p. 1160)

“’One can never know who might help you to get out of galoshes.’

“And the solution of this question was thus obtained, because my very old friend had in view individuals with quite other data and possibilities than these Saturn friends of mine possessed, who were only ordinary three-brained beings; my friend probably did not suspect that in most cases concerning these questions, just these ordinary three-brained beings, who acquire information about every kind of genuine cosmic fact exclusively only thanks to their being-Partkdolg-duty, are more competent than any of the Angels or Cherubim with their prepared Being, who, though perfected in Reason to high gradations, yet as regards practical confrontation may appear to be only such Individuals as our always respected Mullah Nassr Eddin defines in the following words:

“’Never will he understand the sufferings of another who has not experienced them himself though he may have divine Reason and the nature of a genuine Devil.’”

At this point of Beelzebub’s tales, there were diffused all along the intersystem ship Karnak artificially produced vibrations which had the property of penetrating into the common presences of all the passengers of the ship and which acted on what are called the “wandering nerves” of the stomach.

This artificially produced manifestation was an announcement to the passengers about their assembling in the common what is called “Djameechoonatra,” a kind of terrestrial “monasterial refectory” in which the second being-food is collectively taken.

Chapter XLVI

Beelzebub Explains to His Grandson the Significance of the Form and Sequence Which He Chose for Expounding the Information Concerning Man

AFTER the process of taking in the second being-food, Beelzebub did not immediately return from the “Djameechoonatra” where they usually spent their time in conversation, but first went to his “Kesshah.”

Kesshah is the name given to those compartments on space-ships which on terrestrial steamers are called “cabins.”

Beelzebub first entered his Kesshah in order to cool his already extremely decrepit tail a little in a certain liquid, to which he was compelled to have recourse from time to time on account of his old age.

When on returning from his Kesshah he silently entered that section of the ship Karnak where they usually spent their time, he unexpectedly saw the following picture, unusual for him:

His beloved grandson Hassein was standing with his face to the corner, his hands covering his eyes, weeping. Beelzebub, deeply moved, quickly approached Hassein and in a voice full of anxiety, asked him:

“What is the matter, my dear boy? Are you really weeping?”

Hassein wished to answer, but it could be seen that the sobbing of his planetary body prevented him from speaking.

Only after a rather long time, when the planetary body of Hassein was a little calmed did he, gazing and his grandfather with very sad eyes, but yet with a smile of affection, say: