"listen to me," he said when the peasants approached, "you, my brave fellows, my clever brothers simeon. i like your trades and i think, as do my wise advisers, that if thou, the second simeon, art able to see everything going on under the sun, thou shouldst climb quickly on yonder column and glance around to see if there is, as they say, beyond the great sea an island, buzan by name. and see if on that island, as men assert, there is a mighty kingdom, and in that kingdom a mighty king, and if that king, as the story goes, has a daughter, the most beautiful princess helena."