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There once was a King of a tribe in Africa. He lived in a huge, round house made of grass, typical of all the others in the village, except that his was the largest. By day, he sat on the stump of a tree, which had been brought into his hut, and covered with animal skins. Everyone else sat on the floor, some on skins, some on the dirt. No one sat on anything which raised them higher than the King.
One day, an English explorer chanced upon the village. The explorer was carried aloft by a group of bearers. He sat on a small bentwood chair, which sat upon a light platform, which the bearers carried on poles on their shoulders. This enabled the explorer to see across the landscape, above the tall grass. As the group entered the village, there was much consternation. Who was this? And not only that, but why would he dare to sit on something above the ground, above the height at which the King sat? Of course, the King too, was pretty upset. But Kings usually don’t show how upset they really are; they play it cool. And a good thing too, as it turned out for this King. As the explorer was being lowered to the ground, one of the party whispered to him that it seemed that maybe they had blotted their copybook by him being on a chair, and not only that, but a chair up on a platform on their shoulders. After the ritual greetings, the explorer apologized to the King if he had caused offense by being higher than him, and explained that, in fact, he had merely been demonstrating a gift that he had brought for the King, namely the bentwood chair. He explained how much more comfortable this chair would be, as it had a back, and how the woven cane seat would follow the curves of his bottom and how, because it was lightweight, it could be moved around very easily. The King was excited, and graciously accepted the gift. He leaned back into the back of the chair. He wriggled his bottom on the comfortably woven seat. He picked it up and carried it to the doorway, and sat in a nice warm shaft of sunlight until it became a little too warm, when he picked it up and took it back into the cool shade of his large grass house. The explorer went on his way. When he arrived home, he told of his gift to the African King. And so it was, that over the years, many explorers came to visit the King, and all bore a gift for him. And because of the precedent set by the first explorer, all subsequent visitors brought the King a chair of some description. Some brought elaborately carved ones. Some bought painted chairs, some brought chairs fit for a king, some would say they were like thrones! And over the years, the King’s collection of chairs and thrones and sit-upons became famous. And the more famous it became, the more people visited, each visitor bearing a throne as a gift, a gift more elaborate and ornate than the previous one. And the grass hut was filled with thrones, they were side by side across the whole floor, they were hung by hooks on the walls, and they were hung up in the ceiling, and they were placed up on the rafters in the roof. The King became an old man. One day he was sitting on his throne, contemplating all his other thrones which surrounded him – around him, above him, and under him. He looked too at the tired old grass walls of his hut, and mused on how old his grass hut was, and how well it had stood up to the ravages of time, and wind, and fire and rain and termites. But, it hadn’t. At that moment, under the weight of all the thrones in the ceiling and on the walls, the poor tired old grass hut collapsed into a great big heap in the dust. The moral of the story: People in grass houses shouldn’t stow thrones.
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