Bohn's Extra Volume edition of Rabelais (2024)

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{{Template}}Bohn's Extra Volume edition of Rabelais with notes by Ozell, Duchat and others.

Volume 2

BOHN'S EXTRA VOLUME.THE WORKSOFFRANCIS RABELAIS.VOL. II.BOHN'S EXTRA VOLUME.

RABELAIS, although ranking as a classic in every Europeanlanguage, and admitted into almost every general library, is tooexceptionable in language to suit the purer taste of the presentday, and is therefore published (like Grammont) in the extravolume series of the Standard Library. The best of the existingtranslations have been used, and a few notes added from a copyannotated by the celebrated John Wilkes.TESTIMONIA." If Rabelais surpasses all other writers in obscenity, it should be re- marked that there is in his licentiousness nothing of that feverish pleasure in contemplating human nature on its most disgusting side, which is so much acharacteristic of Swift." " Here we take leave of an author who iswithout a parallel in the history of literature; an author who is the literary parent of many authors, since without him we should probably never have known a Swift or a Sterne, or, in fact, any of the regular humorists; an author, who, for the union of heavy learning with the most miraculous powers of imagination, is, perhaps, without a competitor. " -For. Quarterly, No. 62." Beyond a doubt Rabelais was among the deepest, as well as boldest thinkers of his age. His buffoonery was not merely Brutus's rough stick,which contained a rod of gold; it was necessary as an amulet against the monks and legates. Never was there a more plausible, and seldom, I am persuaded, a less appropriate line, than the thousand times quoted ' Rabelais laughing in his easy chair'of Mr. Pope. The caricature of his filth and zanyism shew how fully he bothknew and felt the danger in which he stood. I could write a treatise in praise of the moral elevation of Rabelais' works, which would make the church stareand the conventicle groan, and yet would be truth, and nothing but the truth.I class Rabelais with the great creative minds of the world, Shakspeare,Dante, Cervantes, &c. "-Coleridge." The most celebrated , and certainly the most brilliant performance in the path of fiction that belongs to this age, is that of Rabelais. Few books areless likely to obtain the praise of a rigorous critic, but few have more the stamp of originality, or shew a more redundant fertility, always of language,and sometimes of imagination. His reading is large, but always rendered subservient to ridicule; he is never serious in a single page, and seems to have had little other aim, in his first two volumes, than to pour out the ex- uberance of his animal gaiety. "—Hallam's Literature of Europe." Rabelais is one of the world's master-minds; he belongs to those who have perpetual dominion, and rule us from their urns. His invention is inexhaustible, his opulence of diction wonderful, and his learning ever ready to illustrate and enforce whatever his genius may devise; while for wit and humour he has but one equal in literature. " -Athenæum." Rabelais brightens up to view as I see more of the world; he treated it as it deserved, laughed at it all, and as I judge from myself, ceased to hate it, for I find hatred an unjust preference. "-Walpole.The English version of Rabelais, by Urquhart, and Motteux, may be considered as one of the most perfect specimens of the art of translation ---Tytler.Henryb.Thin /201GloverTOP CRQUHART.Hinchliff

THEWORKSurFRANCIS RABELAIS.Translated from the French.BYSIR THOMAS URQUHART AND MOTTEUX;WITHEXPLANATORY NOTES, BY DUCHAT, OZELL, AND OTHERS.A NEW EDITION,REVISED, AND WITH ADDITIONAL NOTES.VOL. II.LONDON:HENRY G. BOHN, YORK STREET, COVENT GARDEN.1864.KD21400HARVARDUNIVERSITYLIBRARY40x398CONTENTS OF VOL. II.BOOK III.—Continued.TREATING OF THE HEROIC DEEDS AND SAYINGS OF THE GOOD PANChap.TAGRUEL.XIV. Panurge's dream, with the interpretation thereofXV. Panurge's excuse and exposition of the monastic mystery concerning powdered beefXVII. How Panurge spoke to the Sibyl of Panzoust XVIII. How Pantagruel and Panurge did diversely expound theverses ofthe Sibyl of Panzoust XIX. How Pantagruel praiseth the counsel of dumb men XX. How Goatsnose by signs maketh answer to PanurgeXXI. How Panurge consulteth with an old French poet, named Raminagrobis ..Page7XVI. HowPantagruel adviseth Panurge to consult with the Sibyl of Panzoust 111438414852422822198242934XXII. How Panurge patrocinates and defendeth the order of the begging FriarsXXIII. How Panurge maketh a motion of a return to Ramina- grobis XXIV. How Panurge consulteth with Epistemon XXV. How Panurge consulteth with Her Trippa....XXVI. How Panurge consulteth with Friar John of the Fun- nels .. ..XXVII. How Friar John merrily and sportingly counselleth Pa nurge XXVIII. How Friar John comforteth Panurge in the doubtful matter of cuckoldry XXIX. How Pantagruel convocated together a Theologian,Physician, Lawyer, and Philosopher, for extricating Panurge out of the perplexity wherein he was XXX. How the theologue, Hippothadeus, giveth counsel to Panurge in the matter and business of his nuptial en- terprise XXXI. How the physician Rondibilis counselleth Panurge XXXII. How Rondibilis declareth cuckoldry to be naturally one of the appendances of marriage ..XXXIII. Rondibilis the Physician's cure of cuckoldryXXXIV. How women ordinarily have the greatest longing afterthings prohibited XXXV. How the philosopher Trouillogan handleth the diffi culty of marriage ..XXXVI. A continuation of the answers of the Ephectic and Pyrrhonian philosopher Trouillogan XXXVII. How Pantagruel persuaded Panurge to take counsel ..XXXVIII. How Triboulet is set forth and blazoned by Pantagruelof a fooland Panurge5863-67 .757882899498104106112117iv CONTENTS.Chap.Page.. 122XXXIX. How Pantagruel was present at the trial of Judge Bri- dlegoose, who decided causes and controversies in law by the chance and fortune of the dice XL. How Bridlegoose giveth reasons, why he looked over those law-papers, which he decided by the chance of the diceXLI. How Bridlegoose relateth the history of the reconcilers of parties at variance in matters oflaw XLII. How suits at law are bred at first, and how they came afterwards to their perfect growth ..125129135XLIII. How Pantagruel excuseth Bridlegoose in the matter of sentencing actions at law by the chance of the dice 140 XLIV. How Pantagruel relateth a strange history of the per- plexity of human judgment ..XLV. How Panurge taketh advice of Triboulet XLVI. How Pantagruel and Panurge diversely interpret the words of Triboulet ..XLVII. How Pantagruel and Panurge resolved to make a visit to the oracle of the holy bottle .. ..XLVIII. How Gargantua sheweth, that the children ought not to marry without the special knowledge and advice of their fathers and mothersXLIX. How Pantagruel did put himself in a readiness to go to sea; and of the herb named Pantagruelion..L. How the famous Pantagruelion ought to be preparedand wrought143 147150153.. 156163166.. 171177LI. Why it is called Pantagruelion, and of the admirable virtues thereofLII. How a certain kind of Pantagruelion is of that naturethat the fire is not able to consume itBOOK IV.The Translator's Preface ..The Author's Epistle Dedicatory The Author's Prologue ..183 187 190I. How Pantagruel went to sea to visit the oracle of Bacbuc,alias the Holy Bottle 205II. How Pantagruel bought many rarities in the island of Medamothy 209 III. How Pantagruel received a letter from his father Gar- gantua, and of the strange way to have speedy news from far distant places 212IV. How Pantagruel writ to his father Gargantua, and sent him several curiosities 214.. V. How Pantagruel met a ship with passengers returning from Lanternland 217VI. How the fray being over, Panurge cheapened one of Ding- dong's sheep 219with DingdongVII. Which if you read, you will find how Panurge bargained .. 221CONTENTS. VChap.VIII. How Panurge caused Dingdong and his sheep to be drowned in the seaIX. How Pantagruel arrived at the island of Ennasin, and of the strange ways of being akin in that country X. How Pantagruel went ashore at the island of Chely,where he saw King St. Panigon ..Page225227231XI. Why monks love to be in kitchens .. 233XII. HowPantagruel passed through the land of Pettifogging,and ofthe strange way of living among the Catchpoles 236 XIII. How, like Master Francis Villon, the Lord of Basché commended his servants ..XIV. A further account of Catchpoles who were drubbed at Basché's houseXV. How the ancient custom at nuptials is renewed by the Catchpole240243245 XVI. How Friar John made trial of the nature ofthe Catchpoles 248 XVII. How Pantagruel came to the islands of Tohu and Bohu;and of the strange death of Widenostrils, the swal- lower of WindmillsXVIII. How Pantagruel met with a great storm at seaXIX. What countenances Panurge and Friar John kept dur- ing the storm ..XX. How the Pilots were forsaking their ships in the great- est stress of weather .. ..XXI. A continuation of the storm, with a short discourse on the subject of making testaments at sea.. 251 256.. 259261.. 264 267" 269271.. 275277XXII. An end of the stormXXIII. How Panurge played the good fellow when the storm was over ..XXIV. How Panurge was said to have been afraid without reason, during the stormXXV. How, after the storm, Pantagruel went on shore in the Island of the Macreons ..XXVI. How the good Macrobius gave us an account of the Mansion and Decease of the Heroes ..XXVII. Pantagruel's discourse of the decease of heroic souls;and of the dreadful prodigies that happened before the death of the late Lord de Langey.. XXVIII. How Pantagruel related a very sad story of the death ofthe Heroes .. XXIX. How Pantagruel sailed by the Sneaking Island, where Shrovetide reigned XXX. How Shrovetide is anatomized and described by Xeno- manesXXXI. Shrovetide's outward parts anatomized XXXII. A continuation of Shrovetide's countenance, postures,and way of behaving279281.. 283286 2881289.. 294 296.. 298XXXIII. How Pantagruel discovered a monstrous physeter, or whirlpool, near the Wild Island XXXIV. How the monstrous physeter was slain by Pantagruel XXXV. How Pantagruel went on shore in the Wild Island, theancient abode of the ChitterlingsCONTENTS.Chap .XXXVI. How the wild Chitterlings laid an ambuscade for Pantagruel XXXVII. How Pantagruel sent for Colonel Maul- Chitterling, and Colonel Cut- Pudding; with a discourse well worthyour hearing, about the names of places and persons.XXXVIII. How Chitterlings are not to be slighted by menXXXIX. How Friar John joined with the cooks to fight the ChitterlingsXL. How Friar John fitted up the sow; and of the valiant cooks that went into it ..XLI. How Pantagruel broke the Chitterlings at the knees XLII. Hov: Pantagruel held a treaty with Niphleseth, Queen of the Chitterlings XLIII. How Pantagruel went into the Island of RuachXLIV. How small rain lays a high wind..XLV. How Pantagruel went on shore in the Island of PopePage301303 306308309311.. 315.. 317 319Figland 322XLVI. How a junior devil was fooled by a husbandman of Pope-Figland 326Figland 330332335338 340 342XLVII. How the Devil was deceived by an old woman of PopeXLVIII. How Pantagruel went ashore at the Island of Papimany XLIX. How Homenas, Bishop of Papimany, showed us the Uranopet decretals L. How Homenas showed us the Arch-type, or representa- tion of a pope..LI. Table-talk in praise of the decretals LII. A continuation of the miracles caused by the decretals LIII. How by the virtue of the decretals, gold is subtilely 347352drawn out of France to RomeLIV. HowHomenas gave Pantagruel some bon-christian pears LV. How Pantagruel, being at sea, heard various unfrozen words 354LVI. How among the frozen words Pantagruel found some odd onesLVII . How Pantagruel went ashore at the dwelling of Gaster,the first master of arts in the worldLVIII. How, at the court of the Master of Ingenuity, Panta356359364gruel detested the Engastrimythes and the Gastrolaters 362 LIX. Ofthe ridiculous statue Manduce; and how, and what the Gastrolaters sacrifice to their ventripotent god LX. What the Gastrolaters sacrificed to their god on inter- larded fish- days .. LXI. How Gaster invented means to get and preserve cornLXII. How Gaster invented an art to avoid being hurt or touched by cannon balls ..LXIII. How Pantagruel fell asleep near the Island of Chaneph,and of the problems proposed to be solved when he waked366 369371.. 374 377 381384LXIV. How Pantagruel gave an answer to the problems LXV. How Pantagruel passed the time with his servantsLXVI. How, by Pantagruel's order, the Muses were sa'uted near the Isle of GanabinCONTENTS. viiChap.Page LXVII. How Panurge bewrayed himself for fear; and of the huge cat Rodilardus, which he took for a puny devil 387BOOK V.The Author's Prologue 393I. How Pantagruel arrived at the Ringing Island, and of the noise that we heardII. How the Ringing Island had been inhabited by the Siti- cines, who were become birdsIII. Howthere is but one Popehawk in the Ringing Island .. IV. Howthe birds ofthe Ringing Island were all passengers.. V. Ofthe dumb knighthawks of the Ringing Island VI. Howthe birds are crammed in the Ringing Island VII. How Panurge related to Master Edituus the fable of the horse and the ass......399403406 408.. 410 413415.. 420 424426by Gripe- 429 434 436 438 440VIII. How with much ado we got a sight of the Popehawk IX. How we arrived at the Island of ToolsX. How Pantagruel arrived atthe Island of Sharping ( or gaming)XI. How we passed through the wicket, inhabitedmen-all, Arch- duke ofthe Furred Law- cats..XII. How Gripe-men- all propounded a riddle to us XIII. How Panurge solved Gripe-men-all's riddle .. XIV. Howthe furred law-cats live on corruption XV. HowFriar John talks of rooting out the furred law- cats.. XVI. How Pantagruel came to the Island of the Apedefts, orIgnoramuses, with long claws and crooked paws, and of terrible adventures and monsters thereXVII. How we went Forwards, and how Panurge had like to have been killedXVIII. How our ships were stranded, and we were relieved by some people that were subject to Queen Whims (qui te- noient de la Quinte)dom of Quintessence, called Entelechy444451453XIX. How we arrived at the queendom of Whims, or king- 458 XX. How the Quintessence cured the sick with a song XXI. How the Queen passed her time after dinner XXII. How Queen Whim's officers were employed: and howthe said lady retained us among her abstractors461 465468XXIII. Howthe Queen was served at dinner, and of her way of eating .. 471XIV. How there was a ball in the manner of a tournament,at which Queen Whims was present 473XXV. How the thirty- two persons at the ball fought XXVI. How we came to the Island of Odes, where the ways go up and down475481 XXVII. How we came to the Island of Sandals; and of the order of Semiquaver Friars 483 XXVIII. How Panurge asked a Semiquaver Friar many questions, and was only answered in monosyllablesXXIX. How Epistemon disliked the institution of Lent.. 491 496viii CONTENTS.Chap. Page XXX. How we came to the land of SatinXXXI. Howin the land of Satin we saw Hearsay, who kept aschool of vouching ··499.. 503 506506XXXII. Howwe came in sight of LanternlandXXXIII. How we landed at the Port ofthe Lychnobii, and came to Lantern-land .. XXXIV. How we arrived at the Oracle of the BottleXXXV. How we went under-ground to come to the Templeof the Holy Bottle, and how Chinon is the oldest city in the world.. XXXVI. How we went down the Tetradic steps, and of Pa- nurge's fear .XXXVII. How the temple gates in a wonderful manner opened of themselves ..509511513.. 515 517518520XXXVIII. Of the Temple's admirable Pavement XXXIX. How we saw Bacchus's army drawn up in Battalia in Mosaic workXL. Howthe battle, in which the good Bacchus overthrew the Indians was represented in Mosaic workXLI. Howthe temple was illuminated with a wonderful Lamp 523 XLII. How the Priestess Bacbuc showed us a fantastic fountain in the temple, and how the fountain-water had the taste ofwine, according to the imagination of those who drank of it .. 524XLIII. How the Priestess Bacbuc equipt Panurge, in order to have the word of the Bottle 531XLIV. How Bacbuc, the High- Priestess, brought Panurgebefore the Holy Bottle 533536 XLV. HowBacbuc explained the word of the Goddess Bottle 534 XLVI. How Panurge and the rest rhymed with poetic fury .. XLVII. How we took our leave of Bacbuc, and left the Oracle of the Holy Bottle .. .. .. .. 540THE MOST CERTAIN, TRUE, AND INFALLIBLE PANTAGRUELIAN PROGOfthe Golden Number NOSTICATION.I. Of the Governor and Lord Ascendant this year.. II. Of the eclipses this year III. Of the diseases this year .... IV. Ofthe fruits of the earth this year V. Of the disposition of the people this year VI. Ofthe condition of some countries OF THE FOUR SEASONS OF THE YEAR.VII. Of the Spring, VIII . Summer, IX. Autunn X. Winter543 544 545 545 546 546 550552 553553557 .. 558561An Epistle by Pantagruel's Limousin, Grand Excoriator of the Latiale Tongue, &c.The Philosophical Cream of Encyclopedic Questions ..Two Epistles to two Women of different humoursLETTERS WRITTEN BY FRANCIS RABELAIS, DURING HIS STAY IN ITALY, IN THE YEAR 1536 ......RABELAIS .BOOK III .-Continued.TREATING OF THE HEROIC DEEDS AND SAYINGOF THE GOOD PANTAGRUEL.CHAPTER XIV.Panurge's dream, with the interpretation thereof.At seven o'clock of the next following morning, Panurge didnot fail to present himself before Pantagruel, in whose chamber were at that time Epistemon, Friar John of the Funnels,Ponocrates, Eudemon, Carpalim, and others, to whom, atthe entry of Panurge, Pantagruel said , Lo, here cometh our dreamer. That word, quoth Epistemon, in ancient timescost very much, and was dearly sold to the children of Jacob.Then said Panurge, I have been plunged into my dumps sodeeply, as if I had been lodged with Gaffer Noddy- cap.Dreamed indeed I have, and that right lustily; but I couldtake along with me no more thereof, that I did truly understand; save only, that I in my vision had a pretty, fair,young, gallant, handsome woman, who no less lovingly andkindly treated and entertained me, hugged, cherished, co*ckered, dandled, and made much of me, as if I had beenanother neat dilli- darling minion, like Adonis . Never wasman more glad than I wasthen, myjoy at that time was incomparable. She flattered me, tickled me, stroked me, groped me, frizzled me, curled me, kissed me, embraced me, laid herhands about my neck, and nowand then made jestingly, prettylittle horns above my forehead. I told her in the like disport, as I did play the fool with her, that she should ratherplace and fix them in a little below mine eyes, that I mightsee the better what I should stick at with them: for, being VOL. II.B2 RABELAIS | BOOK III. ' WORKS.so situated, Momus ' then would find no fault therewith,as he did once with the position of the horns of bulls.The wanton, toying girl, notwithstanding any remonstranceof mine to the contrary, did always drive and thrust themfurther in yet thereby, which to me seemed wonderful, shedid not do me any hurt at all . A little after, though I knownot how, I thought I was transformed into a tabor, and sheinto a chough, or madge-howlet.My sleeping there being interrupted, I awaked in a start,angry, displeased , perplexed, chafing, and very wroth. Therehave you a large platter-full of dreams, make thereupongood cheer, and, if you please spare not to interpret themaccording to the understanding which you have in them.Come, Carpalim, let us to breakfast. To my sense andmeaning, quoth Pantagruel, if I have skill or knowledge inthe art of divination by dreams, your wife will not really, andto the outward appearance of the world, plant, or set horns,and stick them fast in your forehead, after a visible manner,as satyrs use to wear and carry them; but she will be so farfrom preserving herself loyal in the discharge and observance of a conjugal duty, that, on the contrary she will violate her plighted faith , break her marriage oath, infringe allmatrimonial ties , prostitute her body to the dalliance of othermen, and so make you a cuckold . This point is clearly andmanifestly explained and expounded by Artemidorus, just as I have related it. Nor will there be any metamorphosis,or transmutation made of you into a drum, or tabor, but youwill surely be as soundly beaten as ever was tabor at a merrywedding. Nor yet will she be changed into a chough, butwill steal from you, chiefly in the night, as is the nature ofthat thievish bird . Hereby may you perceive your dreamsto be in everyjot conform and agreeable to the Virgilian lots.A cuckold you will be, beaten and robbed. Then cried out1 Momus. ] See Aristotle, De Partibus Animalium, and Lucian'sNigrinus.2 Carpalim. ] It is in some editions, Monsieur Master Carpalim .He might be some counsellor of a sovereign or supreme court.3 Expounded by Artemidorus. ] " Memini me apud Artemidorum antiquum auctorem legisse, eum qui somniàrit arietem ad se venire,futurum esse ut ejus uxor machetur," says the Scaligerana, at the word cornard, i. e. cuckold. Which is tantamount to the note madeby the Abbot Guyet, in the margin of his Rabelais here, that Artemi- dorus says, who dreams of horns will be a cuckold.CHAP. XIV.] PANTAGRUEL.Father John with a loud voice. He tells the truth; uponmy conscience, thou wilt be a cuckold, an honest one, I warrant thee. O the brave horns that will be borne by thee!Ha, ha, ha! Our good Master de Cornibus. God savethee and shield thee! Wilt thou be pleased to preach buttwo words of a sermon to us, I will go through the parishchurch to gather up alms for the poor.You are, quoth Panurge, very far mistaken in your interpretation; for the matter is quite contrary to the sense thereof. My dream presageth, that I shall by marriage.be stored with plenty of all manner of goods , —the horni- fying of me showing, that I will possess a cornucopia,that Amalthæan horn, which is called the horn of abundance, whereof the fruition did still portend the wealth ofthe enjoyer. You possibly will say, that they are ratherlike to be satyr's horns; for you of these did make some mention. Amen, Amen, Fiat, fiatur, ad differentiam_papæ.Thus shall I have my touch- her- home still ready. My staffof love, semipiternally in a good case, will, satyr- like , be5Our good Master de Cornibus . ] Not de Cornelius , as Sir T. U. has it. It is the Latin name of a Franciscan friar, otherwise called PeterCornu, or Corne. He was doctor of Paris, and contemporary with Rabelais, who, for what he says of this man, did not deserve, any more than Joachim de Bellay (who likewise speaks of him in his Petroma- chia) to be called a libertine, as they both are by Moreri upon this account (at the word cornu) . This Mr. Horne died at Paris in 1542,and the same year came out a collection of epitaphs upon him, one of which runs thus,Must we, alas! O doctor optime,Must we lose you hisce temporibus?In our great necessity, doctor egregie,You do leave us plenos mororibus.See more in Naudæus and la Caille.5 Fiat fiatur ad differentiam Papa. ] This in the former translatior runs fiat, siat, which is all wrong. Siat is no word at all; neithe should it be fiat twice; but fiatur, after the first fiat. Because, as M. Duchat observes, Panurge at first says fiat, a word used by the pope at the bottom of such petitions as he vouchsafes to give a favourable answer to. But then Rabelais corrects himself, out of pure respectful- ness, and says fiatur, in the Macaronic style. Merlin Coccaye Maca- ronic. 4. Supplicat ut præstum, præstum vindicta fiatur."66Mystaff oflove, &c. ] Le virolet en poinct. My lance couched.Virolet (though it signifies many things, and among the rest a man's peace- maker) has all the air of a small lance, and may not improperly be derived from veru (a spit in Latin) or verou, a small dart in the Languedochian dialect.B 24LBOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.never toiled out; a thing which all men wish for, and send uptheir prayers to that purpose, but such a thing as neverthelessis granted but to few. Hence doth it follow by a consequenceas clear as the sunbeams, that I will never be in the danger ofbeing made a cuckold, for the defect hereof is Causa sine qua non; yea, the sole cause, as many think, of making husbandscuckolds. What makes poor scoundrel rogues to beg, Ipray you? Is it not because they have not enough at homewherewith to fill their bellies and their pokes. What is it makes the wolves to leave the woods? Is it not the wantof flesh meat? What maketh women whor*s? You understand me well enough. And herein may I very well submitmy opinion to the judgment of learned lawyers, presidents,counsellors, advocates, procurers, attorneys, and other glossers and commentators on the venerable rubric, De frigidiset maleficiatis. You are, in truth, sir, as it seems to me,(excuse my boldness, if I have transgressed , ) in a most palpable and absurd error, to attribute my horns to cuckoldry.Diana wears them on her head after the manner of a crescent. Is she a cucquean for that? Howthe devil can shebe cuckolded, who never yet was married? Speak somewhat more correctly, I beseech you, lest she, being offended, furnish you with a pair of horns, shapen by the pattern of those which she made for Actæon. The goodlyBacchus also carries horns, -Pan, Jupiter Hammon, with agreat many others. Are they all cuckolds? If Jove be acuckold, Juno is a whor*. This follows by the figure metalepsis; as to call a child in the presence of his father andmother, a bastard, or whor*'s son, is tacitly and underboard, no less than if he had said openly, the father is acuckold, and his wife a punk. Let our discourse comenearer to the purpose. The horns that my wife did makeme are horns of abundance, planted and grafted in my headfor the increase and shooting up of all good things. Thiswill I affirm for truth, upon my word, and pawn my faith and credit both upon it. As for the rest, I will be no lessjoyful, frolic, glad, cheerful, merry, jolly, and gamesome,than a well- bended tabor in the hands of a good drummer ata nuptial feast, still making a noise, still rolling, still buz1 A bastard.] Avoistre an old French word for a child got inavouterie (as Chaucer calls it) i. e. adultery.CHAP. XIV. ]PANTAGRUEL. 5zing and cracking. Believe me, sir, in that consisteth noneof my least good fortunes. And my wife will be jocund,feat, compt, neat, quaint, dainty, trim, tricked up, brisk,smirk, and smug, even as a pretty little Cornish chough.Who will not believe this, let hell or the gallows be theburden of his Christmas carol.I remark, quoth Pantagruel, the last point or particlewhich you did speak of, and, having seriously conferred itwith the first, find that at the beginning you were delightedwith the sweetness of your dream; but in the end and fina.closure of it you startingly awaked, and on a sudden wereforthwith vexed in choler, and annoyed. Yea, quoth Panurge, the reason of that was, because I had fasted too long.Flatter not yourself, quoth Pantagruel; all will go to ruin.Know for a certain truth, that every sleep that endeth witha starting, and leaves the person irksome, grieved, and fretting, doth either signify a present evil, or otherwise presageth and portendeth a future imminent mishap. To signify an evil, that is to say, to show some sickness hardlycurable, a kind of pestilentious or malignant bile, botch, orsore, lying and lurking hid, occult, and latent within thevery centre of the body, which many times doth by themeans of sleep, whose nature is to reinforce and strengthenthe faculty and virtue of concoction, begin according to thetheorems of physic to declare itself, and moves toward theoutward superfices. At this sad stirring is the sleeper's restand ease disturbed and broken, whereof the first feeling andstinging smart admonisheth, that he must patiently enduregreat pain and trouble, and thereunto provide some remedy:as when we say proverbially, to incense hornets, move astinking puddle, and to awake a sleeping lion , instead ofthese more usual expressions, and of a more familiar andplain meaning, to provoke angry persons, to make a thingthe worse by meddling with it, and to irritate a testy cholericman when he is at quiet. On the other part, to presage orforetel an evil, especially in what concerneth the exploits ofthe soul, in matter of somnial divinations, is as much as to sayas that it giveth us to understand, that some dismal fortuneor mischance is destinated and prepared for us, which shortlywill not fail to come to pass. A clear and evident examplehereof is to be found in the dream and dreadful awaking of6 [ BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.Hecuba, as likewise in that of Euridice, the wife of Orpheus,neither of which was no sooner finished , saith Ennius, butthat incontinently thereafter they awaked in a start, and wereaffrighted horribly. Thereupon these accidents ensued;Hecuba had her husband Priamus, together with her children, slain before her eyes, and saw then the destruction ofher country; and Euridice died speedily thereafter in a most miserable manner. Eneas, dreaming that he spoke toHector a little after his decease, did on a sudden on a greatstart, awake, and was afraid. Now hereupon did follow thisevent; Troy that same night was spoiled, sacked, and burnt.At another time the same Æneas, dreaming that he saw hisfamiliar Genii and Penates, in a ghastly fright and astonishment awaked, of which terror and amazement the issue was,that the very next day subsequent, by a most horrible tempest on the sea, he was like to have perished, and been castaway. Moreover, Turnus being prompted, instigated, andstirred up by the fantastic vision of an infernal fury, to enterinto a bloody war against Æneas, awaked in a start muchtroubled and disquieted in spirit, in sequel whereof, aftermany notable and famous routs , defeats, and discomfituresin open field, he came at last to be killed in a single combatby the said Æneas. A thousand other instances I couldafford, if it were needful, of this matter. Whilst I relatethese stories of Æneas, remark the saying of Fabius Pietor,who faithfully averred, That nothing had at any time befallen unto, was done, or enterprised by him, whereof he hadnot previously had notice , and before-hand foreseen it to thefull, by sure predictions altogether founded on the oracles ofsomnial divination . To this there is no want of pregnantreasons, no more than of examples. For if repose and restin sleeping be a special gift and favour of the gods, as ismaintained bythe philosophers, and by the poet attested inthese lines ,Then sleep, that heavenly gift , came to refresh Of human labourers the wearied flesh;such a gift or benefit can never finish or terminate in wrathand indignation, without portending some unlucky fate,and most disastrous fortune to ensue. Otherwise it were aAttested. ] Virg. Æneid ii.Tempus erat quo prima quies, mortalibus ægris Incipit, et dono divûm gratissima serpit. "CHAP. XV. ] PANTAGRuel. 7molestation, and not an ease; a scourge, and not a gift; atleast, not proceeding from the gods above, but from the infernal devils our enemies, according to the common vulgarsaying.Suppose the lord, father, or master of a family, sitting ata very sumptuous dinner, furnished with all manner of goodcheer, and having at his entry to the table his appetite sharpset upon his victuals, whereof there was great plenty, shouldbe seen rise in a start, and on a sudden fling out of hischair, abandoning his meat, frighted, appalled, and in ahorrid terror, who should not know the cause hereof wouldwonder, and be astonished exceedingly. But what? heheard his male servants cry, Fire, fire, fire, fire! his servingmaids and women yell, Stop thief, stop thief! and all hischildren shout as loud as ever they could, Murder, O murder, murder! Then was it not high time for him to leavehis banqueting, for application of a remedy in haste, and togive speedy order for succouring of his distressed household?Truly, I remember, that the Cabalists and Massorets, interpreters of the sacred Scriptures, in treating how with verityone might judge of evangelical apparitions, (because oftentimes the angel of Satan is disguised and transfigured intoan angel of light, ) said, That the difference of these twomainly did consist in this. The favourable and comfortingangel useth in his appearance unto man at first to terrifyand hugely affright him, but in the end he bringeth consolation, leaveth the person who hath seen him, joyful, wellpleased, fully content, and satisfied . On the other side, theangel of perdition , that wicked, devilish , and malignantspirit, at his appearance unto any person, in the beginningcheereth up the heart of his beholder, but at last forsakeshim, and leaves him troubled, angry, and perplexed.CHAPTER XV.Panurge's excuse and exposition of the monastic mystery concerning powdered beef.THE Lord save those who see, and do not hear! quoth Panurge. I see you well enough, but know not what it isthat you have said. The hunger- starved belly wanteth ears.For lack of victuals, before God, I roar, bray, yell, and fume,8[BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.as in a furious madness. I have performed too hard a taskto-day, an extraordinary work indeed. He shall be craftier,and do far greater wonders than ever did Mr. Mush, who shallbe able any more this year to bring me on the stage of preparation for a dreaming verdict. Fie! not to sup at all, that is the devil. Pox take that fashion! Come, Friar John,let us go break our fast; for if I hit cn such a round refectionin the morning, as will serve thoroughly to fill the millhopper and hogs-hide of my stomach, and furnish it withmeat and drink sufficient, then at a pinch, as in the case ofsome extreme necessity which presseth, I could make a shiftthat day to forbear dining. But not to sup! A plague rotthat base custom, which is an error offensive to nature.That lady made the day for exercise, to travel, work, waiton, and labour in each his negotiation and employment;and, that we may with the more fervency and ardour prosecute our business, she sets before us a clear burning candle,to wit, the sun's resplendency; and at night, when shebegins to take the light from us, she thereby tacitly impliesno less, than if she would have spoken thus unto us: Mylads and lasses, all of you are good and honest folks, youhave wrought well to - day, toiled and turmoiled enough, —the night approacheth, -therefore cast off these moiling cares of yours, desist from all your swinking painful labours,and set your minds howto refresh your bodies in the renewing of their vigour with good bread, choice wine, and storeof wholesome meats; then may you take some sport and recreation, and after that lie down and rest yourselves , thatyou may strongly, nimbly, lustily, and with the more alacrityto-morrow attend on your affairs as formerly.Falconers in like manner, when they have fed their hawks,will not suffer them to fly on a full gorge, but let them on aperch abide a little, that they may rouse, bait, tower, andsoar the better. That good pope, who was the first institutor offasting, understood this well enough; for he ordainedthat our fast should reach but to the hour of noon; all theremainder of that day was at our disposure, freely to eat andfeed at any time thereof. In ancient times there were butfew that dined, as you would say, some churchmen, monks,and canons, for they have little other occupation. Eachday is a festival unto them, who diligently heed the claustralCHAP. XV. ]PANTAGRuel. 9proverb, De missa ad mensam. They do not use to lingerand defer their sitting down and placing of themselves attable, only so long as they have a mind in waiting for thecoming of the abbot; so they fell to without ceremony,terms, or conditions; and every body supped, unless it weresome vain, conceited , dreaming dotard. Hence was a suppercalled cæna, which showeth that it is common to all sorts ofpeople. Thou knowest it well , Friar John. Come, let us go, my dear friend, in the name of all the devils of the infernal regions, let us go. The gnawings of my stomach inthis rage of hunger are so tearing, that they make it barklike a mastiff. Let us throw some bread and beef into histhroat to pacify him, as once the sibyl did to Cerberus.Thou likest best monastical brewess, the prime, the flowerof the pot. I am for the solid, principal verb that comesafter the good brown loaf, always accompanied with around slice of the Nine-lecture- powdered labourer. I knowthy meaning, answered Friar John; this metaphor is extracted out of the Claustral kettle . The labourer is the ox,that hath wrought and done the labour; after the fashion ofnine lectures, that is to say, most exquisitely well and thoroughly boiled. These holy religious fathers , by a certain cabalistic institution of the ancients, not written, but carefully by tradition conveyed from hand to hand, rising betimes to go to morning prayers, were wont to flourish thattheir matutinal devotion with some certain notable preamblesbefore their entry into the church, viz. , They dunged in thedungeries, pissed in the pisseries, spit in the spitteries,melodiously coughed in the cougheries, and doted in theirdoteries, that to the divine service they might not bring any thing that was unclean or foul. These things thusdone, they very zealously made their repair to the HolyChapel, for so was in their canting language termed the convent kitchen, where they with no small earnestness had carethat the beef pot should be put on the crook for the breakfast of the religious brothers of our Lord and Saviour; andthe fire they would kindle under the pot themselves. Now,the matins , consisting of nine lessons, were so incumbenton them, that they must have risen the earlier for the moreexpedite dispatching of them all. The sooner that theyrose, the sharper was their appetite, and the barkings of10 [BOOK III,RABELAIS' WORKS.their stomachs, and the gnawings increased in the like proportion, and consequently made these godly men thrice morea hungered and a thirst, than when their matins were hemmedover only with three lessons . The more betimes they rose,by the said cabal, the sooner was the beef pot put on; thelonger that the beef was on the fire, the better it was boiled;the more it boiled, it was the tenderer; the tenderer that itwas, the less it troubled the teeth, delighted more the palate,less charged the stomach, ' and nourished our good religiousmen the more substantially; which is the only end andprime intention of the first founders, as appears by this,That they eat, not to live, but live to eat, and in this worldhave nothing but their life. Let us go, Panurge.Now have I understood thee, quoth Panurge, my plushcodfriar, my caballine and claustral ballock. I freely quit thecosts, interest, and charges, seeing you have so egregiouslycommented upon the most especial chapter of the culinary and monastic cabal. Come along, my Carpalim, and you,Friar John, my leather-dresser. Good morrow to you all,my good lords: I have dreamed enough to drink. Let us go. Panurge had no sooner done speaking, thanEpistemon with a loud voice said these words. It is a veryordinary and common thing amongst men to conceive, foresee,know, and presage the misfortune, bad luck, or disaster ofanother; but to have the understanding, providence, knowledge, and prediction of a man's own mishap, is very scarce,and rare to be found any where. This is exceeding judiciously and prudently deciphered by Æsop in his Apologues,who there affirmeth, That every man in the world carriethabout his neck a wallet, in the fore- bag whereof are contained the faults and mischances of others, always exposed tohis view and knowledge; and in the other scrip thereof, whichhangs behind, are kept the bearer's proper transgressions ,and inauspicious adventures, at no time seen by him, nor thought upon, unless he be a person that hath a favourableespect from the heavens.Less charged the stomach. ] In Francis the First's time powdered beef was much in vogue, even at gentlemen's tables; but much more in the convents, where, that it might digest the better with people that Led an unactive life, they boiled it almost to rags.CHAP. XVI . ]PANTAGRUEL. 11CHAPTER XVI.How Pantagruel adviseth Panurge to consult with the Sibyl of Panzoust.3A LITTLE While thereafter Pantagruel sent for Panurge, andsaid unto him, The affection which I bear you being now inveterate, and settled in my mind by a long continuance oftime, prompteth me to the serious consideration of your welfare and profit; in order whereto, remark what I have thoughtthereon. It hath been told me that at Panzoust, ' nearCrouly, dwelleth a very famous sibyl, who is endowed withthe skill of foretelling all things to come. Take Epistemonin your company, repair towards her, and hear what she willsay unto you. She is possibly, quoth Epistemon, someCanidia, Sagana, or Pythonissa, either whereof with us isvulgarly called a witch, —I being the more easily induced togive credit to the truth of this character of her, that theplace of her abode is vilely stained with the abominablerepute of abounding more with sorcerers and witches thanever didthe plains of Thessaly. I should not, to my thinking,go thither willingly, for that it seems to me a thing unwarrantable, and altogether forbidden in the law of Moses. Weare not Jews, quoth Pantagruel, nor is it a matter judicallyconfessed by her, nor authentically proved by others thatshe is a witch. Let us for the present suspend our judgment,and defer till after your return from thence the siftingand garbeling of those niceties. How know we but that shemay be an eleventh sibyl, or a second Cassandra? Butalthough she were neither, and she did not merit the nameor title of any of these renowned prophetesses, what hazard,in the name of God, do you run, by offering to talk andconfer with her, of the instant perplexity and perturbation ofyour thoughts? Seeing especially, and which is most of all,she is, in the estimation of those that are acquainted withher, held to know more, and to be of a deeper reach of understanding, than is either customary to the country whereinshe liveth, or to the sex whereof she is. What hindrance,hurt, or harm doth the laudable desire of knowledge bring1 Panzoust. ] A parish in the precinct of Poictiers.Canidia, &c. ] Famous sorceresses, mentioned by Horace, 1. i . Sat. 8,' Thessaly. ] See Erasmus's adages, at the words Thessala mulier.12 [ BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.to any man, were it from a sot, a pot, a fool, a stool , a wintermittain, a truckle for a pully, the lid of a goldsmith's crucible, an oil-bottle, or old slipper? You may remember tohave read, or heard at least, that Alexander the Great, immediately after his having obtained a glorious victory overthe King Darius at Arbela, refused, in the presence of the splendid and illustrious courtiers that were about him, togive audience to a poor certain despicable like fellow, who,through the solicitations and mediation of some ofhis royalattendants, was admitted humbly to beg that grace and favourofhim. But sore did he repent, although in vain, a thousandand ten thousand times thereafter, the surly state which hethen took upon him to the denial of so just a suit, the grant whereof would have been worth unto him the value of abrace of potent cities. He was indeed victorious in Persia,but withal so far distant from Macedonia, his hereditarykingdom, that the joy ofthe one did not expel the extremegrief, which through occasion of the other he had inwardlyconceived; for not being able with all his power to find orinvent a convenient mean and expedient, how to get or comeby the certainty of any news from thence, both by reason ofthe huge remoteness of the places from one to another, as also because of the impeditive interposition of many greatrivers, the interjacent obstacle of divers wild deserts, andobstructive interjection of sundry almost inaccessible mountains, whilst he was in this sad quandary and solicitouspensiveness, which, you may suppose, could not be a smallvexation to him, considering that it was a matter of no greatdifficulty to run over his whole native soil, possess his country,seize on his kingdom, instal a new king in the throne, andplant thereon foreign colonies, long before he could come tohave any advertisem*nt of it for obviating the jeopardy ofso dreadful inconveniency, and putting a fit remedy thereto,a certain Sidonian merchant of a low stature, but high fancy,very poor in shew, and, to the outward appearance, of littleor no account, having presented himself before him, wentabout to affirm and declare, that he had excogitated and hit upon a ready mean and way, by the which those of his territories at home should come to the certain notice of his Indianvictories, and himself be perfectly informed of the state andYou may remember. ] This anecdote is taken from Lucian's " Ri- diculous Orator. "CHAP. XVI. ]PANTAGRUEL.13condition of Egypt and Macedonia, within less than five days.Whereupon the said Alexander, plunged into a sullen animadvertency of mind, through his rash opinion of the improbability of performing a so strange and impossible-likeundertaking, dismissed the merchant without giving ear towhat he had to say, and vilified him. What could it havecost him to hearken unto what the honest man had inventedand contrived for his good? What detriment, annoyance,damage, or loss could he have undergone to listen to the discovery of that secret, which the good fellow would havemost willingly revealed unto him? Nature, I am persuaded ,did not without a cause frame our ears open, putting theretono gate at all, nor shutting them up with any manner of inclosures, as she hath done upon the tongue, the eyes, andother such out-jetting parts of the body. The cause as Iimagine, is, to the end that every day and every night, andthat continually, we may be ready to hear, and by a perpetualhearing apt to learn. For, of all the senses, it is the fittestfor the reception of the knowledge of arts, sciences, and disciplines; and it may be, that man was an angel, that is tosay, a messenger sent from God, as Raphael was to Tobit.Too suddenly did he contemn, despise, and misregard him;but too long thereafter, by an untimely and too late repentance, did he do penance for it. You say very well, answeredEpistemon, yet shall you never for all that induce me to believe, that it can tend any way to the advantage or commodity of a man, to take advice and counsel of a woman,namely, of such a woman, and the woman of such a country.Truly I have found, quoth Panurge, a great deal of good inthe counsel of women, chiefly in that of the old wivesamongst them; for, every time I consult with them, I readilyget a stool or two extraordinary, to the great solace of my bum- gut passage. They are as sloth-hounds in the infallibillity of their scent, and in their sayings no less sententiousthan the rubrics of the law. " Therefore in my conceit it isnot an improper kind of speech to call them sage or wisewomen. In confirmation of which opinion of mine, thecustomary style of my language alloweth them the denomination of presage women. The epithet of sage is due untothem, because they are surpassing dexterous in the knowledgeRubrics ofthe law . ] The title pages of the old books of law were written, or printed in red. ]14 [BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.6of most things. And I give them the title of presage, forthat they divinely foresee, and certainly foretell future contingencies, and events of things to come. Sometimes I callthem not maunettes,' but monettes, from their wholesomemonitions. Whether it be so , ask Pythagoras, Socrates,Empedocles, and our master, Ortuinus. I furthermore praise and commend above the skies the ancient memorable institution of the pristine Germans, who ordained the responsesand documents of old women to be highly extolled, mostcordially reverenced, and prized at a rate in nothing inferiorto the weight, test, and standard of the sanctuary. And asthey were respectfully prudent in receiving of these soundadvices, so by honouring and following them did they proveno less fortunate in the happy success of all their endeavours. Witness the old wife Aurinia, and the good motherVelleda, in the days of Vespasian. You need not any waydoubt, but that feminine old age is always fructifying inqualities sublime, I would have said sibylline.Let us go,by the help, let us go, by the virtue of God, let us go.Farewell, Friar John, I recommend the care of my codpieceto you. Well, quoth Epistemon, I will follow you, withthis protestation nevertheless, that if I happen to get a sureinformation, or otherwise find , that she doth use any kind ofcharm or enchantment in her responses, it may not be imputed to me for a blame to leave you at the gate ofher house,without accompanying you any further in.CHAPTER XVII.How Panurge spoke to the Sibyl of Panzoust.THEIR Voyage was six days journeying. On the seventhwhereof, was shown unto them the house of the vaticinatress ,5 Maunettes. ] Malnettes, -slu*ts. Malè nitidæ.• Master Ortuinus. ] The same to whom the famous " Epistolæ ob- scurorum virorum" are addressed . In one of them a certain person,called Conrad Stildriot, tells Ortuinus, that by not sticking to some old woman, as he did, the said doctor had given offence to, and scandalizedthe whole city of Cologne, in getting Henry Quantel the bookseller's maid, with child. Perhaps Rabelais here would give us to understandthat Ortuinus, grown wiser and more cautious by the noise this affair had made, even followed his old nurse's council, who was continually preaching to him to have to do with no other woman but herself.7 Aurinia. ] See Tacitus, De moribus Germanorum; Cæsat, Com- ment. 1. i.; the Lives of Marius, and of Cæsar, in Plutarch, &c.CHAP. XVII . PANTAGRUEL. 15standing on the knap or top of a hill, under a large andspacious walnut- tree. Without great difficulty they enteredinto that straw- thatched cottage, scurvily built, naughtilymoveabled, and all besmoked. It matters not, quoth Epistemon; Heracl*tus, the grand Scotist, and tenebrous darksome philosopher, was nothing astonished at his introit intosuch a coarse and paltry habitation; for he did usually showforth unto his sectators and disciples, that the gods madeas cheerfully their residence in these mean homely mansions,as in sumptuous magnificent palaces, replenished with allmanner of delight, pomp, and pleasure. I withal do reallybelieve, that the dwelling- place of the so famous and renowned Hecate was just such another petty cell as this is ,when she made a feast therein to the valiant Theseus; andthat of no other better structure was the cot or cabin ofHyreus, or Enopion, wherein Jupiter, Neptune, and Mer- cury were not ashamed, all three together, to harbour andsojourn a whole night, and there to take a full and heartyrepast; and in payment of the shot they thankfully pissedOrion. They finding the ancient woman at a corner of herown chimney, Epistemon said, she is indeed a true sibyl,and the lively portrait of one represented by the гpni kavoiof Homer. The old hag was in a pitiful bad plight andcondition, in matter of the outward state and complexion ofher body, the ragged and tattered equipage of her person, inthe point of accoutrement, and beggarly poor provision offare for her diet and entertainment; for she was ill apparelled,worse nourished, toothless , blear- eyed, crook- shouldered,snotty, her nose still dropping, and herself still drooping,faint, and pithless; whilst in this wofully wretched case shewas making ready, for her dinner, porridge of wrinkled greencoleworts, with a swerd of yellow bacon, mixed with a twicebefore cooked sort of waterish, unsavoury broth,² extracted1 The words are Homer's in his Odyss . 1. xviii. ver. 27. Toni Kapivoi loog, or vetulæ fuliginosa similis; a comparison made by that scurrilous scrub Irus, who being deceived by the piteous mien and dress of Ulysses, likens that great man to an old woman, who, not hav- ing once quitted her fireside during the whole winter, had been all thattime a smoke-drying herself in the chimney corner.2 Unsavoury broth, &c. ] Savorados: a Limosin word, says Cot- grave, for this same bone-broth; not very savory I reckon, for all its name; but it is spoken, I suppose, by way of abuse, (catachrestically):as the Latins sometimes call a swimming-place (natatoria) by the name ofa fish-pond (piscini), when there is not a fish in it.16 [BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.out of bare and hollow bones. Epistemon said, by the crossof a groat, we are to blame, nor shall we get from her any response at all, for we have not brought along with us thebranch of gold. I have, quoth Panurge, provided prettywell for that, for here I have it within my bag, in the substance of a gold ring, accompanied with some fair pieces of small money. No sooner were these words spoken, whenPanurge coming up towards her, after the ceremonial per- formance of a profound and humble salutation, ³ presentedher with six neats' tongues dried in the smoke, a greatbutter-pot full of fresh cheese, a boracho furnished withgood beverage, and a ram's cod stored with single pence,newly coined. At last he, with a low courtesy, put on hermedical finger a pretty handsome golden ring, whereinto was right artificially enchased a precious toadstone of Beausse.This done, in few words and very succinctly, did he set openand expose unto her the motive reason of his coming, most civilly and courteously entreating her, that she might bepleased to vouchsafe to give him an ample and plenary in- telligence concerning the future good luck of his intendedmarriage.The old trot for a while remained silent, pensive, andgrinning like a dog; then, after she had set her witheredbreech upon the bottom of a bushel, she took into her handsthree old spindles, which when she had turned and whirledbetwixt her fingers very diversely, and after several fashions,she pryed more narrowly into, by the trial of their points,the sharpest whereof she retained in her hand, and threwtheother two under a stone trough. After this she took a pairProfound salutation. ] This way of saluting is according to the rules, as Verville, in his " le möen de parvenir, " asserts. His wordsare, " When the gentleman was going to make a very low bow to thelady, pray, sir, said she, forbear your compliments; none of your hat;I beseech you be covered, sir. Pray, madam, says he, forbear courte sying: none of your buttocks; I beseech you stand upright, madam."Thus the men salute with their hat, and the women with their breech.Fresh Cheese. ] Coscotons in the original, which, though Cotgrave calls fresh cheese, and likewise curds, is quite another sort of belly- timber, according to the Sieur Mouette's description of it, in the ac- count he gives of his captivity at Fez and Morocco. It is an African olla podrida, and promises to be a very good dish. The natives call it ciscusu. If the reader has no mind to go and eat it on the spot, hemay see a receipt how to make it here, in Duchat's notes on l. i. c.xxvii. of Rabelais.CHAP. XVII.]PANTAGRUEL. 175of yarn windles, which she nine times unintermittedly veered,and frisked about, then at the ninth revolution or turn, without touching them any more, maturely perpending the man- ner of their motion, she very demurely waited on their reposeand cessation from any further stirring. In sequel whereof,she pulled off one of her wooden pattens, put her apron overher head, as a priest uses to do his amice, when he is going to sing mass, and with a kind of antic, gaudy, party- colouredstring, knit it under her neck. Being thus covered and muffled, she whiffed off a lusty good draught out of theboracho, took three several pence forth of the ram-cod fob,put them into so many walnut shells, which she set downupon the bottom of a feather-pot, and then, after she hadgiven them three whisks of a broom besom athwart thechimney, casting into the fire half a bevin of long heather,together with a branch of dry laurel, she observed with avery hush and coy silence, in what form they did burn, andsaw, that, although they were in a flame, they made no kind of noise, or crackling din. Hereupon she gave a mosthideous and horribly dreadful shout, muttering betwixt her teeth some few barbarous words, of a strange termination.This so terrified Panurge that he forthwith said to Epistemon, the devil mince me into a gallimaufry, if I do nottremble for fear! I do not think but that I am now enchanted; for she uttereth not her voice in the terms of anyChristian language. O look, I pray you, how she seemethunto me to be by three full spans higher than she was when she began to hood herself with her apron. What meaneththis restless wagging of her slouchy chaps? What can bethe signification of the uneven shrugging of her hulchyshoulders? To what end does she quaver with her lips,like a monkey in the dismembering of a lobster? My earsthrough horror glow; ah! how they tingle! I think I hearthe shrieking of Proserpina; the devils are breaking looseto be all here. O the foul, ugly, and deformed beasts! Letus run away! by the hook of God I am like to die for fear!I do not love the devils; they vex me, and are unpleasantfellows. Now let us fly, and betake us to our heels. Farewell, Gammer, thanks and grammercy for your goods! I5 Party-coloured string. ] The equipage of the old heathen sorcez.esses. See Lucian's false prophet.VOL. II. C18 RABELAIS' WORKS. [BOOK III.can;will not marry, no, believe me, I will not. I fairly quitmy interest therein, and totally abandon and renounce itfrom this time forward, even as much as at present. Withthis, as he endeavoured to make an escape out of theroom, the old crone did anticipate his flight, and makehim stop. The way how she prevented him was this.Whilst in her hand she held the spindle, she hurried out toa back-yard close by her lodge, where, after she had peeledoff the bark of an old sycamore three several times, shevery summarily, upon eight leaves which dropped fromthence, wrote with the spindle-point some curt and brieflycouched verses , which she threw into the air, then saidunto them, search after them if you will; find them if youthe fatal destinies of your marriage are written in them.No sooner had she done thus speaking than she didwithdraw herself unto her lurking-hole, where on theupper seat of the porch she tucked up her gown, her coatsand smock, as high as her arm-pits, and gave them a fullinspection of the nockandroe: which being perceived byPanurge, he said to Epistemon, God's bodikins, I see thesibyl's hole ,' where many have perished , in seeing: let's fly this hole. She suddenly then bolted the gate behindher, and was never since seen any more. They jointlyran in haste after the fallen and dispersed leaves, andgathered them at last, though not without great labourand toil, for the wind had scattered them amongst the thornbushes of the valley. When they had ranged them eachafter other in their due places , they found out their sentence,as it is metrified in this octastic.6 The nockandroe. ]the peak beyond.7 The Sibyl's hole. ]Thy fame upheld,Even so, so:And she with childOfthee: No.Le cul, &c. i. e. The devil's arse in the peak, andVirgil, Eneid, 1. 6 , v. 10."6"Horrendæque procul secreta Sibyllæ,Antrum immane petit. "Thyfame upheld, English, and should run thus, as the reader will These two Lilliputian lines are wrong in the Even so, so;Foo presently:Thy fame will be shell'd,By her, I trow, &c.CHAP. XVIII .]PANTAGRUEL. 19Thy good end Suck she shall,And flay thee, friend ,But not all.CHAPTER XVIII.How Pantagruel and Panurge did diversly expound the verses ofthe Sibyl ofPanzoust.TheTHE leaves being thus collected , and orderly disposed, Epistemon and Panurge returned to Pantagruel's court, partlywell pleased, and other part discontented: glad for theirbeing come back, and vexed for the trouble they had sus- tained by the way, which they found to be craggy, rugged ,stony, rough, and ill adjusted. They made an ample and full relation of their voyage unto Pantagruel; as likewise of the estate and condition of the sibyl. Then having presentedto him the leaves of the sycamore, they show him the short and twattle verses that were written in them. Pantagruel,having read and considered the whole sum and substance ofthe matter, fetched from his heart a deep and heavy sigh,then said to Panurge: You are now, forsooth, in a goodtaking, and have brought your hogs to a fine market.prophecy of the sibyl doth explain and lay out before us the very same predictions which have been denoted, foretold ,and presaged to us by the decree of the Virgilian lots, andthe verdict of your own proper dreams; to wit, that youshall be very much disgraced, shamed, and discredited by your wife for that she will make you a cuckold, in prostituting herself to others , being big with child by another thanyou, will steal from you a great deal of your goods, and will beat you, scratch, and bruise you, even to plucking theskin in a part from off you; -will leave the print of her blowsin some member of your body. You understand as much,answered Panurge, in the veritable interpretation and expounding of recent prophecies, as a sow in the matter ofT'esgoussera.De renom.Engroisserà.De toy: non.Te sugcera.Le bon bout.T'escorchera.Mais non tout.These are the eight verses, which must be readin this order. They were traced on so many sycamore leaves.c 220 [BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.1spicery. Be not offended, Sir, I beseech you, that I speakthus boldly; for I find myself a little in choler, and thatnot without cause, seeing it is the contrary that is true.Take heed, and give attentive ear unto my words. The oldwife said, that as the bean is not seen till first it be unhusked,and that its swad or hull be shaled, and peeled from off it,so it is that my virtue and transcendant worth will nevercome bythe mouth of fame to be blazed abroad, proportionable to the height, extent, and measure of the excellencythereof, until preallably I get a wife, and make the full halfof a married couple. How many times have I heard yousay, that the function of a magistrate, and office of dignity,discovereth the merits, parts, and endowments of the personso advanced and promoted, and what is in him. That is tosay, we are then best able to judge aright of the deservingsof a man, when he is called to the management of affairs:for, when before he lived in a private condition, we couldhave no more certain knowledge of him, than of a bean within his husk. And thus stands the first article explained: Otherwise could you imagine, that the good fame, repute, andestimation of an honest man should depend upon the tail of a whor*?Now to the meaning of the second article! My wife will be with child, here lies the prime felicity of marriage, but not of me. Copsody, that I do believe indeed! It will beof a pretty little infant. O how heartily I shall love it! Ido already dote upon it; for it will be my aainty feedledarling, my genteel dilly-minion. From thenceforth novexation, care, or grief shall take such deep impression inmy heart, how hugely great or vehement soever it otherwiseappear, but that it shall vanish forthwith, at the sight of thatmy future babe, and at the hearing of the chat and prating of its childish gibberish. And blessed be the old wife.my truly, I have a mind to settle some good revenue or By1 As a sow in the matter ofspicery. ] A proof that swine are dainty- mouthed upon occasion, but above all very quick scented, is their being made use of (by tying a string to their leg) to find out where truffles lie in the ground, which they would presently devour as soon as they have rooted them out, were they not muzzled. So that the proverb,which speaks ironically of a sow's taste for spicery, is not properly to be understood of aromatics, but only sugar-plums and other sweetmsets, which they no more value than they do a pearl.CHAP. XVIII.] PANTAGRUEL. 21pension upon her, out of the readiest increase of the landsof my Salmigondinois; not an inconstant, and uncertainrent- seek, like that of witless, giddy- headed bachelors, butsure and fixed, of the nature of the well- paid incomes ofregenting doctors. Ifthis interpretation doth not please you,think you my wife will bear me in her flanks , conceive withme, and be of me delivered, as women use in childbed tobring forth their young ones; so as that it may be said,Panurge is a second Bacchus, he hath been twice born; heis re-born, as was Hippolytus, -as -a was Proteus, one time ofThetis, and secondly, of the mother of the philosopher Apollonius, as were the two Palici,³ near the flood Simæthos inSicily. His wife was big of child with him. In him isrenewed and begun again the palintokis of the Megarians,and the palingenesis" of Democritus . Fie upon such errors!To hear stuff of that nature rends mine ears.The words of the third article are: She will suck me atmy best end. Why not? That pleaseth me right well.You know the thing; I need not tell you, that it is myintercrural pudding with one end. I swear and promise, that, inwhat I can, I will preserve it sappy, full of juice, and as well victualled for her use as may be. She shall not suck me, Ibelieve, in vain, nor be destitute of her allowance; thereshall her justum both in peck and lippy be furnished to thefull eternally. You expound this passage allegorically, andinterpret it to theft and larceny. I love the exposition, andthe allegory pleaseth me; but not according to the sensewhereto you stretch it. It may be, that the sincerity of theaffection which you bear me moveth you to harbour in yourbreast those refractory thoughts concerning me, with a suspicion of my adversity to come. We have this saying fromthe learned, That a marvellously fearful thing is love, andthat true love is never without fear. But, Sir, according tomy judgment, you do understand both of and by yourself,2 The mother, &c. ] See Philostratus, 1. i . c. iii. of Apollonius's life.3 The two Palici. ] The two Palici or Palisci: two brethren, the sons of Jupiter and of the nymph Thalia, or Etna, who for fear of Juno, desired the earth to open and hide her; so it did, and there she was ten months, and then it let her out again, and she brought forth her children, whence they were called Palici, ἀπὸ τῇ πάλιν ἵκεσθαι.Camb. Dict. Macrob. Saturn . l . v. c. xix.The palintokis. ] See Plutarch, on Greek affairs, question 18.The palingenesis. ] i. e. Second birth. See Cicero, de Finibus, lib.i. ]22 [BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.that here stealth signifieth nothing else, no more than in athousand other places of Greek and Latin, old and modernwritings, but the sweet fruits of amorous dalliance, whichVenus liketh best when reaped in secret, and culled byfervent lovers filchingly. Why so? I prithee tell. Because, when the feat of the loose coat skirmish happeneth tobe done under-hand and privily, between two well- disposed,athwart the steps of a pair of stairs lurkingly, and in covert,behind a suit of hangings, or close hid and trussed upon anunbound fa*ggot, it is more pleasing to the Cyprian goddess,and to me also, I speak this without prejudice to any better,or more sound opinion, than to perform that culbusting art,after the Cynic manner, in the view of the clear sunshine, orin a rich tent, under a precious stately canopy, within aglorious and sublime pavilion , or yet on a soft couch betwixtrich curtains of cloth of gold, without affrightment, at longintermediate respits , enjoying of pleasures and delights abellyfull, all at great ease, with a huge fly- flap fan of crimsonsatin, and a bunch of feathers of some East Indian ostrich,serving to give chase unto the flies all round about; whilst,in the interim, the female picks her teeth with a stiff straw,picked even then from out of the bottom of the bed she liesIf you be not content with this my exposition, are youof the mind that my wife will suck and sup me up, as peopleuse to gulp and swallow oysters out of the shell? or as theCicilian women, according to the testimony of Dioscorides,were wont to do the grain of Alkermes? Assuredly that isan error. Who seizeth on it, doth neither gulch up, norswill down, but takes away what hath been packed up,catcheth, snatcheth, and plies the play of hey-pass, repass.on.6The fourth article doth imply, that my wife will flay me,but not all. O the fine word! You interpret this tobeating strokes and blows. Speak wisely. Will you eata pudding? Sir, I beseech you to raise up your spiritsabove the low-sized pitch of earthly thoughts unto thatheight of sublime contemplation, which reacheth to theapprehension of the mysteries and wonders of dame Nature. And here be pleased to condemn yourself, by a renouncing of those errors which you have committed verygrossly, and somewhat perversely, in expounding the proDioscorides. ] L iv. c. xliii.CHAP. XVIII.] PANTAGRUEL.23tphetic sayings of the holy sibyl. Yet put the case, ( albeitI yield not to it, ) that, by the instigation of the devil, mywife should go about to wrong me, make me a cuckold downto my very breech, disgrace me otherways, steal my goodsfrom me, yea, and lay violently her hands upon me; -shenevertheless should fail of her attempts and not attain to theproposed end of her unreasonable undertakings. The reasonwhich induceth me hereto, is totally grounded on this lastpoint, which is extracted from the profoundest privacies ofa monastic pantheology, as good Friar Arthur Wagtail toldme once upon a Monday morning, as we were, (if I have notforgot, ) eating a bushel of trotter- pies; and I remember wellit rained hard. God give him the good morrow! Thewomen at the beginning of the world, or a little after, conspired to flay the men quick, because they found the spirit of mankind inclined to domineer it, and bear rule over themupon the face of the whole earth; and, in pursuit of thistheir resolution, promised, confirmed, swore, and covenantedamongst themselves bythe pure faith they owe to the nocturnalSanct Rogero. But O the vain enterprises of women! Othe great fragility of that sex feminine! They did begin toflay the man, or peel him, ' (as says Catullus, ) at that member which of all the body they loved best, to wit, the nervousand cavernous cane, and that above five thousand years ago;yet have they not of that small part alone flayed any moretill this hour but the head. In mere despite whereof theJews snip off that parcel of the skin in circumcision, choosing far rather to be called clipyards, rascals , than to be flayedby women, as are other nations. My wife, according tothis female covenant, will flay it to me, if it be not so already. I heartily grant my consent thereto, but will notgive her leave to flay it at all. Nay, truly will I not, my noble king.Yea, but quoth Epistemon, you say nothing of her mostdreadful cries and exclamations, when she and we both sawthe laurel-bough burn without yielding any noise or crackling. You know it is a very dismal omen, an inauspicious" Peel him. ] Catullus, Epigr. Iviii . speaking to Cœlius of his faith- leas, falsehearted Lesbia." Nunc in quadriviis, et angiportis,Glubit magnanimos Remi nepotes.24 [ BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.sign, unlucky indice, and token formidable, bad, disastrous,and most unhappy, as is certified by Propertius, Tibullus,the quick philosopher Porphyrius, Eustathius on the Iliads ofHomer, and by many others. Verily, verily, quoth Panurge,brave are the allegations which you bring me, and testimoniesof two-footed calves. These men were fools, as they werepoets; and dotards, as they were philosophers; full of folly,as they were of philosophy.CHAPTER XIX.How Pantagruel praiseth the counsel of dumb men.PANTAGRUEL, when this discourse was ended, held for apretty while his peace, seeming to be exceeding sad and pensive, then said to Panurge, The malignant spirit misleads,beguileth and seduceth you . I have read, that in times past the surest and most veritable oracles were not those whicheither were delivered in writing, or uttered by word of mouthin speaking. For many times, in their interpretation, rightwitty, learned and ingenious men have been deceived throughamphibologies, equivoques, and obscurity of words, no lessthan by the brevity of their sentences. For which causeApollo, the god of vaticination, was surnamed Aogias.¹ Thosewhich were represented then by signs and outward gestures,were accounted the truest and the most infallible . Such wasthe opinion of Heracl*tus. And Jupiter did himself in thismanner give forth in Ammon frequently predictions. Norwas he single in this practice; for Apollo did the likeamongst the Assyrians. His prophecying thus unto thosepeople moved them to paint him with a large long beard,and clothes beseeming an old settled person, of a most posed,staid, and grave behaviour; not naked, young, and beardless, as he was pourtrayed most usually amongst the Gre- cians. Let us make trial of this kind of fatidicency; and goyou, take advice of some dumb person without any speaking.I am content, quoth Panurge. But, says Pantagruel, itwere requisite that the dumb you consult with be such ashave been deaf from the hour of their nativity, and consequently dumb, for none can be so lively, natural, and kindly dumb, as he who never heard.How is it, quoth Panurge, that you conceive this matter?1 Aotias. ] See the Saturnalia of Macrobius, 1. i . c. xvii.CHAP. XIX.] PANTAGRUEL. 25If you apprehend it so , that never any spoke, who had notbefore heard the speech of others, I will from that antecedentbringyou to infer very logically a most absurd and paradoxicalconclusion. But let it pass; I will not insist on it. You do not then believe what Herodotus wrote of two children,2who at the special command and appointment of Psammeticus king of Egypt, having been kept in a petty countrycottage, where they were nourished and entertained in aperpetual silence, did at last, after a certain long space oftime, pronounce this word Bec, which in the Phrygian language signifieth Bread. Nothing less , quoth Pantagruel, doI believe, that it is a mere abusing of our understandings togive credit to the words of those, who say that there isany such thing as a natural language. All speeches havehad their primary origin from the arbitrary institutions , accords and agreements of nations in their respective condescendments to what should be noted and betokened by them.An articulate voice, according to the dialecticians, hathnaturally no signification at all; for that the sense and meaning thereof did totally depend upon the good will andpleasure of the first deviser and imposer of it. I do not tellyou this without a cause, for Bartholus, Lib. 5. de Verb. Oblig.,very seriously reporteth, that even in his time there was inEugubia one named Sir Nello de Gabrielis ,.who, although he,by a sad mischance, became altogether deaf, understood,nevertheless, every one that talked in the Italian dialecthowsoever he expressed himself; and that only by lookingon his external gestures, and casting an attentive eye uponthe divers motions of his lips and chaps. I have read, I remember also, in a very literate and eloquent author.³ thatTyridates, King of Armenia, in the days of Nero, made avoyage to Rome, where he was received with great honourand solemnity, and with all manner of pomp and magnificence . Yea, to the end there might be a sempiternalamity and correspondence preserved betwixt him and theRoman Senate, there was no remarkable thing in the wholecity which was not shown unto him. At his departure theemperor bestowed upon him many ample donatives of an• What Herodotus wrote, &c. ] In the beginning of l . ii .3 A very literate, &c. ] Lucian in his Dialogue of Dancing. Sec Suetonius, Pliny, and Tacitus, on this Armenian king's visiting Nero.26 RABELAIS' WORKS. [BOOK III.inestimable value: and besides, the more entirely to testifyhis affection towards him, heartily intreated him to be pleasedto make choice of any whatsoever thing in Rome was mostagreeable to his fancy; with a promise juramentally confirmed, that he should not be refused of his demand. Thereupon, after a suitable return of thanks for a so graciousoffer, he required a certain Jack-pudding, whom he had seen.to act his part most egregiously upon the stage, and whosemeaning, albeit he knew not what it was he had spoken,he understood perfectly enough by the signs and gesticulations which he had made. And for this suit of his , inthat he asked nothing else, he gave this reason,―That in theseveral wide and spacious dominions, which were reducedunder the sway and authority of his sovereign government,there were sundry countries and nations much differing fromone another in language, with whom, whether he was tospeak unto them, or give any answer to their requests, hewas always necessitated to make use of divers sorts oftruchmen and interpreters. Now with this man alone ,sufficient for supplying all their places, will that great inconveniency hereafter be totally removed; seeing he is such afine gesticulator, and in the practice of chirology an artistso complete, expert and dexterous, that with his very fingershe doth speak. Howsoever, you are to pitch upon such adumb one as is deaf by nature, and from his birth; to theend that his gestures and signs may be the more vividly andtruly prophetic, and not counterfeit by the intermixture ofsome adulterate lustre and affectation . Yet whether thisdumb person shall be of the male or female sex is in youroption, lieth at your discretion, and altogether dependeth on your own election .I would more willingly, quoth Panurge, consult with andbe advised by a dumb woman, were it not that I am afraid oftwo things. The first is, -That the greater part of women,whatever it be that they see, do always represent unto theirfancies, think and imagine, that it hath some relation to thesugared entering of the goodly ithyphallos, and graffing inthe cleft of the overturned tree the quick-set-imp of the pin .of copulation. Whatever signs, shews, or gestures we shallmake, or whatever our behaviour, carriage or demeanourshall happen to be in their view and presence, they will in-CHAP. XIX. ]273PANTAGruel. 27terpret the whole in reference to the act of androgynation,and the culbatizing exercise; by which means we shall beabusively disappointed of our designs, in regard that shewill take all our signs for nothing else but tokens and repre- sentations of our desire to entice her unto the lists of aCyprian combat, or catsenconny skirmish. Do you remember what happened at Rome two hundred and threescoreyears after the foundation thereof? Ayoung Roman gentleman encountering by chance at the foot of Mount Celionwith a beautiful Latin lady named Verona, who from hervery cradle upwards had always been both deaf and dumb,very civilly asked her, not without a chironomatic Italianising of his demand, with various jectigation of his fingers,and other gesticulations, as yet customary amongst thespeakers of that country, What senators, in her descentfrom the top of the hill, she had met with going up thither.For you are to conceive, that he, knowing no more of herdeafness than dumbness, was ignorant of both. She in themeantime, who neither heard nor understood so much as oneword of what he said, straight imagined, by all that shecould apprehend in the lovely gesture of his manual signs,that what he then required of her was, what herself had agreat mind to, even that which a young man doth naturally desire of a woman. Then was it, that by signs, which in alloccurrences of venereal love are incomparably more attractive, valid and efficacious than words, she beckoned tohim to come along with her to her house; which when hehad done, she drew him aside to a privy room, and thenmade a most lively alluring sign unto him, to show that thegame did please her. Whereupon, without any more advertisem*nt, or so much as the uttering of one word oneither side, they fell to, and bringuardised it lustily.The other cause of my being averse from consulting withdumb women is , ―That to our signs they would make noanswer at all , but suddenly fall backwards in a divaricatingposture, to intimate thereby unto us the reality of their con-• What happened, &c. ] The ground-work and substance of this story is taken from Guevara, ch. xxxvii. of the original Spanish of the fabu- lous life he has given the world of the Emperor Marcus Aurelius. See more of this in Duchat.What Senators. ] It is in the original, What hour of the day it was by the clock of the Tarpeian rock.28 [ BOOK III. RABELAIS' WORKS.sent to the supposed motion of cur tacit demands. Or ifthey should chance to make any counter- signs responsoryto our propositions, they would prove so foolish, impertinent, and ridiculous, that by them ourselves should easilyjudge their thoughts to have no excursion beyond the dufflingacademy. You know very well how at Brignoles, when thereligious nun, sister Fatbum, was made big with child bythe young Stifly- stand-to't, her pregnancy came to be known,and she, cited by the abbess, and in a full convention of the convent, accused of incest. Her excuse was, -That she didnot consent thereto, but that it was done by the violence andimpetuous force of the Friar Stifly- stand-to't. Hereto theabbess very austerely replying, Thou naughty wicked girl,why didst thou not cry-A rape, a rape? then should allof us have run to thy succour. Her answer was, —that therape was committed in the dortor, where she durst not cry,because it was a place of sempiternal silence. But, quoththe abbess, thou roguish wench, why didst not thou thenmake some sign to those that were in the next chamber be- side thee? To this she answered, That with her buttocksshe made a sign unto them as vigorously as she could, yetnever one of them did so much as offer to come to her help and assistance. But, quoth the abbess, thou scurvy baggage,why didst not thou tell it me immediately after the perpetration of the fact, that so we might orderly , regularly, andcanonically have accused him? I would have done so, hadthe case been mine, for the clearer manifestation of mineinnocency. I truly, madam, would have done the like withall my heart and soul, quoth sister Fatbum; but that fearingI should remain in sin, and in the hazard of eternal damnation, if prevented by a sudden death, I did confess myself to the father friar before he went out of the room, who, for mypenance, enjoined me not to tell it, or reveal the matter untoany. It were a most enormous and horrid offence , detestable before God and the angels, to reveal a confession. Suchan abominable wickedness would have possibly brought• When the religious nun, &c. ] This story was publicly told, ( thoughnot with so much additional circ*mstance as Rabelais tells it) , by aDominican friar, a contemporary of Erasmus. He told it to his auditory, in order to divert them after a melancholy sermon he had beenpreaching to them on a Good Friday. See Erasmus in his colloquy intituled, Icthyophagia, and 1. i . of his De Arte Concionandi.CHAP. XX. ]PANTAGRUEL.29down fire from heaven, wherewith to have burnt the wholenunnery, and sent us all headlong to the bottomless pit, tobear company with Corah, Dathan, and Abiram.You will not, quoth Pantagruel, with all your jesting,make me laugh. I know that all the monks, friars, andnuns, had rather violate and infringe the highest of the commandments of God, than break the least of their pro- vincial statutes. Take you therefore Goatsnose , a man veryfit for your present purpose; for he is, and hath been, bothdumb and deaf from the very remotest infancy of his child- hood.CHAPTER XX.How Goatsnose by signs maketh answer to Panurge.GOATSNOSE being sent for, came the day thereafter to Pantagruel's court; at his arrival to which Panurge gave him afat calf, the half of a hog, two puncheons of wine, one loadof corn, and thirty franks of small money: then havingbrought him before Pantagruel, in presence of the gentle- men of the bed- chamber, he made this sign unto him. Heyawned a long time, and in yawning made, without hismouth, with the thumb of his right hand, the figure of the Greek letter Tau, by frequent reiterations. Afterwards helifted up his eyes heavenwards, then turned them in hishead like a she- goat in the painful fit of an absolute birth ,in doing whereof he did cough and sigh exceeding heavily.This done, after that he had made demonstration of thewant of his codpiece, he from under his shirt took hisplacket- racket in a full gripe, making it therewith clack verymelodiously betwixt his thighs: then, no sooner had he withhis body stooped a little forwards, and bowed his left knee,but that immediately thereupon holding both his arms onhis breast, in a loose faint- like posture, the one over the other, he paused awhile. Goatsnose looked wistly uponhim, and having heedfully enough viewed him all over, he lifted up into the air his left hand, the whole fingers whereofhe retained fist ways closed together, except the thumb andthe fore-finger, whose nails he softly joined and coupled to oneanother. I understand, quoth Pantagruel, what he meanethby that sign. It denotes marriage, and withal the numberthirty, according to the profession of the Pythagoreans. You30 RABELAIS' WORKS. [BOOK III .will be married. Thanks to you, quoth Panurge, in turninghimself towards Goatsnose, my little sewer, pretty master'smate, dainty baily, curious serjeant- marshal, and jolly catchpole leader. Then did he lift higher up than before his saidleft hand, stretching out all the five fingers thereof, and severing them as wide from one another as he possibly couldget done. Here, says Pantagruel, doth he more amply andfully insinuate unto us, by the token which he showeth forthof the quinary number, that you shall be married . Yea,that you shall not only be affianced , betrothed, wedded, andmarried, but that you shall furthermore cohabit, and livejollily and merrily with your wife; for Pythagoras calledfive the nuptial number, which, together with marriage, signifieth the consummation of matrimony, because it is composed of a ternary, the first of the odd, and binary, the first of the even numbers, as of a male and female knit and unitedtogether. In very deed it was the fashion of old in the cityof Rome at marriage festivals to light five wax tapers, norwas it permitted to kindle any more at the magnific nuptialsof the most potent and wealthy; nor yet any fewer at thepenurious weddings of the poorest and most abject of the world. Moreover in times past, the heathen, or paynimsimplored the assistance of five deities , or of one, helpful, atleast, in five several good offices to those that were to be married. Of this sort were the nuptial Jove; Juno, president of the feast; the fair Venus; Pitho, the goddess ofeloquence and persuasion; and Diana, whose aid and succour was required to the labour of child-bearing . Thenshouted Panurge, O the gentle Goatsnose, I will give him afarm near Cinais, and a wind- mill hard by Mirebalais! Hereupon the dumb fellow sneezeth with an impetuous vehemency, and huge concussion of the spirits of the whole body,withdrawing himself in so doing with a jerking turn towardsthe left hand. By the body of a fox new slain, quoth Pan- tagruel, what is that? This maketh nothing for your advantage; for he betokeneth thereby that your marriage willbe inauspicious and unfortunate. This sneezing, accordingto the doctrine of Terpsion,² is the Socratic demon. If done1 As of a male, &c. ] See Plutarch in his Questions concerningRoman Affairs.2 Terpsion. ] See Plutarch, in his treatise of Socrates' Dæmon.CHAP. XX. ]PANTAGRUEL. 3:towards the right side, it imports and portendeth, thatboldly, and with all assurance, one may go whither he will,and do what he listeth, according to what deliberation heshall be pleased to have thereupon taken: his entries in thebeginning, progress in his proceedings, and success in theevents, and issues, will be all lucky, good, and happy. Thequite contrary thereto is thereby implied and presaged, if itbe done towards the left. You, quoth Panurge, do takealways the matter at the worst, and continually, like anotherDavus, cast in new disturbances and obstructions; norever yet did I know this old paltry Terpsion worthy of citation, but in points only of cozenage and imposture. Nevertheless, quoth Pantagruel, Cicero hath written I know notwhat to the same purpose in his Second Book of Divination.Panurge then turning himself towards Goatsnose madethis sign unto him. He inverted his eye- lids upwards,wrenched his jaws from the right to the left side , and drewforth his tongue half out of his mouth. This done, he positedhis left hand wholly open, the mid-finger wholly excepted ,which was perpendicularly placed upon the palm thereof,and set it just in the room where his codpiece had been.Then did he keep his right hand altogether shut up in a fist,save only the thumb, which he straight turned backwardsdirectly under the right arm- pit, and settled it afterwards onthat most eminent part of the buttocks, which the Arabs callthe Al- Katim. Suddenly thereafter he made this interchange; he held his right hand after the manner of the left,and posited it on the place wherein his codpiece sometimewas, and retaining his left hand in the form and fashion ofthe right, he placed it upon his Al- Katim . This altering ofhands did he reiterate nine several times; at the last whereofhe reseated his eye-lids into their own first natural position.Then doing the like also with his jaws and tongue, he didcast a squinting look upon Goatsnose, diddering and shivering his chaps, as apes use to do now-a-days, and rabbits ,Towards the left. ] This was the doctrine of the Greeks, but that ofthe Romans was clean contrary. See Cicero , 1. ii . De Divinatione .I know not what, &c. ] Quæ si suscipiamus, says Cicero there,"pedis offensio nobis, et abruptio corrigiæ, et sternutamenta erunt observanda." Which, from his principles, does not suppose that anypresages can be grounded on sneezing at all, much less upon sneezing either on the right or left hand.32 [BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.whilst, almost starved with hunger, they are eating oats inthe sheaf.Then was it that Goatsnose, lifting up into the air his righthand wholly open and displayed, put the thumb thereof, evenclose unto its first articulation, between the two third jointsof the middle and ring fingers , pressing about the said thumb thereof very hard with them both, and, whilst the remainentjoints were contracted and shrunk in towards the wrist, he stretched forth with as much straitness as he could the foreand little fingers. That hand, thus framed and disposed of,he laid and posited upon Panurge's navel, moving withalcontinually the aforesaid thumb, and bearing up, supporting,or under- propping that hand upon the above- specified foreand little fingers, as upon two legs . Thereafter did he makein this posture his hand by little and little , and by degreesand pauses, successively to mount from athwart the belly tothe stomach, from whence he made it to ascend to the breast,even upwards to Panurge's neck, still gaining ground, till ,having reached his chin, he had put within the concaveof his mouth his afore-mentioned thumb: then fiercelybrandishing the whole hand which he made to rub and grateagainst his nose, he heaved it further up, and made thefashion, as if with the thumb thereof he would have put out his eyes. With this Panurge grew a little angry and wentabout to withdraw, and rid himself from this ruggedly untoward dumb devil. But Goatsnose, in the meantime, prosecuting the intended purpose of his prognosticatory response, touched very rudely, with the above- mentionedshaking thumb, now his eyes, then his forehead, and, afterthat, the borders and corners of his cap. At last, Panurgecried out, saying, Before God, master- fool, if you do not letme alone, or that you will presume to vex me any more, youshall receive from the best hand I have a mask, wherewithto cover your rascally scoundrel face, you paltry sh*ttenvarlet. Then said Friar John, He is deaf and doth not understand what thou sayest unto him. Bulli-ballock, makesign to him of a hail of fisticuffs upon the muzzle.What the devil, quoth Panurge, means this busy restlessfellow? What is it, that this polypragmonetic Aliboron to all the fiends of hell doth aim at? He hath almost thrust5 Aliboron. ] i e. a meddling fool. This soubriquet, which La Fon- taine has bestowed on the ass in many of his fables, seems derived fromCHAP. XX. ] PANTAGRUEI.. 38out mine eyes, as if he had been to poach them in a skillet ofbutter and eggs. By God, da jurandi, I will feast you withflirts and raps on the snout, interlarded with a double row ofbobs and finger filipings! Then did he leave him in givinghim by way of salvo a volley of farts for his farewell. Goatsnose, perceiving Panurge thus to slip away from him, got before him, and, by mere strength enforcing him to stand, madethis sign unto him. He let fall his right arm toward hisknee on the same side as low as he could, and, raising allthe fingers of that hand into a close fist, passed his dexterthumb betwixt the foremost and mid-fingers thereto belonging. Then scrubbing and swingeing a little with his lefthand alongst, and upon the uppermost in the very bough ofthe elbow of the said dexter arm, the whole cubit thereof,by leisure, fair and softly, at these thumpatory warnings, didraise and elevate itself even to the elbow, and above it; ona sudden, did he then let it fall down as low as before, andafter that, at certain intervals and such spaces of time raisingand abasing it, he made a show thereof to Panurge.so incensed Panurge, that he forthwith lifted his hand. tohave stricken him the dumb roister, and given him a sound.whirret on the ear, but that the respect and reverence whichhe carried to the presence of Pantagruel restrained his choler,and kept his fury within bounds and limits. Then said Pantagruel, If the bare signs now vex and trouble you, howmuch more grievously will you be perplexed and disquietedwith the real things, which by them are represented andsignified. All truths agree, and are consonant with oneanother. This dumb fellow prophesieth and foretellet that you will be married, cuckolded, beaten , and robbed. Asfor the marriage, quoth Panurge, I yield thereto, and acknowledge the verity of that point of his prediction; as forthe rest I utterly abjure and deny it; and believe, Sir, I beseech you, if it may please you so to do, that in the matterof wives and horses never any man was predestinated to abetter fortune than I.Thisthe name of Oberon. King of Fairy Land, who plays an important rôle in the romances ofthe middle ages. ]In the matter of wives and horses, &c. ] Alluding to a proverb, That there's more deceit in women and horses than in any other creatures whatever. See Laurence Joubert's Vulgar Errors, part 1. 1. v. c. 4.VOL. II. D34 [BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.CHAPTER XXI.How Panurge consulteth with an old French poet, namedare.Raminagrobis.I NEVER thought, said Pantagruel, to have encounteredwith any man so headstrong in his apprehensions, or in hisopinions so wilful, as I have found you to be, and see youNevertheless, the better to clear and extricate your doubts, let us try all courses, and leave no stone unturned,nor wind unsailed by. Take good heed to what I am to say unto you. The swans, which are fowls consecrated toApollo, never chant but in the hour of their approachingdeath, ' especially in the Meander flood, which is a river thatrunneth along some of the territories of Phrygia. This Isay, because Ælianus and Alexander Myndius² write, thatthey had seen several swans in other places die, but neverheard any of them sing or chant before their death. How- ever, it passeth for current that the imminent death of aswan is presaged by his foregoing song, and that no swan dieth until preallably he have sung.After the same manner poets , who are under the protection of Apollo, when they are drawing near their latter end,do ordinarily become prophets, and by the inspiration of thatgod sing sweetly, in vaticinating things which are to come.It hath been likewise told me frequently, that old decrepitmen upon the brinks of Charon's banks do usher their decease with a disclosure, all at ease, to those that are desirousof such informations, of the determinate and assured truth offuture accidents and contingencies. I remember also thatAristophanes, in a certain comedy of his , calleth the old folksSibyls, Ele' yépwv Eißvλlig. For as when, being upon a pierby the shore, we see afar off mariners, seafaring men, andother travellers alongst the curled waves of azure Thetiswithin their ships, we then consider them in silence only,1 The hour of their approaching death ] See the Phædo of Plato,cap. 77, where Socrates beautifully compares his farewell discourse to the song of the dying swan. ]2 Alexander Myndius. ] See Athenæus, 1. ix. c. 25; Ovid, Heroid.Epist. vii. Dido to Eneas,"CSic, ubi fata vocant, udis abjectus in herbis,Ad vada Mæandri concinit albus olor."]CHAP. XXI.. ] PANTAGRUEL. 35and seldom proceed any further than to wish them a happyand prosperous arrival: but, when they do approach near tothe haven, and come to wet their keels within their harbour,then both with words and gestures we salute them, andheartily congratulate their access safe to the port wherein we are ourselves. Just so the angels, heroes, and gooddemons, according to the doctrine of the Platonics , whenthey see mortals drawing near unto the harbour of the grave,as the most sure and calmest port of any, full of repose, ease,rest, tranquillity, free from the troubles and solicitudes ofthis tumultuous and tempestuous world; then is it that theywith alacrity hail and salute them, cherish and comfort them ,and, speaking to them lovingly, begin even then to bless themwith illuminations, and to communicate unto them the abstrusest mysteries of divination. I will not offer here toconfound your memory by quoting antique examples of Isaac,of Jacob, of Patroclus towards Hector, of Hector towardsAchilles, of Polymnestor towards Agamemnon, of Hecuba,of the Rhodian renowned by Posidonius, of Calanus³ theIndian towards Alexander the Great, of Orodes towardsMezentius, and of many others. It shall suffice for the present, that I commemorate unto you the learned and valiantknight and cavalier William of Bellay, late Lord of Langey,who died on the Hill of Tarara, the 10th of January, in theclimacteric year of his age, and of our supputation 1543 ,according to the Roman account. The last three or fourhours of his life he did employ in the serious utterance of avery pithy discourse, whilst with a clear judgment, and spiritvoid of all trouble, he did foretell several important things,whereof a great deal is come to pass, and the rest we wait for. Howbeit, his prophecies did at that time seem unto ussomewhat strange, absurd, and unlikely; because there didnot then appear any sign of efficacy enough to engage ourfaith to the belief of what he did prognosticate. We havehere near to the town of Villaumere, a man that is both oldand a poet, to wit, Raminagrobis," who to his second wife3 Calanus. ] See Plutarch in Alexander's life.Orodes. ] See 1. x. of the Æneid.5 Raminagrobis. ] See Duchat on the etymology and meaning of Raminagrobis, by which Rabelais understood Guillaume Cretin , a fa- mous poet in the reigns of King Charles VIII., Louis XII, and Francis I. La Fontaine has given this name to the cat, in several of his fables . ]D 236 [ BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.espoused my Lady Broadsow, on whom he begot the fair Basoche. It hath been told me he is a dying, and so nearunto his latter end, that he is almost upon the very lastmoment, point, and article thereof. Repair thither as fast as you can, and be ready to give an attentive ear to what he shall chant unto you. It may be, that you shall obtain from himwhat you desire, and that Apollo will be pleased by his meansto clear your scruples. I am content, quoth Panurge. Let usgo thither, Epistemon, and that both instantly and in all haste,least otherwise his death prevent our coming. Wilt thoucome along with us, Friar John? Yes, that I will, quoth Friar John, right heartily to do thee a courtesy, my billyballocks; for I love thee with the best of my milt and liver.Thereupon, incontinently, without any further lingering,to the way they all three went, and quickly thereafter-forthey made good speed-arriving at the poetical habitation,they found the jolly old man, albeit in the agony of his departure from this world, looking cheerfully, with an opencountenance, splendid aspect, and behaviour full of alacrity.After that Panurge had very civilly saluted him, he in a freegift did present him with a gold ring, which he even thenput upon the medical finger of his left hand, in the collet orbezle whereof was inchased an oriental sapphire, very fair andlarge. Then, in imitation of Socrates , did he make an oblation unto him of a fair white co*ck; which was no sooner setupon the tester of his bed, than that with a high raised headand crest, lustily shaking his feather- coat, he crowed stentoriphonically loud. This done, Panurge very courteously required of him, that he would vouchsafe to favour him withthe grant andreport of his sense and judgment touching thefuture destiny of his intended marriage. For answer hereto,when the honest old man had forthwith commanded pen,paper, and ink to be brought unto him, and that he was atthe same call conveniently served with all the three, he wrotethese following verses:Take, or not take her,Off, or on:Handy- dandy is your lot.When her name you write, you blot.Lady Broadsow . ] La grande Gourre. Gorre is a sow. It is aisoapplied to a debauched woman. The citizens of Paris bestowed the name on Isabella of Bavaria. ]CHAP. XXI.] PANTAGRUEL. 87"Tis undone, when all is done,Ended e'er it was begun:Hardly gallop, if you trot,Set not forward when you run,Nor be single, though alone,Take, or not take her.Before you eat begin to fast;For what shall be was never past.Say, unsay, gainsay, save your breath:Then wish at once her life and death.Take, or not take her."These lines he gave out of his own hands unto them , saying unto them, Go, my lads , in peace, -the great God of thehighest heavens be your guardian and preserver; and do not offer any more to trouble or disquiet me with this or any other business whatsoever. I have this same very day, whichis the last both of May and of me, with a great deal of labour,toil, and difficulty, chased out of my house a rabble of filthy,unclean, and plaguily pestilentious rake-hells, black beasts,dusk, dun, white, ash-coloured, speckled, and a foul verminof other hues, whose obtrusive importunity would not permit me to die at my own ease; for by fraudulent and deceitfulpricklings, ravenous, harpy- like graspings, waspish stingings,and such-like unwelcome approaches, forged in the shop ofI know not what kind of insatiabilities, they went about towithdraw, and call me out of those sweet thoughts, whereinI was already beginning to repose myself, and acquiesce inthe contemplation and vision , yea, almost in the very touchand taste of the happiness and felicity which the good Godhath prepared for his faithful saints and elect in the otherlife, and state of immortality. Turn out of their courses,and eschew them, step forth of their ways, and do not re- semble them; meanwhile, let me be no more troubled by you,but leave me now in silence , I beseech you.7 Take, or not take her. ] This rondeau will be found at the end ofCretin's works. It was addressed by him to Christopher de Refuge,who had consulted him on his intended marriage. In a similar mannerMoliere, in his Les Femmes Scavantes, act iii. sc. 2, puts in the mouth of the pedant Trissotin, two sonnets taken from the collection of theAbbé Cotin. ]38 [BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.CHAPTER XXII.How Panurge patrocinates and defendeth the order ofthe begging Friars.PANURGE, at his issuing forth of Raminagrobis's chambersaid, as if he had been horribly affrighted, By the virtue ofGod, I believe that he is an heretic; -the devil take me, if I do not! he doth so villanously rail at the mendicant friars and Jacobins, who are the two hemispheres of the Christianworld; by whose gyronomonic circumbilivagin*tions, as bytwo celivagous filopendulums, all the autonomatic metagro- bolism of the Romish church, when tottering and emblustricated with the gibble gabble gibberish of this odious error and heresy, is hom*ocentrically poised . But what harm, inthe devil's name, have these poor devils the Capuchins and Minims done unto him? Are not these beggarly devilssufficiently wretched already? Who can imagine that thesepoor snakes, the very extracts of Ichthyophagy, are notthoroughly enough besmoked and besmeared with misery,distress, and calamity? Dost thou think, Friar John, by thyfaith, that he is in the state of salvation? He goeth, before God, as surely damned to thirty thousand baskets full ofdevils, as a pruning-bill to the lopping of a vine-branch.To revile with opprobrious speeches the good and courageousprops and pillars of the church, -isthat to be called a poeticalfury? I cannot rest satisfied with him, he sinneth grossly,and blasphemeth against the true religion. I amvery muchoffended at his scandalizing words and contumelious obloquy.I do not care a straw, quoth Friar John, for what he hath said;for although everybody should twit and jerk them, it were but a just retaliation, seeing all persons are served by them withthe like sauce; therefore do I pretend no interest therein. Let us see nevertheless what he hath written. Panurge very attentively read the paper which the old man had penned, thensaid to his two fellow-travellers, The poor drinker doteth.Howsoever, I excuse him, for that I believe he is now drawing near to the end, and final closure of his life. Let us go make his epitaph. By the answer which he hath given us,I am not, I protest. one jot wiser than I was. Hearken here,Epistemon, my little bully, dost not thou hold him to bevery resolute in his responsory verdicts? He is a witty,CHAP. XXII. ]PANTAGRUEL. 39quick, and subtle sophister. I will lay an even wager, thathe is a miscreant apostate. By the belly of a stalled ox ,how careful he is not to be mistaken in his words. He answered but by disjunctives, therefore can it not be true whichhe saith; for the verity of such like propositions is inherentonly in one of its two members. O the cozening prattler thathe is! I wonder if Santiago of Bressure be one of these cogging shirks. Such was of old, quoth Epistemon, the customof the grand vaticinator and prophet Tiresias , who used always, by way of a preface, to say openly and plainly at thebeginning of his divinations and predictions, ―That what hewas to tell would either come to pass or not. And such istruly the style of all prudently presaging prognosticators.He was nevertheless, quoth Panurge, so unfortunately misadventurous in the lot of his own destiny, that Juno thrust out both his eyes.Yes, answered Epistemon, and that merely out of a spiteand spleen for having pronounced his award more veritablythan she, upon the question which was merrily proposed by Jupiter. But, quoth Panurge, what arch- devil is it, thathath possessed this Master Raminagrobis, that so unreasonably, and without any occasion, he should have so snappishly, and bitterly inveighed against these poor honestfathers, Jacobins, minors, and minims? It vexeth me grievously, I assure you; nor am I able to conceal my indignation. He hath transgressed most enormously; his soul 'goeth infallibly to thirty thousand panniers full of devils. Iunderstand you not, quoth Epistemon, and it disliketh mevery much, that you should so absurdly and perversely interpret that of the friar mendicants, which by the harmlesspoet was spoken of black beasts, dun, and other sorts of othercoloured animals. He is not in my opinion guilty of such asophistical and fantastic allegory, as by that phrase of his tohave meaned the begging brothers. He in downright termsspeaketh absolutely and properly offleas, punies, hand worms,flies, gnats, and other such like scurvy vermin, whereof someare black, some dun, some ash- coloured, some tawny, andsome brown and dusky, all noisome, molesting, tyrannous,1 Or not. ] Horace's Sat. 1. ii . sat. v.His soul. ]of elsewhere."6Quicquid dicam, aut erit, aut non."Son asne, his ass in the original. See this taken notice40 RABELAIS [ BOOK III.WORKS.umbersome, and unpleasant creatures, not only to sick anddiseased folks , but to those also who are of a sound, vigorous,and healthful temperament and constitution . It is not un- like, that he may have the ascarids , and the lumbrics, and worms within the entrails of his body. Possibly doth hesuffer, as it is frequent and usual amongst the Egyptians,together with all those who inhabit the Erythræan confines,and dwell along the shores and coasts of the Red Sea, somesour prickings, and smart stingings in his arms and legs ofthose little speckled dragons, which the Arabians callmeden. You are to blame for offering to expound his wordsotherwise, and wrong the ingenious poet, and outrageously abuse and miscal the said fraters, by an imputation of baseness undeservedly laid to their charge. We still should, insuch like discourses of fatiloquent soothsayers, interpret all.things to the best. Will you teach me, quoth Panurge, howto discern flies among milk, or show your father the way howto beget children? He is, by the virtue of God, an arrantheretic, a resolute formal heretic; I say, a rooted riveted combustible heretic, one as fit to burn as the little woodenclock at Rochel . His soul goeth to thirty thousand carts full of devils. Would you know whither? co*cks-body,myfriend, straight under Proserpina's close stool, to the very middle of the self- same infernal pan, within which, she, byan excrementitious evacuation , voideth the fecal stuff of herstinking clysters, and that just upon the left side of thegreat cauldron of three fathom height, hard by the claws and talons of Lucifer, in the very darkest of the passage3 Meden. ] Venæ medini. A distemper so called from the town of Medina, where it is common. Avicenna speaks of it.By the virtue of God. ] This oath in the original is, by the virtue of an ox: par la vertu beuf. Suppose we say, By ox cheek and mar- row-bones. It would answer better to the jocularity of the original,and give no offence to any, the most scrupulous reader.5 The little wooden clock at Rochel. ] Rabelais alludes to the clock- maker of Rochelle named Clavele, who was burnt as a heretic, together with a wooden clock which he had invented. ]6 Hard by the claws, &c. ] The book of Conformities relates thata certain devil, who had taken the shape of one Madam Zanteza of Ravenna, had told Messire James, a Bolonian priest, by way ofsecrecy,that Francis D'Assize was in Lucifer's place in heaven. (See Wier.Dæmonolog.) Raminagrobis had been raving against the monks, and particularly the Franciscans. With an eye to the story above, Rabelais places him in hell, below Proserpine, and within the reach of Lucifer's claws.CHAP. XXIII.] PANTAGRUEL. 41which leadeth towards the black chamber of Demogorgon.O the villain!CHAPTER XXIII.How Panurge maketh a motion of a return to Raminagrobis.LET us return, quoth Panurge, not ceasing, to the uttermostof our abilities , to ply him with wholesome admonitions, forthe furtherance of his salvation . Let us go back for God'ssake, let us go in the name of God. It will be a very meritorious work, and of great charity in us to deal so in thematter, and provide so well for him, ' that albeit he come tolose both body and life , he may at least escape the risk anddanger of the eternal damnation of his soul. We will byour holy persuasions bring him to a sense and feeling of hisescapes, induce him to acknowledge his faults, move him toa cordial repentance of his errors, and stir up in himsuch a sincere contrition of heart for his offences, as willprompt him with all earnestness to cry mercy, and to begpardon at the hands of the good fathers, as well of the absent, as of such as are present. Whereupon we will takeinstrument formally and authentically extended, to the endhe be not, after his decease, declared an heretic , and condemned, as were the hobgoblins of the provost's wife of Orleans, to the undergoing of such punishments, pains, and tortures, as are due to, and inflicted on those that inhabitthe horrid cells of the infernal regions: and withal incline,instigate, and persuade him to bequeath, and leave in legacy,(by way of an amends and satisfaction for the outrage andinjury done to those good religious fathers, throughout allthe convents, cloisters, and monasteries of this province, )many pittances,³ a great deal of mass- singing, store of obits ,¹ Provide so well for him. ] In this chapter Panurge's tender mercies would do credit to a general of the Inquisition.2 The Provost's wife of Orleans. ] The cordeliers of Orleans, in1534, noised abroad that the spirit of Louise de Mareau, wife of the provost of the town, re-appeared in their church. The fraud wasunmasked and punished. For an account of this, see the Recueil de dissert. anciennes et modernes sur les apparitions, by Lenglet Dufresnoy. ]3 Pittances. ] An allowance of victuals over and above bread and wine.Thus Anthony du Pinet, 1. v. c. xix. and l . xviii . c. xii , of his transla- tion of Pliny, gives the appellative pittance to figs and beans. The word originally comes from the people's piety in giving to the poor mendicants in their neighbourhood wherewithal to subsist. Du Canysunder the word pietancia, and Menage under the word pittance.42 [BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.and that sempiternally, on the anniversary day of his decease,every one of them all to be furnished with a quintuple allowance, and that the great borrachoe, replenished with thebest liquor, trudge apace along the tables , as well of theyoung duckling monkitoes, lay-brothers, and lowermost degree of the abbey-lubbards, as of the learned priests, andreverend clerks, -the very meanest of the novices andmitiants unto the order being equally admitted to the benefitofthose funerary and obsequial festivals, with the aged rectors,and professed fathers . This is the surest ordinary means,whereby from God he may obtain forgiveness.Ho, ho, I am quite mistaken, I digress from the purpose,and fly out of my discourse, as if my spirits were a wool- gathering. The devil take me if I go thither! Virtue God! thechamber is already full of devils. Owhat a swingeing, thwack- ing noise is now amongst them! O the terrible coil thatthey keep! Hearken, do you not hear the rustling, thumping bustle of their strokes and blows, as they scuffle one with another, like true devils indeed, who shall gulp up theRaminagrobis soul, and be the first bringer of it, whilst it ishot, to Monsieur Lucifer? Beware, and get you hence: formy part I will not go thither. The devil roast me if I go!Who knows but that these hungry mad devils may in thehaste of their rage, and fury of their impatience take a quifor a quo, and instead of Raminagrobis, snatch up poor Panurge frank and free? Though formerly when I was deep in debt, they always failed. Get you hence! I will not gothither. Before God, the very bare apprehension thereof islike to kill me. To be in the place where there are greedy,famished, and hunger- starved devils; amongst factious devils-amidst trading and trafficking devils-Ŏ the Lord pre- serve me! Get you hence, I dare pawn my credit on it,that no Jacobin, Cordelier, Carmelite, Capuchin, Theatin, orMinim, will bestow any personal presence at his interment.The wiser they because he hath ordained nothing for them in his latter will and testament. The devil take me,if I go thither. If he be damned, to his own loss and hin- drance be it. What the deuce moved him to be so snappishand depravedly bent against the good fathers of the true religion? Why did he cast them off, reject them, and drivethem quite out of his chamber, even in that very nick of time when he stood in greatest need of the aid, suffrage, andCHAP. XXIII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 43assistance of their devout prayers, and holy admonitions?Why did not he by testament leave them, at least, someJolly lumps and cantles of substantial meat, a parcel of cheekpuffing victuals, and a little belly- timber, and provision forthe guts of these poor folks, who have nothing but their lifein this world? Let him go thither who will; the devil takeme, if I go; for, if I should, the devil would not fail to snatch me up. Cancro. Ho, the pox! Get you hence,Friar John, art thou content that thirty thousand wainloadofdevils should get away with thee at this same very instant?If thou be, at my request do these three things. First, giveme thy purse; for besides that thy money is marked withcrosses, and the cross is an enemy to charms, the same maybefall to thee, which not long ago happened to John Dodin,collector of the excise of Coudray, at the ford of Vede, when the soldiers broke the planks. This monied fellow, meetingat the very brink of the bank of the ford with Friar AdamCrankcod, a Franciscan Observatin of Mirebeau, promisedhim a new frock, provided that, in the transporting of himover the water he would bear him upon his neck and shoulders, after the manner of carrying dead goats; for he was alusty, strong-limbed sturdy rogue. The condition beingagreed upon, Friar Crankcod trusseth himself up to his veryballocks, and layeth upon his back, like a fair little Saint Christopher, the load of the said supplicant Dodin, and so carriedhim gaily and with a good will, ( as Æneas bore his fatherAnchises through the conflagration of Troy, ) singing in themeanwhile a pretty Ave Maris Stella. When they were inthe very deepest place of all the ford, a little above themaster-wheel of the water-mill, he asked if he had any coinabout him. Yes, quoth Dodin, a whole bag full; and thathe needed not to mistrust his ability in the performance ofthe promise, which he had made unto him, concerning a newfrock. How? quoth Friar Crankcod, thou knewest wellenough, that by the express rules, canons, and injunctionsof our order, we are forbidden to carry about us any kind ofmoney. Thou art truly unhappy, for having made me in this▲ Adam Crank-cod. ] In the original it means strictly Adam Bean- flap; for Couscoil, in Upper Languedoc, signifies a bean shell or cod.By this coined name, Rabelais intends a monk who by his nudities represented the first man, before the fall.5 Dodin. ] This story is taken from the Latin Epigrams of NicolasBarthelemy, printed at Paris, in 1532. ]To carry about us any money. ] Erasmus, in his Praise of Folly:44 [BOOK III. RABELAIS' WORKS.point to commit a heinous trespass. Why didst thou not leave thy purse with the miller? Without fail thou shaltpresently receive thy reward for it; and if ever hereafter Imay but lay hold on thee within the limits of our chancel atMirebeau, thou shalt have the miserere even to the vitulos .With this , suddenly discharging himself of his burden, hethrows me down your Dodin headlong. Take example bythis Dodin, my dear friend , Friar John, to the end that thedevils may the better carry thee away at thine own ease.Give me thy purse. Carry no manner of cross upon thee.Therein lieth an evident and manifestly apparent danger.For, if you have any silver coined with a cross upon it, theywill cast thee down headlong upon some rocks, as the eaglesuse to do with the tortoises for the breaking of their shells ,as the bald pate of the poet Eschylus" can sufficiently bear witness. Such a fall would hurt thee very sore, my sweetbully, and I would be sorry for it. Or otherwise they willlet thee fall , and tumble down into the high swollen wavesof some capacious sea , I know not where; but, I warrant thee, far enough hence, as Icarus fell; which from thyname would afterwards get the denomination of the Fun- nelian sea.Secondly, Be out of debt. For the devils carry a greatliking to those that are out of debt. I have sore felt the experience thereof in mine own particular; for now the lecherous varlets are always wooing me, courting me, and makingmuch of me, which they never did when I was all to pieces.The soul of one in debt is insipid , dry, and heretical alto- gether.Thirdly, with thy cowl and Domino de Grobis, return toRaminagrobis; and in case, being thus qualified, thirty thousand boats full of devils forthwith come not to carrythee quite away, I shall be content to be at the charge ofpaying for the pint and fa*ggot. Now, if for the more security thou wouldst have some associate to bear thee company," Rursum alios qui pecuniæ contactum ceu aconitum horreant, nec àmulierum contactû temperantes." A passage which the painter Holbein hath illustrated with the print of a Franciscan friar groping a young wench's bubbies with his left hand, while he is so scrupulous as to tell over some money with a bodkin's point in the other hand.7 The miserere even to the vitulos . ] The scourgings which the monks inflicted on themselves during the chanting of the Psalms. ]Eschylus. ] The poet was killed by the descent of a tortoise, which an eagle let fall on his bald pate, mistaking it for a rock. ]CHAP. XXIII. ] PANTAGRuel. 45let not me be the comrade thou searchest for; think not toget a fellow- traveller of me, -nay, do not. I advise theefor the best. Get you hence; I will not go thither; thedevil take me if I go. Notwithstanding all the fright thatyou are in, quoth Friar John, I would not care so much, asmight possibly be expected I should, if I once had but mysword in my hand. Thou hast verily hit the nail on thehead, quoth Panurge, and speakest like a learned doctor,subtle and well- skilled in the art of devilry. At the timewhen I was a student in the University of Toulouse,' thatsame reverend father in the devil, Picatrix, 10 rector of theDiabological Faculty, was wont to tell us, that the devilsdid naturally fear the bright glancing of swords, as much as the splendour and light of the sun. In confirmation ofthe verity whereof, he related this story, that Hercules, athis descent into hell to all the devils of those regions, didnot by half so much terrify them with his club and lion'sskin, as afterwards Eneas did with his clear shining armourupon him, and his sword in his hand well furbished and unrusted, by the aid, council, and assistance of the SibyllaCumana. That was perhaps the reason why the senior JohnJames Trivolse, " whilst he was a dying at Chartres, calledfor his cutlass , and died with a drawn sword in his hand,laying about him alongst and athwart around the bed, andeverywhere within his reach, like a stout, doughty, valorous,and knight-like cavalier; by which resolute manner ofToulouse. ] In the original it is, when I went to school at Tolletteby which is meant Toledo in Spain.10 Picatrix. ] The pseudonym of a Spanish monk, author of a book on demonology , collected from the writings of two hundred and twenty- four Arabic magicians. The doctrine, that assigns an aërial sub- stance to the devils, was taught in the grottos near Toledo till 1492,when the schools of the Arabians in Spain were put an end to, as well as the reign of that people there. Agrippa, who spoke of Picatrix before Rabelais, tells us, that that Spaniard's work was dedicated to King Alphonso.11 John James Trivolse. ] See Mezeray in 1518; also Guicciardini's Italian wars. This lord made his own epitaph .... Here resteth one that never rested before , John James Trivolse. And the reason of histhus flourishing and pushing with his sword on his right hand and left ,just before he died , was probably, that his epitaph might not be charged with a lie. ( He was a brave man, and accordingly Moreri speaks well of him. ) His name in Italian, for he was a Milanese, was Giovann lacomo di Trivulcio. [ See in Brantome's " Vies des grands capitainesétrang," that of Jean Jacques Trivulse. ]46 [BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.fence he scared away and put to flight all the devils thatwere then lying in wait for his soul at the passage of hisdeath. When the Massorets and Cabalists are asked, -Whyit is that none of all the devils do at any time enter into theterrestrial paradise? their answer has been, is, and will bestill , That there is a cherubim standing at the gate thereofwith a flame-like glistering sword in his hand. Although,to speak in the true diabological sense or phrase of Toledo,I must needs confess and acknowledge, that veritably thedevils cannot be killed , or die by the stroke of a sword: I donevertheless avow and maintain, according to the doctrine ofthe said Diabology," that they may suffer a solution of continuity, (as if with thy shable thou shouldest cut athwartthe flame of a burning fire, or the gross opacous exhalationsof a thick and obscure smoke, ) and cry out, like very devils,at their sense and feeling of this dissolution, which in realdeed I must aver and affirm is devilishly painful , smarting,and dolorous.When thou seest the impetuous shock of two armies, andvehement violence of the push in their horrid encounter withone another, dost thou think, Ballockasso, that so horrible anoise as is heard there, proceedeth from the voice and shoutsof men? the dashing and jolting of harness? the clatteringand clashing of armies? the hacking and slashing of battleaxes? the justling and crashing of pikes? the bustling andbreaking of lances? the clamour and shrieks of the wounded?the sound and din of drums? the clangour and shrillness oftrumpets? the neighing and rushing in of horses? with thefearful claps and thundering of all sorts of guns, from the double cannon to the pocket pistol inclusively? I cannot,goodly, deny, but that in these various things which I haverehearsed there may be somewhat occasionative of the hugeyell and tintamarre of the two engaged bodies. But the most fearful and tumultuous coil and stir, the terriblest and mostboisterous garboil and hurry, the chiefest rustling blacksantus of all, and most principal hurly burly, 13 springeth12 The doctrine, &c. ] Cælius Rhodiginus tells us, this doctrine had agreat many defenders in his time.13 Hurly-burly ] Vacarme in French; so called, says M. Duchat,from bacchi carnem. Carnem must be an error of the press, for carmen.But such errors, though material in themselves, may very well be forgiven our learned editor, considering how seldom they have escaped him: not above a dozen times in all the six volumes; once by puttingCHAP. XXIII.]PANTAGRUel. 47from the grievously plangorous howling and lowing of devils,who, pell-mell, in a hand-over-head confusion, waiting forthe poor souls of the maimed and hurt soldiery, receive unawares some strokes with swords, and so by those meanssuffer a solution of, and division in, the continuity of their aërial and invisible substances: as if some lackey, snatchingat the lard- slices, stuck in a piece of roast meat on the spit,should get from Mr. Greasyfist a good rap on the knuckleswith a cudgel. They cry out and shout like devils, even asMars did, when he was hurt by Diomedes at the siege ofTroy, who, as Homer testifieth of him, did then raise hisvoice more horrifically loud, and sonoriferously high, thanten thousand men together would have been able to do.What maketh all this for our present purpose? I have beeniocatur for nugatur, in quoting Beza's famous epigram upon Rabelais.(N. B. jocatur, though good Latin, is bad verse. )" Qui sic jocatur, tractantem ut seria vincat;Seria quum faciet, dic, rogo , quantus erit?"Anglicè.He who a tale so learnedly could tell,That no true hist'ry e'er pleas'd half so well;How much in serious things would he excel!Again, in dividing the word savpáμevov, and making two words of it,in the epigram upon one Diophon, who had so strong a tincture of am- bition, that being condemned to be hanged, he died with envy as soon as he saw the gibbet which was prepared for him, was not so high built as his fellow-rogues.Μακροτέρῳ σαυρῶ σαυρὸ μενον ἄλλον ἑαυτῶ Οφθονερὸς Διοφῶν ἐνγὺς ἰδὼν ἐτάκη;Anglicé.Soon as a gallows Diophon espy'd Higher than his, with envy burst, he dy'd.But the greatest oversight of all, and which it is fit those who are pos- sessed of that French edition as well as of M. Motteaux's 8vo. edition,should be set right in, is the quotation from Plutarch, about the physician,Plutarch has it,Who boasts of healing poor and rich,Yet is himself all over itch.Ιατρὸς ἄλλων, αυτὸς ἕλκεσι βρύων.Whereas M. Duchat, as well as M. Motteaux, have omitted ɛσ , and one of them has it Γητρός, instead of 'Ιατρός.14 Greasyfist. ] Master Hordoux in the original, from the Latin hor- ridus, or else from hors, out, away, begone, from his driving out of the kitchen such as incommode him in his culinary affairs whether man or beast. Thus adds M. Duchat, by way of joke, when a young school- boy is bid to decline hordicus, the lad no sooner comes to the genitive case, but he finds he must get away. (Hordici, hors d'ici. )48 [BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.speaking here of well-furbished armour and bright shining swords. But so is it not, Friar John, with thy weapon; forby a long discontinuance of work, cessation from labour,desisting from making it officiate, and putting it into thatpractice wherein it had been formerly accustomed, and, in aword, for want of occupation , it is, upon my faith, becomemore rusty than the key-hole of an old powdering- tub.Therefore it is expedient that you do one of these two things,either furbish your weapon bravely, and as it ought to be,or otherwise have a care, that, in the rusty case it is in, youdo not presume to return to the house of Raminagrobis.For my part, I vow I will not go thither. The devil take me if I go.葛CHAPTER XXIV.How Panurge consulteth with Epistemon.HAVING left the town of Villaumere, as they were upontheir return towards Pantagruel, Panurge, in addressing his discourse to Epistemon, spoke thus. My most ancient friendand gossip, thou seest the perplexity of my thoughts, and knowest many remedies for the removal thereof; art thounot able to help and succour me? Epistemon, thereupontaking the speech in hand, represented unto Panurge, how the open voice and common fame of the whole country didrun upon no other discourse, but the derision and mockery of his new disguise; whereof his counsel unto him was, thathe would in the first place be pleased to make use of a littlehellebore, for the purging of his brain of that peccant humour,which through that extravagant and fantastic mummery ofhis had furnished the people with a too just occasion of flouting and gibing, jeering and scoffing him, and that next hewould resume his ordinary fashion of accoutrement, and goapparelled as he was wont to do. I am, quoth Panurge, mydear gossip Epistemon, of a mind and resolution to marry,but am afraid of being a cuckold, and to be unfortunate in my wedlock. For this cause have I made a vow to youngSt. Francis, who at Plessis le Tours is much reverenced ofall women, earnestly cried unto by them, and with greatdevotion; for he was the first founder of the confraternityof good men, whom they naturally covet, affect, and longGood men ] The bons hommes, who were instituted by Francis de Feul, surnamed the younger, in contradistinction to Francis d'Assisis,CHAP. XXIV. ] PANTAGRUEL. 49for:-to wear spectacles in my cap, and to carry no codpiece in my breeches, until the present inquietude and perturbation of my spirits be fully settled.Truly, quoth Epistemon, that is a pretty jolly vow, ofthirteen to a dozen. It is a shame to you, and I wondermuch at it, that you do not return unto yourself, and recallyour senses from this their wild swerving and strayingabroad, to that rest and stillness which becomes a virtuousman. This whimsical conceit of yours brings me to the remembrance of a solemn promise made by the shaghairedArgives, who, having in their controversy against the Lacedæmonians for the territory of Thyrea, lost the battle, whichthey hoped should have decided it for their advantage, vowedto carry never any hair on their heads, till preallably they had recovered the loss of both their honour and lands. Aslikewise to the memory of the vow of a pleasant Spaniardcalled Michael Doris, who vowed to carry in his hat a pieceof the skin of his leg, till he should be revenged of him who had struck it off. Yet do not I know which of these twodeserveth most to wear a green and yellow hood with ahare's ears tied to it, either the aforesaid vain- gloriouschampion, or that Enguerrant, who, having forgot the artand manner of writing histories, set down by the Samosatianphilosopher, maketh a most tediously long narrative and relation thereof. For, at the first reading of such a profuse discourse, one would think it had been broached forthe introducing of a story of great importance and moment,concerning the waging of some formidable war, or the notable change and mutation of potent states and kingdoms;but, in conclusion, the world laugheth at the capriciouschampion, at the Englishman who had affronted him , as alsoat their scribbler Enguerrant, more driveling at the mouthare the same as the minims: but here Rabelais speaks of leprous per- who have large talents for venereal exercises. Formerly leperswere called bons hommes, and are still called so in Germany.2 Argives. ] See Herodotus, l. i. c. 82.sons,33 Enguerrant. ] Monstrelet, in the second chapter of his Chronicle,relates the story , which takes up several pages, without coming to the point, by making the parties spend four years in going to and fro, and not doing any thing at all but rail and wrangle . The Spaniard was an Arragonese, named Michael d'Oris, the Englishman was one Sir John Pendergrass.4 Samosatian Philosopher. ] Lucian of Samosata, who lived in the first age of the Christian era. ]VOL. II. E50 [BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.than a mustard pot. The jest and scorn thereof is not unlike to that of the mountain of Horace, which by the poetwas made to cry out and lament most enormously, as awoman in the pangs and labour of child -birth, at which deplorable and exorbitant cries and lamentations the wholeneighbourhood being assembled in expectation to see somemarvellous monstrous production , could at last perceive noother but the paltry ridiculous mouse.Your mousing, quoth Panurge, will not make me leavemy musing, why folks should be so frumpishly disposed,seeing I am certainly persuaded that some flout, who meritto be flouted at; yet, as my vow imports, so will I do. Itis now a long time since, by Jupiter, we did swear faith and amity to one another. Give me your advice, Billy, andtell me your own opinion freely, should I marry or no?Truly, quoth Epistemon, the case is hazardous, and thedanger so eminently apparent, that I find myself too weakand insufficient to give you a punctual and peremptoryresolution therein; and if ever it was true, that judgment is difficult in matters of the medicinal art," what was saidby Hippocrates of Lango, it is certainly so in this case. Trueit is, that in my brain there are some rolling fancies , by means whereof somewhat may be pitched upon of a seemingefficacy to the disentangling your mind of those dubiousapprehensions wherewith it is perplexed; but they do not thoroughly satisfy me. Some of the Platonic sects affirm,that whosoever is able to see his proper Genius, may know hisown destiny. I understand not their doctrine, nor do Ithink that you adhere to them; there is a palpable abuse.I have seen the experience of it in a very curious gentlemanof the country of Estangourre. This is one of the points.There is yet another not much better. If there were anyauthority now in the oracles of Jupiter Ammon; of Apollo in Lebadia, Delphos, Delos, Cyrra, Patara, Tegyres, Preneste,Lycia, Colophon, or in the Castilian Fountain; near Antiochia in Syria, between the Branchidians; of Bacchus in5 Judgment, &c. ] In this aphorism, which is the first of lib. 1 , Hip- pocrates begins with declaring, was a difficult thing for him to fixand settle his opinion, in matters relating to medicine.6 Some of the Platonic sect, &c. ] See Jamblicus de Mysteriis, sect.ix. c. iii.Estangourre. ] Corruptly for East- angle (East- England) one of the kingdoms in the heptarchy of England, under the Saxon kings.CHAP. XXIV. ] PANTAGRUEL. 51Dodona; of Mercury in Phares, near Patras; of Apis inEgypt; of Serapis in Canope; of Faunus in Menalia, andAlbunea near Tivoli; of Tiresias in Orchomenus; of Mopsusin Cilicia; of Orpheus in Lesbos, and of Trophonius inLeucadia; I would in that case advise you, and possibly not,to go thither for their judgment concerning the design andenterprise you have in hand. But you know that they areall of them become as dumb as so many fishes, since theadvent of that Saviour King, whose coming to this worldhath made all oracles and prophecies to cease; as the approach of the sun's radiant beams expelleth goblins, bugbears, hob-thrushes, broams, screech owl-mates, night- walkingspirits, and tenebrions. These now are gone; but althoughthey were as yet in continuance and inthe same power, rule,and request that formerly they were, yet would not I counsel you to be too credulous in putting any trust in theirresponses. Too many folks have been deceived thereby.It stands, furthermore, upon record, how Agrippina didcharge the fair Lollia with the crime of having interrogated the oracle of Apollo Clarius , to understand if she shouldbe at any time married to the Emperor Claudius; for whichcause she was at first banished, and thereafter put to a shameful and ignominious death .8But, saith Panurge, let us do better; the Ogygian Islandsare not far distant from the haven of Sammalo. Let us,after that we shall have spoken to our king, make a voyagethither. In one of these four isles, to wit that which hathits primest aspect towards the sun setting, it is reported , andI have read in good antique and authentic authors, thatthere reside many soothsayers, fortune-tellers, vaticinators,prophets, and diviners of things to come; that Saturn inhabiteth that place, bound with fair chains of gold, and withinthe concavity of a golden rock, being nourished with divineambrosia and nectar, which are daily in great store and abundance transmitted to him from the heavens, by I do not wellknow what kind of fowls, -it may be that they are the same ravens, which in the deserts are said to have fed St.Paul, the first hermit, -he very clearly foretelleth unto every one, who is desirous to be certified of the condition of hislot, what his destiny will be, and what future chance the• Golden rock. ] See Plutarch, in his discourse of the face which appears in the moon's orb.E 252 [BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.fates have ordained for him; for the Parcæ, or WierdSisters do not twist, spin, or draw out a thread, nor yet dothJupiter perpend, project, or deliberate any thing, which thegood old celestial father knoweth not to the full, even whilsthe is asleep. This will be a very summary abbreviationof our labour, if we but hearken unto him a little upon theserious debate and canvassing of this my perplexity. Thatis, answered Epistemon, a gullery too evident, a plain abuseand fib too fabulous . I will not go, not I, I will not go.CHAPTER XXV.

How Panurge consulteth with Her Trippa.NEVERTHELESS, quoth Epistemon, continuing his discourse,I will tell you what you may do, if you believe me, beforewe return to our king. Hard by here, in the Brown- wheat[ Bouchart] Island, dwelleth Her Trippa. You know howby the arts of astrology, geomancy, chiromancy, metopo- mancy, and others of a like stuff and nature, he foretellethall things to come; let us talk a little, and confer with himabout your business . Of that, answered Panurge, I knownothing but of this much concerning him I am assured,that one day, and that not long since , whilst he was pratingto the great king,2 of celestial, sublime, and transcendentthings, the lacqueys and footboys of the court, upon theupper steps of stairs between two doors, jummed, one afteranother, as often as they listed, his wife; who is passable fair, and a pretty snug hussy. Thus he who seemed veryclearly to see all heavenly and terrestrial things withoutspectacles, who discoursed boldly of adventures passed, withgreat confidence opened up present cases and accidents, andstoutly professed the presaging of all future events and con- tingencies, was not able with all the skill and cunning thathe had, to perceive the bumbasting of his wife, whom he1 Her Trippa. ] The author of the English notes upon Rabelais (Mr. Motteaux), printed by themselves at the beginning of these volumes,will have it (and with a great deal of reason) that, by Her Trippa,Rabelais designs Henry Cornelius Agrippa, a German, who, with some,passes for a magician. And indeed , in his book of the Vanity of the Sciences, and his four books of Occult Philosophy, he has treated of most of these kinds of divinations, here brought together by Rabelais in this chapter.2 The great king. ] This must be Francis I., to whose motherAgrippa was physician.CHAP. XXV. ]PANTAGRUEL. 53reputed to be very chaste; and hath not till this hour gotnotice of anything to the contrary. Yet let us go to him,seeing you will have it so; for surely we can never learn toomuch. They on the very next ensuing day came to HerTrippa's lodging. Panurge by way of donative, presentedhim with a long gown lined all through with wolf- skins,with a short sword mounted with a gilded hilt, and coveredwith a velvet scabbard, and with fifty good single angels:then in a familiar and friendly way did he ask of him hisopinion touching the affair. At the very first Her Trippa,looking on him very wistly in the face, said unto him; -Thou hast the metoposcopy, and physiognomy of a cuckold,-I say, of a notorious and infamous cuckold. With this,casting an eye upon Panurge's right hand in all the partsthereof, he said, This rugged draught which I see here, justunder the mount of Jove, was never yet but in the hand of acuckold. Afterwards, he with a white lead pen swiftly andhastily drew a certain number of divers kinds of points,which by rules of geomancy he coupled and joined together,then said: Truth itself is not truer, than that it is certain,thou wilt be a cuckold, a little after thy marriage. Thatbeing done, he asked of Panurge the horoscope of his nativity; which was no sooner by Panurge tendered unto him,than that, erecting a figure, he very promptly and speedilyformed and fashioned a complete fabric of the houses ofheaven, in all their parts, whereof when he had consideredthe situation and the aspects in their triplicities , he fetcheda deep sigh, and said; I have clearly enough already discovered unto you the fate of your cuckoldry, which is unavoidable, you cannot escape it. And here have I got newand further assurance thereof, so that I may now hardlypronounce, and affirm without any scruple or hesitation atall, that thou wilt be a cuckold; that furthermore, thou wiltbe beaten by thine own wife, and that she will purloin, filch,and steal of thy goods from thee; for I find the seventhhouse in all its aspects, of a malignant influence, and everyone of the planets threatening thee with disgrace, accordingas they stand seated towards one another, in relation to thehorned signs of Aries, Taurus, and Capricorn. In the fourthLouse I find Jupiter in a decadence, as also in a tetragonalaspect to Saturn, associated with Mercury. Thou wilt besoundly peppered, my good honest fellow, I warrant thee.54 [BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.3I will be? answered Panurge. A plague rot thee, thou oldfool, and doating sot, how graceless and unpleasant thouart! When all cuckolds shall be at a general rendezvous,thou shouldst be their standard- bearer. But whence comesthis ciron-worm betwixt these two fingers? This Panurgesaid, putting the fore finger of his left hand betwixt the foreand mid finger of the right, which he thrust out towards HerTrippa, holding them open after the manner of two horns,and shutting into his fist his thumb with the other fingers.Then, in turning to Epistemon, he said, -Lo here the trueOlus of Martial, who addicted and devoted himself whollyto the observing the miseries, crosses, and calamities ofothers, whilst his own wife, in the interim, did keep an openbawdy- house. This varlet is poorer than ever was Irus, andyet he is proud, vaunting, arrogant, self- conceited, overweening, and more insupportable than seventeen devils; inone word, ПIT@ xadalov, which term of old was applied tothe like beggarly strutting coxcombs. Come, let us leavethis madpash bedlam, this hair- brained fop, and give himleave to rave and dose his bellyfull , with his private and intimately acquainted devils; who, if they were not the veryworst of all infernal fiends, would never have deigned toserve such a knavish, barking cur as this is. He hath notlearnt the first precept of philosophy, which is, Know thyself; for, whilst he braggeth and boasteth, that he can discern the least mote in the eye of another, he is not able tosee the huge block that puts out the sight of both his eyes.This is such another Polypragmon, as is by Plutarch described. He is of the nature of the Lamian witches, who inforeign places, in the houses of strangers, in public andamongst the common people, had a sharper and morepiercing inspection into their affairs than any lynx; but athome in their own proper dwelling-mansions were blinder than mold-warps, and saw nothing at all. For their customwas, at their return from abroad, when they were by themselves in private, to take their eyes out of their head, fromwhence they were as easily removable, as a pair of spectaclesfrom their nose, and to lay them up into a wooden slipper,3 Olus ofMartial. ] Lib. vii. epigr. x. "Ole quid ad te."4 ПIrwxaλalwv. A ptochalazon, i . e. a proud beggar, from @xò ,poor, and aλawv, haughty. See Plutarch in his treatise Of curiosity.frus was the beggar who kept watch on the suitors of Penelope.CHAP. XXV. ] PANTAGRUEL. 55which for that purpose did hang behind the door of theirlodging.Panurge had no sooner done speaking, when Her Trippatook into his hand a tamarisk branch. In this, quoth Epistemon, he doth very well, right, and like an artist, for Nicander calleth it the Divinatory tree. Have you a mind, quothHer Trippa, to have the truth of the matter yet more fullyand amply disclosed unto you by pyromancy, by aeromancy.whereof Aristophanes in his Clouds maketh great estimation,by hydromancy, by lecanomancy, of old in prime requestamongst the Assyrians, and thoroughly tried by HermolausBarbarus? Come hither, and I will show thee in this platterfull of fair fountain water, thy future wife, lechering andsercroupierising it with two swaggering ruffians, one after another. Yea, but have a special care, quoth Panurge,when thou comest to put thy nose within mine arse, thatthou forget not to pull off thy spectacles . Her Trippa, goingon in his discourse, said, By catoptromancy, likewise held insuch account by the Emperor Didius Julianus, that by means thereof he ever and anon foresaw all that which atany time did happen or befall unto him. Thou shalt notneed to put on thy spectacles, for in a mirror thou wilt seeher as clearly and manifestly nebrundiated, and billibodringit, as if I should show it in the fountain of the temple ofMinerva, near Patras. By coscinomancy, most religiously observed ofold amidst the ceremonies of the ancient Romans.Let us have sieve and shears, and thou shalt see devils.By alphitomancy, cried up by Theocritus in his Pharmaceutria. By alentomancy, mixing the flower of wheat withoatmeal. By astragalomancy, whereof I have the plots andmodels all at hand ready for the purpose. By tiromancy,whereof we make some proof in a great Brehemont cheese,which I here keep by me. By giromancy, if thou shouldestturn round circles, thou mightest assure thyself from me,that they would fall always on the wrong side. By sternomancy, which maketh nothing for thy advantage, for thouhast an ill proportioned stomach. By libanomancy, for thewhich we shall need but a little frankincense. By gastromancy, which kind of ventral fatiloquency was for a longtime together used in Ferrara by Lady Giacoma Rodogina,the Engastrimythian prophetess. By cephalomancy, often practised amongst the High Germans, in their boiling of an56 [BOOK III.RABELAIS WORKS.ass's head upon burning coals. By ceromancy, where, bythe means of wax dissolved into water, thou shalt see thefigure, portrait, and lively representation of thy future wife,and of her fredin fredaliatory belly-thumping blades. Bycapnomancy, O the gallantest and most excellent of allsecrets! By axionomancy; we want only a hatchet and ajet-stone to be laid together upon a quick fire of hot embers .O how bravely Homer was versed in the practice hereof towards Penelope's suiters! By onymancy, for that we have oil and wax. By tephromancy, thou wilt see the ashes thusaloft dispersed, exhibiting thy wife in a fine posture. By botanomancy, for the nonce I have some few leaves in reserve. Bysicomancy; O divine art in fig- tree leaves. Byicthyomancy,in ancient times so celebrated , and put in use by Tiresias andPolydamas, with the like certainty of event as was tried ofoldat the Dina- ditch, within that grove consecrated to Apollo,which is in the territory of the Lycians. By cho*romancy,let us have a great many hogs, and thou shalt have thebladder of one of them. By cheromancy, as the bean isfound in the cake at the Epiphany vigil. By anthropomancy,practised by the Roman Emperor Heliogabalus. It issomewhat irksome, but thou wilt endure it well enough, seeing thou art destinated to be a cuckold. By a sibyllinestitchomancy. By onomatomancy. How do they call thee?Chaw-turd, quoth Panurge. Or yet by alectryomancy. IfI should here with a compass draw a round, and in lookingupon thee, and considering thy lot, divide the circumferencethereof into four and twenty equal parts, then form a severalletter of the alphabet upon every one of them; and lastly,posit a barley corn or two upon each of these so disposedletters, I durst promise upon my faith and honesty, thatif a young virgin co*ck be permitted to range alongst andathwart them, he should only eat the grains which are setand placed upon these letters, A. C.U.C.K.O.L.D. T.H.O.U5 Chaw-turd, or turd-master. ] Maschemerde in the original; an epithet for physicians, tantamount to the scatophagos, which Aristoph- anes bestows on Esculapius. Exaropάyoç, merdivorus, says Robinson's lexicon; Esculapii Epith. apud Aristoph . in Pluto; est à σKATÒÇ merda, et páλw , edo. Heretofore physicians use to taste their patients'excretions, the better to judge of their state and condition. A laudable custom of the ancients, but not much practised bythe moderns! There as much a fashion in physic, as in any thing, and its mode is as changeable almost as that of dress.CHAF . XXV. ] PANTAGRUEL. 57S.H.A.L.T. B.E. And that as fatidically, as under the Emperor Valens, most perplexedly desirous to know the nameof him who should be his successor to the empire, the co*ckvaticinating and alectryomantic, ate up the pickles thatwere deposited on the letters . E.0.A. T.H.E.O.D. Or, for themore certainty, will you have a trial of your fortune bythe art of aruspiciny? By augury? Or by extispiciny?By turdispiciny, quoth Panurge. Or yet by the mystery ofnecromancy? I will, if you please, suddenly set up again,and revive some one lately deceased, as Apollonius ofTyane did to Achilles, and the Pythoness in the presence ofSaul; which body, so raised up and re- quickened, will tellus the sum of all you shall require of him: no more norless than, at the invocation of Erictho, a certain defunctperson foretold to Pompey the whole progress and issue ofthe fatal battle fought in the Pharsalian fields? Or, if yoube afraid of the dead, as commonly all cuckolds are, I willmake use of the faculty of sciomancy."Go, get thee gone, quoth Panurge, thou frantic ass, to thedevil, and be buggered, filthy bardachio that thou art, by someAlbanian, for a steeple- crowned hat. " Whythe devil didstnot thou counsel me as well to hold an emerald, or the stoneof a hyena under my tongue? Or to furnish and providemyself with tongues of whoops, and hearts of green frogs?Or to eat the liver and milt of some dragon? To the endthat by those means I might, at the chanting and chirping ofswans and other fowls, understand the substance of myfuture lot and destiny, as did of old the Arabians in thecountry of Mesopotamia? Fifteen brace of devils seizeO.E.O.A. ] For a proof, that the name ought not to be written at length, as in the Dutch Rabelais, Zonaras and Cedrenus, from whom Rabelais takes the story, affirm that the co*ck touched no other letters but the O.E.O.A. Besides, it was not Theodorus, but Theodosius that succeeded Valens. Ammianus Marcellinus pretends with Sozomenus,that the exploration on this occasion was by dactyliomancy.7 Sciomancy. ] Divination by the shades of the dead. The editors of Rabelais have inserted many of these kinds of divination . Moliere has imitated this chapter in his " Marriage Forcé," Act I. sc. vi . ,where Doctor Pancrace runs over all the languages in which he can reply.]Steeple-crowned hat. ] A head gear with which the hapless wretches who swelled the Autos - da- Fe of the Holy Inquisition were decorated. ]Ofold the Arabians. ] See Philostratus, I. i. c. xii. of Apollonius's life.58 RABELAIS' WORKS. BOOK III.upon the body and soul of this horned renegado, miscreant,cuckold, the enchanter, witch, and sorcerer of antichrist; awayto all the devils of hell? Let us return towards our king, I amsure he will not be well pleased with us, if he once come toget notice that we have been in the kennel of this muffleddevil.10 I repent my being come hither. I would willinglydispense with a hundred nobles, " and fourteen yeomen, oncondition that he, who not long since¹² did blow in thebottom of my breeches, should instantly with his squirtingspittle inluminate his moustaches. O Lord God now! how the villain hath besmoked me with vexation and anger, withcharms and witchcraft, and with a terrible coil and stir of infernal and Tartarian devils! The devil take him! SayAmen, and let us go drink. I shall not have any appetite formy victuals, how good cheer soever I make these two days tocome,-hardly these four.CHAPTER XXVI.How Panurge consulteth with Friar John ofthe Funnels.PANURGE was indeed very much troubled in mind, and disquieted at the words of Her Trippa, and therefore as he passed10 This muffled devil. ] It should be ragged, home- spun devil: he was slanderous as the devil, but at the bottom a mere ninny- hammer.M. Duchat observes, that the Lyons edition, and some others have swelled this chapter with nine or ten sorts of divinations; which, as well as those which Rabelais touches upon, may be seen in the five books, De Sapientia, published by Cardan , just as the third book ofPantagruel came out. Now, since among others, the cephaleonomancy,attributed to the Germans in those editions, is described in 1. iv. ofCardan's De Sapientia, I know not but he may be Her Trippa. Add to this the epithets given him by Panurge, viz. ragged, &c. And it looks the more probable, for Cardan was so careless in what he eitherwore or eat, that in his De propria Vita, speaking of himself, as of asecond Tigellius, (mentioned by Horace)"Modo, sit mihi mensa tripes, et Concha salis puri, et toga, defendere frigus,Quamvis crassa queat.'"11 A hundred nobles. ] Edward III. , King of England, who first coined the rose-nobles, gave a hundred of them to one Gobin Agace ofPicardy, for showing him a ford, where he might cross the river Somme,which parted his army from that of France. This coin was called noble,on account of the excellence of its gold, and was usually disposed of as a reward for a piece of good news brought, or some important ser- vice done.12 Not long since. ] He had for some time left off wearing breechesor codpiece.CHAP. XXVI . ]69 PANTAGRUEL.by the little village of Huymes, after he had made his address to Friar John, in pecking at, rubbing and scratchinghis own left ear, he said unto him, Keep me a little jovialand merry, my dear and sweet bully, for I find my brainsaltogether metagrabolized and confounded, and my spirits.in a most dunsical puzzle at the bitter talk of this devilish,hellish, damned, fool . Hearken my dainty cod. 'Mellow c.Lead-coloured c.Calfeted c.Renowned c.Raised c. Matted c.Knurled c. Odd c.Genetive c.Suborned c. Steeled c.Desired c.Stale c.Gigantal c.Oval c.Stuffed c. Orange-tawny c.Claustral c.Speckled c.Finely-metalled c.Arabian-like c.Embroidered c. Viril c.Glazed c.Interlarded c.Trussed up grey- Burger- like c.Stayed c.Massive c.Manual c.hound-like c. Impoudered c. Absolute, c.Mounted c. Ebonized c. Well- set c.Sleeked c . Brasiliated c. Gemel c.Diapred c. Organized c.Turkish c.Spotted c. Passable c. Burning c.Master c.Trunkified c. Thwacking c.Seeded c.Furious c. Urgent c.Lusty c.Packed c.Jupped c.Hooded c.Handsome c.Prompt c.Milked c.Varnished c. Fortunate c.1 My dainty cod. In the original it is couillon-mignon . Now though couillon signifies a man's scrotum, yet M. Duchat will not allow of its signifying so here . He will have it, that in this, and the next chapter,they call one another only brother monk; for Panurge had been amonk, and friar John was one still; so they might well enough call each other brothers of the cowl, i. e. couillon from cucullio, onis, anaugmentative of cucullus: for, by the bye, couillon is here a contraction of coquillon, formed from the same word cucullio. Be this as it may,Rabelais seems in these two chapters, and again in ch. xxviii. to have no other design in this profusion of epithets, but to show that hethoroughly understood not only the French tongue, but was also capa- ble of enriching it with a great number of words from the Latin, Greek,Arabic, and all the sciences. It may not be amiss to observe, that of the epithets in this chapter, and the next but one, the principal, whichmay be called honourable, relate to Friar John, who was a young man,and whom Panurge had a mind to cajole; whereas those which are ap plied to Panurge, set him out to us an old fusty bachelor.60 [ BOOK III. RABELAIS WORKS.Boxwood c. Digestive c.Latten c.Active c.Unbridled c. Vital c.Hooked c. Magistral c.Household c.Pretty c.Astrolabian c.Algebraical c.Researched c.Monarchal c. Venust c.Encompassed c.Subtil c. Aromatizing c.Strouting out c. Hammering c. Trixy c.Jolly c.Clashing c.Lively c . Tingling c.Paillard c.Gaillard c.Gerundive c. Usual c.Franked c. Exquisite c.Broaching c.Addle c.Polished c.Trim c. Syndicated c.Poudered Beef c. Succulent c. Boulting c.Positive c.Factious c. Snorting c.Spared c. Clammy c. Pilfering c.Bold c.Fat c.Shaking c.Lascivious c. High-prized c. Bobbing c.Gluttonous c. Requisite c. Chiveted c.Resolute c. Laycod c.Cabbage- like c. Hand-filling c .Courteous c. Insuperable c.Fertil c. Agreeable c.Whizzing c.Formidable c.Neat c.Profitable c.Common c.Notable c.Brisk c. Musculous c.Quick c. Subsidiary c.Barelike c. Satyric c.Fumbling c.Raging c.Piled up c.Filled up c.Manly c .Idle c.Membrous c.Strong c.Twin c.Topsyturvying c.Partitional c. Repercussive c. Belabouring c.Patronymic c.Convulsive c. Gentle c.co*ckney c.Robust c.Appetizing c.Succourable c.Auromercuriated c. Masculinating c.Stirring c.Nimble c.Figging c.Restorative c.Incarnative c.Sigillative c.Confident c.Roundheaded c.Sallying c.Redoubtable c. Plump c. Helpful c.Affable c. Thundering c. Spruce c.Memorable c. Lechering c.Plucking c.Palpable c.Fulminating c.Barbable c. Sparkling c.Tragical c. Ramming cTranspontine c. Lusty c.Ramage c.Fine c.Fierce c.Brawny c.CHAP. XXVI. ] PANTAGruel. 61Compt c. Rumbling c.Affected c.Repaired c . Thumping c.Soft c.Bumping c.Wild c . Cringeling c.Renewed c. Berumpling c.Quaint c. Jogging c.Starting c.Nobbing c.Fleshy c. Touzing c.Auxiliary c. Tumbling c.New vamped c. Fambling c.Grappled c.Stuffed c.Well- fed c.Fallow c.Sudden c.Grasp-full c.Swillpow c.Crushing cFlourished c.Improved c. Overturning c. Creaking c.Malling c. Shooting c. Dilting c.Sounding c. Culeting c. Ready c.Battled c. Jagged c. Vigorous c.Burly c .Pinked c. Sculking c.Seditious c. Arsiversing c. Superlative c.Wardian c.Polished c. Clashing c.Protective c. Slasht c. Wagging c.Twinkling c.Hamed c. Scriplike c.Able c. Leisurely c. Encremastered c.Algoristical c.Cut c.Bouncing c.Odoriferous c. Smooth c. Levelling c.Pranked c. Depending c.Jocund c. Independent c.Routing c. Lingring c.Purloining c. Rapping c.Frolic c.Reverend c.Wagging c. Nodding c.Fly-flap c.Perinæ-tegminal c.Squat couching c.Short-hung cWitness-bearing c.The hypogastrian cRuffling c.Disseminating c.Jumbling c. Affecting c.Testigerous c.Instrumental c.My harcabuzing cod, and buttock-stirring ballock, FriarJohn, my friend, I do carry a singular respect unto thee, and honour thee with all my heart. Thy counsel I hold for achoice and delicate morsel, therefore have I reserved it forthe last bit. Give me thy advice freely, I beseech thee,Should I marry, or no? Friar John very merrily, and witha sprightly cheerfulness, made this answer to him. Marry,in the devil's name. Why not? What the devil elseshouldst thou do, but marry? Take thee a wife and furbishher harness to some tune. Swinge her skin- coat, as if thouwert beating on a stock-fish; and let the repercussion of thyclapper from her resounding metal make a noise, as if a double62 [BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.peal of chiming-bells were hung at the cremasters of thy ballocks. As I say, marry, so do I understand, that thou shouldstfall to work, as speedily as may be: yea, my meaning is,that thou oughtest to be so quick and forward therein,as on this same very day, before sun- set, to cause proclaimthy banns of matrimony, and make provision of bedsteads.By the blood of a hog's- pudding, till when wouldst thou delay the acting of a husband's part? Dost thou not know,and is it not daily told unto thee, that the end of the worldapproacheth? We are nearer it by three poles, and half afathom, than we were two days ago. The antichrist is already born, at least it is so reported by many. The truthis, that hitherto the effects of his wrath have not reachedfurther than to the scratching of his nurse and governesses.His nails are not sharp enough as yet, nor have his clawsattained to their full growth, -he is little ." Crescat; nos qui vivimus, multiplicemur. "It is written so, and it is holy stuff, I warrant you thetruth whereof is like to last as long as a sack of corn maybe had for a penny, and a puncheon of pure wine for threepence. Wouldst thou be content to be found with thy genitories full in the day of judgment? Dum venerit judicare?Thou hast, quoth Panurge, a right clear, and neat spirit,Friar John, my metropolitan cod; thou speakst in very deed pertinently, and to purpose. That belike was the reasonwhich moved Leander of Abydos, in Asia, whilst he wasswimming through the Hellespontic sea, to make a visit tohis sweetheart Hero of Sestus, in Europe, to pray unto Neptune, and all the other marine gods, thus:"6Now, whilst I go, have pity on me,And at my back returning drown me.'"92He was loath , it seems, to die with his cods overgorged.He was to be commended: therefore do I promise, thatfrom henceforth no malefactor shall by justice be executedwithin my jurisdiction of Salmigondinois, who shall not, fora day or two at least before, be permitted to culbut, and foraminate, onocrotal wise, so that there remain not in all his2 Now, &c. ] "Parcite, dum propero: mergite, dum redeo: " says Martial, lib. De Spectaculis. Epig. xxv.3 Onocrotalwise.] Onocrotal is a bittern or buzzard, whose cry sounds like that of an ass. So that to do the deed of kind (as Shakespeare's word is) like an onocrotal, is as if one should say an unsaddledCHAP. XXVII.]PANTAGRUEL. 63vessels, to write a Greek Y. Such a precious thing shouldnot be foolishly cast away. He will perhaps therewitnbeget a male, and so depart the more contentedly out of this life, that he shall have left behind him one for one.CHAPTER XXVII.¹How Friar John merrily and sportingly counselleth Panurge.BY Saint Rigomé, quoth Friar John, I do advise thee to nothing, my dear friend Panurge. which I would not domyself, were I in thy place. Only have a special care , andtake good heed thou solder well together the joints of the double-backed, and two bellied beast, and fortify thy nerves so strongly, that there be no discontinuance in the knocksof the venerean thwacking, else thou art lost, poor soul. For,if there pass long intervals betwixt the priapising feats, and that thou make an intermission of too large a time, thatwill befal thee which betides the nurses, if they desist fromgiving suck to children, they lose their milk; and if continually thou do not hold thy aspersory tool in exercise, andkeep thy mentul going, thy lacticinian nectar will be gone,and it will serve thee only as a pipe to piss out at, and thy cods for a wallet of lesser value than a beggar's scrip. Thisis a certain truth I tell thee, friend, and doubt not of it;for myself have seen the sad experiment thereof in many,who cannot now do what they would, because before theydid not what they might have done: Ex desuetudine amitass. For as Cotgrave observes, asses discharged of their burthens, un- saddled, and set at liberty, are the friskiest creatures alive. As for theonocrotalos (which I take to be a bittern or buzzard) it is a very large bird; it never flies but in company of one of its own kind, and under its neck it has a kind of a second belly, where it lays up for a reservewhat provision it is not inclined immediately to eat.M. Duchat saysthat under the name of onocrotals, Panurge means the begging friars ,who, besides, live mostly on fish , like that bird, and, like it too, they have a hoarse rough voice. ( He might have added, that they go in couples too, as I have constantly seen them in France; not to say that they have three stones, as the onocrotals or buteones are said by the authors of the Cambridge Dictionary to have. ) To conclude: onocro- talos comes from ovog, an ass, and кpóraλog, a hoarse, rough, harsh sound.1 This is not a new chapter in M. Duchat's edition , but a continu- ation of chap. xxvi.2 By St. Rigome. ] Rigomarus is a saint particularly worshipped in Poitou, where they keep one of his arms, and usually swear by it.64 [BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.tuntur privilegia. Non-usage oftentimes destroys one's right,say the learned doctors of the law; therefore, my billy, entertain as well as possibly thou canst, that hypogastrianlower sort of troglodytic people, that their chief pleasure may be placed in the case of sempiternal labouring. Giveorder that henceforth they live not, like idle gentlemen, idlyupon their rents and revenues, but that they may work fortheir livelihood, by breaking ground within the Paphiantrenches. Nay truly, answered Panurge, Friar John, myleft ballock, I will believe thee, for thou dealest plain withme, and fallest downright square upon the business , withoutgoing about the bush with frivolous circ*mstances and un- necessary reservations . Thou with the splendour of apiercing wit hast dissipated all the louring clouds of anxiousapprehensions and suspicions, which did intimidate and terrify me: therefore the heavens be pleased to grant to thee,at all she- conflicts , a stiff- standing fortune. Well then, asthou hast said, so will I do, I will, in good sooth, marry,—in that point there shall be no failing, I promise thee, --andshall have always by me pretty girls clothed with the nameof my wife's waiting - maids, that lying under thy wings, thoumayest be night protector of their sisterhood, when thou comest to see me.Let this serve for the first part of the sermon. Hearken,quoth Friar John, to the oracle of the bells of Varenes.³What saythey? I hear and understand them, quoth Panurge;their sound is, by my thirst, more uprightly fatidical, than that of Jove's great kettles in Dodona. Hearken! Take theea wife, take thee a wife, and marry, marry, marry: for ifthoumarry, thou shalt find good therein; here in a wife thoushalt find good; so marry, marry. I will assure thee, that Ishall be married: —all the elements invite and prompt meto it. Let this word be to thee a brazen wall, by diffidencenot to be broken through. As for the second part of this our doctrine, —thou seemest in some measure to mistrust thereadiness of my paternity, in the practising of my placket- racket within the Aphrodisian tennis-court at all timesfitting, as if the stiff god of gardens were not favourable to me. I pray thee, favour me so much as to believe , that I3 The oracle of the bells of Varenes. ] Friar John here quotes froma sermon (De Viduitate, serm. 3) of Jean Raulin, contemporary and rival of the famous preachers Maillard and Menot. ]CHAP. XXVII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 65still have him at a beck, attending always my commandments,docile, obedient, vigorous, and active in all things, and everywhere, and never stubborn or refractory to my will orpleasure. I need no more, but to let go the reins , andslacken the leash, which is the belly-point, and when thegame is shown unto him, say, Hey, Jack, to thy booty! hewill not fail even then to flesh himself upon his prey, andtuzzle it to some purpose. Hereby you may perceive,although my future wife were as unsatiable and gluttonous inher voluptuousness, and the delights of venery, as ever wasthe Empress Messalina, or yet the Marchioness of Oincester,*in England, yet I desire thee to give credit to it, that I lacknot for what is requisite to overlay the stomach of her lust,but have wherewith aboundingly to please her. I am notignorant that Solomon said, who indeed of that matterspeaketh clerk- like , and learnedly, as also how Aristotleafter him declared for a truth, That, for the greater part, thelechery of a woman' is ravenous and unsatisfiable . Nevertheless, let such as are my friends, who read those passages,receive from me for a most real verity, that I for such aGill have a fit Jack; and that, if women's things cannot besatiated, I have an instrument indefatigable,-an implementas copious in the giving, as can in craving be their vade mec*ms. Do not here produce ancient examples of the paragons of Paillardice, and offer to match with my testiculatory ability the Priapaan prowess of the fabulous fornicators, Hercules, Proculus Cæsar,' and Mahomet, who in his4 Marchioness of Oincester. ] As there never was such a title as thisin England, nor any Marchioness of Winchester (the nearest sound toit) in the time of Rabelais, it is difficult to know what lady he meansin this place. Duchat thinks it might be the cant name of some famousprostitute. [The Stews near the Bankside, Southwark, were the property of the Bishops of Winchester. Hence a " Winchester goose,"and probably a " Marchioness of Winchester. " ]The lechery of a woman. ] It is, in the original, l'estré des femmes,i. e. a woman's thing. In Languedoc they call everything thingumy,that they must not name, estré. See c. xiii. of 1. iv . of Feneste, where mention is made of certain monks, who not being able to get at someyoung nuns, their neighbours, they threw over to them carved images of their virile estrés (thingumies) which the nuns very tenderly received into the forelappets of their smocks.Hercules. ] Diodorus Siculus, 1. v. c. ii. of his Antiquities, relates that Hercules, in the vigour of his youth, got King Thespius' fifty daughters with child in one night.¹ Proculus Cæsar. ] He boasted that of a hundred Sarmatian inaids,VOL. II. F66 [ BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.AlchoranⓇ doth vaunt, that in his cods he had the vigour ofthreescore bully ruffians; but let no zealous Christian trust the rogue, —the filthy ribald rascal is a liar. Nor shalt thouneed to urge authorities, or bring forth the instance of theIndian prince, of whom Theophrastus, Plinius, and Athenæustestify, that, with the help of a certain herb, he was able,and had given frequent experiments thereof, to toss hissinewy piece of generation in the act of carnal concupiscence above threescore and ten times in the space of fourand twenty hours. Of that I believe nothing, the numberis supposititious, and too prodigally foisted in. Give nofaith unto it, I beseech thee, but prithee trust me in this, andthy credulity therein shall not be wronged; for it is true,and Probatum est, that my pioneer of nature, -the sacredithyphallian champion, -is of all stiff- intruding blades theprimest. Come hither, my ballockette, and hearken. Didstthou ever see the monk of Castre's cowl? When in anyhouse it was laid down, whether openly in the view ofall, orcovertly out of the sight of any, such was the ineffablevirtue thereof for excitating and stirring up the people ofboth sexes unto lechery, that the whole inhabitants and indwellers , not only of that, but likewise of all the circumjacent places thereto, within three leagues around it, didsuddenly enter into rut, both beasts and folks, men andwomen, even to the dogs and hogs, rats and cats.I swear to thee, that many times heretofore I have perceived, and found in my codpiece a certain kind of energy,or efficacious virtue, much more irregular, and of a greateranomaly, than what I have related . I will not speak to theeeither ofhouse or cottage, nor of church or market, but onlytell thee, that once at the representation of the Passion,which was acted at Saint Maxents, I had no sooner enteredwithin the pit of the theatre, but that forthwith, by thethat were brought to him at one time, he devirginated ten the first night; and that within a fortnight afterwards, there was not one of all the rest which he had not made a woman. See Agrippa, De l'unitScient. chap. lxiii.Mahomet.... in his Alchoran , &c . ] I know not whether any but Peter Belon has seen a certain Arabian book entitled Mahomet's GoodCustoms but according to that book, which says Mahomet had eleven wives, he never was above an hour in doing them all over, one after another. See Brantome's Dames Galantes, tom. 1. p. 378.• Threescore and ten times ] See Theophrastus, l . ii. c. c. Pliny,1. xxvi. c. ix. and Athenæus, 1. i . c. 12CHAP. XXVIII.]PANTAGRUEL. 67virtue and occult property of it, on a sudden all that werethere, both players and spectators, did fall into such an exorbitant temptation of lust, that there was not angel, man,devil, nor deviless, upon the place , who would not then havebricollitched it with all their heart and soul. The prompterforsook his copy, he who played St. Michael's part came downfrom his perch, 10 the devils issued out of hell , and carriedalong with them most of the pretty girls that were there, yea,Lucifer got out of his fetters;-in a word, seeing the hugedisorder, I disparked myself forth of that inclosed place,in imitation of Cato the Censor, who perceiving, by reasonof his presence, the Floralian festivals out of order, withdrew himself. "¹CHAPTER XXVIII.How Friar John comforteth Panurge in the doubtful matter ofcuckoldry.I UNDERSTAND thee well enough, said Friar John; buttime makes all things plain. The most durable marble orporphyry is subject to old age and decay. Though for thepresent thou possibly be not weary of the exercise, yet is itlike, I will hear thee confess a few years hence, that thycods hang dangling downwards for want of a better truss.I see thee waxing a little hoar- headed already. Thy beard,by the distinction of grey, white, tawny, and black, hath tomy thinking the resemblance of a map of the terrestrialglobe, or geographical chart. Look attentively upon, andtake inspection of what I shall show unto thee. Beholdthere Asia. Here are Tygris and Euphrates. Lo, there Africa. Here is the mountain of the moon, -yonder thoumayest perceive the fenny march of Nilus. On this sidelieth Europe. Dost thou not see the Abbey of Theleme?This little tuft, which is altogether white, is the Hyperborean Hills. By the thirst of my throple, friend, when snowis on the mountains , I say the head and the chin, there isnot then any considerable heat to be expected in the valleysand low- countries of the cod- piece. By the kibes of thy10 Came downfrom his perch. ] La volerie. In the early theatres the volerie was the space set apart for the angels, at the upper part of the stage, and was depicted by a cloud, as in like manner hell was represented by an enormous dragon's throat. ]11 Withdrew himself. ] See Valerius Maximus, J. ii. c. 10.F 268 [BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.heels, quoth Panurge, thou dost not understand the topics.'When snow is on the tops of the hills , lightning, thunder,tempest, whirlwinds, storms, hurricanes, and all the devilsof hell rage in the valleys. Wouldst thou see the experience thereof, go to the territory of the Swiss, and earnestly perpend with thyself there the situation of the lake ofWunderberlich, about four leagues distant from Berne, onthe Syonside of the land. Thou twittest me with my greyhairs, yet considerest not how I am of the nature of leeks ,which with a white head carry a green , fresh, straight,and vigorous tail. The truth is, nevertheless , ( why shouldI deny it?) that I now and then discern in myself some indicative signs of old age. Tell this, I prithee, to nobody,but let it be kept very close and secret betwixt us two;for I find the wine much sweeter now, more savoury tomy taste, and unto my palate of a better relish thanformerly I was wont to do; and withal, besides mine accustomed manner, I have a more dreadful apprehensionthan I ever heretofore have had, of lighting on bad wine.Note and observe that this doth argue and portend I knownot what of the west and occident of my time, and signifieththat the south and meridian of mine age is past. But whatthen, my gentle companion. That doth but betoken that Iwill hereafter drink so much the more. That is not, thedevil hale it, the thing that I fear; nor is it there where myshoe pinches. The thing that I doubt most, and havegreatest reason to dread and suspect, is, that throughsome long absence of our King Pantagruel, ( to whom Imust needs bear company, should he go to all the devils ofBarathrum, ) my future wife shall make me a cuckold . Thisis, in truth, the long and short of it. For I am by all thosewhom I have spoken to, menaced and threatened with ahorned fortune; and all of them affirm, it is the lot to whichfrom heaven I am predestinated . Every one, answered Friar John, that would be a cuckold, is not one. If it bethy fate to be hereafter of the number of that horned cattle ,then may I conclude with an Ergo, thy wife will be beautiful,1 Topics. ] Places, or books, of logical invention.Lake of Wunderberlich. ] If, as it is more than probable, this is Pilate's lake, of which Vadianus on Pomponius Mela has written some things very like what is said here, it must be in reference to the won- derful things related of this lake that the Swiss have given it the sur- name of Wunderberlich, or admirable. Rabelais was deceived in taking this German adjective for the name of the lake itself.CHAP. XXVIII. ]PANTAGRUEL. 69and Ergo, thou wilt be kindly used by her. Likewise withthis Ergo, thou shalt be blessed with the fruition of manyfriends and well-willers. And finally with this other Ergo,thou shalt be saved, and have a place in paradise . Theseare monachal topics and maxims of the cloister. Thoumayst take more liberty to sin . Thou shalt be more at ease than ever. There will be never the less left for thee, nothingdiminished, but thy goods shall increase notably. And if sobe it was preordinated for thee, wouldst thou be so impious.as not to acquiesce in thy destiny? Speak, thou jaded cod. 'Faded c. Kneaded -with- Grim c.Mouldy c. cold-water c. Wasted c.Musty c. Appealant c.Inflamed c.Paltry c. Swagging c.Senseless c. Withered c.Unhinged c.Scurvy c.Foundered c. Broken-reined c.Distempered c.Defective c.Straddling c.Putrified c.Bewrayed c.Crestfallen c.Inveigled c.Felled c.Dangling c.Fleeted c.Maimed c.Overlechered c.Druggerly c.Stupid c. Cloyed c.Mitified c.Seedless c. Squeezed c.Goat-ridden c.Soaked c. Resty c.Weakened c.Louting c.Pounded c. Ass- ridden c.Discouraged c.Loose c. Puff- pasted c.Surfeited c. Coldish c.St. Anthonified c.Peevish c.Pickled c.Translated c . Churned c.

• Forlorn c. Filiped c.

Unsavoury c. Singlifild c.Worm-eaten c. Begrimed c.Untriped c.Blasted c.Cut off c.Beveraged c.Scarified c.Overtoiled c.Wrinkled c. Dashed c.Miserable c.Fainted c. Slashed c.Steeped Extenuated c. Infeebled c.c .3 Monachal Topics, &c. ] We have before seen Panurge using the topics, or logical inventions, to Friar John; and here we have Friar John in his turn, doing the like to him, in displaying the claustral maxims, which are such as show how little the state of married people is regarded by men of his character.Speak thou jaded cod. ] This obscene parody of the Roman Litur- gies, like the preceding one in chap. xxvi. , is variously arranged in different editions, with such additions and suppressions as the caprice of his editors has dictated. ]70 RABELAIS' WORKS [BOOK III .whor*-hunting c. Chopped c . Sorrowful c.Deteriorated c. Pinked c. Murdered c.Chill c. Cup-glassified c.Matachin-like c.Scrupulous c.Fruitless c.Besotted c.Crazed c,Riven c.Customerless c.Tasteless c. Pursy c.Hacked c. Fusty c.Flaggy c.Jadish c.Scrubby c.Fistulous c.Drained c.Haled c.Lolling c.Hectic c.Languishing c.Maleficiated c.Minced c.Patched c.Stupified c.Annihilated c.Spent c.. Foiled c.Exulcerated c.Drenched c. Worn out c.Burst c. Ill-favoured c.Anguished c.Disfigured c.Stirred up c.Duncified c. Disabled c.Mitred c.Macerated c. Forceless c.Pedlingly furnished Paralytic c.Censured c.C. Degraded c. Cut c.Rusty c.Benumbed c. Rifled c.Exhausted c. Bat-like c.Undone c.Perplexed c. Fart-shotten c. Corrected c.Unhelved c. Sunburnt c.Slit c.Fizzled c.Pacified c. Skittish c.Leprous c.Blunted c. Spungy c.Bruised c. Rankling tasted c . Botched c.Spadonic c.Rooted out c. Dejected cBoughty c.Costive c. Jagged c.Mealy c.Hailed-on c. Pining c.Wrangling c.Cuffed c.Gangreened c.Buffeted c.Deformed c.Mischieved c.Crustrissen c.Whirreted c. Cobbled c.Ragged c.Robbed c.Imbased c.Quelled c. Neglected c.Ransacked c.Bragodochio c.Lame c. Despised c.Beggarly c.Confused c. Mangy c .Trepanned c. Unsavoury c. Abased c.Bedusked c.Emasculated c.Overthrown c.Boulted c.Supine c.Corked c.Trode under c.Transparent c.Desolate c.Mended c.Harsh c.Dismayed c.Vile c.Declining c.Beaten c.Antidated c. Stinking c.Barred c.CHAP. XXVIII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 71Abandoned c. Proud c. Troubled c.Confounded c.Fractured c. Scornful c.Loutish c.Borne down c.Melancholy c. Dishonest c.Coxcombly c. Reproved c.Sparred c.Base c.co*cketed c.Abashed c. Bleaked c. Filthy c.Unseasonable c. Detested c. Shred c.Oppressed c. Diaphanous c.Grated c. Unworthy c.Falling away c.Checked c.Small cut c. Mangled c.Disordered c. Turned over c.Latticed c.Harried c.Ruined c.Flawed c.Exasperated c.Froward c.Consumed c.Rejected c. Ugly c .Belammed c. Drawn c.Chawned c .Short-winded c.Branchless c.Chapped c.Failing c.Deficient c.Lean c.Used c.Puzzled c.Febricitant c. Riven c. Allayed c .Perused c.Distasteful c. Spoiled c.Emasculated c. Hanging c. Clagged c.Roughly handled c. Broken c.Examined c. Limber c.Cracked c. Effeminate c.Palsy-strucken c.Amazed c.Bedunsed c.Wayward c.Kindled c. Extirpated c.Hagled c.Evacuated c. Banged c.Gleaning c .Grieved c. Stripped c.Ill-favoured c. Carking c. Hoary c.Pulled c. Disorderly c.Winnowed c.Drooping c. Empty c. Decayed c.Faint c. Disquieted c.Disastrous c.Parched c.Desisted c. Unhandsome c.Paltry c.Confounded c.Cankered c. Hooked c.Void c.Divorous c.Vexed c.Bestunk c.Crooked c .Brabling c.Rotten c.Anxious c.Clouted c.Wearied c.Sad c.Cross c.Vain-glorious c.Poor c.Brown c.Shrunken c.Stummed c.Wretched c.Feeble c.Cast down c.Barren c.Stopped c.Kept under c.Tired c.Abhorred c.Stubborn c.Ground c.Retchless c.Weather-beaten c.72 LBOOK 111. 12RABELAIS' WORKS,Flayed c.Hairless c.Bald c. Flamping c.Tossed c.Hooded c.Flapping c. Wormy c.Cleft c.Besysted c.Meagre c. Faulty c.Frumpled c.Stale c.Corrupted c.Beflowered c.Amated c.Blackish c.Dumpified c.Bemealed c. Underlaid c.Suppressed c.Mortified c. Lothing c.Hagged c. Scurvy c. Ill-filled c.Jawped c.Bescabbed c . Bobbed c.Havocked c. Torn c.Mated c.Astonished c. Subdued c. Tawny c.Dulled c. Sneaking c.Whealed c.Slow c.Bare c.Besmeared c.Plucked up c. Swart c.Hollow c.Constipated c.Smutched c. Pantless c.Blown c.Raised up c.Guizened c.Blockified c. Chopped c.Pommeled c. Flirted c.Fallen away c.Unlucky c.Sunk in c.Sterile c. Gastly c.All-to-be-mauled c. Blained c.Blotted c.Demiss c.Refractory c.Rensy c.Frowning c.Limping c.Ravelled c.Besh*tten c. Unpointed c.Rammish c.Appeased c.Beblistered c. Gaunt c.Caitif c.Wizened c.Woful c . Beggar-plated c.Beskimmered c.Scraggy c.Unseemly c.Douf c.Lank c.Heavy c. Clarty c. Swashring c.Weak c. Lumpish c. Moyling c.Prostrated c. Abject c.Uncomely c.Side c.Swinking c.Harried c.Naughty c.Choked up c. Tugged c.Laid flat c.Backward c.Prolix c.Spotted c.Crumpled c.Towed c.Suffocated c.Held down c.Barked c.Adamitical c.Balockatso to the devil, my dear friend Panurge, seeing itis so decreed by the gods, wouldst thou invert the course ofthe planets, and make them retrograde? Wouldst thou disorder all the celestial spheres? blame the intelligences,Misused c.CHAP. XXVIII.]PANTAGRUEL. 7879blunt the spindles , join the wherves, slander the spinningquills, reproach the bobbins, revile the clew-bottoms, andfinally ravel and untwist all the threads of both the warp and the waft of the weird Sister- Parcæ? What a pox tothy bones dost thou mean, stony cod? Thou wouldst, ifthou couldst, a great deal worse than the giants of oldintended to have done . Come hither, billicullion . Whetherwouldst thou be jealous without a cause, or be a cuckold andknow nothing about it?5 Neither the one, nor the other,quoth Panurge, would I choose to be. But if I can get aninkling of the matter, I will provide well enough, or thereshall not be one stick of wood within five hundred leaguesabout me, whereof to make a cudgel. In good faith, FriarJohn, I speak now seriously unto thee, I think it will be my best not to marry. Hearken to what the bells do tell me,now that we are nearer to them! Do not marry, marry not,not, not, not, not; marry, marry not, not, not, not, not. Ifthou marry, thou wilt miscarry, carry, carry; thou wilt repent it, resent it, sent it! If thou marry, thou a cuckold,a cou-cou-cuckoe, cou- cou- cuckold thou shalt be. By the worthy wrath of God, I begin to be angry.This campanalian oracle fretteth me to the guts, -a March hare was never in such a chaff as I am. O how I am vexed! You monksand friars of the cowl- pated and hood- polled fraternity, haveyou no remedy nor salve against this malady of graffing horns in heads? Hath nature so abandoned human-kind,and of her help left us so destitute, that married men cannotknow how to sail through the seas of this mortal life , andbe safe from the whirlpools, quicksands, rocks, and banks,that lie alongst the coast of Cornwall.I will, said Friar John, show thee a way, and teach theean expedient, by means whereof thy wife shall never makethee a cuckold without thy knowledge, and thine own conDo me the favour, I pray thee, quoth Panurge, mypretty soft downy cod; now tell it, Billy, tell it, I beseechthee. Take, quoth Friar John, Hans Carvel's ring uponsent.3 Know nothing about it? ] This problem is borrowed from Hugh le Maronnier, a poet of the thirteenth century. ]& Hans Carvel's ring. ] This story has been repeatedly served up.It appears among the facetime of Poggius ( Visio Francisci Philelphi;)in the fifth satire of Ariosto; in the Cent nouvelles nouvelles of LouisXI.; it has been used by Celio Malespini (Ducento novelle; ) by the author of the Mensa Philosophica; by La Fontaine; and by Prior. ]74 [BOOK III . RABELAIS' WORKS.thy finger, who was the King of Melinda's chief jeweller.Besides that this Hans Carvel had the reputation of beingvery skilful and expert in the lapidary's profession, he wasa studious, learned, and ingenious man, a scientific person,full of knowledge, a great philosopher, of sound judgment,of a prime wit, good sense, clear- spirited, an honest creature ,courteous, charitable, a giver of alms, and of a jovialhumour, a boon companion, and a merry blade, if ever there was any in the world. He was somewhat gorbellied , had alittle shake in his head, and was in effect unwieldy of hisbody. In his old age he took to wife the bailiff of Concordat's daughter, young, fair, jolly, gallant, spruce, frisk ,brisk, neat, feat, smirk, smug, compt, quaint, gay, fine,trixy, trim, decent, proper, graceful, handsome, beautiful,comely, and kind, a little too much-to her neighboursand acquaintance.Hereupon it fell out, after the expiring of a scantling ofweeks, that Master Carvel became as jealous as a tiger, andentered into a very profound suspicion, that his new- marriedgixy did keep a buttock- stirring with others. To preventwhich inconveniency, he did tell her many tragical storiesof the total ruin of several kingdoms by adultery; did readinto her the legend of chaste wives; then made somelectures to her in the praise of the choice virtue of pudicity,and did present her with a book in commendation of conjugal fidelity, wherein the wickedness of all licentious women was odiously detested; and withal he gave hera chain enriched with pure oriental sapphires . Notwithstanding all this, he found her always more and more inclined to the reception of her neighbour copes- mates, so thatday by day his jealousy increased . In sequel whereof, onenight as he was lying by her, whilst in his sleep the ramblingfancies of the lecherous deportments of his wife did takeup the cellules of his brain, he dreamt that he encountered with the devil, to whom he had discovered to the full thebuzzing of his head, and suspicion that his wife did tread her shoe awry. The devil, he thought, in this perplexity,did for his comfort give him a ring, and therewithal didkindly put it on his middle finger, saying, Hans Carvel, Igive thee this ring , —whilst thou carriest it upon that finger7 The legend of chaste wives. ] Doubtless the treatise of Jacques de Bergame, sur les femmes illustres. "]66CHAP. XXIX.] PANTAGRUEL. 75thy wife shall never carnally be known by any other thanthyself, without thy special knowledge and consent. Grammercy, quoth Hans Carvel, my Lord Devil, I renounce Ma- homet, if ever it shall come off my finger. The devil vanished , as is his custom, and then Hans Carvel, full of joyawaking, found that his middle- finger was as far as it couldreach within the what-do - you- call-it of his wife. I didforget to tell thee, how his wife , as soon as she had felt thefinger there, said, in recoiling her buttocks, Off, yes, nay,tut, pish, tush, aye, lord, that is not the thing which shouldbe put up in that place . With this Hans Carvel thoughtthat some pilfering fellow was about to take the ring from him. Is not this an infallible and sovereign antidote?Therefore, if thou wilt believe me, in imitation of this example never fail to have continually the ring of thy wife'scommodity upon thy finger. When that was said, theirdiscourse and their way ended.CHAPTER XXIX.How Pantagruel convocated together a theologian, physician,lawyer, and philosopher, for extricating Panurge out of theperplexity wherein he was.No sooner were they come into the royal palace, but they, tothe full, made report unto Pantagruel of the success of theirexpedition, and showed him the response of Raminagrobis.When Pantagruel had read it over and over again, the oftenerhe perused it, being the better pleased therewith, he said,in addressing his speech to Panurge, I have not as yet seenany answer framed to your demand, which affordeth memore contentment. For in this his succinct copy of verses , hesummarily, and briefly, yet fully enough expresseth, how hewould have us to understand, that every one, in the project andenterprise of marriage, ought to be his own carver, sole arbitrator of his proper thoughts, and from himself alone takecounsel in the main and peremptory closure of what his determination should be, in either his assent to , or dissentfrom it. Such always hath been my opinion to you, andwhen at first you spoke thereof to me, I truly told you thissame very thing; but tacitly you scorned my advice, andwould not harbour it within your mind. I know for certain ,and therefore may I with the greater confidence utter my76 [ BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.conception of it, that philauty, or self love, is that whichblinds your judgment and deceiveth you.Let us do otherways, and that is this. Whatever we are,or have, consisteth in three things-the soul, the body, andthe goods. Now, for the preservation of these three, thereare three sorts of learned men ordained, each respectively tohave care of that one which is recommended to his charge.Theologues are appointed for the soul, physicians for thewelfare of the body, and lawyers for the safety of ourgoods. Hence it is , that it is my resolution to have on Sunday next with me at dinner a divine, a physician, and alawyer, that with those three assembled thus together, we mayin every point and particle confer at large of your perplexity.By Saint Picot, answered Panurge, we never shall do anygood that way, I see it already. And you see yourself howthe world is vilely abused, as when with a fox-tail one clapsanother's breech, to cajole him. We give our souls to keepto the theologues, who for the greater part are heretics . Ourbodies we commit to the physicians, who never themselvestake any physic. And then we intrust our goods to thelawyers, who never go to law against one another. Youspeak like a courtier,' quoth Pantagruel. But the first pointof your assertion is to be denied; for we daily see how goodtheologues make it their chief business, their whole and soleemployment, by their deeds, their words, and writings , toextirpate errors and heresies out of the hearts of men, andin their stead profoundly plant the true and lively faith .The second point you spoke of I commend; for, in truththe professors of the art of medicine give so good order tothe prophylactic, or conservative part of their faculty, inwhat concerneth their proper healths, that they stand in noneed of making use of the other branch, which is the curative, or therapeutic, by medicaments. As for the third, Igrant it to be true, for learned advocates and counsellors atlaw are so much taken up with the affairs of others in theirconsultations, pleadings, and such-like patrocinations ofthose who are their clients, that they have no leisure to attend any controversies of their own. Therefore, on the nextensuing Sunday, let the divine be our godly Father' Hippo1 You speak like a courtier. ] Courtiers despise men of letters, be- cause themselves are illiterate.2 Father Hippothadeus ] or Parathodeus. M. Esmangart conjecturesCHAP. XXIX. ] PANTAGRUEL. 77thadeus, the physician our honest Master Rondibilis ,' and ourlegist our friend Bridlegoose. Nor will it be ( to my thinking) amiss, that we enter into the pythagoric field , and choosefor an assistant to the three aforenamed doctors our ancientfaithful acquaintance, the philosopher Trouillogans; especially seeing a perfect philosopher, such as is Trouillogan,is able positively to resolve all whatsoever doubts you canpropose. Carpalim, have you a care to have them here allfour on Sunday next at dinner, without fail .I believe, quoth Epistemon, that throughout the wholecountry, in all the corners thereof, you could not have pitchedupon such other four. WhichI speak not so much in regard ofthe mostexcellent qualifications and accomplishments wherewith all of them are endowed for the respective discharge andmanagement of each his own vocation and calling, ( whereinwithout all doubt or controversy, they are the paragons ofthe land and surpass all others , ) as for that Rondibilis ismarried now, who before was not, -Hippothadeus was notbefore, nor is yet, -Bridlegoose was married once, but is notnow, and Trouillogan is married now, who wedded wasto another wife before. Sir, if it may stand with your goodliking, I will ease Carpalim of some parcel of his labour, andinvite Bridlegoose myself, with whom I of a long time havehad a very intimate familiarity, and unto whom I am tospeak on the behalf of a pretty hopeful youth who nowstudieth at Tholouse, under the most learned, virtuous DoctorBoissonet. Do what you deem most expedient, quoth Pantagruel, and tell me, if my recommendation can in anythingbe steadable for the promoval of the good of that youth, orotherwise serve for bettering of the dignity and office of thehim to be Guillaume Parvi, a doctor of the Sorbonne, confessor ofLouis XII. , and Bishop of Senlis. ]3 Master Rondibilis ] According to tradition this will be GuillaumeRondelet, a famous physician of Montpellier, who employed himself in writing a history of fishes. ]Bridlegoose. ] Several commentators suppose this to be the cele- brated and learned André Tiraqueau, Lieutenant of the bailliages ofFontenay- le - Comte. ]5 The philosopher Trouillogan. ] Probably Peter Ramus, (or PeterGallaud) whom Rabelais takes occasion to flout at anew, in the prologue to book iv . ] Trouillogan ,-a man who for want of thought, iscontinually twisting and twirling his gloves (gans. )Doctor Boissonnè. ] Professor of jurisprudence, and councillor of the Parliament of Toulouse; author of several treatises. ]78 [ BOOK III. RABELAIS' WORKS.worthy Boissonet, whom I do so love and respect for one ofthe ablest and most sufficient in his way, that any where areextant. Sir, I will use therein my best endeavours, andheartily bestir myself about it.CHAPTER XXX.Howthe theologue, Hippothadeus, giveth counsel to Panurge in thematter and business of his nuptial enterprise.THE dinner on the subsequent Sunday was no sooner madeready, than that the aforenamed invited guests gave theretotheir appearance, all of them, Bridlegoose only excepted,who was the deputy- governor of Fonsbeton. At the ushering in of the second service, Panurge, making a low reverence, spake thus. Gentlemen, the question I am to propound unto you shall be uttered in very few words: ShouldI marry or no? If my doubt herein be not resolved by you ,I shall hold it altogether insolvable , as are the Insolubilia deAliaco; for all of you are elected, chosen and culled outfrom amongst others , every one in his own condition andquality, like so many picked peas on a carpet.The Father Hippothadeus, in obedience to the bidding ofPantagruel, and with much courtesy to the company, answered exceeding modestly after this manner. My friend,you are pleased to ask counsel of us; but first you mustconsult with yourself. Do you find any trouble or disquiet in your body by the importunate stings and pricklings of the flesh? That I do, quoth Panurge, in a hugelystrong and almost irresistible measure. Be not offended, Ibeseech you, good father at the freedom of my expression.No truly, friend, not I, quoth Hippothadeus, there is noreason why I should be displeased therewith. But in thiscarnal strife and debate of yours, have you obtained fromGod the gift and special grace of continency? In goodfaith not, quoth Panurge. My counsel to you in that case,my friend, is that you marry, quoth Hippothadeus; for youshould rather choose to marry once, than to burn still infires of concupiscence. Then Panurge, with a jovial heartand a loud voice, cried out, That is spoke gallantly, withoutcircumbilivagin*ting about and about, and never hitting it¹ Insolubilia de Aliaco. ] Peter d' Ailly; one of whose Insolubilia was:Anporcus, qui ad venalitium agitur, ab homine an à funiculo teneatur?CHAP. XXX. ] PANTAGRUEL. 79in its central point . Grammercy, my good father! Intruth I am resolved now to marry, and without fail I shalldo it quickly. I invite you to my wedding. By the bodyof a hen, we shall make good cheer, and be as merry ascrickets . You shall wear the bridegroom's colours , and, ifwe eat a goose, my wife shall not roast it for me. I willintreat you to lead up the first dance of the bride's maids, if it may please you to do me so much favour and honour.There resteth yet a small difficulty, a little scruple, yea, evenless than nothing, whereof I humbly crave your resolution.Shall I be a cuckold, father, yea or no? By no means, answeredHippothadeus, will you be a cuckold, if it please God. Othe Lord help us now, quoth Panurge, whither are we drivento, good folks? To the Conditionals, which, according tothe rules and precepts of the dialectic faculty, admit of allcontradictions and impossibilities. If my Transalpine mulehad wings, my Transalpine mule would fly. If it pleaseGod, I shall not be a cuckold, but I shall be a cuckold, if itplease him. Good God, if this were a condition which Iknew how to prevent, my hopes should be as high as ever,nor would I despair. But you here send me to God's privycouncil, to the closet of his little pleasures . You, my Frenchcountrymen, which is the way you take to go thither?My honest father, I believe it will be your best not to cometo my wedding. The clutter and dingle dangle noise ofmarriage guests will but disturb you, and break the seriousfancies of your brain. You love repose with solitude and silence; I really believe you will not come. And thenyou dance but indifferently, and would be out of countenance at the first entry. I will send you some good thingsto your chamber, together with the bride's favour, and thereyou may drink our health, if it may stand with your goodliking. My friend, quoth Hippothadeus, take my words in the sense wherein I mean them, and do not misinterpretWhen I tell you,-if it please God, -do I to you anywrong therein? Is it an ill expression? Is it a blaspheming2 My wife shall not roast it for me. ] In the farce of Patelin, the woollen-draper, whom Patelin promised to treat that very evening with a goose of his (Patelin's) wife's own roasting, was deceived by that impostor, who had not wherewithal to buy a goose. Here Panurge, to let Hippothadeus know that he would in good earnest regale him with a roasted goose, tells him, before-hand, that it shall not fare with his goose as with Patelin's.me.80 RABELAIS' WORKS. BOOK III.clause, or reserve any way scandalous unto the world? Donot we thereby honour the Lord God Almighty, Creator,Protector, and Conserver of all things? Is not that a mean,whereby we do acknowledge him to be the sole giver of allwhatsoever is good? Do not we in that manifest our faith ,that we believe all things to depend upon his infinite and incomprehensible bounty? and that without him nothing can be produced, nor after its production be of any value, force,or power, without the concurring aid and favour of his as- sisting grace? Is it not a canonical and authentic exception,worthy to be premised to all our undertakings? Is it not expedient that what we propose unto ourselves, be still referred to what shall be disposed of by the sacred will of God, unto which all things must acquiesce in the heavensas well as on the earth? Is not that verily a sanctifying of his holy name? My friend, you shall not be a cuckold, ifit please God, nor shall we need to despair of the knowledgeof his good will and pleasure herein, as if it were such an abstruse and mysteriously hidden secret, that for theclear understanding thereof it were necessary to consult with those of his celestial privy council, or expressly makea voyage unto the empyrean chamber, where order is givenfor the effectuating of his most holy pleasures. The great God hath done us this good, that he hath declared and revealed them to us openly and plainly, and described them in the Holy Bible. There will you find that you shall neverbe a cuckold, that is to say, your wife shall never be a strumpet, if you make choice of one of a commendable extraction,descended of honest parents , and instructed in all piety and virtue-such a one as hath not at any time haunted or frequented the company or conversation ofthose that are of corrupt and depraved manners, one loving and fearing God, who taketha singular delight in drawing near to him by faith, and thecordial observing of his sacred commandments-and finally,one who, standing in awe of the Divine Majesty of the Most High, will be loth to offend him, and lose the favourablekindness of his grace, through any defect of faith, or transgression against the ordinances of his holy law, whereinadultery is most rigorously forbidden, and a close adherence to her husband alone, most strictly and severely enjoined;yea, in such sort, that she is to cherisn, serve, and love himabove any thing, next to God, that meriteth to be beloved.CHAP. XXX. ] PANTAGRUEL. 81In the interim, for the better schooling of her in these instructions, and that the wholesome doctrine of a matrimonialduty may take the deeper root in her mind, you must needscarry yourself so on your part, and your behaviour is to besuch, that you are to go before her in a good example, byentertaining her unfeignedly with a conjugal amity, by continually approving yourself in all your words and actions afaithful and discreet husband; and by living, not only at homeand privately with your own household and family, but inthe face also of all men, and open view of the world, devoutly, virtuously, and chastely, as you would have her onher side to deport and to demean herself towards you, as becomes a godly, loyal, and respectful wife, who maketh conscience to keep inviolable the tie of a matrimonial oath.For as that looking- glass is not the best, which is mostdecked with gold and precious stones, but that which representeth to the eye the liveliest shapes of objects set beforeit, even so that wife should not be most esteemed whorichest is, and of the noblest race, but she, who, fearingGod, conforms herself nearest unto the humour of herhusband.Consider how the moon doth not borrow her light fromJupiter, Mars, Mercury, or any other of the planets , nor yetfrom any of those splendid stars which are set in thespangled firmament, but from her husband only, the brightsun, which she receiveth from him more or less , accordingto the manner of his aspect and variously bestowed eradiations. Just so should you be a pattern to your wife invirtue, goodly zeal, and true devotion, that by your radiancein darting on her the aspect of an exemplary goodness, she,in your imitation, may outshine the luminaries of all otherwomen. To this effect you daily must implore God's graceto the protection of you both. You would have me then,quoth Panurge, twisting the wiskers of his beard on eitherside with the thumb and forefinger of his left hand, to espouse and take to wife the prudent frugal woman describedby Solomon. Without all doubt she is dead, and truly tomy best remembrance I never saw her; the Lord forgive me! Nevertheless I thank you, father. Eat this slice ofmarchpane, it will help your digestion; then shall you bepresented with a cup of claret hypocras, which is right healthful and stomachal. Le us proceed.VOL. II. G82 [BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.CHAPTER XXXI.How the physician Rondibilis counselleth Panurge.PANURGE, continuing his discourse, said The first wordwhich was spoken by him who gelded the lubbardly quaffingmonks of Saussiniac, ' after that he had unstoned FriarCauldaureil, was this, Now for the rest. In like manner, Isay, Now for the rest. Therefore, I beseech you, my goodmaster Rondibilis, should I marry or not? By the raking pace of my mule, ² quoth Rondibilis , I know not what answerto make to this problem of yours.You say that you feel in you the pricking stings of sensuality, by which you are stirred up to venery. I find in ourfaculty of medicine, and we have founded our opinion therein upon the deliberate resolution and final decision of theancient Platonics, that carnal concupiscence is cooled andquelled five several ways.First, by the means of wine. I shall easily believe that.quoth Friar John, for when I am well whittled with the juiceof the grape, I care for nothing else, so I may sleep . WhenI say, quoth Rondibilis, that wine abateth lust, my mean- ing is, wine immoderately taken; for by intemperance proceeding from the excessive drinking of strong liquor, there is brought upon the body of such a swill -down bouser, achillness in the blood, a slackening in the sinews, a dissipa- tion of the generative seed, a numbness and hebetation ofthe senses, with a perversive wryness and convulsion of themuscles; all which are great lets and impediments to theact of generation. Hence it is, that Bacchus, the god ofMonks of Saussiniac. ] May not this be the story which Thevet 1. iii. c. 45, of his Eminent Men) relates of certain monks of the Abbey of Cluny, whom, because of their irregular, dissolute lives, their prior, Philip Burgoing, had all cut, one after another, in a place of the convent whither he had sent for them separately?2 By the raking pace of my male. ] In the original, par les ambles de mon mulet. In Rondibilis, the author touches William Rondelet, aphysician of Montpelier, a huge corpulent man (see de Thou) . Rabelais makes him swear in this manner because there was nothing more valu- able to him than the ambling of his mule, which might often have en- dangered his neck, had he put the beast upon a trot or a gallop.3 By means of wine. ] Scævola de St. Marthe says, of Rondibilis, that he drank nothing but water; whether because he had a natural aver- sion to wine, or that, his nurse having given him the foul disease, an indisposition occasioned by the relics of it, obliged him to refrain from wine the remaining part of his life. See the History, which John Stephen Strobelberg has published, of the University of Montpelier.CHAP. XXXI. ] PANTAGRUEL. 83bibbers, tipplers , and drunkards, is most commonly painted beardless, and clad in a woman's habit, as a person altogethereffeminate, or like a libbed eunuch. Wine, nevertheless,taken moderately, worketh quite contrary effects, as is implied by the old proverb, which saith, -That Venus takescold, when not accompanied with Ceres and Bacchus. Thisopinion is of great antiquity, as appeareth by the testimony ofDiodorus the Sicilian, and confirmed by Pausanias,"and it universally held amongst the Lampsacians, that Don Priapus was the son of Bacchus and Venus.Secondly, The fervency of lust is abated by certain drugs,plants , herbs, and roots, which make the taker cold, maleficiated , unfit for , and unable to perform the act of generation;as hath been often experimented in the water-lily, Heraclea, Agnus Castus, willow-twigs, hemp- stalks, woodbine,honeysuckle, tamarisk, chaste-tree, mandrake, bennet, keckbugloss, the skin of a hippopotamus, and many othersuch, which, by convenient doses proportioned to thepeccant humour and constitution of the patient, beingduly and seasonably received within the body, —what bytheir elementary virtues on the one side, and peculiar properties on the other, -do either benumb, mortify, and beclumpsewith cold the prolific sem*nce, or scatter and disperse thespirits, which ought to have gone along with, and conductedsperm to the places destinated and appointed for its reception, or lastly, shut up, stop, and obstruct the ways,passages, and conduits through which the seed should havebeen expelled, evacuated, and ejected . We have nevertheless of those ingredients, which, being of a contrary operation, heat the blood, bend the nerves, unite the spirits,quicken the senses , strengthen the muscles, and therebyrouse up, provoke, excite , and enable a man to the vigorousaccomplishment of the feat of amorous dalliance . I haveno need of those, quoth Panurge, God be thanked, and you,my good master. Howsoever, I pray you, take no exception or offence at these my words; for what I have said-4 Diodorus the Sicilian. ] " Fabulantur antiqui, filium Dionysii acVeneris Priapum fuisse: ducti verò satis simili conjectura, quòd qui vino indulgent sunt natura ad venerem promptiores." L. v. c. 1 , of Diodorus Siculus. These are words quoted from an ancient translation of that author printed by Gryphius's heirs . The Greek text edition of Hanau, 1604, says much the same thing; but then it is in l . iv.5 Pausanias ] In his Bootics.G 284 RABELAIS [ BOOK III. ' WORKS.was not out of any ill will I did bear to you, the Lord, he knows.Thirdly, The ardour of lechery is very much subdued andcheck'd by frequent labour and continual toiling. For bypainful exercises and laborious working, so great a dissolution is brought upon the whole body, that the blood, whichrunneth alongst the channels of the veins thereof, for thenourishment and alimentation of each of its members, hathneither time, leisure, nor power to afford the seminalresudation, or superfluity of the third concoction, whichnature most carefully reserves for the conservation of the individual, whose preservation she more heedfully regardeththan the propagating of the species, and the multiplication of human kind. Whence it is, that Diana is said to behaste, because she is never idle, but always busied abouter hunting. For the same reason was a camp, or leaguer,of old called Castrum, as if they would have said Castum;because the soldiers, wrestlers, runners, throwers of the bar,and other such like athletic champions, as are usually seenin a military circumvallation, do incessantly travail and turmoil, and are in a perpetual stir and agitation . To thispurpose Hippocrates also writeth in his book, De Aere, Aqua,et Locis, That in his time there was a people in Scythia, asimpotent as eunuchs in the discharge of a venerean exploit;because that without any cessation, pause, or respite, theywere never from off horseback, or otherwise assiduouslyemployed in some troublesome and molesting drudgery.On the other part, in opposition and repugnancy hereto,the philosophers say, That idleness is the mother of luxury.When it was asked Ovid,' Why Ægisthus became an adulterer? he made no other answer but this, Because he wasidle. Who were able to rid the world of loitering and laziness,might easily frustrate and disappoint Cupids of all his de6 Castrum, quasi Castum. ] Castra, says Isidorus in his Etymologies,lib. ix. "sunt ubi miles steterit; dicta autem castra, quasi casta, eò quod ibi castraretur libido . " A castle from castrating of lust! Parliament, from parler and mens, speaking one's mind!! Firmament,firma mentis, afarmfor the mind!!! 7 Ovid, &c. ] De Remed. Amoris." Quæritur Ægystus quare sit factus adulter:In promptu causa est; desidiosus erat."Cupid, &c. ] Encore Ovid, " de Remed. Amor." 1. i. v. 139. 06 Otia si tollas, periere Cupidinis arcus "6Contemtæque jacent, et sine luce faces. "CHAP. XXXI. ] PANTAGRUEL. 85signs , aims, engines, and devices , and so disable and appalhim that his bow, quiver, and darts should from thenceforth be a mere needless load and burthen to him: for that itcould not then lie in his power to strike, or wound any ofeither sex, with all the arms he had. He is not, I believe, soexpert an archer, as that he can hit the cranes flying inthe air, or yet the young stags skipping through the thickets,as the Parthians knew well how to do: that is to say,people moiling, stirring, and hurrying up and down, restless,and without repose. He must have those hushed, still , quiet,lying at a stay, lither, and full of ease, whom he is able topierce with all his arrows. In confirmation hereof, Theophrastus being asked on a time, What kind of beast or thing hejudged a toyish, wanton love to be? he made answer, Thatit was a passion of idle and sluggish spirits. From whichpretty description of tickling love- tricks, that of Diogenes'shatching was not very discrepant, when he defined lechery,The occupation of folks destitute of all other occupation.For this cause the Sicyonian sculptor Canachus,10 beingdesirous to give us to understand that sloth, drowsiness ,negligence, and laziness were the prime guardians and governesses of ribaldry, made the statue of Venus, notstanding, as other stone-cutters had used to do, but sitting.Fourthly, The tickling pricks of incontinency, are bluntedby an eager study; for from thence proceedeth an incredibleresolution of the spirits, that oftentimes there do not remainso many behind as may suffice to push and thrust forwardsthe generative resudation to the places thereto appropriated, and there withal inflate the cavernous nerve, whose officeis to ejacul*te the moisture for the propagation of humanprogeny. Lest you should think it is not so, be pleased butto contemplate a little the form, fashion, and carriage of aman exceeding earnestly set upon some learned meditation,and deeply plunged therein, and you shall see how all thearteries of his brains are stretched forth, and bent like thestring of a cross- bow, the more promptly, dexterously,and copiously to suppeditate, furnish, and supply him withstore of spirits, sufficient to replenish and fill up the ven9 That it was, &c. ] This apophthegm is Diogenes the Cynic's, not Diogenes Laertius's.10 Canachus. ] See Pausanias's Corinthians.86 [ BOOK III. RABELAIS' WORKS.tricles , seats, tunnels, mansions, receptacles, and cellules ofcommon sense, of the imagination, apprehension, and fancy,-of the ratiocination, arguing, and resolution,—as likewise of the memory, recordation, and remembrance; andwith great alacrity, nimbleness, and agility to run, pass, andcourse from the one to the other, through those pipes , windings, and conduits, which to skilful anatomists are perceivable at the end ofthe wonderful net, where all the arteriesclose in a terminating point: which arteries, taking their riseand origin from the left capsule of the heart, bring throughseveral circuits , ambages, and anfractuosities, the vital spirits,to subtilize and refine them to the ætherial purity of animalspirits. Nay, in such a studiously musing person, you mayespy so extravagant raptures of one, as it were, out of himself, that all his natural faculties for that time will seem to besuspended from each their proper charge and office , and hisexterior senses to be at a stand. In a word, you cannototherwise choose than think, that he is by an extraordinaryecstacy quite transported of what he was, or should be;and that Socrates did not speak improperly, when he said,That philosophy was nothing else but a meditation upondeath. This possibly is the reason why Democritus, " deprived himself of the sense of seeing, prizing at a muchlower rate the loss of his sight, than the diminution of hiscontemplations, which he frequently had found disturbed bythe vagrant, flying-out strayings of his unsettled and roving eyes. Therefore is it, that Pallas, the goddess of wisdom,tutoress and guardianess of such as are diligently studious,and painfully industrious, is , and hath been still, accounted avirgin. The muses upon the same consideration are esteemedperpetual maids and the graces for the like reason, have been held to continue in a sempiternal pudicity.I remember to have read, 12 that Cupid on a time beingasked of his mother Venus, why he did not assault and setupon the Muses, his answer was, That he found them sofair, so sweet, so fine , so neat, so wise, so learned , so modest,so discreet, so courteous, so virtuous, and so continuallybusied and employed , -one in the speculation of the stars,11 Democritus, &c. ] Vide Cicero, lib. v. Tusc. Questions, and Plu- tarch's Treatise of Curiosity.12 To have read. ] In Lucian, in the dialogue entitled, Venus andCupidCHAP. XXXI. ] PANTAGRUEL. 87-another in the supputation of numbers,-the third in thedimension of geometrical quantities, —the fourth in the composition of heroic poems, the fifth in the jovial interludesof a comic strain,-the sixth in the stately gravity of atragic vein, the seventh in the melodious disposition ofmusical airs, the eighth in the completest manner ofwritinghistories, and books on all sorts of subjects. —and the ninthin the mysteries, secrets, and curiosities of all sciences ,faculties, disciplines , and arts whatsoever, whether liberal ormechanic, that approaching near unto them he unbent hisbow, shut his quiver, and extinguished his torch, throughmere shame, and fear that by mischance he might do themsome hurt or prejudice. Which done, he thereafter put offthe fillet wherewith his eyes were bound, to look them inthe face, and to hear their melody and poetic odes. Theretook he the greatest pleasure in the world, that many times hewas transported with their beauty and pretty behaviour, andcharmed asleep by the harmony; so far was he from as- saulting them, or interrupting their studies. Under thisarticle may be comprised what Hippocrates wrote in theafore- cited treatise concerning the Scythians; as also that ina book of his, entitled , Of Breeding and Production, wherehe hath affirmed all such men to be unfit for generation, ashave their parotid arteries cut-whose situation is besidethe ears -for the reason given already, when I was speakingof the resolution of the spirits , and of that spiritual bloodwhereof the arteries are the sole and proper receptacles; andthat likewise he doth maintain a large portion of the parastatic liquor to issue and descend from the brains andbackbone.Fifthly, by the too frequent reiteration of the act ofvenery. There did I wait for you, quoth Panurge, andshall willingly apply it to myself, whilst any one that pleasethmay, for me, make use of any of the four preceding . Thatis the very same thing, quoth Friar John, which FatherScyllino, Prior of Saint Victor at Marseilles , calleth bythe13 Father Scyllino . ] Rabelais' word is Fray Scyllino; fray means frere, i. e. brother (not father.) Scyllino, or, as some editions, andparticularly this of M. Duchat has it, Scyllo, may come from Scilla, asea-onion (squill) . Boccace, in one of his novels, calls a certain monk Brother Onion (Frater Cipolla. ) Rabelais, in imitation of him, might have used the same appellation here, (Frere Oignon, Brother Onion,)but he chose rather that of Brother Sea-onion , (Fray Scyllo) because88 [BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.name of maceration, and taming of the flesh. I am of thesame opinion, and so was the hermit of Saint Radegonde,a little above Chinon: for , quoth he, the hermits of Thebaide can no waymore aptly or expediently macerate and bring downthe pride of their bodies, daunt and mortify their lecherous sensuality, or depress and overcome the stubbornness andrebellion of the flesh, than by dufling and fanfreluching itfive and twenty or thirty times a day. I see, Panurge,quoth Rondibilis, neatly featured, and proportioned in all the members of his body, of a good temperament in hishumours, well complexioned in his spirits, of a competentage, in an opportune time, and of a reasonably forwardmind to be married . Truly, if he encounter with a wife ofthe like nature, temperament, and constitution , he maybeget upon her children worthy of some transpontine monarchy; 15 and the sooner he marry, it will be the betterfor him, and the more conducible for his profit, if he wouldsee and have his children in his own time well provided for.Sir, my worthy master, quoth Panurge, I will do it, do not you doubt thereof; and that quickly enough, I warrant you.Nevertheless, whilst you were busied in the uttering of yourlearned discourse, this flea which I have in mine ear hath tickled me more than ever. I retain you in the number ofmy festival guests, and promise you, that we shall not wantfor mirth, and good cheer enough, yea, over and above the ordinary rate. And, if it may please you, desire your wife to come along with you, together with her she-friends andneighbours-that is to be understood-and there shall be fairplay,16he was a monk of Marseilles, a maritime city. The story itself is the same with that which Poggius tells of a certain hermit of Pisa. " Eremita," says he, " qui Pisis morabatur, tempore Petri Gambacurtæ,meretricem noctu in suam cellulam deduxit, vigesiesque ea nocte mulierem cognovit; semper cum moveret clunes, ut crimen fugeret luxu- riæ, vulgaribus verbis dicens: domati, carne cattivella; hoc est doma te,miserrima caro. "15 Transpontine monarchy. ] Beyond-sea. Some such monarchies were formed in the east, in the age of the Crusades.16 And there shall be fair play. ] More correctly, “ and there shall be sport, but without rudeness," Et jeu sans villenie . That is, you shall want for no diversion, in a civil way; and, as no one is igno- rant of the proverb, jeu de main, jeu de villain, I depend upon it you will all so far bear it in mind as not to towse my wife, or use any horseplay to her. (Welcome to Bell- bar, bar-bell, was a no less merry thanCHAP. XXXII. PANTAGRUEL. 89CHAPTER XXXII.How Rondibilis declareth cuckoldry to be naturally one of theappendances of marriage.THERE remaineth, as yet, quoth Panurge, going on in hisdiscourse, one small scruple to be cleared. You have seenheretofore, I doubt not, in the Roman standards, S. P. Q. R. Si, Peu, Que, Rien. Shall not I be a cuckold? By thehaven of safety,' cried out Rondibilis, what is this you ask of me? If you shall be a cuckold? My noble friend , Iam married, and you are like to be so very speedily: therefore be pleased, from my experiment in the matter, to writein your brain with a steel- pen this subsequent ditton, thereis no married man who doth not run the hazard of being made a cuckold. ' Cuckoldry naturally attendeth marriage.The shadow doth not more naturally follow the body, than cuckoldry ensueth after marriage, to place fair horns upon the husbands' heads.And when you shall happen to hear any man pronouncethese words-he is married-if you then say he is, hathbeen, shall be, or may be a cuckold, you will not be ac- counted an unskilful artist in framing of true consequences.Tripes and bowels of all the devils , cries Panurge, what doyou tell me? My dear friend, answered Rondibilis, as Hippocrates on a time was in the very nick of setting forwardsfrom Lango to Polistillo, to visit the philosopher Demomemorable saying of Sir Robt. Howard to some noble guests he had invited to come and see him at Bell-bar, Northall. ) The French pro- verb above is of great antiquity, and Brantome in his 7th disc. of his Dames Illustres, p. 359, observes that Froissart relates that Jeanne of France, the first of the name, Queen of Naples, presented herself before the pope at Fondi, confessed to him and showed him all her ware and ieu sans villenie, all the game without naughtiness. In heraldry, a lion sans villenie, is a lion without his pizzle and stones.¹ By the haven of safety. ] In the original, aure de grace, a Langue- docian exclamation used by the physician Rondibilis, who it is likely,was used in this manner to call upon the Holy Ghost, and implore the aid of the Spirit of Grace. The 32nd stanza of the 1st canto of Tasso's Jerusalem:- "Hor quai pensieri quai petti,Son chiusi a te, sant' aura?"What thoughts, what hearts, are shut to thee, blest air!2 From Lango to Polistillo. ] Lango is the ancient Còs, Hippocrates's country. Polistillo is the ancient Abdera, the philosopher Democritus's country. This letter of Hippocrates is fictitious. See Le Clerc's Hist.of Physic.90 [BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.critus , he wrote a familiar letter to his friend Dionysius,wherein he desired him, that he would, during the intervalof his absence, carry his wife to the house of her father andmother, who were an honourable couple, and of good repute; because I would not have her at my home, said he,to make abode in solitude. Yet, notwithstanding this herresidence beside her parents, do not fail, quoth he, with amost heedful care and circ*mspection, to pry into her ways,and to espy what places she shall go to with her mother,and who those be that shall repair unto her . Not, quothhe, that I do mistrust her virtue, or that I seem to have anydiffidence of her pudicity, and chaste behaviour, -for ofthat I have frequently had good and real proofs, -but I must freely tell you, she is a woman. There lies the suspicion.My worthy friend, the nature of women is set forth before our eyes, and represented to us by the moon in divers otherthings as well as in this, that they squat, sculk, constraintheir own inclinations, and, with all the cunning they can,dissemble and play the hypocrite in the sight and presenceof their husbands; who come no sooner to be out of theway, but that forthwith they take their advantage, pass thetime merrily, desist from all labour, frolic it, gad abroad, layaside their counterfeit garb, and openly declare and manifestthe interior of their dispositions, even as the moon, whenshe is in conjunction with the sun, is neither seen in theheavens, nor on the earth, but in her opposition, when remotest from him, shineth in her greatest fulness , and whollyappeareth in her brightest splendour whilst it is night. Thus women are but women.When I say womankind, I speak of a sex so frail, sovariable, so changeable, so fickle, inconstant, and imperfect, that, in my opinion, Nature, under favour nevertheless,of the prime honour and reverence which is due unto her,did in a manner mistake the road which she had traced formerly, and stray exceedingly from that excellence of providential judgment, by the which she had created and formedall other things, when she built, framed, and made up the woman. And having thought upon it a hundred and fivetimes, I know not what else to determine therein, save onlythat in the devising, hammering, forging, and composing ofMoon. ] Comparison taken from Plutarch, in his precepts on marriage.CHAP. XXXII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 91the woman, she hath nad a much tenderer regard, and by agreat deal more respectful heed, to the delightful consortship, and sociable delectation of the man, than to the perfection and accomplishment of the individual womanishnessor muliebrity . The divine philosopher Plato was doubtfulin what rank of living creatures to place and collocate them ,whether amongst the rational animals, by elevating themto an upper seat in the specifical classes of humanity; orwith the irrational, by degrading them to a lower bench onthe opposite side, of a brutal kind, and mere bestial*ty. Fornature hath posited in a privy, secret, and intestine place oftheir bodies, a sort of member, by some not impertinentlytermed an animal, which is not to be found in men. Thereinsometimes are engendered certain humours, so saltish ,brackish, clammy, sharp, nipping, tearing, prickling, andmost eagerly tickling, that by their stinging acrimony, rending nitrosity, figging itch, wriggling mordicancy, and smarting salsitude, (for the said member is altogether sinewy, andof a most quick and lively feeling, ) their whole body isshaken and ebrangled, their senses totally ravished andtransported, the operations of their judgment and understanding utterly confounded, and all disordinate passionsand perturbations of the mind throughly and absolutely allowed, admitted, and approved of; yea, in such sort, that if nature had not been so favourable unto them as to havesprinkled their forehead with a little tincture of bashfulness and modesty, you should see them in a so franticmood run mad after lechery, and hie apace up and down4 Run mad after lechery, &c . ] It is, in the original, run for the cod.piece-point, courir l'aguillette. The learned may see, in Duchat, acurious criticism, and some pleasant historical remarks on this phrase and custom, but both too long to find a place here. The substance of them is, that in Rabelais' time, and ever since, till about the year 1676, it was customary at Beaucaire, the eve of the great fair, to make the madams that came thither to trade, run races naked, and she thatbeat had for her prize a bundle of codpiece-points. Again, at Tou- louse, and other places, the common wenches are (or at least were in old time) enjoined to wear codpiece-points on one of their shoulders,to distinguish them from those that professed honesty. And, now I'm upon this point, I'll conclude with Cotgrave's words on aguillette nouée.It signifies, says he, the charming of a man's codpiece-point so, as he shall not be able to use his own wife, or woman (though he may useany other. ) Hence avoir aguillette nouée signifies to want erection;this impotency is supposed to come by the force of certain words uttered92 [ BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.with haste and lust, in quest of, and to fix some chamberstandard in their Paphian ground, that never did the Proëtides, Mimallonides, nor Lyæan Thyads deport themselvesin the time of their Bacchanalian festivals more shamelessly,or with a so effronted and brazen- faced impudency; becausethis terrible animal is knit unto, and hath an union with allthe chief and most principal parts of the body, as to anato- mists is evident. Let it not here be thought strange that Ishould call it an animal, seeing therein I do no otherwise than follow and adhere to the doctrine of the academic andperipatetic philosophers. For if a proper motion be acertain mark and infallible token of the life and animationof the mover, as Aristotle writeth, and that any such thingas moveth of itself ought to be held animated, and of aliving nature, then assuredly Plato with very good reasondid give it the denomination of an animal, for that he perceived and observed in it the proper and self- stirring motionsof suffocation, precipitation, corrugation, and of indignation,so extremely violent, that oftentimes by them is taken andremoved from the woman all other sense and moving whatsoever, as if she were in a swounding lipothymy, benumbing syncope, epileptic, apoplectic palsy, and true resemblance ofa pale-faced death.Furthermore, in the said member there is a manifest discerning faculty of scents and odours very perceptible towomen, who feel it fly from what is rank and unsavoury,and follow fragrant and aromatic smells . It is not unknownto me how Cl . Galen striveth with might and main to provethat these are not proper and particular notions proceedingintrinsically from the thing itself, but accidentally, and by chance. Nor hath it escaped my notice, how others of thatsect have laboured hardly, yea, to the utmost of their abilities, to demonstrate that it is not a sensitive discerning orperception in it of the difference of wafts and smells, butmerely a various manner of virtue and efficacy, passing forthand flowing from the diversity of odoriferous substancesapplied near unto it. Nevertheless, if you will studiouslyexamine, and seriously ponder and weigh in Critolaus'sby the charmer, while he ( Q. whether a she may not do it?) ties aknot on the party's codpiece- point. To conclude, courir aguillette or- dinarily signifies to be troubled with afuror uterinus.CHAP. XXXII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 93balance the strength of their reasons and arguments, youshall find that they, not only in this, but in several othermatters also of the like nature, have spoken at random, and rather out of an ambitious envy to check and reprehend theirbetters, than for any design to make inquiry into the solid truth .I will not launch my little skiff any further into the wideocean of this dispute, only will I tell you that the praise and commendation is not mean and slender which is due to thosehonest and good women, who living chastely and withoutblame, have had the power and virtue to curb, range, andsubdue that unbridled, heady, and wild animal to an obedient , submissive, and obsequious yielding unto reason.Therefore here will I make an end of my discourse thereon ,when I shall have told you, that the said animal being oncesatiated-if it be possible that it can be contented or satisfied-by that aliment which nature hath provided for it out ofthe epididymal store-house of man, all its former and irregular and disordered motions are at an end, laid and assuaged, all its vehement and unruly longings lulled, pacified,and quieted, —and all the furious and raging lusts, appetites,and desires thereof appeased, calmed, and extinguished.For this cause let it seem nothing strange unto you, if we bein a perpetual danger of being cuckolds, that is to say, such ofus as have not wherewithal fully to satisfy the appetite and expectation of that voracious animal. Ods fish! quothPanurge, have you no preventive cure in all your medicinalart for hindering one's head to be horny-graffed at home,whilst his feet are plodding abroad? Yes, that I have, my gallant friend, answered Rondibilis, and that which is a sovereign remedy, whereof I frequently make use myself; and,that you may the better relish, it is set down and written inthe book of a most famous author, whose renown is of astanding of two thousand years. Hearken and take goodheed. You are, quoth Panurge, by co*cks- hobby, a right honest man, and I love you with all my heart. Eat a littleof this quince- pie; it is very proper and convenient for the5 Quince- pie. ] See a receipt how to make it in Duchat; from Platina, de honesta Voluptate, 1. viii. , in brief, they took out the cores from the quinces, and then filled them with beef- marrow, seasoned with sugar, cinnamon , and a little salt. Then they made a pie of them,which being baked, or otherwise done at a slow fire, either loosened o94 BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.shutting up of the orifice of the ventricle of the stomach,because of a kind of astringent stypticity, which is in that sortof fruit, and is helpful to the first concoction. But what?I think I speak Latin before clerks. Stay till I give yousomewhat to drink out of this Nestorian goblet. Will youhave another draught of white hippocras? Be not afraid ofthe squinzy, no. There is neither squinanthus, ginger, norgrains in it; only a little choice cinnamon, and some of thebest refined sugar, with the delicious white wine of thegrowth of that vine, which was set in the slips of the greatsorb- apple, above the walnut tree.CHAPTER XXXIII.Rondibilis the Physician's cure of cuckoldry.Ar what time,' quoth Rondibilis, when Jupiter took a view ofthe state of his olympic house and family, and that he had made the calendar of all the gods and goddesses, appointingunto the festival of every one of them its proper day andseason, establishing certain fixed places and stations for thepronouncing of oracles, and relief of travelling pilgrims, and ordaining victims, immolations, and sacrifices suitable andcorrespondent to the dignity and nature of the worshipped and adored deity. Did not he do, asked Panurge, therein ,as Tinteville ' the bishop of Auxerre is said once to havedone? This noble prelate loved entirely the pure liquor ofthe grape, as every honest and judicious man doth; therefore was it that he had an especial care and regard to thebud of the vine tree, as to the great grandfather of Bacchus.But so it is , that for sundry years together, he saw a mostpitiful havoc, desolation, and destruction made amongst thebound up the body, according as they were eaten at the beginning or end of a meal.6 Squinzy- -Squinanthum. ] The apothecaries may here consult the original about the distemper called the Squincy, and the vegetable, Squinanthum, or Juncus Odoratus of Pliny.1 At what time, &c. ] This is exactly the character of Dr. Rondeletius,who, being by nature a pleasant man, would be continually enlivening his lectures with such like stories as this, and that in the preceding chapter, &c.2 Tinteville. ] He died at Rome the last day but one of April, 1530,according to the Gallia Christiana, but alive and hearty the 20th of November the next year, according to Sebastian Rouillard, p. 602 of his History of Melun.CHAP XXXIII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 95sprouts, shootings, buds, blossoms, and scions of the vines,by hoary frost, dank fogs , hot mists, unseasonable colds ,chill blasts, thick hail, and other calamitous chances of foulweather, happening, as he thought, by the dismal inauspiciousness of the Holy Days of St. George, St, Mary, St.Paul, St. Eutropius, Holy Rood, the Ascension, and otherfestivals , in that time when the sun passeth under the signof Taurus; and thereupon harboured in his mind this opinion, that the aforenamed saints were Saint Hail- flingers,Saint Frost- senders, Saint Fog-mongers, and Saint Spoilers ofthe vine- buds. For which cause he went about to havetransmitted their feasts from the spring to the winter, to becelebrated between Christmas and Epiphany, so the motherof the three kings called it, allowing them with all honourand reverence the liberty then to freeze, hail, and rain asmuch as they would; for that he knew that at such a timefrost was rather profitable than hurtful to the vine-buds, andin their steads to have placed the festivals of St. Christopher,St. John the Baptist, St. Magdalene, St. Ann, St. Domingo,and St. Lawrence; yea, and to have gone so far as to collocate and transpose the middle of August in and to the beginning of May, because during the whole space of theirsolemnity there was so little danger of hoary frosts and coldmists , that no artificers are then held in greater request,than the afforders of refrigerating inventions, makers ofjunkets, fit disposers of cooling shades, composers of greenarbours, and refreshers of wine.Jupiter, said Rondibilis, forgot the poor devil Cuckoldry,who was then in the court at Paris, very eagerly soliciting apiddling suit at law for one of his vassals and tenants. Withinsome few days thereafter, I have forgot how many, when hegot full notice of the trick, which in his absence was doneunto him, he instantly desisted from prosecuting legal processes in the behalf of others, full of solicitude to pursueafter his own business , lest he should be fore- closed, andthereupon he appeared personally at the tribunal of the greatJupiter, displayed before him the importance of his pre3 Between Christmas and Epiphany, so the mother of the three kings called it. ] This is quite murdered. It is in the original thus: Between Christmas and Tiphany, the mother of the three kings, (as he called her.) Tiphany, by an ignorant corruption for Epiphany, (as the feast of the kings is called . ) Of this feast of Tiphany the vulgar have made a saint.96BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.ceding merits, together with the acceptable services, which in obedience to his commandments he had formerly performed; and therefore, in all humility, begged of him thathe would be pleased not to leave him alone amongst all thesacred potentates, destitute and void of honour, reverence,sacrifices, and festival ceremonies. To this petition Jupiter'sanswer was excusatory, That all the places and offices of hishouse were bestowed. Nevertheless, so importuned was heby the continual supplications of Monsieur Cuckoldry, thathe, in fine, placed him in the rank, list, roll, rubric, and catalogue, and appointed honours, sacrifices, and festival rites tobe observed on earth in great devotion, and tendered to himwith solemnity. The feast, because there was no void,empty, nor vacant place in all the calendar, was to be celebrated jointly with and on the same day that had been consecrated to the goddess Jealousy. His power and dominionshould be over married folks, especially such as had hand- some wives. His sacrifices were to be suspicion, diffidence ,mistrust, a lowering pouting sullenness, watchings, wardings, researchings, plyings, explorations, together with thewaylayings, ambushes, narrow observations , and maliciousdoggings of the husband's scouts and espials of the mostprivy actions of their wives. Herewithal every married manwas expressly and rigorously commanded to reverence,honour, and worship him, to celebrate and solemnize hisfestival with twice more respect than that of any other saintor deity, and to immolate unto him, with all sincerity andalacrity of heart, the above-mentioned sacrifices and oblations, under pain of severe censures, threatenings, and com- minations of these subsequent fines, mulcts, amercements,penalties, and punishments to be inflicted on the delinquents;that Monsieur Cuckoldry should never be favourable norpropitious to them, -that he should never help, aid, supply,succour, nor grant them any subventitious furtherance,auxiliary, suffrage, or adminiculary assistance, -that heshould never hold them in any reckoning, account, or estimation, that he should never deign to enter within their4 Should never, &c. ] All this is taken from Plutarch, except that here Rondibilis attributes to jealousy the same effects which in Plutarch are attributed to grief, in a certain discourse which a philosopher made to the Queen Arsinoe, to comfort her on the death of her son. See Plutarch in his consolation to Apollonius, on the death of his son.CHAP. XXXIII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 97houses, neither at the doors, windows, nor any other placethereof, -that he should never haunt nor frequent theircompanies or conversations, how frequently soever theyshould invocate him, and call upon his name, -and that notonly he should leave and abandon them to rot alone withtheir wives in a sempiternal solitariness, without the benefitof the diversion of any copesmate or corrival at all, butshould withal shun and eschew them, fly from them , andeternally forsake and reject them as impious heretics andsacrilegious persons, according to the accustomed manner ofother gods, towards such as are too slack in offering upthe duties and reverences which ought to be performed respectively to their divinities; as is evidently apparent inBacchus towards negligent vine- dressers; in Ceres, againstidle ploughmen and tillers of the ground; in Pomona, tounworthy fruiterers and costard-mongers; in Neptune, to- wards dissolute mariners and seafaring men; in Vulcan,towards loitering smiths and forgemen; and so throughout the rest. Now, on the contrary, this infallible promisewas added, that unto all those who should make a HolyDay of the above-recited festival, and cease from all mannerof worldly work and negotiation, lay aside all their ownmost important occasions, and be so retchless , heedless , andcareless of what might concern the management of theirproper affairs, as to mind nothing else but a suspiciousespying and prying into the secret deportments of theirwives, and how to coop, shut up, hold at under, and dealcruelly and austerely with them, by all the harshness andhardships that an implacable and every way inexorablejealousy can devise and suggest, conform to the sacred ordinances of the afore-mentioned sacrifices and oblations, heshould be continually favourable to them, should love them,sociably converse with them, should be day and night intheir houses, and never leave them destitute of his presence.Now I have said, and you have heard my cure.Ha, ha, ha, quoth Carpalim, laughing, this is a remedyyet more apt and proper than Hans Carvel's ring. Thedevil take me if I do not believe it! The humour, inclination, and nature of women is like the thunder, whose forcein its bolt, or otherwise, burneth, bruiseth, and breaketh onlyhard, massive and resisting objects, without staying or stopping at soft, empty, and yielding matters. For it dashethVOL. II. H98 [BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.into pieces the steel sword, without doing any hurt to the velvet scabbard which insheatheth it. It crusheth also, andconsumeth the bones, without wounding or endamagingthe flesh, wherewith they are veiled and covered. Just soit is , that women for the greater part never bend the contention, subtility, and contradictory disposition of their spirits,unless it be to do what is prohibited and forbidden. Verily,quoth Hippothadeus, some of our doctors aver for a truth,that the first woman of the world, whom the Hebrews callEve, had hardly been induced or allured into the temptationof eating of the fruit of the tree of life," if it had not been for- bidden her so to do. And that you may give the morecredit to the validity of this opinion, consider how the cautelous and wily tempter did commemorate unto her, for anantecedent to his enthymeme, the prohibition which wasmade to taste it; as being desirous to infer from thence, It isforbidden thee; therefore thou shouldst eat of it, else thou canst not be a woman.CHAPTER XXXIV.How women ordinarily have the greatest longing after thingsprohibited.¹WHEN I was, quoth Carpalim, a whor*-master at Orleans,the whole heart of rhetoric, in all its tropes and figures, wasnot able to afford unto me a colour or flourish of greaterforce and value; nor could I by any other form or mannerof elocution pitch upon a more persuasive argument forbringing young beautiful married ladies into the snares ofadultery, through alluring and enticing them to taste withTree of life. ] Should not this be the tree of knowledge? My Bible tells me so, and so does Rabelais's text. Le fruict de tout Sça- voir; and yet it is in both editions of this translation, in italic letters too, the Tree of Life.How women, &c. This thirty-fourth chapter is adjoined to, and made part of the preceding by M. Duchat.2 A whor*master. ] Ruffien in French does indeed signify both awhor*-hunter and a whor*- broker, but M. Duchat thinks it here meansneither, because of the indecency of the word, &c. , but rather a stu dent, one that from reading the rubrics of the law may be called (but he does not say is actually called) ruffien, (from rufus, red; as rubric,from ruber, red. ) This is M. Duchat's meaning, if I understand himright, for he has a little darkly expressed himself. I shall only say with the Italians,"Se non è vero, è ben trovato."CHAP. XXXIV.]PANTAGRUEL. 99me of amorous delights, than with a lively sprightfulnessto tell them in downright terms, and to remonstrate to them,(with a great shew of detestation of a crime so horrid, ) howtheir husbands were jealous. This was none ofmy invention .It is written, and we have laws, examples, reasons, and daily experiences confirmative of the same. If this belief onceenter into their noddles, their husbands will infallibly becuckolds; yea, by God, will they, without swearing, althoughthey should do like Semiramis, Pasiphaë, Egesta, thewomen of the Isle Mandez in Egypt, and other such likequeanish flirting harlots, mentioned in the writings of Herodotus, Strabo, and such like puppies.3Truly, quoth Ponocrates, I have heard it related , and itIn this belief, &c. ] This whole period is exceedingly amiss in both the English editions, as it is translated by Sir T. U. The original runs thus, " Ayans ceste persuasion en leurs caboches, elles feront leursmaritzcocquz infailliblement par bieu, (sans jurer) , deussent elles faire ce que feirent Semiramis, Pasiphaë, Egesta, les femmes de l'Isle Mandez en Egypte, blasonnées par Herodote, et Strabo, et aultres telles mas- tines." The translator makes Rabelais call Herodotus and Strabopuppies, whereas he really called Semiramis, Pasiphaë, &c. bitches: (for mastine is a mastiff bitch, as mastin is a mastiff dog. ) I never heard any thorough scholar open his mouth against Herodotus or Strabo,much less call them puppies; but as for those queens, or rather queans,above-mentioned, they were worse than bitches. Semiramis, though as famous for heroic achievements as ever any prince was, yet fell to suchinfamous sensuality as to solicit her own son to commit incest with her;she was, besides, so cruel as to cut the throats of all the instruments ofher lust, (except her son who slew her. ) She did indeed erect magni- ficent rooms for them afterwards. Pasiphaë found means to be served(as our country folks speak) by a bull, Egesta by a dog. What the bestial*ty of the women of Mandez, or Mendes, was, may be learned from Herodotus, lib. 2. But to return to our translator: he makes Carpalim swear, point-blank, by God, whereas the reader sees Rabelaismakes him not swear at all; at least not by God, but by cod, par bieu,which indeed is a salvo for Dieu, Again, where is the reader, thatwould readily understand the sense of, " although they should do like Semiramis," &c. The whole ought to have been translated thus, ( at least I think so:) Ifthis persuasion once gets possession of their peri- craniums, (or as Sir T. U. expresses it, If this belief once enter theirnoddles) they will infallibly make their husbands cuckolds, (which is Rabelais's accurate way of expressing his sense, to make it correspond with the verb-active which comes after, ) yea, by cod, will they, (withoutswearing. ) even though they were to do what was done by Semiramis,Pasiphaë, Egesta, the women of the Island of Mandez in Egypt, (bla- Loned by Herodotus and Strabo, ) with other such like nasty bitches.I have heard, &c. ] This story is taken out of a volume intituled,н 2100 [ BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.hath been told me for a verity, that Pope John XXII,passing on a day through the abbey of Toucherome," was inall humility required and besought by the abbess, and otherdiscreet mothers of the said convent, to grant them an in.dulgence, by means whereof they might confess themselvesto one another, alleging, That religious women were subjectto some petty secret slips and imperfections, which would bea foul and burning shame for them to discover and to revealto men, how sacerdotal soever their function were: but thatthey would freelier, more familiarly, and with greater cheerfulness, open to each other their offences, faults, and escapes,under the seal of confession. There is not anything, answered the pope, fitting for you to impetrate of me, whichI would not most willingly condescend unto: but I find oneinconvenience. You know, confession should be kept secret,and women are not able to do so. Exceeding well, quoththey, most holy father, and much more closely than the best of men.upThe said pope on the very same day gave them in keepinga pretty box, wherein he purposely caused a little linnetto be put, willing them very gently and courteously to lock it in some sure and hidden place, and promising them ,by the faith of a pope, that he should yield to their request,if they would keep secret what was enclosed within thatdeposited box: enjoining them withal, not to presume oneway nor other, directly or indirectly, to go about the opening thereof, under pain of the highest ecclesiastical censure,eternal excommunication. The prohibition was no soonermade, but that they did all of them boil with a most ardentdesire to know and see what kind of thing it was that waswithin it. They thought it long already, that the pope wasnot gone, to the end they might jointly, with the moreleisure and ease, apply themslves to the box-opening curiosity.The holy father, after he had given them his benediction,retired and withdrew himself to the pontifical lodgings of" Sermones Discipuli de Tempore, " Serm. 50. The author of Contro- versies between the Masculine and Feminine Sexes had before inserted it in the 8th and 9th leaves of 1. iii.5Abbey of Toucherome. ] By this word Touch- her-home, Sir T. U.translates Abbaye de Coingnaufond, and very rightly as well as wittily,but the name of the Abbey in M. Duchat's edition is the true name,not a ludicrous one, and that is Fontevrault, according to the best editions.CHAP. XXXIV. ]PANTAGRUEL. 101his own palace. But he was hardly gone three steps fromwithout the gates of their cloister, when the good ladiesthrongingly, and as in a huddled crowd, pressing hard onthe backs of one another, ran thrusting and shoving whoshould be first at the setting open of the forbidden box, anddescrying of the Quod latitat within.On the very next day thereafter, the pope made themanother visit, of a full design, purpose, and intention , as theyimagined, to dispatch the grant of their sought and wishedfor indulgence. But before he would enter into any chat or communing with them, he commanded the casket to bebrought unto him. It was done so accordingly; but, byyour leave, the bird was no more there. Then was it, thatthe pope did represent to their maternities, how hard amatter and difficult it was for them to keep secrets revealedto them in confession, unmanifested to the ears of others,seeing for the space of four- and-twenty hours they were notable to lay up in secret a box, which he had highly recommended to their discretion, charge, and custody.8Welcome, in good faith, my dear master, welcome! Itdid me good to hear you talk, the Lord be praised for all.I do not remember to have seen you before now, since thelast time that you acted at Montpellier with our ancientfriends, Anthony Saporta, Guy Bourguyer, Balthasar Noyer,Tolet, John Quentin, Francis Robinet, John Perdrier, andFrancis Rabelais, the moral comedy of him who had espoused and married a dumb wife. I was there, quoth Epistemon. The good honest man her husband was very earnestlyurgent to have the fillet of her tongue untied, and would• Welcome. ] It is not said, by Rabelais, who it is that speaks here.It must, however, be Panurge; and his calling Carpalim, Monsieur Maitre, induces M. Duchat still the more to think Carpalim was astudent of law, that being the compellation by which such are distinguished.7I do not remember, &c. ] This is not a Scotchism but an IrishismRabelais says, I have not seen you since you acted at Montpellier, &c.8 Ant. Saporta. ] Professor of physic at Montpellier. He was of Spanish extraction. There were several sons and grandsons of the family, which Jos. Scaliger suspected of Maranism (Judaism. ) They,about 150 years ago, turned Protestants. There are some prayers of one Saporta, a reformed minister, printed anno 1620. See Duchat more at large upon this head.• Tolet. ] Peter Tolet, physician at the hospita. of Lyons. He wrote upon the gout. See more of him in M. Duchat102 [ BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.needs have her speak by any means. At his desire, somepains were taken on her, and partly by the industry of thephysician, other part by the expertness of the surgeon, theencyliglotte which she had under her tongue being cut, shespoke, and spoke again; yea, within a few hours she spokeso loud, so much, so fiercely, and so long, that her poorhusband returned to the same physician for a receipt to make her hold her peace. There are, quoth the physician, manyproper remedies in our art to make dumb women speak,but there are none that ever I could learn therein to makethem silent. The only cure which I have found out is their husband's deafness.10 The wretch became within few weeksthereafter, by virtue of some drugs, charms, or enchantments, which the physician had prescribed unto him, so deaf,that he could not have heard the thundering of nineteen hundred cannons at a salvo. His wife perceiving that indeed he was as deaf as a door-nail, and that her scolding was but in vain, sith that he heard her not, she grew starkmad.Some time after, the doctor asked for his fee of the husband; who answered, That truly he was deaf, and so wasnot able to understand what the tenour of his demand mightbe. Whereupon the leech bedusted him with a little, Iknow not what, sort of powder; which rendered him a foolimmediately, so great was the stultificating virtue of that strange kind of pulverised dose. Then did this fool of ahusband, and his mad wife, join together, and falling on thedoctor and the surgeon, did so scratch, bethwack, and bangthem, that they were left half dead upon the place , so furiouswere the blows which they received . I never in my lifetime laughed so much, as at the acting of that buffoonery. "Let us come to where we left off, quoth Panurge. Yourwords, being translated from the clapper-dudgeons to plainEnglish, do signify, that it is not very inexpedient that Imarry, and that I should not care for being a cuckold. Youhave there hit the nail on the head. I believe, master10 Husband's deafness. ] " Utinam aut hic surdus aut hæc mutafacta sit," says Davus, in " Terence's Andria. "11 Buffoonery. ] In the original Patelinage. Epistemon found thefarce as amusing as that of Patelin, a piece to which Rabelais is perpetually making_allusion . Moliere has more fully worked out this rough sketch of Rabelais, in several scenes of his Medecin malgré lui. ]CHAP. XXXIV. ] PANTAGRUEL. 103doctor, that on the day of my marriage you will be so muchtaken up with your patients, or otherwise so seriously em- ployed, that we shall not enjoy your company. Sir, I willheartily excuse your absence." Stercus et urina medici sunt prandia prima.Ex aliis paleas, ex istis collige grana.'You are mistaken, quoth Rondibilis, in the second verseof our distich; for it ought to run thus-"Nobis sunt signa, vobis sunt prandia digna."If my wife at any time prove to be unwell, and ill at ease,I will look upon the water¹2 which she shall have made inan urinal glass , quoth Rondibilis, grope her pulse, and seethe disposition of her hypogaster, together with her umbilicary parts, according to the prescript rule of Hippocrates,2. Aph. 35,-before I proceed any further in the cure of herdistemper. No, no, quoth Panurge, that will be but to littlepurpose. Such a feat is for the practice of us that are lawyers, who have the rubric, De ventre inspiciendo. Do nottherefore trouble yourself about it master doctor: I willprovide for her a plaster of warm guts.13 Do not neglectyour more urgent occasions otherwhere, for coming to mywedding. I will send you some supply of victuals to yourown house, without putting you to the trouble of comingabroad, and you shall always be my special friend. Withthis, approaching somewhat nearer to him, he clapped intohis hand, without the speaking of so much as one word,four rose nobles.¹4 Rondibilis did shut his fist upon themright kindly; yet, as if it had displeased him to make acceptance of such golden presents, he in a start, as if he hadbeen wroth, said, He, he, he, he, he, there was no need of12 Iwill look upon her water. ] Rondelet wrote de Urinis, and is mightily for the physicians seeing people's water.13 A plaster of warm guts.] So Cotgrave interprets Rabelais's Clystere barbarin. Clyster, both in Greek and Latin , signifies as well the pipe as the potion. Potion one may call it. For what else is a clys- ter, as I think Tom Brown says, but an arse vomit, as a vomit is amouth clyster?14 Four rose nobles. ] Twenty livres Tournois, at the rate of a hun- dred sous each of those nobles, as they were valued by the ordinance of 1532.15 Right kindly. ] It should be right hastily, for that is what Rabe- lais means by les print très bien; for, as L. Joubert, quoted by Tes sier, says, Rondelet used to do everything in a hurry.104 LBOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.anything, I thank you nevertheless. From wicked folks Inever get enough, and from honest people I refuse nothing.I shall be always, sir, at your command. Provided that Ipay you well, quoth Panurge. That, quoth Rondibilis, is understood.CHAPTER XXXV.How the philosopher Trouillogan handleth the difficulty ofmarriage.As this discourse was ended, Pantagruel said to the philosopher Trouillogan, Our loyal, honest, true, and trusty friend,the lamp from hand to hand is come to you. It falleth toyour turn to give an answer, should Panurge, pray you,marry, yea, or no? ' He should do both, quoth Trouillogan.What say you, asked Panurge? That which you have heard, answered Trouillogan. What have I heard? repliedPanurge. That which I have said, replied Trouillogan.Ha, ha, ha, are we come to that pass, quoth Panurge? Let it go nevertheless, I do not value it at a rush, seeing we canmake no better ofthe game. But howsoever tell me, should I marry or no? Neither the one nor the other, answeredTrouillogan. The devil take me, quoth Panurge, if theseodd answers do not make me dote, and may he snatch mepresently away, if I do understand you. Stay awhile, until I fasten these spectacles of mine on this left ear,that I mayhear you better. With this Pantagruel perceived at the door of the great hall, which was that day their dining room,Gargantua's little dog, whose name was Kyne; for so was Toby's dog called, as is recorded. Then did hethese who were there present, Our king is not far off, -let us all rise.2say toThat word was scarcely sooner uttered, than that Gargantua with his royal presence graced that banquetting andstately hall. Each of the guests arose to do their king thatreverence and duty which became them. After that Gargantua had most affably saluted all the gentlemen there present,he said, Good friends, I beg this favour of you, and thereinyou will very much oblige me, that you leave not the places1 Yea or no. ] Compare this dialogue with Sganarelle's consulta- tion with Marphurius in Moliere's Le Marriage Force, act I. sc. 8. ]2 Gargantua. ] This prince appears now upon the stage for the first time since his being conveyed to the Land of the Fairies, i.e. inchanted,as is mentioned in 1. ii.CHAP. XXXV.] PANTAGRUEL. 105Let where you sate, nor quit the discourse you were upon.a chair be brought hither unto this end of the table, andreach me a cup full of the strongest and best wine you have,that I may drink to all the company. You are, in faith, allwelcome, gentlemen. Now let me know, what talk youwere about. To this Pantagruel answered, that at the beginning of the second service Panurge had proposed a problematic theme, to wit, Whether he should marry, or notmarry? that Father Hippothadeus and Doctor Rondibilis hadalready dispatched their resolutions thereupon; and that,just as his majesty was coming in, the faithful Trouilloganin the delivery of his opinion hath thus far proceeded, thatwhen Panurge asked, -whether he ought to marry, yea, orno? at first he made this answer, Both together. Whenthis same question was again propounded , his second answerwas, Neither the one, nor the other. Panurge exclaimeth,that those answers are full of repugnancies and contradictions, protesting that he understands them not, nor what itis that can be meant by them. If I be not mistaken, quothGargantua, I understand it very well. The answer is notunlike to that which was once made by a philosopher ' inancient time, who being interrogated, if he had a woman,whom they named him, to his wife? I have her, quoth he,but she hath not me, -possessing her, by her I am notpossest. Such another answer, quoth Pantagruel, was oncemade by a certain bouncing wench of Sparta¹ who beingasked, if at any time she had had to do with a man? No,quoth she, but sometimes men have had to do with me.Well then, quoth Rondibilis, let it be a neuter in physic,-as when we say a body is neuter, when it is neither sick norhealthful, and a mean in philosophy; that, by an abnegationof both extremes, and this, by the participation of the oneand of the other. Even as when lukewarm water is said tobe both hot and cold; or rather, as when time makes thepartition, and equally divides betwixt the two , a while inthe one, another while as long in the other opposite extremity. The holy apostle , quoth Hippothadeus, seemeth, asI conceive, to have more clearly explained this point, whenhe said, Those that are married, let them be as if they were notmarried; and those that have wives let them be as if they had3 Aphilosopher. ] Aristippus. He said this of Thaïs, the famous courtezan, whom he used to visit.• Sparta. ] See Plutarch, in his precepts about matrimony.106 [BOOK III. RABELAIS' WORKS.no wives at all. I thus interpret, quoth Pantagruel, thehaving and not having of a wife. To have a wife, is to havethe use of her in such a way as nature hath ordained, whichis for the aid, society, and solace of man, and propagating of his race. To have no wife is not to be uxorious, play thecoward, and be lazy about her, and not for her sake to distain the lustre of that affection which man owes to God; oryet for her to leave those offices and duties which he owesunto his country, unto his friends and kindred; or for herto abandon and forsake his precious studies, and other busi- nesses of account, to wait still on her will, her beck, and herbuttocks. If we be pleased in this sense to take having andnot having of a wife, we shall indeed find no repugnancy norcontradiction in the terms at all.CHAPTER XXXVI.A continuation of the answers of the Ephectic and Pyrrhonianphilosopher Trouillogan.IYou speak wisely, quoth Panurge, if the moon were greencheese. Such a tale once pissed my goose. I do not thinkbut that I am let down into that dark pit, in the lowermostbottom whereof the truth was hid, according to the sayingof Heracl*tus.' I see no whit at all, I hear nothing, understand as little, my senses are altogether dulled and blunted;truly I do very shrewdly suspect that I am enchanted.will now alter the former style of my discourse, and talk to him in another strain . Our trusty friend, stir not, nor imburse any; but let us vary the chance, and speak withoutdisjunctives . I see already, that these loose and ill-joinedmembers of an enunciation do vex, trouble, and perplex you.Now go on, in the name of God! Should I marry?TROUILLOGAN. There is some likelihood therein.PANURGE. But if I do not marry?TROUIL. I see in that no inconvenience.PAN. You do not?TROUIL. None, truly, if my eyes deceive me not.PAN. Yea, but I find more than five hundred.TROUIL. Reckon them.1 Heracl*tus. ] This is one of Rabelais' affected negligences, so familiar to him . He very well knew that this sentence was ascribedto Democritus. Nay, he says so somewhere, but he does not vouch- safe to remember it here.CHAP. XXXVI. ]PANTAGRUEL. 107PAN. This is an impropriety of speech, I confess; forI do no more thereby, but take a certain for an uncertainnumber, and posit the determinate term for what is indeterminate. When I say therefore five hundred, my meaningis , many.TROUIL. I hear you.PAN. Is it possible for me to live without a wife, in the name of all the subterranean devils?TROUIL. Away with these filthy beasts.PAN. Let it be then in the name of God; for my Salmigondinish people used to say, To lie alone, without a wife, iscertainly a brutish life . And such a life also was it assevered to be by Dido, in her lamentations.TROUIL. At your command.PAN. By the pody cody, I have fished fair; where are we now? But will you tell me? Shall I marry?TROUIL. Perhaps.PAN. Shall I thrive or speed well withal?TROUIL. According to the encounter.PAN. But if in myadventure I encounter aright, as I hopeI will, shall be I fortunate?TROUIL. Enough.PAN. Let us turn the clean contrary way, and brush ourformer words against the wool: what if I encounter ill?TROUIL. Then blame not me.PAN. But, of courtesy, be pleased to give me some advice. I heartily beseech you, what must I do?TROUIL. Even what thou wilt.PAN. Wishy washy; trolly, lolly.TROUIL. Do not invocate the name of any thing, I prayyou.PAN. In the name of God, let it be so! My actions shallbe regulated by the rule and square of your counsel. Whatis it that you advise and counsel me to do?TROUIL. Nothing.PAN. Shall I marry?TROUIL. I have no hand in it.PAN. Then shall I not marry?TROUIL, I cannot help it.PAN. If I never marry, I shall never be a cuckoMİ.TROUIL. I thought so.PAN. But put the case that I be married.108 [BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.TROUIL. Where shall we put it?PAN. Admit it be so then, and take my meaning, in that sense.TROUIL. I am otherwise employed.PAN. By the death of a hog, and mother of a toad, OLord, if I durst hazard upon a little fling at the swearinggame, though privily and under thumb, it would lighten theburden of my heart, and ease my lights and reins exceedingly. A little patience, nevertheless, is requisite. Well then, if I marry, I shall be a cuckold.TROUIL. One would say so.PAN. Yet if my wife prove a virtuous, wise, discreet, and chaste woman, I shall never be cuckolded.TROUIL. I think you speak congruously.PAN. Hearken.TROUIL. As much as you will.PAN. Will she be discreet and chaste? This is the onlypoint I would be resolved in.TROUIL. I question it.PAN. You never saw her.TROUIL. Not that I know of.PAN. Why do you then doubt of that which you know not.TROUIL. For a cause.PAN. And if you should know her.TROUIL. Yet more.PAN. Page, mylittle pretty darling, take here my cap, —Igive it to thee. Have a care you do not break the spectacles that are in it Go down to the lower court. Swear there halfan hour for me, and I shall in compensation of that favour swear hereafter for thee as much as thou wilt. But whoshall cuckold me?TROUIL. Somebody.PAN. By the belly of the wooden horse at Troy, MasterSomebody, I shall bang, belam thee, and claw thee well forthy labour.TROUIL. You say so .PAN. Nay, nay, that Nick in the dark cellar, who hath nowhite in his eye, carry me quite away with him, if, in thatcase, whensoever I go abroad from the palace of my domesticresidence, I do not, with as much circ*mspection as theyuse to ring mares in our country to keep them from beingCHAP. XXXVI.] PANTÁGRUEL. 109sallied by stoned horses, clap a Bergamasco lock upon mywife.TROUIL. Talk better.PAN. It is bien chien, chié chanté, well cacked, and cackled,sh*tten, and sung in matter of talk. Let us resolve on somewhat.TROUIL. I do not gainsay it.PAN. Have a little patience. Seeing I cannot on thisside draw any blood of you, I will try, if with the lancet ofmy judgment I be able to bleed you in another vein. Areyou married, or are you not?TROUIL. Neither the one nor the other, and both together.PAN. O the good God help us! By the death of a buffle- ox, I sweat with the toil and travail that I am put to, andfind my digestion broke off, disturbed, and interrupted; forall my phrenes, metaphrenes, and diaphragms, back, belly,midriff, muscles, veins, and sinews, are held in a suspense,and for a while discharged from their proper offices, to stretchforth their several powers and abilities, for incornifistibulating, and laying up into the hamper of my understanding your various sayings and answers.3TROUIL. I shall be no hinderer thereof.PAN. Tush, for shame! Our faithful friend, speak, are you married?TROUIL. I think so.PAN. You were also married before you had this wife.2 A Bergamasco lock. ] This precaution, which some Italians have thought proper to take with their wives, had like to have been introduced into France also, in the reign of Henry II., but several gallants of the court could not, without great dissatisfaction , behold the vast trade that was driven in these (serrature) padlocks by an Italian mer- chant, who had opened shop for that sort of ware at the fair of St. Ger- main. Being threatened to be flung into the river if he continued that traffic, he was forced to pack up his merchandise, and vend no more of his Italian contrivances; and since that time nobody has dealt in that commodity in France.3 Incornifistibulating. ] By cornifistibular, the people in and about Toulouse mean troubled, afflicted with an uneasiness of mind; buthere we have the proper signification of this word, and Rabelais seems to derive it from cornu (a horn) , fistula, (a whistle, ) and stipula, (astubble-pipe used by shepherds. ) I suppose our English words for those three things come from these Latin ones. So Rabelais uses thatmade-up word ( incornifistibulate) to signify the beating any thing into one's memory or head, as if it were done by a horn, a whistle, and apipe.110 RABELAIS WORKS. [BOOK III.TROUIL. It is possible.PAN. Had you good luck in your first marriage?TROUIL. It is not impossible.PAN. How thrive you with this second wife of yours?TROUIL. Even as it pleaseth my fatal destiny.PAN. But what in good earnest? Tell me-do you prosper well with her?TROUIL. It is likely.PAN. Come on, in the name of God. I vow, by theburden of Saint Christopher, that I had rather undertakethe fetching of a fart forth of the belly of a dead ass , thanto draw out of you a positive and determinate resolution.Yet shall I be sure at this time to have a snatch at you, andget my claws over you. Our trusty friend, let us shame thedevil of hell, and confess the verity. Were you ever acuckold? I say you who are here, and not that other you,who playeth below in the tennis- court?TROUIL. No, if it was not predestinated .PAN. By the flesh, blood, and body, I swear, reswear,forswear, abjure, and renounce he evades and avoids, shiftsand escapes me, and quite slips and winds himself out of my gripes and clutches.At these words Gargantua arose, and said, praised be thegood God in all things, but especially for bringing the worldinto that height of refinedness beyond what it was when Ifirst became acquainted therewith, that nowthe most learnedand most prudent philosophers are not ashamed to be seenentering in at the porches and frontispieces of the schools ofthe Pyrrhonian, Aporrhetic, Sceptic, and Ephetic sects .Blessed be the holy name of God! Veritably, it is like henceforth to be found an enterprise of much more easy undertaking, to catch lions by the neck, horses by the mane,oxen by the horns, bulls by the muzzle, wolves by the tail,goats by the beard, and flying birds by the feet, than to entrap such philsophers in their words. Farewell, my worthy,dear, and honest friends .When he had done thus speaking, he withdrew himselffrom the company. Pantagruel, and others with him wouldhave followed and accompanied him, but he would not permit them so to do. No sooner was Gargantua departed outof the banqueting-hall, than that Pantagruel said to the inEscapes me. ] Il m' eschappe. Anguilla'st: elabitur. Plautus in dolo.CHAP. XXXVI.] PANTAGRUEL. lilvited guests; Plato's Timæus, at the beginning always of asolemn festival convention, was wont to count those thatwere called thereto. We, on the contrary, shall at theclosure and end of this treatment, reckon up our number.One, two, three; where is the fourth? I miss my friendBridlegoose . Was not he sent for? Epistemon answered,-That he had been at his house to bid and invite him, butcould not meet with him; for that a messenger from theparliament of Myrelingois, in Myrelingues, was come to him ,"with a writ of summons, to cite and warn him personally toappear before the reverend senators of the High Courtthere, to vindicate and justify himself at the bar, of thecrime of prevarication laid to his charge, and to be peremptorily instanced against him, in a certain decree, judgment, orsentence lately awarded, given, and pronounced by him: andthat, therefore, he had taken horse, and departed in greathaste from his own house, to the end, that without peril ordanger of falling into a default, or contumacy, he might bethe better able to keep the prefixed and appointed time.I will, quoth Pantagruel, understand how that mattergoeth. It is now above forty years, that he hath been constantly the judge of Fonsbeton, during which space of time he hath given four thousand definitive sentences. Of twothousand three hundred and nine whereof, although appealwas made by the parties whom he had judicially condemned,from his inferior judicatory to the supreme court of the665 Was come to him. ] I shall give this period a literal and exact translation, for the sake of a note of M. Duchat's upon this place. " An usher or tipstaff, from the parliament of Myrelingois in Myrelingues,was come to summon him personally to appear, and, before the sena- tors, to render the reason of a certain sentence by him pronounced. "This is all our author says: not a word of prevarication, &c. Now,M. Duchat observes, from Innocent Gentilet's Anti- Machiavel, Part iii.Max. xxxv. In, and before, the reign of Louis XII. the magistrates(non-souverains) from whom there lay appeal, were not many in one and the same seat and degree of justice; nay, there was no more than one in each tribunal to administer justice; namely, a provost or ordinary judge in the first degree, and a lieutenant general de bailly or senéchal in the second degree. But, in the supreme courts of the par- liaments and grand council there were several; not however, in so great number as now." Thus, adds M. Duchat, our judge Bridlegoose(Bridoie) was alone responsible for a sentence which he alone had passed; and thence it comes, that, in France, at this time, by the sen tence of such and such a judge, is understood a certain sentence passed by the judge and counsellors of such or such a subaltern jurisdiction.112 [BOOK III, RABELAIS WORKS.parliament of Myrelingois, in Myrelingues, they were all othem nevertheless confirmed, ratified, and approved of byan order, decree, and final sentence of the said sovereigncourt, to the casting of the appellants, and utter overthrowof the suits wherein they had been foiled at law, for everand a day. That now, in his old age, he should be personally summoned, who in all the foregoing time of his lifehath demeaned himself so unblameably in the discharge ofthe office and vocation he had been called unto, it cannotassuredly be, that such a change hath happened without some notorious misfortune and disaster. I am resolved tohelp and assist him in equity and justice to the uttermostextent of my power and ability. I know the malice, despite and wickedness of the world to be so much morenow-a-days exasperated, increased, and aggravated by whatit was not long since, that the best cause that is, how justand equitable soever it be, standeth in great need to besuccoured, aided, and supported. Therefore presently, fromthis very instant forth, do I purpose, till I see the event andclosure thereof, most heedfully to attend and wait upon it,for fear of some under-hand tricky surprisal, cavilling pettifoggery, or fallacious quirks in law, to his detriment, hurt,or disadvantage.Then dinner being done, and the tables drawn and removed, when Pantagruel had very cordially and affectionately thanked his invited guests for the favour which hehad enjoyed of their company, he presented them withseveral rich and costly gifts, such as jewels, rings set withprecious stones, gold and silver vessels, with a great deal ofother sort of plate besides, and lastly, taking of them all hisleave, retired himself into an inner chamber.CHAPTER XXXVII.How Pantagruel persuaded Panurge to take counsel of afool.WHEN Pantagruel had withdrawn himself, he, by a littlesloping window in one of the galleries, perceived Panurge ina lobby not far from thence, walking alone, with the gesture,carriage, and garb of a fond dotard, raving, wagging, andshaking his hands, dandling, lolling, and nodding with hishead, like a cow bellowing for her calf; and, having thencalled him nearer, spoke unto him thus. You are at thisCHAP. XXXVII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 113present, as I think, not unlike to a mouse entangled in asnare, who the more that she goeth about to rid and unwindherself out of the gin wherein she is caught, by endeavouring to clear and deliver her feet from the pitch whereto theystick, the fouler she is bewrayed with it, and the morestrongly pestered therein. Even so is it with you . Forthe more that you labour, strive, and inforce yourself to disencumber, and extricate your thoughts out of the implicating involutions and fetterings of the grievous and lamentable gins and springs of anguish and perplexity, the greaterdifficulty there is in the relieving of you, and you remain faster bound than ever. Nor do I know for the removal ofthis inconveniency any remedy but one.Take heed, I have often heard it said in a vulgar proverb,The wise may be instructed by a fool. Seeing the answers and responses of sage and judicious men have in no mannerof way satisfied you, take advice of some fool, and possibly by so doing you may come to get that counsel which will beagreeable to your own heart's desire and contentment. Youknow how bythe advice and counsel and prediction of fools,many kings, princes, states, and commonwealths have beenpreserved, several battles gained, and divers doubts of amost perplexed intricacy resolved. I am not so diffident ofyour memory, as to hold it needful to refresh it with a quotation of examples; nor do I so far undervalue your judg ment, but that I think it will acquiesce in the reason of this my subsequent discourse. As he who narrowly takes heedto what concerns the dexterous management of his privateaffairs, domestic businesses, and those adoes which are confined within the strait-laced compass of one family, -who is attentive, vigilant, and active in the economic rule of hisown house, -whose frugal spirit never strays from home.-who loseth no occasion whereby he may purchase to himselfmore riches, and build up new heaps of treasure on his former wealth, -and who knows warily how to prevent theinconveniences of poverty, is called a worldly wise man,though perhaps in the second judgment of the intelligences which are above, he be esteemed a fool, -so, on the contraryis he most like, even in the thoughts of celestial spirits, tobe not only sage, but to presage events to come by divineinspiration, who laying quite aside those cares which are conducible to his body, or his fortunes, and, as it were VOL. II.I114 [BOOK III. RABEI AIS' WORKS.departing from himself, rids all his senses of terrene affections, and clears his fancies of those plodding studies which harbour in the minds of thriving men. All which neglectsof sublunary things are vulgarly imputed folly. After thismanner, the son of Picus, King of the Latins, the great soothsayer Faunus, was called Fatuus by the witless rabble ofthe common people. The like we daily see practised amongstthe comic players , whose dramatic rolls, in distribution of the personages, appoint the acting of the fool to him who isthe wisest of the troop. In approbation also of this fashionthe mathematicians allow the very same horoscope to princesand to sots. Whereof a right pregnant instance by them isgiven in the nativities of Æneas and Chorobus; the latterof which two is by Euphorion said to have been a fool; andyet had with the former the same aspects, and heavenlygenethliac influences.¹I shall not, I suppose, swerve much from the purpose inhand, if I relate unto you, what John Andrew² said uponthe return of a papal writ, which was directed to the mayorand burgesses of Rochelle, and after him by Panorme, uponthe same Pontifical canon; Barbatias on the Pandects, andrecently by Jason, in his councils, concerning Seyny John,'the noted fool of Paris, and Caillette's fore great grandfather.The case is this.1 Genethliac influences. ] I am ignorant in what astrologer, unless perhaps in Cardan , Rabelais has found that Æneas and Chorobus hadone and the same horoscope, and that fools and kings are born under the same constellation. For want of proofs to verify these two articles,I shall only say that the second has a great resemblance with the pro- verb, " Aut regem, aut fatuum, nasci oportere. " See Erasmus's Adages.2 John André, &c. ] André was a celebrated Florentine canonist of the fourteenth century; Antoine Beccadelli, or Panormita, a famouslitterateur and jurisconsult of Bologna, in the fourteenth century;André Barbatias, a Sicilian jurisconsult of the fifteenth century Jason Maino, a famous lawyer of the University of Padua, favoured by Louis XII.]3 Seyny John. ] This Seyny John, (or, as Rabelais has it , Seigni Joan, ) great- grandfather (bisaïeul ) to Caillette, was, in his time, known by the name of John the fool, and is here called by Rabelais, Seigni Joan or Johan, from Senex Johannes, to distinguish him from Johan,Fol de Madame, of whom Marot speaks in his epitaphs. Our author makes this Seigni Joan great-grandfather to the fool Caillette, because he was prior to him about a century; Caillette flourishing, or rather driveling about the year 1494. In the frontispiece of the Ship of Fools,printed in 1497, there is the picture of Seigni Joan, and that of Cail- lette; the latter as the patron of the new mode, and the former as head of those who still retain the old mode.CHAP. XXXVII.] PANTAGRUel. 113At Paris, in the roast-meat cookery of the Petit- Chastelet,before the cook-shop of one of the roast-meat- sellers of thatlane, a certain hungry porter was eating his bread, after hehad by parcels kept it a while above the reek and steam ofa fat goose on the spit, turning at a great fire, and found itso besmoked with the vapour, to be savoury; which thecook observing, took no notice, till after having ravined hispenny loaf, whereof no morsel had been unsmokified, hewas about decamping and going away. But, by your leave,as the fellow thought to have departed thence shot- free, themaster- cook laid hold upon him by the gorget, and demandedpayment for the smoke of his roast-meat. The porter answered, That he had sustained no loss at all, —that by whathe had done there was no diminution made of the flesh, -that he had taken nothing of his, and that therefore he wasnot indebted to him in anything . As for the smoke inquestion, that, although he had not been there, it wouldhowsoever have been evaporated: besides, that before thattime it had never been seen nor heard, that roast-meat smokewas sold upon the streets of Paris. The cook hereto replied,That he was not obliged nor any way bound to feed andnourish for nought a porter whom he had never seen before,with the smoke of his roast-meat, and thereupon swore, thatif he would not forthwith content and satisfy him with present payment for the repast which he had thereby got, thathe would take his crooked staves from off his back; which,instead of having loads thereafter laid upon them, should serve for fuel to his kitchen fires . Whilst he was goingabout so to do, and to have pulled them to him by one ofthe bottom rungs, which he had caught in his hand, thesturdy porter got out of his gripe, drew forth the knottycudgel, and stood to his own defence. The altercation waxedhot in words, which moved the gaping hoydens of the sottishParisians to run from all parts thereabouts, to see what theissue would be of that babbling strife and contention . Inthe interim of this dispute, to very good purpose SeynyJohn, the fool and citizen of Paris, happened to be there,whom the cook perceiving, said to the porter, Wilt thourefer and submit unto the noble Seyny John, the decision ofthe difference and controversy which is betwixt us? Yes,by the blood of a goose, answered the porter, I am content.Seyny John the fool, finding that the cook and porter had I 2116 [BOOK IIL RABELAIS' WORKS.compromised the determination of their variance and debateto the discretion of his award and arbitrement, after thatthe reasons on either side, whereupon was grounded themutual fierceness of their brawling jar, had been to the fulldisplayed and laid open before him, commanded the porterto draw out of the fob of his belt a piece of money, if he hadit. Whereupon the porter immediately without delay, inreverence to the authority of such a judicious umpire, putthe tenth part of a silver Philip into his hand. This littlePhilip Seyny John took, then set it on his left shoulder, totry by feeling if it was of a sufficient weight. After that,laying it on the palm of his hand, he made it ring and tingle,to understand by the ear if it was of a good alloy in themetal whereof it was composed. Thereafter he put it to theball or apple of his left eye, to explore bythe sight, if it waswell stamped and marked; all which being done, in a profound silence of the whole doltish people, who were therespectators of this pageantry, to the great hope of the cook's,and despair of the porter's prevalency in the suit that was inagitation, he finally caused the porter to make it sound several times upon the stall of the cook's shop. Then with apresidential majesty holding his bauble, sceptre- like, in hishand, muffling his head with a hood of marten skins, eachside whereof had the resemblance of an ape's face, sprucifiedup with ears of pasted paper, and having about his neck abucked ruff, raised, furrowed, and ridged, with pointingsticks of the shape and fashion of small organ pipes, he firstwith all the force of his lungs coughed two or three times,and then with an audible voice pronounced this followingsentence. The Court declareth, that the porter, who ate hisbread at the smoke of the roast, hath civilly paid the cookwith the sound of his money. And the said Court ordaineth, that every one return to his own home, and attend hisproper business, without costs and charges, and for a cause.This verdict, award, and arbitrement of the Parisian fooldid appear so equitable, yea, so admirable to the aforesaiddoctors, that they very much doubted, if the matter hadbeen brought before the sessions for justice of the saidSound of his money. ] Bocchoris, according to Plutarch, gave alalar judgment against the courtesan Thonis, who demanded in oney the price of her favours, from a young spark who had enjoyed emin imagination only. ]CHAP. XXXVIII.]PANTAGRUEL. 117place; or that the judges of the Rota at Rome had beenumpires therein; or yet that the Areopagites themselves hadbeen the deciders thereof; if by any one part, or all of themtogether, it had been so judicially sententiated and awarded.Therefore advise if you will be counselled by a fool .CHAPTER XXXVIII.How Tribouletis set forthandblazoned by Pantagruel and Panurge.By my soul, quoth Panurge, that overture pleaseth me exceedingly well. I will therefore lay hold thereon, and embrace it. At the very motioning thereof, my right entraii seemeth to be widened and enlarged, which was but just now hard- bound , contracted, and costive . But as we havehitherto made choice of the purest and most refined creamof wisdom and sapience for our counsel, so would I nowhave to preside and bear the prime sway in our consultation as very a fool in the supreme degree. Triboulet, 'quoth Pantagruel, is completely foolish, as I conceive. Yes,truly, answered Panurge, he is properly and totally a fool , aPantagruel. Panurge.Fatal f.Natural f.Jovial f.Mercurial f.Celestial f.Erratic f.Eccentric f.Etherial and Junonian f.Arctic f.Lunatic f.Ducal f.Common f.Lordly f.Palatin f.1 Triboulet. ] A buffoon, whom Epistemon saw in hell, had before been called by this name, and is the same that Francis Hotman, in his Matag. de Matagonibus, says that the King Louis XII . had in his retinue. Here an arrant fool is called Triboulet; from whence it is plainthat this word is properly applicable to any poor wretch that has atroubled spirit. Froissart, vol. iii. c. cxviii. "En Angleterre, pourceste saison, ils étoyent tous triboulez et en mauvais arroy." AndAlain Chartier, in his book of the Four Ladies."Et sont foulezEt par fortune triboulez. "At Toulouse, a man troubled with affliction is said to be treboulat: and when Marot, in one of his poems, says that Triboulet has brothers and sisters, he does not mean that that buffoon of Louis XII. was still alive,or that he had brothers and sisters; but only that, after Triboulet's death,there were still left in France fools, and people with troubled brains.Oudin renders Triboulet, " huomo grosso e corte;" and then Triboulet comes from tripe, and means fat-bellied.118 RABELAIS WORKS. [ BOOK III.Pantagruel.Heroic f.Genial f.Inconstant f.Earthly f.Principal f.Pretorian f.Panurje.Elected f.Salacious and Sporting f.Jocund and wanton f.Pimpled f.Freckled f.Bell- tinging f.Laughing and lecherous f.Nimming and filching f.Unpressed f.First broached f.Augustal f.Cæsarine f.Imperial f.Patriarchal f.Royal f.Original f.Loyal f.Episcopal f.Doctoral f.Monachal f.Fiscal f.Extravagant f.Writhed f.Canonical f.Such another f.Graduated f.Commensal f.Primolicentiated f.Trainbearing f.Supererogating f.Collateral f.Haunch and side f.ling f.Courtly f.Primipilary f.Triumphant f.Vulgar f.Domestic f.Exemplary f.Rare outlandish f.Satrapal f.Civil f.Popular f.Familiar f.Notable f.Favourized f.Latinized f.Ordinary f.Transcendent f.Rising f.Papal f.Consistorian f.Conclavist f.Bullist f.Synodal f.Doting and raving f.Singular and surpassing f.Special and excelling f.Metaphysical f.Extatical f.Predicamental and categoricf.Predicable and enunciatoryf.Decumane and superlative f.Nestling, ninny, and young- Dutiful and officious f.Optical and perspective f.Flitting, giddy, and unsteady f. Algoristic f.Brancher, novice, and co*ckney Algebraical f.f.Haggard, cross, and forward f.Cabalistical and massoreticalf.CHAP. XXXVIII. ]PANTAGRuel. 119Pantagruel. Panurge.Mail- coated f.Gentle, mild, and tractable f. Talmudical f.Algamalized f.Pilfering and Purloining f. Compendious f.Tail- grown f. Abbreviated f.Grey peckled f.Pleonasmical f.Capital f.Hair-brained f.Cordial f.Intimate f.Hepatic f.Cupshotten and swilling f.Splenetic f.Windy f.Legitimate f.Hyperbolical f.Anatomastical f.Allegorical f.Tropological f.Micher pincrust f.Heterocl*t f.Summist f.Abridging f.Azymathal f.Almicantarized f.Proportioned f.Chinnified f.Swollen and puffed- up f.Overco*ckrilifedled and fied f.Corallory f.Eastern f.Sublime f.Crimson f.Ingrained fCity f.Mast-headed f.Model f.Basely-accoutred f.Second notial f.Cheerful and buxom f.Solemn f.Annual f.Festival f.Recreative f.Morish f.Leaden- sealed f.Mandatory f.Compassionate f.Titulary f.Crooching, showking, ducking f.Grim, stern, harsh, and way.ward f.Well- hung and timbered f.Ill - clawed, pounced, and pawea f.Well-stoned f.Crabbed and unpleasing f.Winded and untainted f.Kitchen-haunting f.Lofty and stately f.Spitrack f.Architrave f.Pedestal f.Tetragonal f.Renowned f.Rheumatic f.Flaunting and braggadochieBoorish and counterfeit f. f.Pleasant f.Privileged f.Rustical f.Proper and peculiar f.Egregious f.Humorous and capricious f.Rude, gross, and absurd f.Large-measured f.120 [BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.Pantagruel.Ever ready f.Diapasonal f.Resolute f.Hieroglyphical f.Authentic f.Worthyf.Precious f.Fanatic f.Fantastical f.Symphatic f.Panic f.Limbecked and distilled f.Comportable f.Wretched and heartless fFooded f.Thick and threefold f.Panurge.Babble f.Down-right f.Broad- listed f.Downsical- bearing f.Stale and over- worn f.Saucy and swaggering f.Full-bulked f.Gallant and vainglorious f.Gorgeous and gaudy f.Continual and intermitting f.Rebasing and roundling f.Prototypal and precedenting f.Prating f.Catechetic f.Cacodoxical f.Damasked f.Fearny f.Unleavened f.Meridional f.Nocturnal f.Occidental f.Barytonant f.Pink and spot-powdered f.Musket-proof f.Pedantic f.Strouting f.Wood f.Greedy f.Senseless f.Godderlich f.Obstinate f.Contradictory f.Pedagogical f.Daft f.1 Drunken f.Peevish f.Prodigal f.Rash f.Plodding f.Trifling f.Astrological and figure-flinging f.Genethliac and horoscopal f.Knavish f.Idiot f.Blockish f.Beetle- headed f.Grotesque f.Impertinent f.Quarrelsome f.Unmannerly f.Captious and sophistical f.Soritic f.Catholoproton f.Hoti and Dioti f.Alphos and Catati f.PANTAGRUEL. If there was any reason why at Rome theQuirinal holiday of old was called the Feast of Fools; Iknow not, why we may not for the like cause institute inCHAP. XXXVIII.]PANTAGRUEL. 121AFrance the Tribouletic Festivals , to be celebrated and so lemnized over all the land.PANURGE. If all fools carried cruppers.2PANT. If he were the god Fatuus, of whom we havealready made mention, the husband of the goddess Fatua,his father would be Good Day, and his grand- mother Good Even.¹PAN. If all fools paced, albeit he be somewhat wry- legged,he would overlay at least a fathom at every rake. Let usgo toward him without any further lingering or delay; -weshall have, no doubt, some fine resolution of him. I amready to go, and long for the issue of our progress impatiently. I must needs, quoth Pantagruel, according to my former resolution therein, be present at Bridlegoose's trial.Nevertheless, whilst I shall be upon my journey towardsMyrelingues, which is on the other side of the river of Loire,I will dispatch Carpalim to bring along with him from Blois the fool Triboulet. Then was Carpalim instantly sent away,and Pantagruel at the same time, attended by his domestics,Panurge, Epistemon, Ponocrates, Friar John, Gymnast, Ryzotomus, and others, marched forward on the high road toMyrelingues.2 If all fools carried cruppers. ] What then? --Add, Triboulet would have his buttocks clawed off. Left out by Sir T. U. " Il auroit les fesses bien escourchées." Thus the best editions have it. In therest it is, " Il y auroit des fesses bien escourchées; " which being down- right nonsense, I do not wonder Sir T. U. did not understand it, and so left it out.3 Fatuus. ] A rural god: Rabelais calls him Fatuel, from Fatuellus;which likewise was the name he sometimes went by. The Camb.Dict. calls him King Oberon .Good day and good even. ] Bonadiés and Bonedée. Q. whether this may not refer to the Bona Dea of the ancients?5 Myrelingues, which is on the other side of the river Loire. ] Myrelin- gues, qui est de là la riviere de Loire; conformable to the three editions ofLyons, which in this are right; and so is Sir T. U.'s version.66 The other editions, by omitting the adverb là, and only saying,Myrelingues, qui est de la riviere de Loire, " would put one upon hunting for Myrelingues, on the river Loire. Now, it is plain this here means the parliament of Toulouse, called Myrelingues; as if one should say, millelangues, on account of the vast diversity of dialects, or rather jargonic- pedlers' French; which prevails throughout the extent of its whole jurisdiction.122 [BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.CHAPTER XXXIX.How Pantagruel was present at the trial of Judge Bridlegoose,'who decided causes and controversies in law by the chance andfortune ofthe dice.On the day following, precisely at the hour appointed, Pantagruel came to Myrelingues. At his arrival the presidents,senators, and counsellors prayed him to do them the honourto enter in with them, to hear the decision of all the causes,arguments, and reasons, which Bridlegoose in his own defence would produce, why he had pronounced a certain sentence, against the subsidy assessor, Toucheronde, 2 which didnot seem very equitable to that centumviral court. Pantagruel very willingly condescended to their desire, and accordingly entering in, found Bridlegoose sitting within themiddle ofthe inclosure of the said court of justice; who immediately upon the coming of Pantagruel, accompanied withthe senatorian members of that worshipful judicatory, arose,went to the bar, had his indictment read, and for all hisreasons, defences, and excuses, answered nothing else, butthat he was become old, and that his sight of late was verymuch failed, and become dimmer than it was wont to be;instancing therewithal many miseries and calamities, whichold age bringeth along with it, and are concomitant towrinkled elders; which not. per Archid. d. l . lxxxvi. c. tanta.By reason of which infirmity he was not able so distinctlyand clearly to discern the points and blots of the dice, asformerly he had been accustomed to do: whence it mightvery well have happened, said he, as old dim-sighted Isaac took Jacob for Esau, that I, after the same manner, at thedecision of causes and controversies in law, should have been1 Judge Bridlegoose. ] Beaumarchais has introduced him under the nameof Bridoison, in his Marriage of Figaro. ]2 Toucheronde. ] A nickname, at pleasure, for a taxgatherer, who touches, i. e. receives the tax, which those of his parish pay in money round.3 Centumviral court. ] In the edition of 1547, and in that of 1553 we read bis- centumvirale: which supposes there was at that time, inFrance, such a parliament as consisted of two hundred judges. The new editions, also the three of Lyons, that of 1596, and that of 1626,have centumvirale; which quadrates less ill with what is said in the Anti-Machiavel, part iii. Max. 35. that anciently the number of counschors of a supreme tribunal was not great in comparison of what has unce been seen.CHAP. XXXIX]PANTAGRUEL. 123mistaken in taking a quatre for a cinque, or trois for a deuce.This, I beseech your worships, quoth he, to take into yourserious consideration , and to have the more favourable opinionofmyuprightness, (notwithstanding the prevarication whereofI am accused, in the matter of Toucheronde's sentence, ) forthat at the time of that decree's pronouncing I only had madeuse of my small dice; and your worships, said he, knew very well, how by the most authentic rules of the lawit is provided, That the imperfections of nature shouldnever be imputed unto any for crimes and transgressions; asappeareth, ff. de re milit. l. qui cum uno. ff. de reg. Jur. l.fere. ff. de adil. edict. per totum, ff. de term. mod. 1. DivusAdrianus, resolved by Lud. Rom. in l . si. vero. ff. Sol. Matr.And who would offer to do otherwise, should not therebyaccuse the man, but nature, and the all- seeing providence ofGod, as is evident in l. maximum vitium, c. de lib. prætor.What kind of dice, quoth Trinquamelle, grand presidentof the said court, do you mean, my friend Bridlegoose? Thedice, quoth Bridlegoose, of sentences at law, decrees, and peremptory judgments, Alea Judiciorum, whereof is written,Per Doct. 26. qu. 2. cap. sort. l . nec emptio ff. de contrahend.empt. 1. quod debetur. ff. de pecul. et ibi Bartol. , and whichyour worships do, as well as I, use, in this glorious sovereigncourt of yours. So do all other righteous judges in their decision of processes, and final determination of legal differences, observing that which hath been said thereof by D.Henri. Ferrandat, et not. gl. in c. fin. de sortil. et l. sed cum ambo. ff. dejud. Ubi. Docto. Mark, that chance and fortuneare good, honest, profitable, and necessary for ending of, and putting a final closure to dissensions and debates in suits atlaw. The same hath more clearly been declared by Bald.Bartol. et Alex. c. communia de leg. l. si duo. But how is itthat you do these things? asked Trinquamelle. I verybriefly, quoth Bridlegoose, shall answer you, according to the doctrine and instructions of Leg. ampliorem §. in refutatoriis.♦ Trinquamellé, grand president. ] In old time, in France, they used to say grand president instead of first president. Trinc' amollos, in the Toulousain language, signifies a bully, whose whole courage lies in hacking (trancher) boldly through the middle of the kernels (amandes)of all sorts of nuts. Under this name is here characterised a first president; inasmuch as the fines (amendes, ) to be levied on the effects of those condemned by arrêt, are by him adjudged, one third part to the public treasure, another to the poor, and the other third to the prosecutor.124 [BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.c. de appel.; which is conformable to what is said in Gloss. l. 1 .ff. quod. met. causa. Gaudent brevitate moderni. My practice istherein the same with that of your other worships , and asthe custom of the judicatory requires, unto which our lawcommandeth us to have regard, and by the rule thereof stillto direct and regulate our actions and procedures; ut not.extra. de consuet. c. ex literis et ibi innoc. For having well andexactly seen, surveyed, overlooked, reviewed, recognized,read, and read over again, turned and tossed over, seriouslyperused and examined the bills of complaint, accusations,impeachments, indictments, warnings, citations , summonings,comparitions, appearances, mandates, commissions, delegations, instructions, informations, inquests, preparatories, productions, evidences, proofs, allegations, depositions, crossspeeches, contradictions, supplications, requests, petitions,inquiries, instruments of the deposition of witnesses, rejoinders, replies, confirmations of former assertions, duplies,triplies, answers to rejoinders, writings, deeds, reproaches,disabling of exceptions taken, grievances, salvation- bills,re-examination of witnesses, confronting of them together,declarations, denunciations, libels , certificates , royal missives,letters of appeal, letters of attorney, instruments of compulsion, delinatories , anticipatories , evocations, messages, dimissions, issues, exceptions, dilatory pleas, demurs, compositions,injunctions, reliefs, reports, returns, confessions, acknow- ledgements, exploits , executions, and other such like confects,and spiceries, both at the one and the other side, as a goodjudge ought to do, conform to what hath been noted thereupon. Spec. de ordination. Paragr. 3. et Tit. de Offi. omn. jud.paragr. fin. et de rescriptis præsentat. parag. 1.-I posit onthe end of a table in my closet, all the pokes and bags ofthe defendant, and then allow unto him the first hazard ofthe dice, according to the usual manner of your other worships. And it is mentioned, l. favorabiliores ff. de reg. jur. etin cap. cum sunt eod. tit. lib. 6. which saith, Quum suntpartium jura obscura, reo potius favendum est quam auctori. "That being done, I thereafter lay down upon the other endof the same table the bags and sachels of the plaintiff, asyour other worships are accustomed to do, visum visu, justover against one another: for, Oppositajuxta se posita clariusVisum Visu. ] Whence the French preposition vis- à-vis, I suppose;i.. over against.66CHAP. XL. ]PANTAGRUEL. 125elucesc*nt: ut not. in lib. 1. parag. Videamus. ff. de his qui suntsui vel alienijuris, et in l. munerum § mixta ff. de mun. et hon.Then do I likeways and semblably throw the dice for him,and forthwith liver him his chance. But, quoth Trinquamelle, my friend, how come you to know, understand, andresolve, the obscurity of these various and seeming contrarypassages, in law, which are laid claim to by the suitors andpleading parties? Even just, quoth Bridlegoose, after thefashion of your other worships: to wit, when there aremany bags on the one side, and on the other, I then use mylittle small dice, after the customary manner of your otherworships, in obedience to the law, Semper in stipulationibusff.de reg. jur. and the law versale verifieth' that Eod. tit. semperin obscuris quod minimum est sequimur: canonized in c. inobscuris, eod. tit. lib . 6. I have other large great dice, fair,and goodly ones, which I employ in the fashion that yourother worships use to do, when the matter is more plain,clear, and liquid, that is to say, when there are fewer bags.But when you have done all these fine things, quoth Trinquamelle, how do you, my friend, award your decrees, andpronounce judgment? Even as your other worships, answered Bridlegoose; for I give out sentence in his favourunto whom hath befallen the best chance by dice, ' judiciary,tribunian, pretorial, what comes first. So our laws command, ff. qui pot. in pign. l. creditor. c. de consul. 1. Et de regul. jur. in 6. Qui prior est tempore potior estjure.CHAPTER XL.How Bridlegoose giveth reasons , why he looked over those lawpapers which he decided by the chance of the dice.YEA, but, quoth Trinquamelle, my friend, seeing it is by theYour other worships. ] Vous autres messieurs: a Gallicism. It only means in English your worships. This pronoun autres sounds oddly in English; but it is a beautiful redundancy in French, and in other languages too. Thus, I remember, the answer, sent back by the Spanish governor at Port St. Mary's to the late Duke of Ormond's summons to submit to Charles III., was " Nos otros Espagnoles nomudamos el Rey. " We (other) Spaniards don't use to change our kings.Verifieth. ] Versifieth, Rabelais says; for that law is a perfect pentameter; " Semper, in obscuris, quod minimum est sequimur. "Versale means royal and sometimes text hand. Cotgr.8 Chance by dice, &c ] Judiciary, tribunian, pretorial, are three synonymous expressions. Chance judiciary, aleu judiciorum, showathe uncertainty of judgments.126 [BOOK III. RABELAIS' WORKS.lot, chance, and throw of the dice that you award yourjudgments and sentences, why do not you deliver up these fairthrows and chances, the very same day and hour, withoutany further procrastination or delay, that the controvertingparty- pleaders appear before you? To what use can thosewritings serve you, those papers, and other procedures contained in the bags and pokes of the law- suitors? To thevery same use, quoth Bridlegoose, that they serve your otherworships. They are behooful unto me, and serve my turnin three things very exquisite, requisite, and authentic .First, For formality- sake; the omission whereof, that itmaketh all, whatever is done, to be of no force nor value, isexcellently well proved, by Spec. 1. tit. de instr. edit. et tit. derescript. present. Besides that, it is not unknown to you,who have had many more experiments thereof than I, howoftentimes, in judicial proceedings, the formalities utterly destroy the materialities and substances of the causes andmatters agitated; for Forma mutata, mutatur substantia. f.ad exhib. I. Julianus ff. ad. leg. fals. l. si is qui quadraginta.Et extra. de decim. c. ad audientiam, et de celebrat miss. c. inquadam.Secondly, They are useful and steadable to me, even as untoyour other worships, in lieu of some other honest and healthful exercise. The late Master Othoman Vadat, ' [Vadere, ] aprime physician, as you would say, Cod. de Commit, et Archi.lib. 12, hath frequently told me, That the lack and default ofbodily exercise is the chief, if not the sole and only, causeof the little health and short lives of all officers of justice,such as your worships and I am. Which observation wassingularly well, before him, noted and remarked by Bartholus in lib. 1. c. de sent. quæ pro eo quod. Therefore is it that thepractice of such- like exercitations is appointed to be laidhold on by your other worships, and consequently not to bedenied unto me, who am of the same profession; Quia accessorium naturam sequitur principalis, de reg. jur. l. 6. et l.1 Othoman Vadat, a prime physician. ] His name, in Rabelais, is Vadere. First physician, i . e. one of those physicians (in point of rank) of whom the Code speaks, l . xii . t . xiii . " De Comitibus et Archiatris Sacri Palatii. " Michael Vataire, first physician to the Duke of Alençon, in 1574, was, in all likelihood , the son of this Othoman.See the Duke De Never's Memoirs, Ambrose Paré (Paræus, alias Cheek) Introd . to Chirurgery, and Simon Golart's admirable and me- morable history.CHAP. XL. ]PANTAGRUEL. 127cum principalis, et l. nihil dolo. ff. eod. tit. ff. de fide-jus. l.fide-jus, et extra de officio deleg. cap. 1. Let certain honest andrecreative sports and plays of corporeal exercises be allowedand approved of; and so far, ff. de allus. et aleat, l. solent. etauthent. et omnes obed. in princ. coll. 7. et ff. de præscript. verb.1. sigratuitam et l. 1, cod. de spect. l. 11. Such also is theopinion of D. Thomæ, in secunda, secundæ, Q. I. 168. Quotedto very good purpose, by D. Albert de Rosa, who fuit magnuspracticus, and a solemn doctor, as Barbatias attesteth in principiis consil. Wherefore the reason is evidently and clearly deduced and set down before us in gloss. in proemio ff. par neautem tertii.Interpone tuis interdum gaudia curis.In very deed, once, in the year a thousand four hundredfourscore and nine, having a business concerning the portion and inheritance of a younger brother depending in thecourt and chamber of the four High Treasurers of France,whereinto as soon as ever I got leave to enter, by a pecuniarypermission of the usher thereof, -as your other worshipsknow very well, that Pecuniæ obediunt omnia, and there, saysBaldus, in l. singularia ff. si cert. pet. et Salic, in l. receptitia.Cod. de constit. pecuni. et Card. in Clem. 1. de baptism. —I foundthem all recreating and diverting themselves at the playcalled muss, either before or after dinner: to me, truly, it isa thing altogether indifferent, whether of the two it was.provided that hic not. , that the game of the muss is honest,healthful, ancient, and lawful, a Muscho inventore, de quo cod.depetit. hæred. l. si post motam, et Muscarii. Such as playand sport at the muss are excusable in and by law, lib. 1. c.de excus. artific. lib. 10. And at the very same time wasMaster Tielman Piquet one of the players of that game muss. There is nothing that I do better remember, for helaughed heartily, when his fellow-members of the aforesaidjudicial chamber spoiled their caps in swingeing of his shoulders. He, nevertheless, did even then say unto them, thatthe banging and flapping of him to the waste and havoc oftheir caps, should not, at their return from the palace totheir own houses, excuse them from their wives, Per c. extra.2 Tielman Picquet. ] Afamily of Montpellier; of which, in 1490,was Honorious Picquet, one of the four physic-professors then estab- lished by Charles VIII. in the university of Montpellier. See Juh.Steph. Strobelberger, Hist. Monspel.128 [BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.depræsumpt. et ibi gloss. Now, resolutorie loquendo, I shouldsay, according to the style and phrase of your other worships, that there is no exercise, sport, game, play, nor recreation in all this palatine, palacial, or parliamentary world,more aromatizing and fragrant, than to empty and void bagsand purses-turn over papers and writings-quote marginsand backs of scrolls and rolls , fill panniers, and take inspection of causes, Ex Bart. et Joan. de Pra. in l. falsa de condit.et demonst. ff.Thirdly, I consider, as your own worships used to do,that time ripeneth and bringeth all things to maturity,—thatby time everything cometh to be made manifest and patent,-and that time is the father of truth and virtue. Gloss.in l. 1. cod. de servit authent. de restit. et ea quæ pa. et spec.tit. de requisit. cons. Therefore is it, that after the mannerand fashion of your other worships, I defer, protract, delay,prolong, intermit, surcease, pause, linger, suspend, prorogate,drive out, wire-draw, and shift off the time of giving a definitive sentence, to the end that the suit or process, beingwell fanned and winnowed, tossed and canvassed to and fro,narrowly, precisely, and nearly garbelled, sifted, searched,and examined, and on all hands exactly argued, disputed,and debated, may, by succession of time, come at last to itsfull ripeness and maturity. By means whereof, when thefatal hazard of the dice ensueth thereupon, the parties castor condemned by the said aleatory chance will with muchgreater patience, and more mildly and gently, endure and bear up the disastrous load of their misfortune, than if theyhad been sentenced at their first arrival unto the court, asnot. gl. ff. de excus. tut. l. tria onera." Portatur leviter quod portat quisque libenter. "On the other part, to pass a decree or sentence, when theaction is raw, crude, green, unripe, and unprepared as at thebeginning, a danger would ensue of a no less inconveniencythan that which the physicians have been wont to say befalleth to him in whom an imposthume is pierced before it beripe, or unto any other, whose body is purged of a strong predominating humour before its digestion. For as it is written, in authent. hæc constit. in Innoc. de consist. princip. —sois the same repeated in gloss. in c. cæterum, extra de juram,' Aromatizing. ] These dusty papers in the end bring good spices Jees) to those who turn them over.CHAF. XLI. PANTAGRUEL. 129calumn. Quod medicamenta morbis exhibent, hoc jura negotiis.Nature furthermore admonisheth and teacheth us to gatherand reap, eat and feed on fruits when they are ripe, and not before . Instit. de rer. div. paragr. is ad quem. et ff. de action.empt. 1. Julianus. To marry likewise our daughters whenthey are ripe, and no sooner, ff. de donation , inter vir, et uxor.1. cum. hic status. paragr. si quis sponsam et 27 qu. 1. c. sicut dicit gloss."Jam matura thoro plenis adoleverat annis Virginitas."And, in a word, she instructeth us to do nothing of anyconsiderable importance, but in a full maturity and ripeness,23 q. 1. § ult. et 23. de c. ultimo.CHAPTER XLI.How Bridlegoose relateth the history of the reconcilers of parties at variance in matters of law.I REMEMBER to the same purpose, quoth Bridlegoose, incontinuing his discourse, that in the time when at PoictiersI was a student of law under Brocadium Juris,' there wasat Semerve one Peter Dendin,2 a very honest man, carefullabourer of the ground, fine singer in a church desk, of goodrepute and credit, and older than the most aged of all your1 Brocadium Juris. ] In the reign of Louis XII. , John Petit, bookseller of Paris, printed in 16mo, in Gothic character, a small volume,intitled , Brocardia Juris . This book, whose very title Bridlegoose cor- rupts, the good man makes to be the name of the professor under whom he studied law at Poictiers. And, if we are to believe Perrin Dendin ,another ingenious and learned man, contemporary with Bridlegoose,the council of Lateran and the progmatic sanction were likewise two persons he had seen in his youthful days, so that, if we may give credit to Rabelais, before the restoration of learning the French lawyers were,in point of knowledge, much upon a level with a certain Venetian po- desta, (chief magistrate, ) of whom Poggius relates, that a priest, who was pleading before that judge, having alleged the authority of a cer- tain clementine and I know not what novelle, the podesta, who took that papal constitution , and that imperial law for two young wenchesof the priest's acquaintance, reproved him severely, for daring to pro- duce, in so grave a court, the evidence of two of his concubines.2 Peter Dendin.] Rabelais here lashes a certain judge, sitting upon a stone (pierre) instead of a bench, and dangling his legs just as the sound ofthe bells seemed to go, din , dan, din. On one ofthese seats , with- out any footstool, still to be seen at Metz in the Place d'Armes, the highsheriff formerly gave audience, like Dendin. [ Racine has given this name to the chief personage in his comedy of the Plaideurs. ]VOL. II. K130 RABELAIS' WORKS. [BOOK III.worships; who was wont to say, that he had seen the greatand goodly good man, the Council of Lateran,³ with his wideand broad- brimmed red hat. As also , that he had beheldand looked upon the fair and beautiful pragmatical sanction,his wife, with her huge rosary or patenotrian chapelet of jetbeads, hanging at a large sky- coloured riband . This honestman compounded, attoned, and agreed more differences, controversies, and variances at law, than had been determined,voided, and finished during his time in the whole palace ofPoictiers , in the auditory of Montmorillon , and in the townhouse of the old Partenay. This amicable disposition ofhis rendered him venerable, and of great estimation, sway,power, and authority throughout all the neighbouring placesof Chauvigny, Nouaillé, Legugé, Vivonne, Mezeaux, Estables, and other bordering and circumjacent towns, villages ,and hamlets. All their debates were pacified by him; heput an end to their brabling suits at law, and wrangling differences. By his advice and counsels were accords and reconcilements no less firmly made, than if the verdict of asovereign judge had been interposed therein, although, invery deed, he was no judge at all , but a right honest man, asyou may well conceive , ―arg. in l. sed si unius ff. de jurejur. et de verbis obligatoriis l. continuus . There was not a hogkilled within three parishes of him, whereof he had notsome part of the haslet and puddings. He was almostevery day invited either to a marriage- banquet, christeningfeast, an uprising or women-churching treatment, a birthday's anniversary, solemnity, a merry frolic gossiping, orotherwise to some delicious entertainment in a tavern, tomake some accord and agreement between persons at odds,and in debate with one another. Remark what I say; forhe never yet settled and compounded a difference betwixtany two at variance , but he straight made the parties agreedand pacified to drink together, as a sure and infallible tokenand symbol of a perfect and completely well- cemented reThe Council of Lateran. ] This council, of which Perrin Dendin makes a goodly good man, commenced in 1512, and ended in 1517.The pragmatic sanction of Charles VII. was the bone of contention at all the councils, wherever the Gallican and Romish church met face to face. ]Montmorillon. ] A small town on the frontiers of Poitou and theLimosin, where Francis I. afterwards established a presidial. See Beza'z Eccl. HistCHAP. XLI1.. ]PANTAGRUEL. 181conciliation, a sign of a sound and sincere amity, and propermark of a new joy and gladness to follow thereupon, -Utnot. per doct. ff. de peric . et com. rei vend. l. 1. He had a son,whose name was Tenot Dendin, a lusty, young, sturdy,frisking roister, so help me God, who likewise, in imitationof his peace- making father, would have undertaken andmeddled with the making up of variances and deciding ofcontroversies between disagreeing and contentious partypleaders as you know,66 Sæpe solet similis filius esse patri.Et sequitur leviter filia matris iter."Ut ait gloss. 6, quæst. I. c. Si quis, gloss. de cons. dist. 5. c.2. fin. et est. not. per Doct. cod. de impub. et aliis substit. l. ult.et l. legitime. ff. de stat. hom, gloss. in l. quod si nolit, ff. de ædil.edict. l. quisquis c. ad leg. Jul. majest. excipio filios à monialisusceptos ex Monacho, per gloss. in c. impudicas. 27. quæstione.1. And such was his confidence to have no worse success thanhis father, that he assumed unto himself the title of Lawstrife- settler. He was likewise in these pacificatory negotiations so active and vigilant, -for, Vigilantibus jura subveniunt. ex l. pupillus. ff. quæ in fraud. cred. et ibid. l. non enim.et instit. in proam. —that when he had smelt, heard, andfully understood, ―ut ff. si quando paup. fec. l. Agaso. gloss.in verb. olfecit, id est, nasum ad culum posuit-and found thatthere was any where in the country a debateable matterat law, he would incontinently thrust in his advice, and soforwardly intrude his opinion in the business, that he madeno bones of making offer, and taking upon him to decideit, how difficult soever it might happen to be, to the fullcontentment and satisfaction of both parties. It is written,Qui non laborat non manducat; and the said gl. ff. de damn.Olfecit, &c. ] This law speaks of such creatures, as by smelling at the vent of their females, judge whether they want to be served or no.6 Non manducat. ] Rabelais has it, " Qui non laborat , non manige ducat. " That is, in Languedocian jargon, he who works not, does notfeel (handle) the ducats; i . e. does not grow rich; gets nothing.Rabelais, who loved allusions, here makes one, from the Languedocian manige ducat to the Latin manducat. Thus, instead of qui non laborat,non manducat, he has said, with as good sense, though in two languages,qui non laborat, non manige ducat. The Languedocian maniger for manier, comes from the Italian maneggiare; and from maniger, though obsolete, comes the word manigance, covert- dealing, private-shuffling.secret- practising, closeting, packing, &c. , alluding to handling, fingering,feeling; but enough of this, though not too much for those who are pos.K 2132 RABELAIS' WORKS. [BOCK III.infect. l. quamvis and Currere plus que le pas vetulam compel 1.lit egestas. gloss. ff. de lib. agnosc . 1. si quis pro qua facit. I. si plures. c. de cond. incert. But so hugely great was hismisfortune in this his undertaking, that he never composedany difference, how little soever you may imagine it mighthave been, but that, instead of reconciling the parties atodds, he did incense , irritate, and exasperate them to ahigher point of dissension and enmity than ever they were at before. Your worships know, I doubt not that,Sermo datur cunctis, animi sapientia paucis."Gl.ff. de alien. jud. mut. caus. fa. lib. 2. This administered unto the tavern- keepers, wine- drawers and vintners of Semerve an occasion to say, that under him they had not in the space of a whole year so much reconciliation- wine, forso were they pleased to call the good wine of Legugé, as under his father they had done in one half hour's time. Ithappened a little while thereafter, that he made a mostheavy regret thereof to his father, attributing the causes of his bad success in pacificatory enterprizes to the perversity,stubbornness, froward , cross , and backward inclinations ofthe people of his time; roundly, boldly, and irreverently upbraiding, that if, but a score of years before the world hadbeen so wayward, obstinate, pervicacious, implacable, andout of all square, frame, and order, as it was then, his fatherhad never attained to and acquired the honour and title ofStrife-appeaser, so irrefragably, inviolably, and irrevocably as he had done. In doing whereof Tenot did heinously transgress against the law which prohibiteth children to theactions of their parents; per gl. et Bart. l. 3. paragr. si quis.ff.de cond. ob caus. et authent. de nept. par. sed quod sancitum . col.4. To this the honest old father answered thus. My sonDendin, when Don Oportet taketh place, this is the coursewhich we must trace. gl, c. de appell. l . eos etiam. For thesessed of Rabelais in French, and are willing to understand what he means by his odd and seemingly unaccountable language.¹ Currere plus que le pas vetulam compellit egestas. ] I know not well what plus que le pas means, unless it is pacing (or else trotting.) Then the whole sentence will bear this translation, which, by the bye, is not translated at all, either by Sir T. U. or Mr. Motteaux. Need makesthe old wife gallop, instead of trotting or pacing. (Plus que le pas )It is an hexameter, half French, half Latin.When Don Oportet, &c. ] A rhyming law-proverb,"Quand Oportet vient en place ,Il convient qu'ainsi se face."CHAP. XLI.] PANTAGRUEL. 133road that you went upon was not the way to the fuller's mill,nor in any part thereof was the form to be found whereinthe hare did sit. Thou hast not the skill and dexterity of settling and composing differences. Why? Because thoutakest them at the beginning, in the very infancy and budas it were, when they are green, raw, and indigestible . YetI know, handsomely and featly, how to compose and settlethem all. Why? Because I take them at their decadence,in their weaning, and when they are pretty well digested .So saith Gloss."Dulcior est fructus post multa pericula ductus."L. non moriturus. c. de contrahend. et committ. stip. Didst thouever hear the vulgar proverb, " Happy is the physician,whose coming is desired at the declension of a disease?"For the sickness being come to a crisis is then upon the decreasing hand, and drawing towards an end, although thephysician should not repair thither for the cure thereof;whereby, though nature wholly do the work, he bears awaythe palm and praise thereof. My pleaders , after the samemanner, before I did interpose my judgment in the reconciling of them, were waxing faint in their contestations.Their altercation heat was much abated, and, in decliningfrom their former strife, they of themselves inclined to afirm accommodation of their differences; because therewanted fuel to that fire of burning rancour and despightfulwrangling, whereof the lower sort of lawyers were thekindlers. That is to say, their purses were emptied of coin,they had not a win in their fob, nor penny in their bagwherewith to solicit and present their actions."Deficiente pecu, deficit omne, nia. "There wanted then nothing but some brother to supplythe place of a paranymph, brawl- broker, proxenete, or mediator, who acting his part dexterously, should be the firstbroacher of the motion of an agreement, for saving both theone and the other party from that hurtful and pernicious shame, whereof he could not have avoided the imputation,when it should have been said, that he was the first whoyielded and spoke of a reconcilement; and that, therefore ,his cause not being good. and being sensible where his shoelid pinch him, he was willing to break the ice, and make.he greater haste to prepare the way for a condescendment134 RABELAIS' WORKS. BOOK III.to an amicable and friendly treaty. Then was it that Icame in pudding time, Dendin, my son, nor is the fat ofbacon more relishing to boiled peas, than was my verdictthen agreeable to them. This was my luck, my profit, andgood fortune. I tell thee, my jolly son Dendin, that by this rule and method I could settle a firm peace, or at least clapup a cessation of arms, and truce for many years to comebetwixt the Great King and the Venetian State, —the Emperor and the Cantons of Switzerland, —the English and theScots, and betwixt the pope and the Ferrarians . Shall Igo yet further? Yea, as I would have God to help me, betwixt the Turk and the Sophy, the Tartars and the Muscoviters. Remark well, what I am to say unto thee. I wouldtake them at that very instant nick of time, when both thoseof the one and the other side should be weary and tired ofmaking war, when they had voided and emptied their owncashes and coffers of all treasure and coin, drained and exhausted the purses and bags of their subjects , sold and mortgaged their domains and proper inheritances, and totallywasted, spent, and consumed the munition, furniture, provision, and victuals that were necessary for the continuance ofa military expedition . There I am sure, by God, or by hismother, that, would they, would they not, in spite of allteeth , they should be forced to take a little respite andbreathing time to moderate the fury and cruel rage of their ambitious aims. This is the doctrine in Gl. 37. d. c. si quando.Odero, si potero; si non, invitus amabo.The great king and the Venetians. ] Louis XII. , when he took from the Venetians almost all their terra firma. It is related of Innocent X. that one day, as he was looking down from his window, to see two fellows fighting. Cardinal Pancirola asked his holiness, if he would not pleaseto have somebody go and part them. No, no, said the pope, let them alone. Soon after, these two combatants gave over, shook hands, and went and drank together. Then said his holiness to the cardinal, " Cosi faranno gli Spagnuoli e Francesi; dopo che saranno strácchi di battersi,fra di loro s' accorderanno senza che alcuno impieghi la sua opera .'Just so will it be with the Spaniards and French; when they are weary of fighting, they will agree of themselves, without anybody's needing to interpose their mediation . See tom. ii. of the Miscellanies, published by Bonaventure d'Argonne, prior of the Chartreuse de Gaillon, under the name of Vigneul Marville. Here, and before, the King of France is styled the great king, after the example of the Asiatic Greeks, who , by way of excellence, used to call the King of Persia the great king.CHAP. XLII . ] PANTAGRUEL. 135CHAPTER XLII.How suits at law are bred at first, and how they come afterwards to their perfect growth.FOR this cause, quoth Bridlegoose, going on in his discourse, I temporize and apply myself to the times, as yourother worships use to do, waiting patiently for the maturityof the process, the full growth and perfection thereof in allits members, to wit, the writings and the bags. Arg. in l. simajor. c. commun. divid. et de cons, di 1. c. solemnitates, et ibi gl.A suit in law at its production, birth, and first beginning,seemeth to me, as unto your other worships, shapeless, without form or fashion, incomplete, ugly, and imperfect even as abear, ' at his first coming into the world, hath neither hands,skin, hair, nor head, but is merely an inform, rude, and illfavoured piece and lump of flesh, and would remain still so ,if his dam, out of the abundance of her affection to her hopeful cub, did not with much licking put his members into thatfigure and shape which nature had provided for those of anarctic and ursinal kind; ut not. Doct. ad. l . Aquil. 1. 2. in fin.Just so do I see, as your other worships do, processes andsuits of law, at their first bringing forth, to be numberless,"without shape, deformed, and disfigured, for that then theyconsist only of one or two writings, or copies of instruments,through which defect they appear unto me, as to your otherworships, foul, loathsome, filthy, and mis- shapen beasts.³ Butwhen there are heaps of these legiformal papers packed,piled, laid up together, impoked, insacheled , and put up inbags, then is it that with a good reason we may term that1 A bear- -hath neither hands, &c . ] Rabelais ' words are,hath neither feet, hands, &c. n'ha pieds, ne mains, peau, poil, ne teste.Sir T. U. has left out feet, and so he might all the rest, for it is all afib. Aristotle and Pliny after him, (lib. viii . cap. xxxvi. ) are the persons that tell us this fine story. Une main, by the way, signifies, inFrench and Spanish, not only a human hand, but the forefoot of a quad- ruped likewise.2 Numberless, &c. ] This " numberless " murders the whole thought,being the very reverse of it. It should be shapeless, informes: not aword of numberless.3 Foul- -beasts. ] According to the proverb," C'est une laide beste,Qui n'a queue ni teste."That's an ugly beast indeed,Which has neither tail nor head.136 [ BOOK III .RABELAIS' WORKS.suit, to which, as pieces, parcels, parts, portions, and members thereof, they do pertain, and belong, well- formed andfashioned, big-limbed, strong set, and in all and each of itsdimensions most completely membered. Because forma datesse rei. l. si is qui . ff. ad leg. Falcid. in c. cum dilecta derescript. Barbat. concil. 12. lib . 2, and before him, Baldus, inc. ult. extra de consuet. et l. Julianus ad exhib. ff. et. l. quæsitum ff. de leg. 3. The manner is such as is set down in gl.p. quæst. 1. c. Paulus."Debile principium melior fortuna sequetur. "Like your other worships also , the sergeants, catchpoles,pursuivants, messengers, summoners, apparitors , ushers , doorkeepers, pettifoggers, attornies, proctors, commissioners, justices of the peace, judge delegates, arbitrators, overseers ,sequestrators, advocates, inquisitors, jurors, searchers, examiners, notaries, tabellions , scribes , scriveners , clerks, prenotaries, secondaries, and expedanean judges, de quibus tit.est. 1. 3. c. , by sucking very much, and that exceeding forcibly, and licking at the purses of the pleading parties, they,to the suits already begot and engendered, form, fashion, andframe head, feet, claws, talons, beaks, bills , teeth ," hands,veins, sinews, arteries, muscles, humours, and so forth,through all the similary and dissimilary parts of the whole;which parts, particles, pendicles , and appurtenances, are thelaw pokes and bags, gl. de cons . d. 4. accepisti."Qualis vestis erit, talia corda gerit."Hic notandum est, that in this respect the pleaders, litigants,and law-suiters are happier than the officers, ministers, and administrators of justice, For beatius est dare quam accipere.4 Expedanean judges. ] It is, in Rabelais, judges pedanées, i. e.country judges, judges of villages , inferior judges. I never heard ofexpedanean judges. These pedanean judges (or rather pedarian, see Camb. Dict. ) were so called because they went not in their chariots to courts, but trudged it on foot, pedibus.5 Claws, talons, beaks, teeth. ] Marot, in that place of his hell where the poet is setting forth his law-suits under the representation of so many serpents:" Celuy qui siffle, et ha les dents si drues,Mordra quelq' un, qui en courra les rues."That hissing serpent there, with thick set teeth,Will bite one into madness (if not death. )6 Beatius, &c. ] It is a saying of our Saviour's (on what occasion is not known) quoted by St. Paul, though none of the evangelists mention it. Our Saviour, who was and is God, tells us it is more godlike to give than to receive.CHAP. XLII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 137f. commun. 1. 3. extra. de celebr. Miss. c. cum Marthæ, et 24.quæst. 1. cup. Od. gl." Affectum dantis penset censura tonantis,"Thus becometh the action or process, by their care andindustry to be of a complete and goodly bulk, well- shaped,framed, formed, and fashioned, according to the canonicalgloss." Accipe, sume, cape, sunt verba placentia Papæ."Which speech hath been more clearly explained by Albert de Ros, in verbo Roma." Roma manus rodit, quas rodere non valet, odit.Dantes custodit, non dantes spernit, et odit."The reason whereof is thought to be this:" Ad præsens ova, cras pullis sunt meliora. "ut est gl. in l. quum hi. ff. de transact. Nor is this all; forthe inconvenience of the contrary is set down in gloss. c. dealiu. fin.“ Quum labor in damno est, crescit mortalis egestas. "In confirmation whereof we find, that the true etymologyand exposition of the word process is purchase; viz. of goodstore of money to the lawyers, and of many pokes, -id estProu Sacks, to the pleaders: upon which subject we havemost celestials quips, gibes, and girds."Ligitando jura cresc*nt, litigando jus acquiritur."Item gl. in cap. illud extrem. de præsumpt. et c. de prob. l. instrum. l. non epistolis. l. non nudis." Et si non prosunt singula, multa juvant. "Yea, but, asked Trinquamelle, how do you proceed, myfriend, in criminal causes, the culpable and guilty party beingtaken and seized upon, flagrante crimine? Even as your otherworships use to do, answered Bridlegoose. First, I permitthe plaintiff to depart from the court, enjoining him not to presume to return thither, till he preallably should havetaken a good sound and profound sleep, which is to serve forthe prime entry and introduction to the legal carrying on ofthe business. In the next place, a formal report is to be madeto me of his having slept. Thirdly, I issue forth a warrant toconvene him before me. Fourthly, He is to produce a suf- ficient and authentic attestation of his having thoroughly" Litigando, &c. ] This being no verse, Rabelais, as correct an author as M. Duchat is an annotator, does not make a separate line of it.138 [BOOK III. RABELAIS' WORKS.and entirely slept, conform to the Gloss. 37. Quest. 7. c.Si quis cum .66 Quandoque bonus dormitat Homerus."Being thus far advanced in the formality of the process, Ifind that this consopiating act engendereth another act,whence ariseth the articulating of a member. That againproduceth a third act, fashionative of another member;which third bringeth forth a fourth, procreative of another act. New members in a no fewer number are shapen andframed, one still breeding and begetting another-as linkafter link, the coat of mail at length is made-till thus pieceafter piece, by little and little, by information upon information, the process be completely well-formed and perfect inall his members. Finally, having proceeded this length, Ihave recourse to my dice, nor is it to be thought, that this interruption, respite, or interpellation is by me occasionedwithout very good reason inducing me thereunto, and anotable experience of a most convincing and irrefragable force.I remember, on a time, that in the camp at Stockholm ,there was a certain Gascon named Gratianauld, native ofthe town of Saint Sever, who having lost all his money atplay, and consecutively being very angry thereat-as youknow, Pecunia est alter sanguis, ut ait Anto. de Burtio, in c.accedens. 2. extra ut lit. non contest. et Bald. in l . si tuis. c.de opt. leg. per tot . in l . advocati. c. de advoc. div. jud. pecuniaest vita hominis et optimus fide -jussor in necessitatibus, —did, athis coming forth of the gaming-house, in the presence of the whole company that was there, with a very loud voice, speak inhis own language these following words: " Pao cap de bious,hillots, que mau de pippe bous tresbire: ares que de pergudes sont les mies bingt, et quouatre baquettes, ta pla donnerien picz, trucz, et patactz; Sei degun de bous aulx, quiboille truquar ambe iou a bels embis." Finding that nonewould make him any answer, he passed from thence to that8 Inthe campat Stockholm . ] This story is taken from Aretino, in his dialogue on Play. Stockholm was besieged in 1518, by Christiern II . ,King of Denmark. ]Iou a bels embis. ] Gascon. " D-n me, if I don't wish you'd atun of wine about your ears. Here have I lost my four and twentydeniers; now I'll give as many blows and fisticuffs, aye and more too, toany one who'd like to stand up; so come on, and the more the merrier." ¡HAP. XLII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 139part of the leaguer where the huff-snuff, honder- sponder,swash-buckling High Germans were, to whom he renewedthese very terms, provoking them to fight with him; but allthe return he had from them to his stout challenge was only," Der Gascongner " thut sich ausz mit eim ieden zu schlagen,aber er ist geneigter zu stehlen; darum, liebe frauwen, habtsorg zu euerm hauszrath. " Finding also, that none of thatband of Teutonic soldiers offered himself to the combat, hepassed to that quarter of the leaguer where the French freebooting adventurers were encamped, and, reiterating untothem what he had before repeated to the Dutch warriors,challenged them likewise to fight with him, and therewithalmade some pretty little Gasconado frisking gambols, to obligethem the more cheerfully and gallantly to cope with him inthe lists of a duellizing engagement; but no answer at allwas made unto him. Whereupon the Gascon, despairing ofmeeting with any antagonists, departed from thence, andlaying himself down, not far from the pavilions of the grand Christian cavalier Crissé, 12 fell fast asleep. When he hadthoroughly slept an hour or two, another adventurous andall-hazarding blade of the forlorn hope of the lavishinglywasting gamesters, having also lost all his monies, salliedforth with a sword in his hand, in a firm resolution tofight with the aforesaid Gascon, seeing he had lost as well as he." Ploratur lachrymis amissa pecunia veris,saith the Gl. de pœnitent. distinct. 3. c . sunt plures. To thiseffect having made inquiry and search for him throughoutthe whole camp, and in sequel thereof found him asleep, hesaid unto him, Up, ho, good fellow, in the name of all thedevils of hell rise up, rise up, get up! I have lost my moneyas well as thou hast done, let us therefore go fight lustily together, grapple and scuffle it to some purpose. Thoumayest look and see that my tuck is no longer than thyrapier. The Gascon, altogether astonished at his unex10 Honder-Sponder. ] A coined word, like lifre- lofres elsewhere, to abuse the Germans, as if they only spoke those words, and no other.11 Der Gasconner, &c. ] The sense of this German sentence is , in English, " This Gascooning fellow here, who is quarrelling with every body, is more likely to steal than to fight. So pray, good women, take care of your househoid goods. "12 Crissé. ] Perhaps James Turpin, second of that name, Lord of Crissé in Anjou. See the Genealogies of St. Marthe, 1. xxx.140 [ BOOK III. RABELAIS' WORKS.66cappected provocation, without altering his former dialect, spoke thus: 66 Cap de Sanct Arnaud,13 quau seys tu, qui me rebeilles? Que mau de taberne te gire . Ho San Siobé,de Gascoigne, ta pla dormie iou, quand aquoest taquain me bingut estée." The venturous roister inviteth him again to the duel, but the Gascon, without condescending to his desire,said only this. Hé paovret¹ iou tesquinerie ares , que sonpla reposat. Vayne un pauque te posar come iou, puesse truqueren. " Thus, in forgetting his loss , he forgot the eagerness which he had to fight. In conclusion, after thatthe other had likewise slept a little, they, instead of fighting,and possibly killing one another, went jointly to a sutler'stent, where they drank together very amicably, each upon the pawn of his sword. Thus by a little sleep was pacifiedthe ardent fury of two warlike champions. There, gossip,comes the golden word of John Andr. in cap. ult. de sent. et rejudic. l. sexto." Sedendo, et quiescendo fit anima prudens. "CHAPTER XLIII.How Pantagruel excuseth Bridlegoose in the matter ofsentencingactions at law by the chance of the dice.WITH this Bridlegoose held his peace. Whereupon Trinquamelle bid him withdraw from the court, -which accordingly was done, —and then directed his discourse to Pantagruel after this manner. It is fitting, most illustrious prince,not only by reason of the deep obligations wherein thispresent parliament, together with the whole Marquisate ofMyrelingues, stand bound to your Royal Highness, for the innumerable benefits, which, as effects of mere grace, theyhave received from your incomparable bounty; but for thatexcellent wit also, prime judgment, and admirable learningwherewith Almighty God, the giver of all good things , hathmost richly qualified and endowed you; that we tender andpresent unto you the decision ofthis new, strange, and paradoxical case of Bridlegoose; who, in your presence, to your13 Cap de Sanct Arnaud. ] By St. Arnaud, who the devil are you that awake me, pox take you? Ha! St. Sever-cap of Gascony, what a sleep I should have had, if this cursed scoundrel had not disturbed me.14 Hé paovret. ] Ha! poor devil! Won't I batter your hide when I've had my nap. Here, come, lie down a while, and then we'll get to't.CHAP. XLIII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 141both hearing and seeing, hath plainly confessed his finaljudging and determinating of suits of law, by the mere chance and fortune of the dice . Therefore do we beseech you, that you may be pleased to give sentence therein, as unto you shall seem most just and equitable. To this Pantagruel answered, Gentlemen, It is not unknown to you, howmy condition is somewhat remote from the profession ofdeciding law controversies; yet, seeing you are pleased todo me the honour to put that task upon me, instead ofundergoing the office of a judge, I will become your humblesupplicant. I observe, gentlemen, in this Bridlegoose severalthings, which induce me to represent before you, that it ismy opinion he should be pardoned. In the first place, hisold age; secondly, his simplicity; to both which qualitiesour statute and common laws, civil and municipal together,allow many excuses for any slips or escapes, which, throughthe invincible imperfection of either, have been inconsidera- bly stumbled upon by a person so qualified. Thirdly, genlemen, I must need display before you another case, whichin equity and justice maketh much for the advantage of Bridlegoose, to wit, that this one, sole, and single fault ofhis ought to be quite forgotten, ' abolished, and swallowed upby that immense and vast ocean ofjust dooms and sentences,which heretofore he hath given and pronounced; his demeanours, for these forty years and upwards that he hathbeen a judge, having been so evenly balanced in the scales of uprightness, that envy itself, till now, could not have beenso impudent as to accuse and twit him with any act worthyof a check or reprehension: as, if a drop of the sea were thrown into the Loire, none could perceive, or say, that by this single drop the whole river should be salt and brackishTruly, it seemeth unto me, that in the whole series ofBridlegoose's juridical decrees there hath been I know notwhat of extraordinary savouring of the unspeakable benignity of God, that all these his preceding sentences, awards,and judgments, have been confirmed and approved of byyourselves, in this your own venerable and sovereign court.1 Quiteforgotten, &c. ] Herodotus, 1. vii. tells us, that Darius, son of Hystaspes, one day going to send to execution one of his officers for some act of great injustice, upon second thoughts pardoned him, on ac- count of the many instances of equity and justice he was informed that offender had given in time past, when he was in power.142 [BOOK III. RABELAIS' WORKS.For it is usual, (as you know well , ) with him whose ways areinscrutable, to manifest his own ineffable glory in blunting the perspicacity of the eyes of the wise, in weakening thestrength of potent oppressors, in depressing the pride of rich extortioners, and in erecting, comforting, protecting, supporting, upholding, and shoring up the poor, feeble, humble,silly, and foolish ones of the earth. But, waving all thesematters, I shall only beseech you, not by the obligations which you pretend to owe to my family, for which I thankyou, but for that constant and unfeigned love and affectionwhich you have always found in me, both on this and on the other side of the Loire, for the maintenance and establishment of your places, offices, and dignities, that for this one timeyou would pardon and forgive him upon these two conditions .First, That he satisfy, or posit sufficient surety for the satisfaction of the party wronged by the injustice of the sentencein question. For the fulfilment of this article, I will providesufficiently. And, secondly, That for his subsidiary aid in the weighty charge of administrating justice, you would be pleased to appoint and assign unto him some virtuous counsellor, younger, learneder, and wiser than he, by the square and rule of whose advice he may regulate, guide, temper,and moderate in times coming all his judiciary procedures;or otherwise, if you intend totally to depose him from his office, and to deprive him altogether of the state and dignityof a judge, I shall cordially intreat you to make a presentand free gift of him to me, who shall find in my kingdomscharges and employments enough wherewith to imbusy him,for the bettering of his own fortunes, and furtherance of myservice. In the meantime, I implore the Creator, Saviour,and Sanctifier of all good things, in his grace, mercy, andkindness, to preserve you all, now and evermore, world with- out end.These words thus spoken, Pantagruel, veiling his cap andmaking a leg with such a majestic grace as became a personof his paramount degree and eminency, farewelled Trinquamelle, the president and master speaker of that Myrelinguesian parliament, took his leave of the whole court, and wentout of the chamber at the door whereof finding Panurge,Epistemon, Friar John, and others, he forthwith, attendedby them, walked to the outer gate, where all of them immediately took horse to return towards Gargantua Panta-CHAP. XLIV. ] PANTAGRUEL. 143tagruel by the way related to them from point to point themannerof Bridlegoose's sententiating differences at law. FriarJohn said, that he had seen Peter Dendin, and was acquaintedwith him at that time when he sojourned in the monasteryof Fontaine le Comte, under the noble Abbot Ardillon.Gymnast likewise affirmed , that he was in the tent of thegrand Christian cavalier de Crissé, when the Gascon, afterhis sleep, made an answer to the adventurer. Panurge wassomewhat incredulous in the matter of believing that it wasmorally possible Bridlegoose should have been for such along space of time so continually fortunate in that aleatoryway of deciding law debates. Epistemon said to Pantagruel . Such another story, not much unlike to that in allthe circ*mstances thereof, is vulgarly reported of the provostof Montlehery. In good sooth, such a perpetuity of good luck is to be wondered at. To have hit right twice or thricein a judgment so given by hap-hazard might have fallen outwell enough, especially in controversies that were ambiguous,intricate, abstruse, perplexed, and obscure.CHAPTER XLIV.How Pantagruel relateth a strange history of the perplexity ofhumanjudgment.SEEING you talk, quoth Pantagruel, ' of dark, difficult, hard,and knotty debates, I will tell you of one controverted before Cneius Dolabella,2 Proconsul in Asia. The case was this.A wife in Smyrna had of her first husband a child named Abecé. He dying, she, after the expiring of a year and aday, married again, and to her second husband bore a boycalled Effegé. A pretty long time thereafter it happened, asyou know the affection of step - fathers and step- dames is very rare towards the children of the first fathers andmothers deceased, that this husband, with the help of hisson Effegé, secretly, wittingly, willingly, and treacherouslymurdered Abecé. The woman came no sooner to get information of the fact, but, that it might not go unpunished, she2 Aleatory, &c. ] He had not found his account in the Virgilian lots.1 Seeing you talk, quoth Pantagruel, &c. ] M. Duchat says this pa- renthesis is not in the editions of 1547 and 1553. He adds, that thiswhole chapter is part of the foregoing, and likewise that it is Epistemon who still continues to speak, and not Pantagruel.2 Dolabella, &c. ] See Val. Max. 1. 8, c. 6, and A. Gell, 1. 12, c. 7,144 [ BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.caused kill them both, to revenge the death of her first son.She was apprehended and carried before Cneius Dolabella,in whose presence, she, without dissembling anything, confessed all that was laid to her charge; yet alleged , that shehad both right and reason on her side for the killing of them.Thus was the state of the question. He found the businessso dubious and intricate, that he knew not what to determinetherein, nor which of the parties to incline to . On the onehand, it was an execrable crime to cut off at once both her second husband and her son. On the other hand, the causeof the murder seemed to be so natural, as to be groundedupon the law of nations, and the rational instinct of all thepeople of the world, seeing they two together had feloniouslyand murderously destroyed her first son; —not that they hadbeen in any manner of way wronged, outraged, or injuredby him, but out of an avaricious intent to possess his inheri- tance. In this doubtful quandary and uncertainty what topitch upon, he sent to the Areopagites, then sitting atAthens, to learn and obtain their advice and judgment.That judicious senate, very sagely perpending the reasons ofhis perplexity, sent him word to summon her personally tocompeer before him a precise hundred years thereafter, to answer to some interrogatories touching certain points,which were not contained in the verbal defence. Whichresolution of theirs did import, that it was in their opinionso difficult and inextricable a matter, that they knew notwhat to say or judge therein. Who had decided that pleaby the chance and fortune of the dice, could not have errednor awarded amiss, on which side soever he had past hiscasting and condemnatory sentence. If against the woman,she deserved punishment for usurping sovereign authority,by taking that vengeance at her own hand, the inflictingwhereof was only competent to the supreme power to administer justice in criminal cases. If for her, the just resentment of a so atrocious injury done unto her, in murdering her innocent son, did fully excuse and vindicate her ofany trespass or offence about that particular committed byher. But this continuation of Bridlegoose for so manyyears, still hitting the nail on the head, never missing themark, and always judging aright, by the mere throwing ofthe dice, and the chance thereof, is that which most asto- nisheth and amazeth me.CHAP. XLIV. ] PANTAGRUEL. 145To answer, quoth Pantagruel, categorically to that whichyou wonder at, I must ingeniously confess and avow that Icannot; yet, conjecturally to guess at the reason of it, Iwould refer the cause of that marvellously long- continuedhappy success in the judiciary results of his definitive sentences, to the favourable aspect of the heavens, and benignityof the intelligences; who out of their love to goodness,after having contemplated the pure simplicity and sincereunfeignedness of Judge Bridlegoose in the acknowledgmentof his inabilities, did regulate that for him by chance, whichby the profoundest act of his maturest deliberation he wasnot able to reach unto. That, likewise, which possiblymade him to diffide in his own skill and capacity, notwithstanding his being an expert and understanding lawyer, forany thing that I know to the contrary, was the knowledgeand experience which he had of the antinomies, contrarieties, antilogies , contradictions, traversings, and thwartings oflaws, customs, edicts, statutes, orders, and ordinances, inwhich dangerous opposition, equity and justice being structured and founded on either of the opposite terms, and a gapbeing thereby opened for the ushering in of injustice andiniquity through the various interpretations of self- endedlawyers; being assuredly persuaded that the infernal calumniator, who frequently transformeth himself into the likeness of a messenger or angel of light, maketh use of thesecross glosses and expositions in the mouths and pens of hisministers and servants, the perverse advocates, bribingjudges, law-monging attorneys, prevaricating counsellors,and such other like law- wresting members of a court of justice, to turn by those means black to white, green to grey,and what is straight to a crooked ply. For the more expedient doing whereof, these diabolical ministers make boththe pleading parties believe that their cause is just andrighteous; for it is well known that there is no cause, howbad soever, which doth not find an advocate to patrocinateand defend it,-else would there be no process in the world,no suits at law, nor pleadings at the bar. He did in theseextremities, as I conceive, most humbly recommend thedirection of his judicial proceedings to the upright judge ofjudges, God Almighty, -did submit himself to the conductand guideship of the blessed Spirit, in the hazard and perplexity of the definitive sentence, —and, by this aleatory lot,VOL. II. L146 RABELAIS' WORKS [BOCK III. .did as it were implore and explore the divine decree of hisgood will and pleasure, instead of that which we call theFinal Judgment of a Court. To this effect, to the betterattaining to his purpose, which was to judge righteously, hedid, in my opinion, throw and turn the dice, to the end thatby the providence aforesaid, the best chance might fall tohim whose action was uprightest, and backed with greatestreason. In doing whereof he did not stray from the senseof the Talmudists, who say that there is so little harm inthat manner of searching the truth, that in the anxiety andperplexedness of human wits, God oftentimes manifesteththe secret pleasure of his Divine Will.³Furthermore, I will neither think nor say, nor can I believe, that the unstraightness is so irregular, or the corruption so evident, of those of the Parliament of Myrelingois inMyrelingues, before whom Bridlegoose was arraigned forprevarication, that they will maintain it to be a worse prac- tice to have the decision of a suit at law referred to thechance and hazard of a throw of the dice, hab nab, or luckas it will, than to have it remitted to , and past , by the determination of those whose hands are full of blood, and heartsof wry affections . Besides that, their principal direction inall law matters comes to their hands from one Tribonian, ' awicked, miscreant, barbarous, faithless, and perfidious knave,so pernicious, unjust, avaricious , and perverse in his ways,that it was his ordinary custom to sell laws, edicts, declarations, constitutions, and ordinances, as at an outroop or putsale, to him who offered most for them. Thus did he shapemeasures for the pleaders, and cut their morsels to them byand out of these little parcels, fragments, bits, scantlings,and shreds of the law now in use, altogether concealing, suppressing, disannulling, and abolishing the remainder, whichdid make for the total law; fearing that, if the whole lawwere made manifest and laid open to the knowledge of suchas are interested in it , and the learned books of the ancientdoctors of the law upon the exposition of the Twelve Tablesand Prætorian Edicts , his villanous pranks, naughtiness, and3 Pantagruel speaks after Thomas Aquinas, 1. 2, c. 173 , of the original French of the Gardener's dream. This portrait of Tribonian,which is drawn by Suidas, in his article on that famous lawyer, hasbeen copied by Cœlius Rhodiginus, 1. 22, c. 20, of his Ancient Lections;by Budæus, part 1 , of his Annot. on the Pandects, and by Fr. Hotman, b. 11, of his Anti - Tribonian.CHAP. XLV. ]PANTAGRUEL. 117vile impiety should come to the public notice of the world.Therefore were it better, in my conceit, that is to say lessinconvenient, that parties at variance in any juridical case should in the dark, march upon caltrops, than submit the determination of what is their right to such unhallowed sen- tences and horrible decrees: as Cato in his time wished andadvised, that every judiciary court should be paved withcaltrops.5CH. XLV. -How Panurge taketh advice of Triboulet.On the sixth day thereafter, Pantagruel was returned homeat the very same hour that Triboulet was by water comefrom Blois. Panurge, at his arrival, gave him a hog's bladder,puffed up with wind, and resounding, because of the hardpeas that were within it. Moreover he did present him witha gilt wooden sword, a hollow budget made of a tortoiseshell, an osier- wattled wicker bottle full of Breton wine, andfive and twenty apples of the orchard of Blandureau.If he be such a fool, quoth Carpalim, as to be won withapples, there is no more wit in his pate than in the head ofan ordinary cabbage. Triboulet girded the sword and scripto his side, took the bladder in his hand, ate some few ofthe apples, and drunk up all the wine. Panurge very wistlyand heedfully looking upon him said , I never yet saw a fool,and I have seen ten thousand franks worth of that kind ofcattle, who did not love to drink heartily, and by good longdraughts. When Triboulet had done with his drinking,Panurge laid out before him, and exposed the sum of thebusiness wherein he was to require his advice, in eloquentand choicely- sorted terms, adorned with flourishes of rhetoric. But, before he had altogether done, Triboulet with hisfist gave him a bouncing whirret between the shoulders,rendered back into his hand again the empty bottle, filippedand flirted him on the nose with the hog's bladder, andlastly, for a final resolution , shaking and wagging his headstrongly and disorderly, he answered nothing else but this,By God, God, mad fool, beware the monk, Buzançay hornpipe! These words thus finished, he slipped himself out ofthe company, went aside, and, rattling the bladder, took ahuge delight in the melody of the rickling, crackling, noise5 See Pliny, 1. 19, c. 1. This was done, says Bouchet, that litigiouspeople might be kept from coming near so dangerous a spot.L 2148 BABELAIS' WORKS. [BOOK III .ofthe peas. After which time it lay not in the power ofthem all to draw out of his chaps the articulate sound of onesyllable, insomuch that, when Panurge went about to inter- rogate him further, Triboulet drew his wooden sword, andwould have stuck him therewith. I have fished fair now,quoth Panurge, and brought my pigs to a fine market. HaveI not got a brave determination of all my doubts, and a response in all things agreeable to the oracle that gave it?He is a great fool, that is not to be denied, yet he is a greater fool, who brought him hither to me, —but of the three I amthe greatest fool, who did impart the secret of my thoughtsto such an idiot ass and native ninny, —That bolt, quothCarpalim, levels point blank at me.Without putting ourselves to any stir or trouble in theleast, quoth Pantagruel, let us maturely and seriously consider and perpend the gestures and speech which he hathmade and uttered. In them, veritably, quoth he, have Iremarked and observed some excellent and notable mysteries, yea, of such important worth and weight, that I shallnever henceforth be astonished, nor think strange, why theTurks, with a great deal of worship and reverence, honourand respect natural fools equally with their primest doctors,mufties, divines, and prophets. Did not you take heed,quoth he, a little before he opened his mouth to speak, whata shogging, shaking, and wagging, his head did keep? Bythe approved doctrine of the ancient philosophers, the customary ceremonies of the most expert magicians, and thereceived opinions of the most learned lawyers, such a brangling agitation and moving should by us all be judged toproceed from, and be quickened and suscitated by, thecoming and inspiration of the prophetizing and fatidicalspirit, which, entering briskly and on a sudden into a shallowreceptacle of a debil substance, (for, as you know, and as theproverb shows it, a little head containeth not much brains , )was the cause of that commotion. This is conform to what.is avouched bythe most skilful physicians, when they affirm,that shakings and tremblings fall upon the members of ahuman body, partly because of the heaviness and violentimpetuosity of the burden and load that is carried, and otherpart, by reason of the weakness and imbecility that is in the virtue of the bearing organ. A manifest example whereofappeareth in those who, fasting, are not able to carry toCHAP. XLV. ] PANTAGRUEL. 149their head a great goblet full of wine without a tremblingand a shaking in the hand that holds it. This of old wasaccounted a prefiguration and mystical pointing out of thePythian divineress, who used always, before the uttering ofa response from the oracle, to shake a branch of her domestic laurel. Lampridius also testifieth, that the EmperorHeliogabalus, to acquire unto himself the reputation of asoothsayer, did, on several holy days, of prime solemnity, inthe presence of the fanatic rabble, make the head of his idolby some slight within the body thereof, publicly to shake.Plautus, in his Asinaria, declareth likewise, that Saurias,whithersoever he walked, like one quite distracted of hiswits, kept such a furious lolling and mad- like shaking of hishead, that he commonly affrighted those who casually metwith him in their way. The said author in another place,showing a reason why Charmides shook and brangled hishead, assevered that he was transported, and in an ecstasy.Catullus after the same manner maketh mention, in hisBerecynthia and Atys, of the place wherein the Menades,Bacchical women, she-priests of the Lyæan god, and demented prophetesses, carrying ivy boughs in their hands,did shake their heads. As in the like case, amongst theGalli, the gelded priests of Cybele were wont to do in thecelebrating of their festivals. Whence, too, according tothe sense of the ancient theologues, she herself has her denomination; for Kußrav signifieth, to turn round, whirl about,shake the head, and play the part of one that is wry-necked.Semblably Titus Livius writeth, that, in the solemnizationtime of the Bacchanalian holidays at Rome, both men andwomen seemed to prophetize and vaticinate, because of anaffected kind of wagging of the head, shrugging of theshoulders, and jectigation of the whole body, which theyused then most punctually. For the common voice of thephilosophers, together with the opinion of the people, asserteth for an irrefragable truth, that vaticination is seldomby the heavens bestowed on any, without the concomitancyof a little frenzy, and a head-shaking, not only when thesaid presaging virtue is infused, but when the person alsotherewith inspired , declareth and manifesteth it unto others.The learned lawyer Julian, being asked on a time, if thatslave might be truly esteemed to be healthful and in a goodplight, who had not only conversed with some furious, ma-150 [BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.niac, and enraged people, but in their company had alsoprophesied, yet without a noddle- shaking concussion , answered, That seeing there was no head- wagging at the timeof his predictions, he might be held for sound and competent enough. Is it not daily seen, how schoolmasters,teachers, tutors , and instructors of children , shake the headsof their disciples, as one would do a pot in holding it bythe lugs, that by this erection, vellication, stretching andpulling their ears , which, according to the doctrine of thesage Egyptians , is a member consecrated to the memory,they may stir them up to recollect their scattered thoughts,bring home those fancies of theirs, which perhaps havebeen extravagantly roaming abroad upon strange and uncouth objects, and totally range their judgments, which possibly by disordinate affections have been made wild, to therule and pattern of a wise, discreet, virtuous, and philosophical discipline . All which Virgil acknowledgeth to betrue, in the branglement² of Apollo Cynthius.CH. XLVI.-How Pantagruel and Panurge diversely interpretthe words of Triboulet.He says you are a fool. And what kind of fool? A madfool, who in your old age would enslave yourself to thebondage of matrimony, and shut your pleasures up within awedlock, whose key some ruffian carries in his cod-piece.He says furthermore, Beware of the monk. Upon minehonour, it gives me in my mind, that you will be cuckoldedby a monk. Nay, I will engage mine honour, which is themost precious pawn I could have in my possession, althoughI were sole and peaceable dominator over all Europe, Asia,and Africa, that if you marry, you will surely be one of the horned brotherhood of Vulcan. Hereby may you perceive,how much I do attribute to the wise foolery of our morosoph Triboulet. The other oracles and responses did in thegeneral prognosticate you a cuckold, without descending sonear to the point of a particular determination, as to pitchupon what vocation amongst the several sorts of men, heshould profess, who is to be the copesmate of your wife andhornifier of your proper self. Thus noble Triboulet tells itus plainly, from whose words we may gather with all easea Branglement. ] I suppose he means pulling by the ears, the vellicat aures ofthat poet, Ecl . 6.JHAP. XLVI . ] PANTAGRUEL. 151imaginable, that your cuckoldry is to be infamous, and somuch the more scandalous, that your conjugal bed will beincestuously contaminated with the filthiness of a monkerylecher. Moreover he says , that you will be the hornpipe ofBuzançay, that is to say, well horned, hornified, and cornuted. And, as Triboulet's uncle asked from Louis theTwelfth, for a younger brother of his own, who lived atBlois, the hornpipes of Buzançay, for the organ pipes,through the mistake of one word for another, even so,whilst you think to marry a wise, humble, calm, discreet,and honest wife , you shall unhappily stumble upon one,witless, proud, loud, obstreperous, bawling, clamorous, andmore unpleasant than any Buzançay hornpipe. Considerwithal, how he flirted you on the nose with the bladder,and gave you a sound thumping blow with his fist upon theridge of the back. This denotes and presageth, that youshall be banged, beaten, and filipped by her, and that alsoshe will steal of your goods from you, as you stole the hog'sbladder from the little boys of Vaubreton.Flat contrary, quoth Panurge; -not that I would impudently exempt myself from being a vassal in the territory offolly. I hold of that jurisdiction, and am subject thereto, Iconfess it. And why should I not? For the whole world isfoolish. In the old Lorrain language, fou for oou; all andfool were the same thing. Besides, it is avouched by Solomon, that infinite is the number of fools. From an infinity nothing can be deducted or abated, nor yet, by thetestimony of Aristotle, can anything thereto be added orsubjoined. Therefore were I a mad fool, if, being a fool, Ishould not hold myself a fool. After the same manner ofspeaking, we may aver the number of the mad and enraged folks to be infinite. Avicenna maketh no bones to assert,that the several kinds of madness are infinite. Though thismuch of Triboulet's words tend little to my advantage, howbeitthe prejudice which I sustain thereby be common with meto all other men, yet the rest of his talk and gesture makethaltogether for me. He said to my wife, Be weary of the1 In the old Lorrain language fou for oou; all andfool were the same thing. ] It may be so; but Rabelais ' words are, " En Lorraine Fou estprez Tou," i . e. in Lorraine (to keep the pun in English) fool is near fool, &c. There is, says M. Duchat, a large town in Lorrain cailedFou, (fool) within three leagues of Toul, another considerable town in the same duchy.152 [BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.monkey; that is as much as if she should be cheery, andtake as much delight in a monkey, as ever did the Lesbia ofCatullus in her sparrow; who will, for his recreation pass histime no less joyfully at the exercise of snatching flies , thanheretofore did the merciless fly- catcher Domitian. Withalhe meant by another part of his discourse, that she shouldbe of a jovial country-like humour, as gay and pleasing aa harmonious hornpipe of Saulieu or Buzançay. The veri- dical Triboulet did therein hint at what I liked well, as perfectly knowing the inclinations and propensities of mymind, my natural disposition , and the bias of my interiorpassions and affections. For you may be assured, that my humour is much better satisfied and contented with thepretty, frolic, rural, dishevelled shepherdesses, whose bumsthrough their coarse canvass smocks, smell of the clovergrass of the ield, than with those great ladies in magnificent courts, with their flaunting top-knots and sultanas ,their polvil, pastillos, and cosmetics. The homely sound,likewise, of a rustic hornpipe is more agreeable to my ears,than the curious warbling and musical quivering of lutes,theorbos, viols, rebecs, and violins. He gave me a lustyrapping thwack on my back, -what then? Let it pass, inthe name and for the love of God, as an abatement of, anddeduction from so much of my future pains in purgatory.He did it not out of any evil intent. He thought, belike , tohave hit some of the pages. He is an honest fool, and arinnocent changeling . It is a sin to harbour in the heart any2 Be weary ofthe monkey. ] Weary should be wary, but that is only a fault in the press. The rest is all wrongly translated. Rabelais' words are, " Il dict à ma femme, guare Moyne. C'est ung moineau qu'elle aura en delices, comme avoit la Lesbie de Catulle: lequel vollera pour mousches," &c. Now moyne in French was never known to signifymonkey. Moineau does indeed signify a sparrow, as well as a friar or monk; and upon that hinge the equivoque turns. Thus it should run:the fool said to my wife, " Ware sparrow; " that is as much as to say," Beware your sparrow come to no harm;" meaning that she ( not he,as Sir T. U. has it, ) " should take as much delight in a sparrow (not amonkey) as ever did Catullus' Lesbia; and that he will, for his recre- ation, hunt flies," &c.Clover-grass. ] In the original, wild-thyme, (serpolet, ) on which M. Duchat quotes Champier, 1. viii. c. xxxv. of his De Re Cibaria→" Rustici proverbium pervulgatum habent; succosiores esse virgines quæ serpillum quam quæ moschum olent. "Pastillos. ] In the original , maujoinct; which, according to Champica,just quoted, is to be understood in this place to signify musk.CHAP. XLVII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 153bad conceit of him. As for myself, I heartily pardon him.He flirted me on the nose. In that there is no harm; for itimporteth nothing else , but that betwixt my wife and methere will occur some toyish wanton tricks, which usually happen to all new married folks.CH. XLVII.-How Pantagruel and Panurge resolved to makea visit to the oracle of the holy bottle.THERE is as yet another point, quoth Panurge, which youhave not at all considered on, although it be the chief andprincipal head of the matter. He put the bottle in myhand and restored it me again. How interpret you thatpassage? What is the meaning of that? He possibly,quoth Pantagruel, signifieth thereby, that your wife will besuch a drunkard as shall daily take in her liquor kindly, andply the pots and bottles apace. Quite otherwise , quothPanurge; for the bottle was empty. I swear to you, bythe prickling brambly thorn of St. Fiacre' in Brie, thatour unique Morosoph, " whom I formerly termed the lunaticTriboulet, referreth me, for attaining to the final resolutionof my scruple, to the response-giving bottle. Therefore doI renew afresh the first vow which I made, and here in yourpresence protest and make oath by Styx and Acheron, tocarry still spectacles in my cap, and never to wear a codpiece in my breeches, until upon the enterprise in hand ofmynuptial undertaking, I shall have obtained an answer fromthe holy bottle. I am acquainted with a prudent, understanding, and discreet gentleman, and, besides, a very goodfriend of mine, who knoweth the land, country, and placewhere its temple and oracle is built and posited. He willguide and conduct us thither sure and safely. Let us gothither, I beseech you. Deny me not, and say not, nay;reject not the suit I make unto you, I intreat you. I willbe to you an Achates, a Damis, and heartily accompany youall along in the whole voyage, both in your going forth andcoming back. I have of a long time known you to be agreat lover of peregrination, desirous still to learn new things,and still to see what you had never seen before.1 Brambly thorn of St. Fiacre. ] Wrongly translated; the original is l'espine, i. e. the backbone of the saint, which was preserved in the ca thedral of Meaux. ]2 Morosoph. ] word of Rabelais' coining, from µwpòc, fooush, and oooos, wise. Unich here is singular, odd. Wilkes. ]154 [BOOK III. RABELAIS' WORKS.Very willingly, quoth Pantagruel, I condescend to your request. But before we enter in upon our progress towardsthe accomplishment of so far a journey, replenished andfraught with imminent perils , full of innumerable hazards,and every way stored with evident and manifest dangers-What dangers? quoth Panurge, interrupting him. Dangersfly back, run from, and shun me whithersoever I go, sevenleagues around, —as in the presence of the sovereign a subordinate magistracy is eclipsed; or as clouds and darknessquite vanish at the bright coming of a radiant sun; or as allsores and sicknesses ' did suddenly depart, at the approachof the body of St. Martin à Quande. Nevertheless, quothPantagruel, before we adventure to set forward on the roadof our projected and intended voyage, some few points areto be discussed, expedited, and dispatched. First, let us send back Triboulet to Blois. Which was instantly done,after that Pantagruel had given him a frieze coat. Secondly,our design must be backed with the advice and counsel ofthe king my father. And, lastly, it is most needful and expedient for us, that we search for and find out some sibyl, toserve us for a guide, truchman, and interpreter. To this Panurge made answer, That his friend Xenomanes wouldabundantly suffice for the plenary discharge and performance of the sibyl's office; and that, furthermore, in passingthrough the Lanternatory revelling country, they should takealong with them a learned and profitable Lanternesse, whowould be no less useful to them in their voyage, than wasthe sibyl to Æneas, in his descent to the Elysian fields.Carpalim, in the interim, as he was upon the conductingaway of Triboulet, in his passing by, hearkened a little tothe discourse they were upon, then spoke out, saying, Ho,Panurge, master freeman, take my Lord Debitis at Calais,3 A cripple guided a blind man that carried him, and so they begged together. Being told St. Martin's body would soon be there, and it would cure them both, the devil a bit would they stay for the saint's body; they did not want to be healed. This story is grounded on aparable, used by a Jewdoctor to the emperor Antoninus Pius, to make him understand that the soul and body would be punished conjointlyfor having joined together in sinning . See Basnage, l. vi . c. xi.Xenomanes. ] Græcé, lover of travel. Some commentators recog- nize in him the poet and historian, Jean Bouchet, who took the pseudo- nym of Traverseur des voies perilleuses, a title which Rabelais gives to Xenomanes farther on. ]My lord Debitis. ] Corruptly for my lord deputy, or governor of Calais for Henry VIII ., at that time Henry Fitz Alan, Earl of Arundel.CHAP. XLVII.] PANTAGRUEL. 155along with you, for he is goud-fallot, a good fellow. Hewill not forget those who have been debtors; these are Lanternes. Thus shall you not lack for both fallot and lanterne."I may safely with the little skill I have, quoth Pantagruel,prognosticate, that by the way we shall engender no melancholy. I clearly perceive it already. The only thing thatvexeth me is, that I cannot speak the Lanternatory language. I shall, answered Panurge, speak for you all. Iunderstand it every whit as well as I do mine own maternaltongue; I have been no less used to it than to the vulgarFrench.7" Brisz marg dalgotbric nubstzne zos ,Isquebsz prusq albork crinqs zacbac.Misbe dilbarkz morp nipp stancz bos,Strombtz, Panurge, walmap quost gruszbac. "Now guess, friend Epistemon , what is this? They are,quoth Epistemon, names of errant devils, passant devils , andrampant devils . These words of thine, dear friend of mine,are true, quoth Panurge, yet are they terms used in the language of the court of the Lanternish people. By the way,as we go upon our journey, I will make to thee a prettylittle dictionary, which, notwithstanding, shall not last youmuch longer than a pair of new shoes. Thou shalt havelearned it sooner than thou canst perceive the dawning ofthe next subsequent morning. What I have said in theforegoing tetrastic is thus translated out of the Lanternishtongue into our vulgar dialect."All miseries attended me, whilst IA lover was, and had no good thereby.Of better luck the married people tell;Panurge is one of those, and knows it well. "There is little more, then, quoth Pantagruel, to be done,but that we understand what the will of the king my fatherwill be therein, and purchase his consent.This is a pun impossible to be translated. Fallot is both a goodfellow and a candle. Rabelais plainly alludes to this, Ainsi auras et fallot crlanternes. Thus you will have both candle and lanterns.— Wilkes. ]Lanternatory language. ] The barbarous language of the Romish school divines, in their different councils of Lateran.In these verses, which mostly consist of half words, Rabelais ridi- cules the frequent abbreviations of the Gothic characters, which had been made use of in printing a world of school- divinity-books, barbarous in themselves, and to the last degree tiresome to read.• Shall not last, &c. ] Barbarism will now soon be banished out of the schools. Else it may mean, the dictionary will serve for the little time you shall be crossing the Lantern- country.156 [ BOOK III.RAPELAIS' WORKS.CH. XLVIII.- How Gargantua sheweth, that the childrenought not to marry without the special knowledge and adviceof theirfathers and mothers.No sooner had Pantagruel entered in at the door of thegreat hall of the castle, than that he encountered full buttwith the good honest Gargantua coming forth from thecouncil board, unto whom he made a succinct and summarynarrative of what had passed and occurred, worthy of his observation, in his travels abroad, since their last interview;then, acquainting him with the design he had in hand, besought him that it might stand with his good will and plea- sure, to grant him leave to prosecute and go thorough- stitchwith the enterprise which he had undertaken. The good man Gargantua, having in one hand two great bundles ofpetitions, indorsed and answered, and in the other some re- membrancing notes and bills, to put him in mind of suchother requests of supplicants, which, albeit presented, had nevertheless been neither read nor heard, he gave both to Ulrich Gallet, his ancient and faithful Master of Requests;then drew aside Pantagruel, and, with a countenance moreserene and jovial than customary, spoke to him thus. I praise God, and have great reason so to do, my most dear son, thathe hath been pleased to entertain in you a constant inclina- tion to virtuous actions. I am well content that the voyagewhich you have motioned to me be by you accomplished,but withal I could wish you would have a mind and desireto marry, for that I see you are of competent years . [ Panurge, in the meanwhile, was in a readiness of preparingand providing for remedies, salves, and cures against all such lets, obstacles, and impediments, as he could in theheight of his fancy conceive might by Gargantua be cast inthe way of their itinerary design. ] Is it your pleasure, mostdear father, that you speak; answered Pantagruel. For my part, I have not yet thought upon it. In all this affairI wholly submit and rest in your good liking and paternal authority. For I shall rather pray unto God that he would1 This period, betwixt crotchets, which in the translation is narrative,and interrupts the dialogue, seems in the original to be a continuation of Gargantua's speech. ' Panurge s'est assez efforcè rompre les diffi- cultés, qui lui povoient estre en empeschement: parlez pour vous.'Panurge has taken great pains to break through the difficulties, which might stand in his way; speak for yourself.44CHAP. XLVIII . ]PANTAGRUEL. 157throw me down stark dead at your feet, in your pleasure,than that against your pleasure I should be found marriedalive. I never heard that by any law, whether sacred orprofane, yea, amongst the rudest and most barbarous nationsin the world, it was allowed and approved of, that childrenmay be suffered and tolerated to marry at their own goodwill and pleasure, without the knowledge, advice, or consentasked and had thereto, of their fathers, mothers, and nearestkindred. All legislators , everywhere upon the face ofthe wholeearth have taken away and removed this licentious libertyfrom children, and totally reserved it to the discretion of theparents.My dearly beloved son, quoth Gargantua, I believe you,and from my heart thank God for having endowed you withthe grace of having both a perfect notice of, and entire likingto, laudable and praiseworthy things; and that through thewindows of your exterior senses he hath vouchsafed to transmit unto the interior faculties of your mind, nothing but whatis good and virtuous. For in mytime there hath been foundon the continent a certain country, wherein are I know notwhat kind of Pastophorian mole- catching priests, who, albeitaverse from engaging their proper persons into a matrimonialduty, like the pontifical flamens of Cybele in Phrygia;² as ifthey were capons, and not co*cks; full of lasciviousness , salacity, and wantonness, who yet have, nevertheless, in thematter of conjugal affairs , taken upon them to prescribe lawsand ordinances to married folks . I cannot goodly determinewhat I should most abhor, detest, loathe, and abominate, -whether the tyrannical presumption of those dreaded sacerdotal mole- catchers, who not being willing to contain andcoop up themselves within the grates and trellises of theirown mysterious temples, do deal in, meddle with, obtrude2 Rabelais says only the priests of Cybele in Phrygia; not a word of flamens; these were peculiar to the Romans. The Phrygians knew of no flamens. 3 Bythese mole-catchers, andthe lattices ( treillis ) of their temples, Rabelais meansthe Sorbonne and its doctors, particularly cer- tain monks whom Pasquier calls patchers- up, and vampers ofold glosses,whichhave, says he, advanced, atleast insinuated this barbarous opinion,that bythe canon lawthe consent of fathers and mothers was not requisite to the marriage of their children, but only for decency's sake, and not out ofany necessity. On occasion of this chapter of Rabelais, the reader may consult the letter from whence this passage of Pasquier is taken. It is the first ofthe 3rd Book of his Letters , and he addressed it to a friend,on occasion of an article of the ordinance of Orleans, 1560; by which3153 [ BOOK III.RABELAIS WORKS.upon, and thrust their sickles into harvests of secular businesses, quite contrary and diametrically opposite to the quality,state, and condition of their callings , professions, and vocations; or the superstitious stupidity and senseless scrupulousness of married folks, who have yielded obedience, and submitted their bodies, fortunes , and estates to the discretionand authority of such odious, perverse, barbarous, and un- reasonable laws. Nor do they see that, which is clearerthan the light and splendour of the morning star,-how allthese nuptial and connubial sanctions, statutes, and ordinances have been decreed, made, and instituted , for the solebenefit, profit, and advantage of the flaminal mysts and mysterious flamens, and nothing at all for the good, utility, oremolument of the silly hood- winked married people. Whichadministereth unto others a sufficient cause for renderingthese churchmen suspicious of iniquity, and of an unjust andfraudulent manner of dealing, no more to be connived atnor countenanced, after that it be well weighed in the scalesof reason, than if with a reciprocal temerity the laics, by way of compensation, would impose laws to be followed and observed by those mysts and flamens, how they should behavethemselves in the making and performance of their rites andceremonies, after what manner they ought to proceed in theoffering up and immolating of their various oblations , victims,and sacrifices; seeing that, besides the edecimation and tithehaling of their goods, they cut off and take parings, shreddings, and clippings of the gain proceeding from the labourof their hands , and sweat of their brows, therewith to entertain themselves the better. Upon which consideration, in myopinion, their injunctions and commands would not prove sopernicious and impertinent, as those of the ecclesiastic power,unto which they had tendered their blind obedience. For,as you have very well said, there is no place in the world,where, legally, a licence is granted to the children to marrywithout the advice and consent of their parents and kindred.Nevertheless, by those wicked laws, and mole- catching customs whereat there is a little hinted in what I have alreadyspoken to you, there is no scurvy, measly, leprous, orpocky ruffian, pander, knave, rogue, scellum, robber, or thief,pilloried, whipped, and burn-marked in his own country forthe states did but in part redress this disorder, which he says is properly what the French law calls raptus in parentes. This letter lays down much the same principles with these here employed by Gargantua.1CHAP. XLVIII.]PANTAGRUEL. 159his crimes and felonies, who may not violently snatch away and ravish what maid soever he had a mind to pitch upon,how noble, how fair, how rich, nonest, and chaste soever she be, and that out of the house of her own father, in his own presence, from the bosom of her mother, and in thesight and despite of her friends and kindred looking on a so woful spectacle, provided that the rascal villain be so cunning as to associate unto himself some mystical flamen, who,according to the covenant made betwixt them two, shall bein hope some day to participate of the prey.Could the Goths, the Scythians, or Massagetæ do a worseor more cruel act to any of the inhabitants of a hostile city,when, after the loss of many of their most considerablecommanders, the expense of a great deal of money, and along siege, that they shall have stormed and taken it by aviolent and impetuous assault? May not these fathers andmothers, think you, be sorrowful and heavy-hearted, whenthey see an unknown fellow, a vagabond stranger, a barbarous lout, a rude cur, rotten, fleshless, putrified , scraggy,boily, botchy, poor, a forlorn caitiff, and miserable sneak, byan open rapt, snatch away before their own eyes their sofair, delicate, neat, well-behavioured, richly provided for andhealthful daughters, on whose breeding and education theyhad spared no cost nor charges, by bringing them up in anhonest discipline to all the honourable and virtuous employments becoming one of their sex, descended of a nobleparentage, hoping by those commendable and industriousmeans in an opportune and convenient time to bestow themon the worthy sons of their well- deserving neighbours andancient friends, who had nourished, entertained , taught, instructed, and schooled their children with the same care andsolicitude, to make them matches fit to attain to the felicityof a so happy marriage, that from them might issue anoffspring and progeny no less heirs to the laudable endowments and exquisite qualifications of their parents, whomthey every way resemble, than to their personal and realestates, moveables and inheritances? How doleful, trist,and plangorous would such a sight and pageantry prove untothem? You shall not need to think, that the collachrymation of the Romans and their confederates at the decease ofGermanicus Drusus was comparable to this lamentation oftheirs? Neither would I have you to believe that the dis-160 [ BOOK III. RABELAIS' WORKS.comfort and anxiety of the Lacedæmonians, when the GreekHelen, by the perfidiousness ofthe adulterous Trojan, Paris,was privily stolen away out of their country, was greater ormore pitiful than this ruthful and deplorable collugency oftheirs? You may very well imagine, that Ceres at theravishment of her daughter Proserpine, was not more attristed, sad, nor mournful than they. Trust me, and yourown reason, that the loss of Orsiris was not so regrettable toIsis, nor did Venus so deplore the death of Adonis, -noryet did Hercules so bewail the straying of Hylas,-nor wasthe rapt of Polyxena more throbbingly resented and condoled by Priamus and Hecuba, than this aforesaid accidentwould be sympathetically bemoaned, grievous, ruthful, andanxious, to the wofully desolate and disconsolate parents.Notwithstanding all this, the greater part of so vilelyabused parents are so timorous and afraid of the devils andhobgoblins, and so deeply plunged in superstition , that theydare not gainsay nor contradict, much less oppose and resist,those unnatural and impious actions, when the mole- catcherhath been present at the perpetrating ofthe fact, and a partycontractor and covenanter in that detestable bargain. Whatdo they do then? They wretchedly stay at their own miserable homes, destitute of their well- beloved daughters, —thefathers cursing the days and the hours wherein they weremarried, and the mothers howling and crying, that it wasnot their fortune to have brought forth abortive issues,when they happened to be delivered of such unfortunategirls; and in this pitiful plight spend at best the remainderof their time, with tears and weeping for those their children,of and from whom they expected , (and, with good reason,should have obtained and reaped, ) in these latter days oftheirs, joy and comfort. Other parents there have been, soimpatient ofthat affront and indignity put upon them, andtheirfamilies, that, transported with the extremity of passion, ina mad and frantic mood, through the vehemency of a grievousfury and raging sorrow, they have drowned, hanged, killed,and otherwise put violent hands on themselves. Others,again, of that parental relation, have, upon the reception ofthe like injury, been of a more magnanimous and heroic spirit,who, in imitation and at the example of the children ofJacob, revenging upon the Sichemites the rapt of theirsister Dina, having found the rascally ruffian in the associaJHAP. XLVIII.]PANTAGRuel. 161tion of his mystical mole- catcher, closely and in huggermugger conferring, and parleying, with their daughters,for the suborning, corrupting, depraving, perverting, and enticing these innocent unexperienced maids unto filthy lewdnesses, have without any further advisem*nt on the matter,cut them instantly to pieces, and thereupon forthwith thrownout upon the fields their so dismembered bodies, to serve forfood unto the wolves and ravens. Upon the chivalrous , bold,and courageous achievement of a so valiant, stout, and manlike act, the other mole- catching symmists have been sohighly incensed, and have so chafed , fretted, and fumedthereat, that bills of complaint and accusations having beenin a most odious and detestable manner put in before thecompetent judges, the arm of secular authority hath withmuch importunity and impetuosity been by them imploredand required; they proudly contending, That the servants ofGod would become contemptible, if exemplary punishmentwere not speedily taken upon the persons of the perpetratorsof such an enormous, horrid, sacrilegious, crying, heinous,and execrable crime.Yet neither by natural equity, by the law of nations, norby any imperial law whatsoever, hath there been found somuch as one rubric, paragraph, point, or tittle, by the whichany kind of chastisem*nt or correction hath been adjudgeddue to be inflicted upon any for their delinquency in thatkind. Reason opposeth, and nature is repugnant. Forthere is no virtuous man in the world, who both naturallyand with good reason will not be more hugely troubled inmind, hearing of the news of the rapt, disgrace, ignominy,and dishonour of his daughter, than of her death. Nowany man, finding in hot blood one, who with a fore- thoughtfelony hath murdered his daughter, may, without tying himself to the formalities and circ*mstances of a legal proceeding,kill him on a sudden, and out of hand, without incurringany hazard of being attainted and apprehended by theofficers of justice for so doing. It is no wonder then if alechering rogue, together with his mole- catching abettor, beentrapped in the flagrant act of suborning his daughter, andstealing her out of his house, though herself consent thereto, that the father in such a case of stain and infamy bythem brought upon his family, should put them both to ashameful death, and cast their carcases upon dunghills to beVOL. II.MRABELAIS' WORKS. LBOOK III.162 devoured and eaten up by dogs and swine, or otherwise flingthem a little further off to the direption, tearing and rending asunder of their joints and members by the wild beasts ofthe field, as being unworthy to receive the gentle, the desired, the last kind embraces of their great Alma Mater, theearth, commonly called burial. Dearly beloved son, have an especial care, that after mydecease none of these laws be received in any of your king- doms; for whilst I breathe, by the grace and assistance ofGod, I shall give good order. Seeing, therefore, you havetotally referred unto my discretion the disposure of you in marriage, I am fully of an opinion, that I shall provide sufficiently well for you in that point. Make ready and preTake along with you pare yourself for Panurge's voyage.Epistemon, Friar John, and such others as you will choose.Do with my treasures what unto yourself shall seem mostexpedient. None of your actions, I promise you, can in any Take out of my arsenal manner of way displease me.Thalasse whatsoever equipage, furniture, or provision you please, together with such pilots , mariners, and truchmen,as you have a mind to, and with the first fair and favourablewind set sail and make out to sea, in the name of God ourSaviour. In the meanwhile, during your absence, I shall notbe neglective of providing a wife for you, nor of those preparations, which are requisite to be made for the more sumptuous solemnizing of your nuptials with a most splendid feast, if ever there was any in the world.CH. XLIX. -How Pantagruel did put himself in a readiness togo to sea; and of the herb named Pantagruelion. WITHIN Very few days after that Pantagruel had taken hisleave of the good Gargantua, who devoutly prayed for hisson's happy voyage, he arrived at the sea- port, near to Sam- malo, accompanied with Panurge, Epistemon, Friar John ofthe Funnels, Abbot of Theleme, and others of the royalhouse, especially with Xenomanes the great traveller, and thwarter of dangerous ways, who was to come at the bid- ding and appointment of Panurge, of whose Castlewick ofSalmigondin he did hold some petty inheritance by the tenure of a mesne fee. Pantagruel, being come thither, pre- pared and made ready for launching a fleet of ships, to the number of those which Ajax of Salamine had of old equip.CHAP. XLIX. ] PANTAGRUEL. 163ped in convoy of the Grecian soldiery against the Trojan state. He likewise picked out for his use so many mariners,pilots, sailors, interpreters, artificers, officers, and soldiers,as he thought fitting, and therewithal made provision of somuch victuals of all sorts, artillery, munition of divers kinds,clothes, monies, and other such luggage, stuff, baggage,chaffer, and furniture, as he deemed needful for carryingon the design of a so tedious, long, and perilous voyage.Amongst other things it was observed, how he caused someof his vessels to be fraught and loaded with a great quantityof an herb of his called Pantagruelion , not only of the greenand raw sort of it , but of the confected also , and of thatwhich was notably well befitted for present use, after the fashion of conserves. The herb Pantagruelion' hath a littleroot, somewhat hard and rough, roundish, terminating in anobtuse and very blunt point, and having some of its veins,strings, or filaments coloured with some spots of white,never fixeth itself into the ground above the profoundness almost of a cubit, or foot and a half. From the root thereofproceedeth the only stalk, orbicular, cane- like, green without, whitish within, and hollow like the stem of smyrnium ,olus atrum, beans, and gentian, full of long threads, straight,easy to be broken, jagged, snipped, nicked and notched alittle after the manner of pillars and columns, slightly furrowed, chamfered, guttered and channelled, and full offibres, or hairs like strings, in which consisteth the chiefvalue and dignity of the herb, especially in that part thereofwhich is termed mesa, as one would say the mean; and inthat other, which had got the denomination of mylasea.

¹ Pantagruelion. ] Hemp: inasmuch as it is of that plant the cord is made which is used for the strangling those who are so unhappy asto be gibbeted. As the punishment of the har, (a withy of green sticks;the band of a fa*ggot see Cotgrave, who says malefactors in old time were, and at this day in some barbarous countries are, hanged with withies) as, I say, the punishment ofthe hairis much ancienter in Francethan the reign of Francis I. , Rabelais must have given hemp the name of Pantagruelion, in regard it was in that prince's time this punishment began to be exercised on the Lutherans, or French Protestants, who were hoisted up to the top of a gibbet with a pulley, and there left to hang till they were burnt or smothered with the fire that was kindledunder them. Rabelais, who durst not speak out his thoughts of such a piece of inhumanity, says, that Pantagruel held these poor people by the throat, and that, in this condition , they wofully lamented the insup.portable manner in which they were put to death.164 [BOOK 111 RABELAIS WORKS.Its height is commonly five or six feet. Yet sometimes it isof such a tall growth, as doth surpass the length of a lance,but that is only when it meeteth with a sweet, easy, warm,wet, and well-soaked soil, -as is the ground of the territory of Olone, and that of Rosea, near to Preneste in Sabinia, and that it want not for rain enough about theseason of the fishers' holidays, and the æstival solstice.There are many trees whose height is by it very far exceeded, and you might call it dendromalache by the authority ofTheophrastus. The plant every year perisheth. -the treeneither in the trunk, root, bark, or boughs, being durable.From the stalk of this Pantagruelion plant there issueforth several large and great branches, whose leaves havethrice as much length as breadth, always green, roughish,and rugged like the Orcanet, or Spanish Bugloss, hardish,slit round about like unto a sickle, or as the saxifragum,as betony, and finally ending as it were in the points of a Macedonian spear, or of such a lancet as surgeons commonlymake use of in their phlebotomizing tiltings . The figureand shape of the leaves thereof is not much different fromthat of those of the ash tree, or of Agrimony; the herb itself being so like the Eupatorian plant, that many skilfulherbalists have called it the Domestic Eupator, and theEupator the Wild Pantagruelion. These leaves are in equaland parallel distances spread around the stalk, by the number in every rank either of five or seven, nature having sohighly favoured and cherished this plant, that she hathrichly adorned it with these two odd, divine, and mysterious numbers. The smell thereof is somewhat strong, and notvery pleasing to nice, tender, and delicate noses. The seednclosed therein mounteth up to the very top of its stalk,and a little above it."This is a numerous herb: for there is no less abundanceSabinia. ] See Pliny, l . 10, c. 9.3 Oras the saxifragum . ] This is added bythe translator. The author only says, as betony: he goes on, and ending in the point of the Macedonian lariz, not as the translator has it, in the points of a Macedonian spear. He took larice (larch-tree) for lance, belike.4 & Eupatorian plant. ] Read eupatorium, or eupatoria. Eupator was not the herb itself, but the king from whom it had its name.Divine and mysterious . ] See Macrobius, on Scipio's dream.'Vers le chefdu tige, et peu au dessoubs. ] The English whereof seems to me, to be near the top of the stalk, and but a very little below it.CHAP. XLIX PANTAGRuel. 165of it than of any other whatsoever. Some of these plantsare spherical, some romboid, and some of an oblong shape,and all of these either black, bright- coloured, or tawny, rudeto the touch, and mantled with a quickly-blasted - away coat,yet such a one as is of a delicious taste and savour to allshrill and sweetly singing birds, such as linnets , goldfinches ,larks, canary birds, yellow hammers, and others of that airychirping quire; but it would quite extinguish the naturalheat and procreative virtue of the sem*nce of any man, whowould eat much, and often of it. And although that ofold amongst the Greeks' there was certain kind of frittersand pancakes, buns and tarts , made thereof, which commonly for a liquorish daintiness were presented on the tableafter supper, to delight the palate and make the wine relishthe better; yet is it of a difficult concoction, and offensiveto the stomach. For it engendereth bad and unwholesomeblood, and with its exorbitant heat woundeth them withgrievous, hurtful, smart, and noisome vapours. And, as indivers plants and trees there are two sexes, male and female, which is perceptible in laurels, palms, cypresses, oaks,holmes, the daffodil , mandrake, fern , the agaric, mushroom,birthwort, turpentine, pennyroyal, peony, rose of the mount,and many other such like, 10 even so in this herb there is amale which beareth no flower at all, yet it is very copious ofand abundant in seed. There is likewise in it a female,which hath great store and plenty of whitish flowers, serviceable to little or no purpose, nor doth it carry in it seedof any worth at all, at least comparable to that of the male.It hath also a larger leaf, and much softer than that of themale, nor doth it altogether grow to so great a height. ThisPantagruelion is to be sown at the first coming of theswallows, and is to be plucked out of the ground when thegrasshoppers begin to be a little hoarse.CH. L.-How thefamous Pantagruelion ought to be preparedand wrought.THE herb Pantagruelion in September, under the autumnalequinox, is dressed and prepared several ways, according to• Procreative, &c. ] See Pliny, 1. 20, c. 23.Amongst the Greeks. ]of his De Re Cibaria.Champier has the same remark, 1. 7, c. 13,10 And many other such like. ] Et aultres.Among these unnamed ones may be intended mushrooms and roses ofthe mount; but Rabelais has not specified either of them by name.166 [BOOK III. RABELAIS' WORKS.the various fancies of the people, and diversity of the climates wherein it groweth. The first instruction which Pantagruel gave concerning it was, to divest and despoil thestalk ind stem thereof of all its flowers and seeds, to macerate and mortify it in stagnant, not running water, for fiveaays together, if the season be dry, and the water hot;or for full nine or twelve days, if the weather be cloudish,and the water cold. Then must it be dried in the sun, tillit be drained of its moisture. After this it is in the shadow,where the sun shines not, to be peeled, and its rind pulled off. Then are the fibres and strings thereof to be parted,wherein, as we have already said , consisteth its prime virtue,price, and efficacy, and severed from the woody part thereof, which is unprofitable, and serveth hardly to any otheruse than to make a clear and glistering blaze, to kindle thefire, and for the play, pastime, and disport of little children ,to blow up hogs' bladders, and make them rattle. Manytimes some use is made thereof by tippling sweet- lippedbibbers, who out of it frame quills and pipes, through whichthey with their liquor- attractive breath suck up the newdainty wine from the bung of the barrel. Some modernPantagruelists, to shun and avoid that manual labour, whichsuch a separating and partitional work would of necessityrequire, employ certain cataractic instruments, composedand formed after the same manner that the froward, pettish,and angry Juno, did hold the fingers of both her hands' interwovenly clenched together, when she would have hindered the childbirth delivery of Alcmena, at the nativity ofHercules; and athwart those cataracts they break and bruiseto very trash the woody parcels, thereby to preserve thebetter the fibres, which are the precious and excellent parts.In and with this sole operation do these acquiesce and arecontented, who, contrary to the received opinion of thewhole earth, and in a manner paradoxical to all philosophers,gain their livelihoods backwards, and by recoiling. Butthose that love to hold it at a higher rate, and prize it according to its value, for their own greater profit, do the very same which is told us of the recreation of the three fatalSister-Parcæ, or of the nocturnal exercise of the noble Circe,1 The fingers, &c. ] See Pliny, 1. 28, c. 6. Do these acquiesce.¡Ropemakers, to whom the hemp comes raw and who, in working it, go backwards. Dothe very same. ] Spin it and weave it.CHAP. L.] PANTAGRUEL. 167or yet of the excuse which Penelope made to her fondwooing youngsters and effeminate courtiers, during the long absence of her husband Ulysses.By these means is this herb put into a way to display itsinestiinable virtues , whereof I will discover a part;-for torelate all is a thing impossible to do. I have already interpreted and exposed before you the denomination thereof. Ifind that plants have their names given and bestowed upon them after several ways. Some got the name of him whofirst found them out, knew them, sowed them, improvedthem by culture, qualified them to a tractability, and appropriated them to the uses and subserviences they were fitfor. As the Mercurialis from Mercury; Panacea from Panace, the daughter of Esculapius; Armois from Artemis,who is Diana; Eupatoria from the king Eupator; Telephion from Telephus; Euphorbium from Euphorbus, KingJuba's physician; Clymenos from Clymenus; Alcibiadiumfrom Alcibiades; Gentian from Gentius, King of Sclavonia,and so forth, through a great many other herbs or plants.Truly, in ancient times, this prerogative of imposing the inventor's name upon an herb found out by him was held in aso great account and estimation , that, as a controversy arosebetwixt Neptune and Pallas, from which of them two thatland should receive its denomination , which had been equallyfound out by them both together; though thereafter it wascalled and had the appellation of Athens, from Athene,which is Minerva, -just so would Lynceus, King of Scythia, have treacherously slain the young Triptolemus, whomCeres had sent to show unto mankind the invention of corn,which until then had been utterly unknown; to the end that,after the murder of the messenger, whose death he madeaccount to have kept secret, he might, by imposing, withthe less suspicion of false dealing, his own name upon thesaid found out seed, acquire unto himself an immortal honour and glory for having been the inventor of a grain soprofitable and necessary to and for the use of human life.For the wickedness of which treasonable attempt he was byCeres transformed into that wild beast, which by some iscalled a lynx, and by others an ounce. Such also was theambition of others upon the like occasion, as appeareth,Armois, &c. ] Artemisia, (mug- wort, or mother-wort) from Queen Artemisia, or from Diana who was likewise called Artemis.168 RABELA18 WORKS. [BOOK III.by that very sharp wars, and of a long continuance havebeen made of old betwixt some residentiary kings in Cappadocia upon this only debate, of whose name a certain herbshould have the appellation; by reason of which difference,so troublesome and expensive to them all, it was by themcalled Polemonion, and by us for the same cause termedMake-bate."Other herbs and plants there are, which retain the namesof the countries from whence they were transported; as theMedian apples from Media, where they first grew; Punicapples from Punicia, that is to say, Carthage; Ligusticum,which we call Louage," from Liguria, the coast of Genoa;Rhubarb from a flood in Barbary, as Ammianus attesteth,called Ru; Santonica ' from a region of that name; Fenugreek from Greece; Castanes 10 from a country so called;Persicaria " from Persia; Sabine from a territory of thatappellation; Stachas from the Stachad Islands; SpicaCeltica from the land of the Celtic Gauls, and so throughouta great many other, which were tedious to enumerate. Someothers, again, have obtained their denominations by way ofantiphrasis, or contrariety; as Absinth, " because it is contrary to Yvos, for it is bitter to the taste in drinking, -Holosteon, as if it were all bones, whilst on the contrary,there is no frailer, tenderer, nor brittler herb in the wholeproduction of nature than it.There are some other sorts of herbs, which have got theirnames from their virtues and operations; as Aristolochia,Makebate.] Guerroyre. Warlike. All this and most that comes after is taken from Pliny, 1. xxv. c. vi. and vii , &c. &c . &c.Medianapples ] Pome-citrons. 7 Punic apples. ] Pomegranates.Louage. Lovage. In the original linesche, which Cotgrave inter- prets lovage of Lombardy. Camb. Dict. says the same of ligusticum,and reason good. Santonica. ] Cotgrave interprets this the seed of holy wormwood, Camb. Dict. says French wormwood, and in that case it may have its name from Saintonge in France.19 Castanes. From Castana, a city of Thessaly, which abounds with chesnut trees; or, as Cooper writes it, chesten tree or nut.11 Persicaria.] Rabelais says, (persique, ) a peach tree, not the herb called persicaria, i . e. arse-smart or culrage. 12 Absinth. ] Absin thium. Worm vood. The derivation of which word according to theauthors of the Cambridge Dictionary, is ' A↓ıvØvov (undrinkable)quasi drivhior ab a privativa et ivw bibo quod non sit potabile ob am- arorem; vel ab a priv, et Vívŷog, i, e. rápkıç delectatio. Wormwood does indeed make none of the pleasantest drinkables; but in a fit of the cholic, there is nothing so relieving as a glass of wormwood wineCHAP. L.]PANTAGRUEL. 169because it helpeth women in child- birth; Lichen, for that itcureth the disease of that name; Mallow, because it mollifieth; Callithricum, because it maketh the hair of a brightcolour; Alyssum, Ephemerum, Bechium, Nasturtium, Henbane, and so forth through many more.Other some there are, which have obtained their namesfrom the admirable qualities that are found to be in them;as Heliotropium, which is the marigold, because it followeththe sun, so that at the sun rising it displayeth and spreadsitself out, at his ascending it mounteth, at his declining itwaneth, and, when he is set, it is close shut; Adianton, because, although it grow near unto watery places, and albeityou should let it lie in water a long time, it will neverthelessretain no moisture nor humidity; Hierachia, Eringium, and so throughout a great many more. There are also a greatmany herbs and plants, which have retained the very samenames ofthe men and women who have been metamorphosedand transformed in them; as from Daphne, the laurel iscalled also Daphne; Myrrh from Myrrha, the daughter ofCinarus; Pythis from Pythis; Cinara, which is the artichoke, from one of that name; Narcissus, with Saffron,Smilax, and divers others.Many herbs, likewise, have got their names of those thingswhichthey seem to have some resemblance to; as Hippuris,because it hath the likeness of a horse's tail; Alopecuris, because it representeth in similitude the tail of a fox; Psyllion,from a flea which it resembleth; Delphinium, for that it islike the dolphin fish; Bugloss is so called , because it is anherb like an ox's tongue; Iris, so called , because in itsflowers it hath some resemblance of the rainbow; Myosota,because it is like the ear of a mouse; Coronopus, for that itis of the likeness of a crow's foot. A great many other suchthere are, which here to recite were needless . Furthermore,as there are herbs and plants which have had their namesfrom those of men, so by a reciprocal denomination have thesurnames of many families taken their origin from them; asthe Fabii, à fabis, beans; the Pisons, à pisis, peas; theLentuli, from lentils; the Cicerons, à ciceribus, vel ciceris, asort of pulse called chickpeas , and so forth. In some plantsand herbs, the resemblance or likeness hath been taken froma higher mark or object, as when we say Venus' navel,170 RABELAIS' WORKS. IBOOK III.Venus' hair, Venus' tub, Jupiter's beard, Jupiter's eye,"Mar's blood, the Hermodactyl or Mercury's nngers, which are all of them names of herbs , as there are a great manymore of the like appellation . Others, again, have receivedtheir denomination from their forms; such as the trefoil,because it is three-leaved; Pentaphylon, for having fiveleaves; Serpolet, because it creepeth along the ground;Helxine, Petast, Myrobalon, which the Arabians calledBeen, " as if you would say an acorn, for it hath a kind ofresemblance thereto, and withal is very oily.CH. LI.- Why it is called Pantagruelion, and of the ad- mirable virtues thereof.By such like means of attaining to a denomination, thefabulous ways being only from thence excepted; for, theLord forbid, that we should make use of any fables in thisa so very heritable history, is this herb called Pantagruelion;for Pantagruel was the inventor thereof. I do not say ofthe plant itself, but of a certain use which it serves for, exceeding odious and hateful to thieves and robbers, untowhom it is more contrarious and hurtful than the strangleweed and choke- fitch is to the flax, the cats- tail to thebrakes, the sheave- grass to the mowers of hay, the fitches tothe chickney-peas, the darnel to barley, the hatchet- fitch tothe lentil - pulse, the antramium to the beans, tares to wheat,ivy to walls, the water- lily to lecherous monks, ' the birchenrod to the scholars of the college of Navarre in Paris, colewort to the vine tree , garlic to the load- stone, onions to thesight, fearn-seed to women with child, willow- grain to vicious nuns, the yew- tree shade to those that sleep under it,13 Jupiter's eye. ] It is the name which the Latins gave to the sem- pervivum majus. See Salmasius, who proves it by two Greek authori- ties, ch. xix. of his hom*onymies, byles ïatricæ. " Folia pinguia, 'says Gesner, speaking of the plant, " carnosa, longitudine pollicari, ia cacumine linguæ similia, alia in terram convexa, alia in capite stant:ainvicem , ita ut ambitu effigiem imitentur oculi. " Doubtless it was onthe account of this affinity, the Latins called Jupiter's eye the semper- vivum majus, and that just before, for such another affinity, Rabelais with the Greeks uses the word Jupiter's beard.14 Been. See Avicenna, canon ii, ch. lxxxv.1 Water lily to lecherous monks . ] It is in a most especial mannerprescribed to the monks, against the temptations of the flesh. See Bouchet.CHAP. LI. ]PANTAGRUEL. 1718wolfsbane to wolves and libbards, the smell of fig-tree tomad bulls, hemlock to goslings , purslane to the teeth, or oto trees. For we have seen many of those rogues, by virtueand right application of this herb, finish their lives shorand long, after the manner of Phyllis Queen of Thracia, ² otBonosus, Emperor of Rome, of Amata, King Latinus'swife, of Iphis, Autolia, Lycambes, " Arachne, Phædra,Leda, Achius, King of Lydia, and many thousands more;who were chiefly angry and vexed at this disaster therein,that, without being otherwise sick or evil disposed in theirbodies, by a touch only of the Pantagruelion, they came ona sudden to have the passage obstructed, and their pipes,through which were wont to bolt so many jolly sayings , andto enter so many luscious morsels, stopped, more cleverly,than ever could have done the squinancy.Others have been heard most wofully to lament, at thevery instant when Atropos was about to cut the thread oftheir life, that Pantagruel held them by the gorge. But,well-a-day, it was not Pantagruel; he never was an execu- tioner.10 It was the Pantagruelion , manufactured and fashioned into an halter, and serving in the place and office of acravat. In that, verily, they solecized and spoke improperly, unless you would excuse them by a trope, whichalloweth us to posit the inventor in the place of the thinginvented; as when Ceres is taken for bread, and Bacchusput instead of wine. I swear to you here, by the good and2 See Ovid. Heroid. ep. ii . Phyllis to Demophoon.783 Bonosus. ] Strangled by the Emperor Probus, for assuming the im- perial purple in Gaul. See his Life, by Vobiscus. ] Amata. ] Virgil Eneid, 1. xii. 5 Iphis. ] See Ovid, Metam. 1. xiv. Autolia. ] Orrather Autolyca, mother of Ulysses. She hung herself in despair on receiving false intelligence of her son's death. ] Lycambes. ] Fatherof Neobule. He had betrothed her to the poet Archilochus, but gave her to a wealthier man. The biting verses of the exasperated lover drovehim to despair and the herb Pantagruelion . ] Arachne. ] Ovid ,Metam. lib. vi. Achius, King of Lydia. ] For endeavouring to raise a new tribute from his subjects, he was hung by the popular faction,taken down, and thrown headlong into the river Pactolus. See Poly- bius. Ovid, Ibis, 301. 10 Executioner. ] Roüart, in Rabelais . This,Cotgrave says, signifies a marshal, or provost-marshal, an officer that breaks, or sees broken, malefactors on the wheel. Then roüart mustcome from rotare, roïer, rože, a wheel. But M. Duchat, in the present sense of the executioners' strangling the offenders in question, says roüart comes from raucus, hoarse, because he by that action makes them hoarse.172 [ BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.frolic words which are to issue out of that wine- bottle, whichis a- cooling below in the copper vessel full of fountain water,that the noble Pantagruel never snatched any man by thethroat, unless it was such a one as was altogether carelessand neglective of those obviating remedies, which were pre- ventive of the thirst to come.It is also termed Pantagruelion by a similitude . ForPantagruel, at the very first minute of his birth, was no lesstall than this herb is long, whereof I speak unto you, —hismeasure having been then taken the more easy, that he wasborn in the season of the great drought, when they werebusiest in the gathering of the said herb, to wit, at that timewhen Icarus's dog, with his fiery bawling and barking atthe sun, maketh the whole world Troglodytic, and enforcethpeople everywhere to hide themselves in dens and subterranean caves. It is likewise called Pantagruelion, becauseof the notable and singular qualities, virtues, and propertiesthereof. For as Pantagruel hath been the idea , pattern,prototype, and exemplary of all jovial perfection and accomplishment-in the truth whereof I believe there is none ofyou, gentlemen drinkers, that putteth any question—so inthis Pantagruelion have I found so much efficacy and energy,so much completeness and excellency, so much exquisitenessand rarity, and so many admirable effects and operationsof a transcendent nature, that, if the worth and virtue thereofhad been known, when those trees , by the relation of theprophet, made election of a wooden king to rule and governover them, it without doubt would have carried away fromall the rest the plurality of votes and suffrages.Shall I yet say more? If Oxylus," the son of Orius, hadbegotten this plant upon his sister Hamadryas , he had takenmore delight in the value and perfection of it alone, than inall his eight children, so highly renowned by our ablestmythologians, that they have sedulously recommended theirnames to the never-failing tuition of an eternal remembrance.The eldest child was a daughter, whose name was Vine; thenext born was a boy, and his name was Fig- tree; the thirdwas called Walnut-tree; the fourth Oak; the fifth Sorbapple-tree; the sixth Ash; the seventh Poplar; and the11 Oxylus, &c.] See Athenæus, l . iii. c. iii.12 Ash. In the original, fenabregue. M. Duchat, after he had sought while what this word meant, at length found that at Sommieres,nguedoc, they called fenebregue, the tree that is called in otherCHAP. LI.] PANTAGRUEL. 17313 last had the name of Elm, who was the greatest surgeon ¹³ inhis time. I shall forbear to tell you, how the juice or sapthereof, being poured and distilled within the ears, killethevery kind of vermin, that by any manner of putrefactioncometh to be bred and engendered there, and destroyeth alsoany whatsoever other animal that shall have entered inthereat. If, likewise, you put a little of the said juice withina pail or bucket full of water, you shall see the water instantly turn and grow thick therewith, as if it were milkcurds, whereof the virtue is so great, that the water thuscurded is a present remedy for horses subject to the cholic ,and such as strike at their own flanks. " The root thereofwell boiled mollifieth the joints, softeneth the hardness ofshrunk-in sinews, is every way comfortable to the nerves,and good against all cramps and convulsions, as likewise all cold and knotty gouts. If you would speedily heal a burning, whether occasioned by water or fire, apply thereto alittle raw Pantagruelion , that is to say, take it so as it comethout of the ground, without bestowing any other preparationor composition upon it; but have a special care to change itfor some fresher, in lieu thereof, as soon as you shall find itwaxing dry upon the sore.Without this herb, kitchens would be detested, the tablesof dining-rooms abhorred, although there were great plentyand variety of most dainty and sumptuous dishes of meatset down upon them-and the choicest beds also , how richlysoever adorned with gold, silver, amber, ivory, porphyry,and the mixture of most precious metals, would without ityield no delight or pleasure to the reposers in them . Without it millers could neither carry wheat, nor any other kindof corn, to the mill, nor would they be able to bring backfrom thence flour, or any other sort of meal whatsoever.Without it, how could the papers and writs of lawyers'clients be brought to the bar? Seldom is the mortar, lime,or plaister brought to the workhouse without it. Withoutit, how should the water be got out of a draw- well; in whatparts of France alister, the lote tree; of which, says Cotgrave, there is the grey, the red, and other sorts, all strangers in England.13 The greatest surgeon. ] See Pliny, 1. xxiv. c. viii.14 See Pliny, 1. xx. , last chapter but one. The same remedy was successfully employed in Alsace in 1705, in the cure of a kind of cholicwith which the horses of the French army were very much disordered.174 RABELAIS [BOOK III.' WORKS.15case would tabellions, notaries, copists, makers of counterpanes, writers, clerks, secretaries, scriveners, and suchlike persons be without it? Were it not for it, what wouldDecome of the toll- rates and rent- rolls? Would not thenoble art of printing perish without it? Whereof could thechassis or paper windows be made? How should the bellsbe rung? The altars of Isis are adorned therewith, thePastophorian priests are therewith clad and accoutred, andwhole human nature covered and wrapped therein, at itsfirst position and production in and into this world. All thelanific trees of Seres, the bumbast and cotton bushes in theterritories near the Persian sea, and Gulf of Bengala; theArabian swans, together with the plants of Malta , do not allof them clothe, attire, and apparel so many persons as thisone herb alone. Soldiers are now- a-days much better sheltered under it, than they were in former times, when theylay in tents covered with skins . It overshadows the theatresand amphitheatres from the heat of a scorching sun.begirdeth and encompasseth forests, chases, parks, copses,and groves, for the pleasure of hunters. It descendeth intothe salt and fresh of both sea and river waters, for the profitof fishers. By it are boots of all sizes, buskins, gamashes,brodkins, gambados, shoes, pumps, slippers, and every cobbled ware wrought and made steadable for the use of man.By it the butt and rover bows are strung, the cross- bowsbended, and the slings made fixed . And, as if it were an herbevery whit as holy as the vervain, and reverenced by ghosts,spirits, hobgoblins, fiends, and phantoms, the bodies of de- ceased men are never buried without it.I will proceed yet further. By the means of this fine herb,the invisible substances are visibly stopped, arrested, taken,detained, and prisoner- like committed to their receptive gaols .Heavy and ponderous weights are by it heaved, lifted up ,turned, veered, drawn , carried, and every way moved quickly,nimbly and easily, to the great profit and emolument ofFastophorian priests . ] Only pastophores in French. They were the pontiffs among the Egyptians, in the temple of Serapis. Пluso , ‘ pull- um sacerdotale, a cope . Falliam Veneris quod ferebant in Egypto sacerdotes cæteris honoratiores." The plan of their abode was close to the temple, and called pastophorium . Ruff. Eccles. Hist. 1. ii . c. xxiii.Item Hieron. in Esa. pastopho.ium , inquit, est thalamus, in quo habitat præpositus templi. "CHAP. LI. ] PANTAGRUEL. 175human kind. When I perpend with myself these and suchlike marvellous effects of this wonderful herb, it seemethstrange unto me, how the invention of so useful a practicedid escape through so many by- past ages the knowledge ofthe ancient philosophers, considering the inestimable utilitywhich from thence proceeded, and the immense labour.which, without it, they did undergo in their pristine lucubrations. By virtue thereof, through the retention of someaerial gusts, are the huge barges, mighty galleons, the largefloats, the Chiliander, the Myriander ships launched fromtheir stations, and set agoing at the pleasure and arbitrementof their rulers, conders, and steersman. By the help thereof¹those remote nations, whom nature seemed so unwilling tchave discovered to us, and so desirous to have kept themstill in abscondito and hidden from us, that the ways throughwhich their countries were to be reached unto, were notonly totally unknown, but judged also to be altogether impermeable and inaccessible, are now arrived to us, and we to them.Those voyages outreached the flights of birds, and far surpassed the scope of feathered fowls, how swift soever they had been on the wing, and notwithstanding that advantage.which they have of us, in swimming through the air. Taproban hath seen the heaths of Lapland, and both the Javas,the Riphæan mountains; wide distant Phebol shall see The- leme, and the Islanders drink of the flood of Euphrates . By it the chill- mouthed Boreas hath surveyed the parched mansions ofthe torrid Auster, and Eurus visited the regions whichZephyrus hath under his command; yea, in such sort have interviews been made, by the assistance of this sacred herb that, maugre longitudes and latitudes, and all the variationsof the zones, the Peræcian people, and Antoecian, Amphis- cian, Heteroscian, and Periscian have oft rendered and received mutual visits to and from other, upon all the climates.These strange exploits bred such astonishment to the celestial intelligences, to all the marine and terrestrial gods,that they were on a sudden all afraid . From which amaze- ment, when they saw, how, by means of this blest Pantagruelion, the Arctic people looked upon the Antarctic, scouredthe Atlantic Ocean, passed the tropics, pushed through the16Bythe help thereof. ] This is an imitation ofa*grippa, chap. lxxviii. of his De Vanitate Scientiarum .176 [BOOK III.EABELAIS WORKS.torrid zone, measured all the zodiac, sported under the equi.noctial, having both poles level with their horizon; theyjudged it high time to call a council for their own safety and preservation.The Olympic gods, being all and each of them affrightedat the sight of such achievements, said, Pantagruel hathshapen work enough for us, and put us more to a plunge,and nearer our wit's end, by this sole herb of his, than didof old the Aloida by overturning mountains. He veryspeedily is to be married, and shall have many children by his wife. It lies not in our power to oppose this destiny;for it hath passed through the hands and spindles of theFatal Sisters, necessity's inexorable daughters. Who knowsbut by his sons may be found out an herb of such anothervirtue and prodigious energy, as that by the aid thereof inusing it aright according to their father's skill, they maycontrive a way for human kind to pierce into the high aërianclouds, get up unto the spring-head of the hail, take an inspection of the snowy sources, and shut and open as theyplease the sluices from whence proceed the floodgates of therain; then prosecuting their etherial voyage, they may stepin unto the lightning workhouse and shop, where all thethunderbolts are forged, where, seizing on the magazine ofheaven, and storehouse of our warlike fire munition, theymay discharge a bouncing peal or two of thundering ordnance, for joy of their arrival to these new supernal places;and, charging those tonitrual guns afresh, turn the wholeforce of that artillery wherein we most confided againstourselves. Then is it like, they will set forward to invadethe territories of the moon, whence, passing through bothMercury and Venus, the Sun will serve them for a torch, toshow the way from Mars to Jupiter and Saturn. We shall notthen be able to resist the impetuosity of their intrusion, norput a stoppage to their entering in at all, whatever regions,domiciles, or mansions of the spangled firmament they shallhave any mind to see, to stay in, or to travel through for theirrecreation. All the celestial signs together, with the constellations of the fixed stars , will jointly be at their devotion then. Some will take up their lodging at the Ram, some atthe Bull, and others at the Twins; some at the Crab, some17 Sported under the equinoctial. ] Here Rabelais gilds the pill; cut- ting the line has always been reported as a thing far from being pleasant.CHAP. LII.]PANTAGRUEL. 177at the Lion Inn, and others at the sign of the Virgin; some at the Balance, others at the Scorpion, and others will be quartered at the Archer; some will be harboured at theGoat, some at the Water-pourer's sign, some at the Fishes; some will lie at the Crown, some at the Harp, some at the Golden Eagle and the Dolphin; some at the Flying Horse, some at the Ship, some at the great, some at the little Bear; and so throughout the glistening hostelries of the whole twinkling asteristic welkin . There will be sojourners come from the earth, who, longing after the taste of the sweet cream, of their own skimming off, from the best milk of allthe dairy of the Galaxy, will set themselves at table down with us, drink of our nectar and ambrosia, and take to theirown beds at night for wives and concubines, our fairest god- desses, the only means whereby they can be deified . Ajunto hereupon being convocated, the better to consult upon the manner of obviating so dreadful a danger, Jove, sitting inhis presidential throne, asked the votes of all the other gods, which, after a profound deliberation amongst themselves on all contingencies, they freely gave at last, and then resolved unanimously to withstand the shocks of all whatsoever sublunary assaults.CHAP. LII. —How a certain kind of Pantagruelion is of that·nature that the fire is not able to consume it .I HAVE already related to you great and admirable things;but, if you might be induced to adventure upon the hazardof believing some other divinity of this sacred Pantagruelion,Believe it, if you will,I very willingly would tell it you.or, otherwise, believe it not, I care not which of them youIt shall be sufficient for my do, they are both alike to me.purpose to have told you the truth , and the truth I will tellBut to enter in thereat, because it is of a knaggy, diffiyou cult., and rugged access, this is the question which I ask ofyou.If I had put within this bottle two pints, the one of wine, and the other of water, thoroughly and exactly mingled together, how would you unmix them? After what mannerwould you go about to sever them, and separate the one liquor from the other, in such sort, that you render me the water apart, free from the wine, and the wine also pure,1 This is not a new chapter in M. Duchat's edition, but a continuation ofthe former.VOL II.N178 [BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.without the intermixture of one drop of water, and both ofthem in the same measure, quantity, and taste, that I hadembottled them? Or, to state the question otherwise. Ifyour carmen and mariners, entrusted for the provision ofyour houses with the bringing of a certain considerable number of tuns, puncheons, pipes, barrels, and hogsheads ofGraves wine, or of the wine of Orleans, Beaune, and Mirevaux , should drink out² the half, and afterwards with waterfill up the other empty halves of the vessels as full as before;as the Limosins use to do, in their carriages by wains and carts,of the wines of Argenton and Sangaultier, after that, howwould you part the water from the wine, and purify them both in such a case? I understand you well enough. Yourmeaning is, that I must do it with an ivy funnel. Thatis written, it is true , and the verity thereof explored by athousand experiments; you have learned to do this feat before, I see it. But those that have never known it, nor atany time have seen the like, would hardly believe that itwere possible. Let us nevertheless proceed.But put the case, we were now living in the age of Sylla,Marius Cæsar, and other such Roman emperors, or that wewere in the time of our ancient Druids, whose custom wasto burn and calcine the dead bodies of their parents andlords, and that you had a mind to drink the ashes or cindersof your wives or fathers, in the infused liquor of some good white-wine, as Artemisia³ drunk the dust and ashes of herhusband Mausolus; or, otherwise, that you did determine tohave them reserved in some fine urn , or reliquary pot; howwould you save the ashes apart, and separate them fromthose other cinders and ashes into which the fuel of thefuneral and bustuary fire hath been converted? Answer, ifyoucan. Bymy figgings, I believe it will trouble you so to do.Well, I will dispatch, and tell you, that, if you take ofthis celestial Pantagruelion so much as is needful to coverthe body of the defunct, and after that you shall have enwrapped and bound therein, as hard and closely as you can,2 Shoulddrink out. ] Buffeter in French, which signifies to give one buffet, or cuff: hence, metaphorically to mar a vessel of wine, by often tasting it before it was broached; or, rather, ashore, to fill it up with water, after much wine hath been stolen, or taken out of it. (Which to prevent, in the case of Yorkshire and Burton ale , I have heard, the Bender puts the full cask into an empty one.) 3 See Aulus Gellius,1. x. c. xviii.CHAP. LII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 179rates.the corpse of the said deceased persons, and sewed up thefolding-sheet, with thread of the same stuff, throw it intothe fire , how great or ardent soever it be, it matters not astraw, the fire through this Pantagruelion will burn the bodyand reduce to ashes the bones thereof, and the Pantagruelionshall be not only not consumed nor burnt, but also shallneither lose one atom of the ashes enclosed within it, norreceive one atom of the huge bustuary heap of ashes resulting from the blazing conflagration of things combustible laidround about it , but shall at last, when taken out of the fire,be fairer, whiter, and much cleaner than when you did putit in first. Therefore it is called Asbeston, which is as muchas to say incombustible. Great plenty is to be found thereofin Carpasia, as likewise in the climate Dia Cyenes, at very easyO how rare and admirable a thing it is, that the fire,which devoureth, consumeth, and destroyeth all such things.else, should cleanse, purge, and whiten this sole PantagruelionCarpasianAsbeston! Ifyou mistrust the verity of this relation,and demand for further confirmation of my assertion a visiblesign, as the Jews, and such incredulous infidels use to do,take a fresh egg, and orbicularly, or rather, ovally, enfold itwithin this divine Pantaguelion. When it is so wrappedup, put it in the hot embers of a fire, how great or ardentsoever it be, and, having left it there as long as you will,you shall at last, at your taking it out of the fire, find theegg roasted hard, and as it were burnt, without any altera- tion, change, mutation, or so much as a calefaction of thesacred Pantagruelion . For less than a million of poundssterling, modified, taken down and amoderated to the twelfthpart of one four pence half- penny farthing, you are to put itto a trial, and make proof thereof.Do not think to overmatch me here, by paragoning with itin the way of a more eminent comparison the Salamander.That is a fib; for, albeit a little ordinary fire , such as is used indining-rooms and chambers, gladden, cheer up, exhilarate andquicken it, yet may I warrantably enough assure , that in theflaming fire of a furnace it will, like any other animatedcreature, be quickly suffocated, choked, consumed, and destroyed. Wehave seen experiment thereof, and Galen manyages ago hath clearly demonstrated and confirmed it , lib. 3.See Plutarch, in his Treatise of Oracles ceasing.Pausanias.5 SeeIn the original , fifty thousand Bourdelois crowns.N 2180 [BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.De Temperamentis, and Dioscorides maintaineth the same doctrine, lib. 2. Do not here instance, in competition withthis sacred herb, the feather allum, or the wooden tower ofPyræus, which Lucius Sylla ' was never able to get burnt;for that Archelaus, governor of the town for MithridatesKing of Pontus, had plastered it all over on the outside withthe said allum. Nor would I have you to compare therewiththe herb, which Alexander Cornelius called Eonem, and said,that it had some resemblance with that oak which bears themistletoe, and that it could neither be consumed , nor receiveany manner of prejudice by fire, nor by water, no more thanthe mistletoe, of which was built, said he , the so renownedship Argos. Search where you please for those that willbelieve it. I in that point desire to be excused . Neitherwould I wish you to parallel therewith, -although I cannotdeny, but that it is of a very marvellous nature , —that sort oftree which groweth along the mountains of Briançon andAmbrun, which produceth out of its root the good Agaric.From its body it yieldeth unto us a so excellent rosin, thatGalen hath been bold to equal it unto the turpentine. Upon the delicate leaves thereof it retaineth for our use that sweetheavenly honey, which is called the manna; and, although itbe of a gummy, oily, fat and greasy substance, it is notwithstanding unconsumable by any fire. It is in the Greek andLatin called Larix. The Alpinese name is Melze. TheAnternorides and Venetians term it Larége; which gave occasion to that castle in Piedmont to receive the denominationof Larignum, by putting Julius Cæsar to a stand at his return from amongst the Gauls.8Julius Cæsar commanded all the yeomen, boors, hinds ,and other inhabitants in, near unto, and about the Alps and7 See Aulus Gellius, 1. xv. c. 1 . In the original , it is at going tothe Gauls. This is taken from Vitruvius, l. ii . c. ix. Phi- lander, in his remarks on this passage of Vitruvius, Venice edition,1557 , says, that being at Venice he had a mind to try whether the me- leze, supposing it to be the larix of Vitruvius, would withstand the force of fire; but found that this pretended larix was consumed by it, though at first this wood seemed to defy the flame, and make it keep its dis- tance. Upon which M. Le Clerc, who had some of the true incombustible larix, avers, in art. ii . of t. xii. of his Bibliotheque Choisie,that the meleze of Philander was not the true larix. I believe so too;but yet it is certain, by what goes before in Rabelais, that our author took the meleze for the larix , or incombustible wood of Vitruvius. In short, the true larix is not unknown to the virtuosi of Rome, one of whom sent some of it not long ago to Holland, where it is stii! kept.CHAP. LII.]PANTAGRUEL 181Piedmont, to bring all manner of victuals and provision foran army to those places, which on the military road he hadappointed to receive them for the use of his marchingsoldiery. To which ordinance all of them were obedient,save only those as were within the garrison of Larignum,who, trusting in the natural strength of the place , would notpay their contribution . The emperor, purposing to chastisethem for their refusal, caused his whole army to marchstraight towards that castle , before the gate whereof waserected a tower built of huge big spars and rafters of thelarch tree, fast bound together with pins and pegs of thesame wood, and interchangeably laid on one another, afterthe fashion of a pile or stack of timber, set up in the fabricthereof to such an apt and convenient height, that from theparapet above the portcullis they thought with stones andleavers to beat off and drive away such as should approach thereto.When Cæsar had understood, that the chief defence ofthose within the castle did consist in stones and clubs , andthat it was not an easy matter to sling , hurl , dart, throw, orcast them so far as to hinder the approaches, he forthwithcommanded his men to throw great store of bavins, fa*ggots,and fascines round about the castle; and, when they hadmade the heap of a competent height, to put them all in afair fire, which was thereupon incontinently done. The fireputamidstthe fa*ggots was so great and so high, that it coveredthe whole castle, that they might well imagine the towerwould thereby be altogether burnt to dust and demolished .Nevertheless , contrary to all their hopes and expectations ,when the flame ceased, and that the fa*ggots were quite burntand consumed, the tower appeared as whole, sound, and en- tire as ever. Cæsar, after a serious consideration had thereof,commanded a compass to be taken without the distance of astone cast from the castle, round about it; there, with ditchesand entrenchments to form a blockade; which when theLarignans understood , they rendered themselves upon terms.And then, by a relation from them, it was, that Cæsar learnedthe admirable nature and virtue of this wood, which of itselfproduceth neither fire, flame, nor coal, and would, therefore,in regard of that rare quality of incombustibility, have beenadmitted into this rank and degree of a true Pantagruelionplant; and that so much the rather, for that Pantagruel di-182 [BOOK III.RABELAIS' WORKS.rected that all the gates, doors, angiports, windows, gutters,frettized, and embowed ceilings, cans , and other whatsoeverwooden furniture in the abbey of Theleme, should be all ma- teriated of this kind of timber. He likewise caused to covertherewith the sterns, stems, cook- rooms or laps, hatchets,decks, courses, bends and walls of his carricks, ships , galleons , galleys, brigantines, foysts, frigates, crears, barks ,floyts , pinks, pinnaces, hoys, catches, capers, and other vessels of his Thallassian arsenal; were it not that the woodor timber of the larch- tree being put within a large andample furnace, full of huge vehemently flaming fire proceeding from the fuel of other sorts and kinds of wood, cometh atlast to be corrupted, consumed, dissipated , and destroyed, asare stones in a lime- kiln. But this Pantagruelion Asbestonis rather by the fire renewed and cleansed , than by the flames thereof consumed or changed. Therefore,Arabians, Indians, Sabæans,Sing not, in hymns and Io Pæans,Your incense, myrrh, or ebony.Come here, a nobler plant to see,And carry home, at any rate,Some seed, that you may propagate.If in your soil, it takes to heaven Athousand thousand thanks be given;And say with France, it goodly goes,Where the Pantagruelion grows.END OF BOOK THE THIRD.ADVERTIsem*nT. ( Published in Ozell's edition , 1750.) As Sir Thomas Urquhart's part of the translation ends here, the editor of this editionthinks proper to take notice, that the remarkable difference of style,which appears betwixt the three former and the two latter volumes, is entirely owing to the taste of the two translators, and not to Rabelais himself. Sir Thomas, from the redundancy of his fancy, endeavourscontinually to heighten and embellish his author, by a profusion of epithets, and various modes of expression, and not seldom even by thoughts of his own, helps which it must be allowed no author ever needed less than this. Mr. Motteux, though a gentleman of imagina- tion, sticks more closely to the sense, turns, and phraseology of hisoriginal; and therefore may be said to have done it more justice.However, it must be allowed that both of them in the general, havesucceeded happily in their labours on this most difficult of all the French writers. And as to the preface and remarks of Mr. Motteuz,they are so esteemed abroad, that a translation of them into French is included in M. Le Duchat's quarto edition. [ In the present editionthese remarks for convenience of reference are given at the end of the several chapters to which they belong. }BOOK IV.TREATING OF THE HEROIC DEEUS AND SAYINGSOF THE GOOD PANTAGRUEL.your own.TheTHE TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE.READER,-I don't know what kind of a preface I must write to findthee courteous, an epithet too often bestowed without a cause. author ofthis work has been as sparing of what we call good nature, as most readers are now-a-days. So I am afraid his translator and commentator is not to expect much more than has been shewed them. What's worse, there are but two sorts of taking prefaces, as there are but two kinds of prologues to plays: for Mr. Bays was doubtless inthe right, when he said that if thunder and lightning could not fright an audience into complaisance. the sight of the poet with a rope abouthis neck might work them into pity. Some, indeed, have bullied many of you into applause , and railed at your faults, that you might think them without any; and others. more safely, nave spoken kindly of you, that you might think, or at least speak, as favourably of them, andbe flattered into patience. Now, I fancy, there's nothing less diffi- cult to attempt than the first method: for, in this blessed age, ' tis aseasy to find a bully without courage, as a whor* without beauty, or a writer without wit; though those qualifications are so necessary in their respective professions. The mischief is, that you seldom allow any to rail besides yourselves, and cannot bear a pride which shocks As for wheedling you into a liking of a work, I must con- fess it seems the safest way: but though flattery pleases you well whenit is particular, you hate it, as little concerning you, when it is general. Then we knights of the quill are a stiff- necked generation, who as sel- dom care to seem to doubt the worth of our writings, and their being liked, as we love to flatter more than one at a time; and had ratherdraw our pens, and stand up for the beauty of our works (as some arrant fools used to do for that of their mistresses) to the last drop of our ink. And truly this submission, which sometimes wheedles you into pity, as seldom decoys you into love, as the awkward cringing of an antiquated fop, as moneyless as he is ugly, affects an experienced fair one. Now we as little value your pity, as a lover his mistress's,But well satisfied that it is only a less uncivil way of dismissing us. what if neither of these two ways will work upon you, of which doleful truth some of our playwrights stand so many living monuments? Why, then truly I think on no other way at present, but blending the two into one; and, from this marriage of huffing and cringing, there will result a new kind of careless medley, which, perhaps, will work upon both sorts of readers, those who are to be hectored, and those whomAt least, it is like to please by its novelty; and it we must creep to. will not be the first monster that has pleased you, when regular nature could not do it. Ifuncommon worth, lively wit , and deep learning, wove into whole- some satire, a bold, good, and vast design admirably pursued, truth184 [BOOK IV. RABELAIS' WORKS.set out in its true light, and a method how to arrive to its oracle, can recommend a work, I am sure this has enough to please any reasonable man. The three books published some time since, which arein a man.ner an entire work, were kindly received: yet, in the French, they come far short of these two, which are also entire pieces; for the satire is all general here, much more obvious, and consequently more enter taining. Even my long explanatory preface was not thought improper.Though I was so far from being allowed time to make it methodical,that at first only a few pages were intended; yet as fast as they were printed I wrote on, till it proved at last like one of those towns built little at first, then enlarged, where you see promiscuously an odd variety of all sorts of irregular buildings. I hope the remarks I give now will not please less: for, as I have translated the work which they explain,I had more time to make them, though as little to write them . It would be needless to give here a large account of my performance:for, after all, you readers care no more for this or that apology, or pre- tence of Mr. Translator, if the version does not please you, than we do for a blundering cook's excuse, after he has spoiled a good dish in the dressing. Nor can the first pretend to much praise, besides that of giving his author's sense in its full extent, and copying his style, if it is to be copied since he has no share in the invention or disposition of what he translates. Yet there was no small difficulty in doing Rabelais justice in that double respect: the obsolete words and turns of phrase,and dark subjects, often as darkly treated , make the sense hard to be understood even by a Frenchman, and it cannot be easy to give it the free easy air of an original: for even what seems most common talk in one language, is what is often the most difficult to be made so inanother; and Horace's thoughts of comedy may be well applied to this:"Creditur, ex medio quia res arcessit, habere Sudoris minimum; sed habet commodia tantum Plus oneris, quanto veniæ minus. "Far be it from me, for all this, to value myself upon hitting the words of cant in which my drolling author is so luxuriant; for though such words have stood me in good stead, I scarce can forbear thinking myself unhappy in having insensibly hoarded up so much gibberish and Billingsgate trash in my memory; nor could I forbear asking of myself, as an Italian cardinal said on another account, D'onde hai tu pigliato tante coglionerie? Where the devil didst thou rake up all these fripperies?It was not less dfficult to come up to the author's sublime expres- sions. Nor would I have attempted such a task, but that I was ambitious of giving a view of the most valuable work of the greatest genius of his age, to the Mecenas and best genius of this. For I am not overfond of so ungrateful a task as translating, and would rejoice to seeLess versions, and more originals; so the latter were not as bad as many of the first are, through want of encouragement. Some indeed havedeservedly gained esteem by translating; yet not many condescend to translate, but such as cannot invent; though, to do the first well, re- quires often as much genius , as to do the latter.The gracious acknowledgement of Cardinal Ippolite d'Este, to Ariosto, on dedicating to him his Orlando Furioso.BOOK IV. ] THE TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE. 185I wish, reader, thou mayest be as willing to do my author justice, as I have strove to do him right. Yet, if thou art a brother of the quill,it is ten to one thou art too much in love with thy own dear produc- tions, to admire those of one of thy trade. However, I know three or four who have not such a mighty opinion of themselves; but I'll not name them, lest I should be obliged to place myself among them. If thou art one of those, who, though they never write, criticise every onethat does; avaunt! -Thou art a professed enemy of mankind and of thyself who wilt never be pleased, nor let anybody be so, and knowest no better way to fame, than by striving to lessen that of others; though wouldst thou write thou mightst be soon known,even by the butter-women, and fly through the world in band- boxes.If thou art of the dissembling tribe, it is thy office to rail at those books which thou huggest in a corner. If thou art one of thoseeave-droppers, who would have their moroseness be counted gravity,thou wilt condemn a mirth which thou art past relishing; and Iknow no other way to quit the score, than by writing (as like enough I may) something as dull, or duller than thyself, if possible. If thou art one of those critics in dressing, those extempores of fortune, who,having lost a relation, and got an estate, in an instant, set up for wit and every extravagance, thou'lt either praise or discommend this book,according to the dictates of some less foolish than thyself, perhaps of one of those, who being lodged at the sign of the box and dice, will know better things, than to recommend to thee a work which bids thee beware of his tricks. This book might teach thee to leave thy follies:but some will say , it does not signify much to some fools whether they are so or not; for when was there a fool that thought himself one? If thou art one of those who would put themselves upon us for learned men in Greek and Hebrew, yet are mere blockheads in English, and patch together old pieces of the ancients, to get themselves clothes out of them, thou art too severely mauled in this work to like it. Who then will? some will cry. Nay, besides these, many societies that make a great figure in the world are reflected on in this book; whichcaused Rabelais to study to be dark, and even bedaub it with many loose expressions, that he might not be thought to have any other design than to droll; in a manner bewraying his book, that his enemies mightnot bite it. Truly, though now the riddle is expounded, I would ad- vise those who read it, not to reflect on the author, lest he be thought to have been before- hand with them, and they be ranked among thosewho have nothing to show for their honesty, but their money; nothing for their religion, but their dissembling, or a fat benefice; nothing for their wit, but their dressing; for their nobility, but their title; for their gentility, but their sword; for their courage, but their huffing; for their preferment but their assurance; for their learning, but their de- grees; or for their gravity, but their wrinkles or dulness. They had better laugh at one another here, as it is the custom of the world.Laughingis of all professions: the miser may hoard, the spendthrift squan- der, the politician plot, the lawyer wrangle, and the gamester cheat; still their main design is to be able to laugh at one another; and here they may do it at a cheap and easy rate. After all, should this work failto please the greater number of readers, I am sure it cannot miss being186 [BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WOorks.liked by those who are for witty mirth, and a chirping bottle; though not by those solid sots, who seem to have drudged all their youth long,only that they might enjoy the sweet blessing of getting drunk every night in their old age. But those men of sense and honour, who love truth, and the good of mankind in general above all other things,will undoubtedly countenance this work. I will not gravely insist upon its usefulness, having said enough of it in the preface to the first part. I will only add, that as Homer in his Odyssey makes his hero wander ten years through most parts of the then known world, so Ra- belais, in a three months' voyage, makes Pantagruel take a view of al- most all sorts of people and professions: with this difference, however,between the ancient mythologist and the modern, that while theOdyssey has been compared to a setting sun, in respect to the Iliads,Rabelais' last work, which is this Voyage to the Oracle of the Bottle(by which he means truth) is justly thought his masterpiece; being wrote with more spirit, salt, and flame, than the first part of his works.At near seventy years of age, his genius, far from being drained,seemed to have acquired fresh vigour, and new graces, the more it exerted itself; like those rivers which grow more deep, large, majestic,and useful by their course. Those who accuse the French of being as sparing of their wit, as lavish of their words, will find an Englishman in our author. I must confess indeed that my countrymen, and othersouthern nations, temper the one with the other, in a manner, as they do their wine with water, often just dashing the latter with a little of the first. Now here men love to drink their wine pure; nay, sometimes it will not satisfy, unless in its very quintessence, as in brandies;though an excess of this betrays want of sobriety , as much as an excess of wit betrays a want of judgment. But I must conclude, lest I bejustly taxed with wanting both. I will only add, that as every lan- guage has its peculiar graces, seldom or never to be acquired by aforeigner, I cannot think I have given my author those of the English in every place; but as none compelled me to write, I fear to ask apardon which yet the generous temper of this nation makes me hope to obtain. Albinus, a Roman, who had written in Greek, desired in his preface to be forgiven his faults of language: but Cato asked himin derision, whether any had forced him to write in a tongue of which he was not an absolute master. Lucullus wrote a history in the same tongue, and said, He had scattered some false Greek in it, to let theworld know it was the work of a Roman. I will not say as much of my writings, in which I study to be as little incorrect as the hurry of business and shortness of time will permit; but I may better say, asTully did of the history of his consulship, which he also had written in Greek, that what errors may be found in the diction, are crept in against my intent. Indeed Livius Andronicus and Terence, the one aGreek, the other a Carthaginian, wrote successfully in Latin, and the latter is perhaps the most perfect model of the purity and urbanity of that tongue; but I ought not to hope for the success of those great men. Yet am I ambitious of being as subservient to the useful diversion of the ingenious of this nation as I can, which I have endeavouredin this work, with hopes to attempt some greater tasks, if ever I am happy enough to have more leisure. In the meantime it will not disBOOK IV. ] THE EPISTLE DEDICATORY. 187please me, if it is known that this is given by one, who, though born and educated in France, has the love and veneration of a loyal subjectfor this nation; one who, by a fatality , which with many more made him say,"Nos patriam fugimus et dulcia linquimus arva,"is obliged to make the language of these happy regions as natural to him as he can, and thankfully say with the rest , under this Protestant government,"Deus nobis hæc otia fecit. "THE AUTHOR'S EPISTLE DEDICATORY,TO THE MOST ILLUSTRIOUS PRINCE, AND MOST REVERENDLORD ODET, CARDINAL DE CHASTILLON.Youare not unacquainted, most illustrious prince, how often I havebeen, and am daily pressed and required by great numbers of emi- nent persons, to proceed in the Pantagruelian fables: they tell methat many languishing, sick, and disconsolate persons, perusing them, have deceived their grief, passed their time merrily, and beeninspired with new joy and comfort. I commonly answer, that Iaimed not at glory and applause, when I diverted myself with writing; but only designed to give by my pen, to the absent who labourunder affliction, that little help which at all times I willingly striveto give to the present that stand in need of my art and service.Sometimes I at large relate to them, how Hippocrates in several places, and particularly in lib. 6. Epidem , describing the institutionof the physician his disciple, and also Soranus of Ephesus, Oribasius,Galen, Hali Abbas, and other authors, have descended to particulars,in the prescription of his notions, deportment, looks, counter.ance,gracefulness, civility, cleanliness of face, clothes, beard, hair, hands,mouth, even his very nails; as if he were to play the part of a lover in some comedy, or enter the lists to fight some potent enemy.And indeed the practice of physic is properly enough compared byHippocrates to a fight, and also to a farce acted between three persons, the patient, the physician, and the disease. Which passagehas sometimes put me in mind of Julia's saying to Augustus her father. One day she came before him in a very gorgeous, loose,lascivious dress, which very much displeased him, though he didnot much discover his discontent. The next day she put on another,and in a modest garb, such as the chaste Roman ladies wore, cameinto his presence. The kind father could not then forbear expressing the pleasure which he took to see her so much altered, and said to her: Oh! how much more this garb becomes, and is commendable in the daughter of Augustus. But she, having her excuseready, answered: This day, sir, I dressed myself to please my fa-¹ See Macrobius, 1 , 9, c. 5, of his Saturnalia.188 [BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.ther's eye; yesterday, to gratify that of my husband. Thus disguised in looks and garb, nay even, as formerly was the fashion,with a rich and pleasant gown with four sleeves, which was calledphalonium according to Petrus Alexandrinus in 6. Epidem. a physician might answer to such as might find the metamorphosis indecent: Thus have I accoutred myself, not that I am proud of appearing in such a dress; but for the sake of my patient, whom alone Iwholly design to please, and no ways offend or dissatisfy. Thereis also a passage in our father Hippocrates, in the book I havenamed, which causes some to sweat, dispute, and labour: not indeedto knowwhether the physician's frowning, discontented, and moroseCatonian look render the patient sad, and his joyful, serene, andpleasing countenance rejoice him; for experience teaches us thatthis is most certain; but whether such sensations of grief, or plea.sure, are produced by the apprehension of the patient observing hismotions and qualities in his physician, and drawing from thenceconjectures of the end and catastrophe of his disease; as, by hispleasing look, joyful and desirable events, and by his sorrowful andunpleasing air, sad and dismal consequences; and whether thosesensations be produced by a transfusion of the serene or gloomy,aerial or terrestrial, joyful or melancholic spirits of the physician,into the person of the patient, as is the opinion of Plato and Aver- roes.Above all things, the fore- cited authors have given particular directions to physicians about the words, discourse, and converse,which they ought to have with their patients; every one aiming at one point, that is , to rejoice them without offending God, and inno ways whatsoever to vex or displease them. Which causes Herophilus much to blame the physician Callianax, who, being askedbya patient of his, Shall I die? impudently made him this answer:Patroclus died, whom all allow,By much a better man than you.Another, who had a mind to know the state of his distemper,asking him, after our merry Patelin's way; Well, doctor, does notmy water tell you I shall die? He foolishly answered. No; if Latona, the mother of those lovely twins, Phoebus and Diana, begot thee. Galen, lib . 4 , Comment. 6. Epidem. , blames much also Quintus his tutor, who, a certain nobleman of Rome, his patient, sayingto him, You have been at breakfast, my master, your breath smellsof wine; answered arrogantly, Yours smells of fever which is thebetter smell ofthe two, wine or a putrid fever? But the calumny of certain cannibals, misanthropes, perpetual eavesdroppers, has2 Rabelais forgets himself. It was not Herophilus that blamed Callianax but another. Callianax, in the place from whence this is quoted,is only said to be an Herophilian. See Galen on lib. 6 of Hippocrates de Epidem. 3 Agelastes, i. e. one that never laughs; a Greek word.BOOK IV. j THE EPISTLE DEDICATORY. 189been so foul and excessive against me, that it had conquered my patience, and I had resolved not to write one jot more. For theleast of their detractions were, that my books are all stuffed with various heresies, of which, nevertheless, they could not show one single instance: much, indeed, of comical and facetious fooleries,neither offending God nor the king; (and truly I own they are the only subject, and only theme of these books) but of heresy, not aword, unless they interpreted wrong, and against all use of reason,and common language, what I had rather suffer a thousand deaths,if it were possible, than have thought: as who should make bread to be stone, a fish to be a serpent, and an egg to be a scorpion.This, my lord, emboldened me once to tell you, as I was complaining of it in your presence, that if I did not esteem myself a better Chris- tian, than they shew themselves towards me, and if my life, writings,words, nay thoughts, betrayed to me one single spark of heresy, or I should in a detestable manner fall into the snares of the spirit of detraction, Außoλog, who, by their means, raises such crimes against me; I would then, like the phoenix, gather dry wood, kindle a fire,and burn myself in the midst of it. You were then pleased to say to me, that King Francis, of eternal memory, had been made sen- sible of those false accusations; and that having caused my books(mine, I say, because several, false and infamous, have been wickedly laid to me) to be carefully and distinctly read to him by the most learned and faithful anagnost in this kingdom, he had not found anypassage suspicious; and that he abhorred a certain envious, ignorant,hypocritical informer, who grounded a mortal heresy on an n put instead of an m³ by the carelessness of the printers.4As much was done by his son, our most gracious, virtuous,and blessed sovereign, Henry, whom Heaven long preserve: so thathe granted you his royal privilege, and particular protection for me,against my slandering adversaries.You kindly condescended since, to confirm me these happy newsat Paris; and also lately, when you visited my Lord Cardinal duBellay, who, for the benefit of his health, after a lingering distemper,was retired to St. Maur, that place ( or rather paradise) of salubrity,serenity, conveniency, and all desirable country pleasures .Thus, my lord, under so glorious a patronage, I am emboldenedonce more to draw my pen, undaunted now and secure; with hopes that you will still prove to me, against the power of detraction, aThe original has it only a snake- eater, by which word Rabelais designs the monks; whom, in chap. 46, he compares to the Troglodytes,who, Pliny tells us, lib. 5, cap. 8, lived in caverns and fed on snakes.As there are instances enough that formerly they wrote asme with an s, for ame, the soul; this might be an impious allusion of asme to asne, an ass, which so often is mentioned, 1. 3, c. 22 and 23, in the oldeditions. Those of Lyons, and that of 1626, corrected, as is said in the title, according to the censure passed in 1552, removed the scandal.190 [ BOOK IV. RABELAIS' WORKS.second Gallic Hercules in learning, prudence, and eloquence; an Alexicacos in virtue, power, and authority: you, of whom I maytruly say what the wise monarch Solomon saith of Moses, that great prophet and captain of Israel, Ecclesiast . 45. A man fearing andloving God, who found favour in the sight of all flesh, well- beloved both of God and man; whose memorial is blessed. God made himlike to the glorious saints, and magnified him so, that his enemies stood in fear of him; and for him made wonders; made him glorious in the sight of kings, gave him a commandment for his people,and by him showed his light: he sanctified him in his faithfulness,and meekness, and chose him out of all men. By him he made us to hear his voice, and caused by him the law of life and knowledge to be given.Accordingly, if I shall be so happy as to hear any one commendthose merry composures, they shall be adjured by me to be obliged,and pay their thanks to you alone, as also to offer their prayers toHeaven, for the continuance and increase of your greatness; and to attribute no more to me, than my humble and ready obedienceto your commands; for by your most honourable encouragement,you at once have inspired me with spirit, and with invention; andwithout you my heart had failed me, and the fountain- head of myanimal spirits had been dry. May the Lord keep you in his blessedmercy. My Lord,Your Most Humble, and Most Devoted Servant,FRANCIS RABELAIS, Physician.Paris, this 28th of January, MDLII.THE AUTHOR'S PROLOGUE.GOOD people. God save and keep you! Where are you? Ican't see you: stay—I'll saddle my nose with spectacles-oh, oh!it will be fair anon , I see you. Well, you have had a good vintage, they say this is no bad news to Frank, you may swear.You have got an infallible cure against thirst: rarely performed1 He can't see good people, they are so scarce. So Aristophanes, in his Plutus, makes Cremylus say. 2 It should be Englished,"soft and fair, Lent is drawing to an end: I see you. "3 Rabelais, who but a moment before saw none of these good people,to whom he addresses his Prologue, or Preface, sees numbers of them all of a sudden; which he ascribes to Lent drawing to a conclusion.And, indeed, as soon as Easter approaches, in obedience to the Church'scommand, everybody is forward to receive the communion, in order to seem at least to be good people.BOOK IV. ]THE AUTHOR'S PROLOGUE. 191of you, my friends! You, your wives, children, friends, and families are in as good case as hearts can wish; it is well, it is as Iwould have it: God be praised for it, and if such be his will, may you long be so. For my part, I am thereabouts, thanks to hisblessed goodness; and by the means of a little Pantagruelism,(which you know is a certain jollity of mind, pickled in the scorn of fortune,) you see me now hale and cheery, as sound as a bell, andready to drink, if you will . Would you know why I'm thus, goodpeople? I will even give you a positive answer-Such is theLord's will, which I obey and revere; it being said in his word, ingreat derision to the physician neglectful of his own health, Physician, heal thyself.Galen had some knowledge of the Bible, and had conversed withthe Christians of his time, as appears lib. 11. De Usu Partuum:lib. 2. De Differentiis Pulsuum, cap. 3, and ibid. lib. 3. cap. 2.and lib. De Rerum Affectibus (if it be Galen's) . Yet it was notfor any such veneration of holy writ that he took care of his ownhealth. No, it was for fear of being twitted with the saying so well known among physicians.Ιατρὸς ἄλλων αὐτὸς ἕλκεσι βρύων.He boasts of healing poor and rich,Yet is himself all over itch.This made him boldly say, that he did not desire to be esteemeda physician, if from his twenty- eighth year to his old age he hadnot lived in perfect health, except some ephemerous fevers, of which he soon rid himself: yet he was not naturally of the soundest temper, his stomach being evidently bad. Indeed, as, he saith,lib. 5, De Sanitate tuenda, that physician will hardly be thought very careful of the health of others, who neglects his own. Asclepiades boasted yet more than this; for he said that he had articled with fortune not to be reputed a physician, if he could be saidto have been sick, since he began to practise physic, to his latterage, which he reached, lusty in all his members, and victoriousover fortune; till at last the old gentleman unluckily tumbleddown from the top of a certain ill - propt and rotten staircase, and so there was an end of him.If by some disaster health is fled from your worships to theright or to the left , above or below, before or behind, within or without, far or near, on this side or the other side, wheresoever it be, may you presently, with the help of the Lord, meet with it.Having found it, may you immediately claim it, seize it, and secure it. The law allows it: the king would have it so: nay, you haveA sentence ascribed by Plutarch to a certain tragic poet. See hisdiscourses against Clotes the Epicurean.but a day and are cured with rest .1. 7, c. 27.5 Fevers that lastSee Pliny. 1. 26, c. 3;192 [ BOOK IV. RABELAIS' WORKS.8my advice for it . Neither more nor less than the law-makers ofold did fully impower a master to claim and seize his runaway servant, wherever he might be found. Ods- bodikins, is it notwritten and warranted by the ancient customs of this so noble, sorich, so flourishing realm of France, that the dead seizes thequick? See what has been declared very lately in that point bythat learned, wise, courteous, humane and just civilian, AndrewTiraqueau, counsellor of the great, victorious, and triumphant 'Henry II., in the most honourable court of Parliament at Paris.Health is our life, as Ariphron the Sicyonian wisely has it;without health life is not life, it is not living life: ' ABI'ŎΣ BI'OΣ ,ΒΙΟΣ ΑΒΙΏΤΟΣ. Without health life is only a languishment,and an image of death. Therefore, you that want your health,that is to say, That are dead, seize the quick; secure life to your- selves, that is to say, health.10I have this hope in the Lord, that he will hear our supplications,considering with what faith and zeal we pray, and that he will grant this our wish, because it is moderate and mean. Mediocrity was held by the ancient sages to be golden, that is to say precious,praised by all men, and pleasing in all places. Read the sacred Bible, you will find, the prayers of those who asked moderately were never unanswered. For example, little dapper Zaccheus,whose body and reliques the monks of St. Garlick, near Orleans,boast of having, and nicknamed him St. Sylvanus; he only wished to see our blessed Saviour near Jerusalem. It was but a smallrequest, and no more than anybody then might pretend to. But7 That is, the death of a person gives a right to his heir to seize what he has left, i. e. to give him as it were livery and seisin of it.138 When Tiraqueau was lieutenant-general of the bailiwick of For tenay-le- Comte, he released Rabelais out of prison, into which the Cor- deliers of the place had cast him. Rabelais here testifies his gratitude to him. 9 M. Duchat says, the author having published this his fourth book, before Henry II. had seized the three bishop- rics (Metz, Toul, and Verdun, I suppose he means) the eulogium we see here ofthat monarch, was inserted after the first edition, and only out of regard to that conquest. 10 See Athenæus, 1. 15, c. ultim.12 Or11 To these Greek words should be added, xwpic vyuias and then the sentence is complete, otherwise not. Here it may not be amissto observe, that the great Pyrrhus, King of Epirus, (now AlbaniaInferior) never prayed the gods to give him anything but health; andMenage used to say, "Sanitas, sanitatum, omnia sanitas."rather St. Onion; for Rabelais, who was a dear lover of puns (andthe worse the pun the better, as Mr. Dryden used to say) quibbles upon the similitude between ainan and onion; for near Orleans there is an Abbey called St. Aignan, or Anian, as it is pronounced, and sosounds just like Oignon. 13 From sylva a wood. Zaccheus might be so called from his climbing up a tree, the better to behold the Messias, as he passed by.BOOK IV.]THE AUTHOR'S PROLOGUE. 193alas! he was but low-built; and one of so diminutive a size, amongthe crowd, could not so much as get a glimpse of him. Wellthenhe struts, stands on tip-toes, bustles, and bestirs his stumps, shoves and makes way, and with much ado clambers up a sycamore.Upon this, the Lord, who knew his sincere affection, presentedhimself to his sight, and was not only seen by him, but heard also; nay, what is more, he came to his house, and blessed his family.One of the sons of the prophets in Israel felling wood near the river Jordan, his hatchet forsook the helve, and fell to the bottomof the river so he prayed to have it again, ( it was but a smallrequest, mark ye me, ) and having a strong faith, he did not throw the hatchet after the helve, as some spirits of contradiction say byway of scandalous blunder, but the helve after the hatchet, as youall properly have it. Presently two great miracles were seen: up springs the hatchet from the bottom of the water, and fixes itselfto its old acquaintance the helve. Now had he wished to coach itto heaven in a fiery chariot like Elias, to multiply in seed likeAbraham, be as rich as Job, strong as Sampson, and beautiful asAbsalom, would he have obtained it, do ye think? In troth, my friends, I question it very much.Now I talk of moderate wishes in point of hatchet, (butharkee me, be sure you do not forget when we ought to drink, ) Iwill tell you what is written among the apologues of wise Esopthe Frenchman. I meanthe Phrygian and Trojan, as Max. Planudesmakes him; from which people, according to the most faithfulchroniclers, the noble French are descended. Elian writes thathe was of Thrace; and Agathias, after Herodotus, that he was ofSamos; it is all one to Frank.In his time lived a poor honest country fellow of Gravot, Tom Wellhung by name, a wood- cleaver by trade, who in that lowdrudgery made shift so to pick up a sorry livelihood. It happened that he lost his hatchet. Now tell me who ever had more cause tobe vexed than poor Tom? Alas, his whole estate and life dependedon his hatchet; by his hatchet he earned many a fair penny of the best wood- mongers or log-merchants, among whom he went ajobbing , for want of his hatchet he was like to starve; and haddeath but met with him six days after without a hatchet, the grim fiend would have mowed him down in the twinkling of a bed- staff.In this sad case he began to be in a heavy taking, and called uponJupiter with the most eloquent prayers -for you know necessity was the mother of eloquence . With the whites of his eyes turnedup towards heaven, down on his marrow- bones, his arms rearedhigh, his fingers stretched wide, and his head bare, the poor wretch without ceasing was roaring out, by way of litany, at every repeti- tion of his supplications, My hatchet, lord Jupiter, my hatchet!VOL. II. U194 BABELAIS WORKS. BOOK IV.myhatchet! only my hatchet, OJupiter, or moneyto buy another,and nothing else! alas, my poor hatchet!Jupiter happened then to be boiding a grand council, aboutcertain urgent affairs, and old gammer Cybele was just giving her opinion, or, if you would rather have it so, it was young Phoebus the bean; but, in short, Tom's outeries and lamentations were soloud, that they were heard with no small amazement at the couneil-board. by the whole consistory of the gods. What a devilhave we below, quoth Jupiter, that howls so horridly? By themud of Styx, have not we had all along, and have not we herestill enough to do, to set to rights a world of damned puzzằngbusinesses of consequence? We made an end of the fray betweenPresthan, King of Persia, and Soliman the Turkish Emperor: wehave stopped up the passages between the Tartars and the Muscovites; answered the Xeriff's petition; done the same to that of Golgots Rays: " the state of Parma's dispatched; so is that of Maydenburg, that of Mirandola, and that of Africa. that town onthe Mediterranean which we call Aphrodisium;" Tripoli by carelessness has got a newmaster; her hour was come.Here are the Gascons cursing and damning, demanding the restitution of their bells.In yonder corner are the Saxons, Easterlings, Ostrogoths, andGermans, nations formerly invincible, but now aberkeids. " bridled,curbed, and brought under by a paltry diminutive crippled fellow:they ask us revenge, relief, restitution of their former good sense,and ancient liberty.But what shall we do with this same Ramus and this Galland,14 The famous corsair Dragut. 15 A town of Africa, inBarbary. 16 King Francis I. had introduced the tax on salt throughout the country of Guienne. The people, especially thepeasants, who could not brook this new imposition , took their oppor- tunity, and when the new king, Henry II. , was in Piedmont with most of his forces, rose in arms, and crowded into Bordeaux, when they massacred the king's lieutenant of the province, Tristan de Monnins, akinsman of the high constable's. This rebellion, too much concernedthe first (military) officer of the crown, for him to sit still , and not take immediate measures to punish it with severity. He hastened towards Bordeaux with some troops, and a good train of artillery, in 1549, and the gates being thrown open, on the bare terror of his name, among other disgraceful penalties which he inflicted on the people of Bordeaux,he took away all their bells; nor were they restored to them again till three months afterwards, together with their privileges. See Mezeray in the year above- mentioned. 17 It was the Emperor Charles V. who, though he had for many years been crippled with thegout, yet held the German noses to the grindstone, and had so done even From the time he obtained the victory over the Protestants at Mulberg in 1547. 19 Ramus opposed Aristotle's philosophy Gallandusdefended it. Though Ramus never wrote against any of his adverBOOK IV. ]THE AUTHOR'S PROLOGUE. 195with a pox to them, who, surrounded with a swarm of their scullions, blackguard ragamuffins, sizers, vouchers, and stipulators, settogether by the ears the whole university of Paris? I am in a sadquandary about it, and for the heart's blood of me cannot tell yet with whom of the two to side.20Both seem to me notable fellows, and as true cods as ever pissed.The one has rose- nobles, " I say fine and weighty ones; the otherwould gladly have some too. " The one knows something; theother is no dunce. The one loves the better sort of men; theother is beloved by them. The one is an old cunning fox; theother with tongue and pen, tooth and nail, falls foul on the ancientorators and philosophers, " and barks at them like a cur.What thinkest thou of it, say, thou bawdy Priapus? I havefound thy council just before now, et hahet tua mentula mentem.King Jupiter, answered Priapus, standing up and taking off hiscowl, his snout uncased and reared up, fiercely and stiffly propt,since you compare the one to a yelping snarling cur, and the otherto sly Reynard the fox, my advice is, with submission, that withoutfretting or puzzling your brains any further about them, withoutany more ado, even serve them both as, in the days of yore, youdid the dog and the fox. How? asked Jupiter; when? whowere they? where was it? You have a rare memory, for aught Isee, returned Priapus! This right worshipful father Baccus,whom we have here nodding with his crimson phiz, to be revengedon the Thebans, had got a fairy fox, who whatever mischief hedid, was never to be caught or wronged by any beast that wore ahead.The noble Vulcan here present had framed a dog of Monesianbrass, and with long puffing and blowing, put the spirit of lifeinto him he gave it to you, you gave it your Miss Europa, MissEuropa gave it Minos, Minos gave it Procris, Procris gave it Ce- phalus. He was also ofthe fairy kind; so that, like the lawyers ofour age, he was too hard for all other sorts of creatures; nothingcould escape the dog. Now who should happen to meet but these two? What do you think they did? Dog by his destiny was totake fox, and fox by his fate was not to be taken.The case was brought before your council: you protested thatyou would not act against the fates; and the fates were contradictory. In short, the end and result of the matter was, that to resaries, yet Gallandus fell foul on him, and by the bye calls Rabelais aridiculous writer; his words are, " Vernaculos ridiculi Pantagruelis libros, " &c. Here Rabelais revenges himself, but not severely . SeeRamus's life by Thomas Freigius, p. 34. 19 Ramus who was rich 20 Rabelais seems here to tax Peter Gallanduswith having no other view in writing against Ramus, in behalf of theold philosophy, but only to get patrons that might make him rich too.21 Aristotle and Cicero,o 2196 RABELAIS' WORKS ¿BOOK IV..The concile two contradictions was an impossibility in nature.very pang put you into a sweat; some drops of which happeningto light on the earth, produceth what the mortals call cabbage.All our noble consistory, for want of a categorical resolution, were seized with such a horrid thirst, that above seventy- eight hogsheadsof nectar were swilled down at that sitting. At last you took myadvice, and transmogrified them into stones; and immediately gotrid ofyour perplexity, and a truce with thirst was proclaimed throughthis vast Olympus. This wasthe year of flabby cods, near Teumes- sus, " between Thebes and Chalcis2426After this manner, it is my opinion, that you should petrify thisdog and this fox. The metamorphosis will not be incongruous:for they both bear the name of Peter.25 And because, accordingto the Limosin proverb, to make an oven's mouth there must bethree stones, you may associate them with master Peter du Coignet,"whomyou formerly petrified for the same cause. Then those threedead pieces shall be put in an equilateral trigone, somewhere inthegreat temple at Paris; in the middle of the porch, if you will;there to perform the office of extinguishers, and with their noses22 Nothing is so brackish to the taste as sweat, and nothing causes drought like cabbage, particularly that called cole- cabbage, whether dressed with beef- marrow for flesh days, or with oil for fish- days.The white cabbage- heads, being of themselves insipid, must be well peppered and salted , especially consisting of so many very thick leaves,that neither the salt nor pepper can penetrate, unless there is abun- dance of both. 23 Pausanias, in his Bootica, relates this fable, and after him Caelius Rhodiginus, Ovid, Suidas, &c .24 Read, instead of not incongruous, not unprecedented , there having been one before. 25 Pierre, in French, signifies both Peter and a stone. 26 Or de Coigneres, a knight and advocate- generalof the parliament of Paris in the reign of Philip de Valois, did with great vigour, and some success , oppose the encroachments made by the clergy of his time on the king's authority. The ecclesiastics laboured hard to ruin this honest man, but in vain. So they fell foul on his memory,and as soon as ever he was dead, they caused to be made, in most ofthe churches which were chiefly resorted to, several odd kind of gro- tesque monkey-like figures in stone, and gave them the name of Pierre du Coignet, from their being placed in corners (coins in French. ) These impertinent statues, they would have to represent the impious Pierre du Cognieres, as they called him. His being thus marked, before he died,for an enemy of the church, and a reprobate, people made a merit of abusing his statues any how. Thus at Notre Dame, at Paris, under ashow of offering candles to the statue of Peter du Coignet, as is usually done to the images of the saints, they run the candles in his face when they wanted to extinguish them. And it being impossible but that thisridiculous figure, being put to such a use, must be extremely bedaubed and begrimed, thence it came about, that in order to exaggerate the ugliness of any body, it has been a common saying for above two hun- dred years, uglier than Pierre du Coignet.BOOK IV. ]THE AUTHOR'S PROLOGUE. 197rut out the lighted candles, torches, tapers, and flambeaux; since,while they lived, they still lighted , ballock- like, the fire of faction,division, ballock sects, " and wrangling among those idle beardedboys, the students. And this will be an everlasting monument toshow, that those puny self- conceited pedants, ballock- framers, were rather contemned than condemned by you. Dixi, I have saidmy say.You deal too kindly by them, said Jupiter, for aught I see, Monsieur Priapus. You do not use to be so kind to every body, let metell you; for as they seek to eternize their names, it would be muchbetter for them to be thus changed into hard stones, than to returnto earth and putrefaction. But now to other matters. Yonder behind us, towards the Tuscan sea, and the neighbourhood of MountAppenine, do you see what tragedies are stirred up by certaintopping ecclesiastical bullies? 29 This hot fit will last its time, likethe Limosins' ovens, and then will be cooled, but not so fast.We shall have sport enough with it; but I foresee one inconveniency for methinks we have but little store of thunder amunition, since the time that you, my fellow gods, for your pastime,lavished them away to bombard new Antioch, 20 by my particularpermission; as since, after your example, the stout champions, who had undertaken to hold the fortress of Dindenarois" against allcomers, fairly wasted their powder with shooting at sparrows; and27 If because it is Priapus that speaks here, we should take this word couilloniques in an obscene sense, we should fall into the very snare Rabelais had a mind to catch his less judicious readers in.These couillonic sects are not properly any other thing than the differentorders of monks, or cucullated, i . e. hooded gentry; for the word may come from the Latin cucullus, a hood, as well as from couillon, the cod.Among these monks there are generally subsisting, divisions and fac tions, about things of much the same weight as those which then dividedthe university of Paris.28 An allusion to the massacres of Cabrières, and Merindol, in 1547 , by the orders of the Par- liament of Aix. 29 Pastophores in the original, i . e.sacred priests, reverend prelates, among the ancient Egyptians.30 New Antioch must be the city of Rome. The word Antioch means nothing but preposterous venery, avri contra, et oxɛía con- cubitus. The thunder darted against this Antioch, may be the sack- ing of it in 1527 , as also the considerable diminution of the extent ofher church by the introduction of the Protestant religion; misfortunes which befel her when Rabelais wrote. 31 The German dinten-narr signifies one possessed with the demon of scribbling. Ifancy, Rabelais, by this, means certain scholastics, who being furiously bent on debating with one another upon questions of no moment,were mute when they should have strenuously defended the doctrine and worship of the Romish church against the Lutherans, whose party,humanly speaking, could never have subsisted, if at the beginning it had been attacked by some preachers of the crusades.138 RABELAIS WORKS. [ BOOK IV.then, not having wherewith to defend themselves in time of need,vanantly surrendered to the enemy, who were already packing up then awls, full of madness and despair, and thought on nothingbut a shameful retreat. Take care this be remedied, son Vulcan:rouse up your drowsy cyclopes, Asteropes, Brontes, Arges, Poly- phemus, Steropes, Pyracmon, and so forth; set them at work, and make them drink as they ought.Never spare liquor to such as are at hot work. Now let us despatch this bawling fellow below. You, Mercury, go see who it is,and knowwhat he wants. Mercury looked out at heaven's trapdoor, through which as I am told, they hear what is said here below.By the way, one might well enough mistake it for the scuttle of aship; though Icaromenippus said it was like the mouth of a well ."The light-heeled deity saw that it was honest Tom, who asked forhis lost hatchet; and accordingly he made his report to the synod.Marry, said Jupiter, we are finely helped up, as if we had nownothing else to do here but to restore lost hatchets. Well, he musthave it then for all this, for so it is written in the book of fate, ( doyou hear?) as well as if it was worth the whole duchy of Milan.The truth is, the fellow's hatchet is as much to him as a kingdomto a king. Come, come, let no more words be scattered about c,let him have his hatchet again.Now, let us make an end of the difference betwixt the levites andmole- catchers of Landerousse.33 Whereabouts were we? Priapuswas standing in the chimney- corner, and having heard what Mercury had reported, said in a most courteous and jovial manner: " KingJupiter, while by your order and particular favour, I was gardenkeeper-general on earth, I observed that this word hatchet is equi- vocal to many things: for it signifies a certain instrument, by themeans of which men fell and cleave timber. It also signifies ( atleast I am sure it did formerly) a female soundly and frequentlythumpthumpriggletickletwiddletobyed. Thus I perceived that every32 See Lucian's Icaromenippus. 33 I think it should rather etranslated, their mole-ships the monks of Landerousse; for Rabelais elsewhere more than once, calls the monks moles (not molecatchers )from their living as it were under ground. The original runs, “ Resol- vons la difference du clergé et de la taulpetiere de Landerousse. " This difference between these two bodies of ecclesiastics, M. Duchat says,may have been the famous law suit between the chapter of St. Gatien of Tours, and the chapter of St. Martin of the same city, about the dirt (or pus) of St. Martin. The last were in possession of this pretended relic;but the property of it had been claimed by the former for the space of between threescore and fourscore years, and it was not till ten yearsafer Rabelais' death, that the Huguenots cut this Gordian knot. See Reza's Ecclesiast. Hist. on the year 1563, and M. du Thou. 1. 30.34 Priapus was reckoned to be Jupiter's son; wherefore Rabelais some.where calls him John Thursday.ROOK IV.] E AUTHOR'S PROLOGUE. 199co*ck of the game used to call his doxy his hatchet; for with thatsame tool (this he said lugging out and exhibiting his nine- inch knocker) they so strongly and resolutely shove and drive in their helves, that the females remain free from a fear epidemical amongsttheir sex, viz. , that from the bottom of the male's belly the instrument should dangle at his heel for want of such feminine props.And I remember, for I have a member, and a memory too, ay, and afine memory, large enough to fill a butter- firkin:) I remember, I say,that one day of tubilustre" [horn-fair] at the festivals of good- manVulcan in May, I heard Josquin Des Prez, Ockeghem, Hobrecht,Agricola, Brumel, Camelin, Vigoris, de la fa*ge, Bruyer, Prioris,Seguin, de la Rue, Midy, Moulu, Mouton, Gascogne, Loysel, Compere, Penet, Fevin, Rousée, Richard Fort, Rousseau, Consilion,Constantio Festi, Jacquet Bercan, melodiously singing the follow- ing catch on a pleasant green.6636Long John to bed went to his bride,And laid a mallet by his side:What means this mallet, John, saith she?Why it is to wedge thee home, quoth he.Alas! cried she, the man's a fool;What need you use a wooden tool?When lusty John does to me come,He never shoves but with his bum."Nine Olympiads, and an intercalary year after (I have a rare member, I would say memory; but I often make blunders in thesymbolization and colligance of those two words) I heard Adrian Villart, Gombert, Janequin, Arcadet, Claudin, Certon, Manchi- court, Auxerre, Villiers, Sandrin, Sohier, Hesdin, Morales, Passereau, Maille, Maillart, Jacotin, Heurteur, Verdelot, Carpentras,l'Heritier, Cadeac, Doublet, Vermont, Bouteiller, Lupi, Pagnier,Millet, du Moulin, Alaire, Maraut, Morpain, Gendre, and other merrylovers of music, in a private garden, " under some fine shady trees,round about a bulwark of flagons, gammons, pasties, with severalcoated quails, and laced mutton, waggishly singing:" Since tools without their hafts are useless lumber,And hatchets without helves are of that number;That one may go in t'other, and may match it,I'll be the helve, and thou shalt be the hatchet. "35 From tuba, a trumpet, and lustrum, a sacrifice. The Cambridge dictionary gives a somewhat different account of this feast fromwhat Cotgrave does, who says, it was the day whereon the trum- pets dedicated to sacrifices were hollowed (I suppose he means hal- lowed) and the trumpeters with water purged. M. Motteux, in his merry-way, calls it horn-fair. 36 Ten of thosemany musicians named here, were the disciples of this excellent mu sician, who was of Cambray. There are several books of songs of hiscomposing, printed with the music notes at Paris, Lyons, Antwerp, &c.27 Belon. 1. 4, c. 26, of his Ornithologia, seems to speak of this adven.ture, and dates it in 1552.200 RABELAIS' WORKS. [BOOK IV.Now would I know what kind of hatchet this bawling Tomwants? This threw all the venerable gods and goddesses into a itof laughter, like any microcosm of flies; and even set limping Vulcan a hopping and jumping smoothly three or four times for the sake of his dear. Come, come, said Jupiter to Mercury, rundown immediately, and cast at the poor fellow's feet three hatchets;his own, another of gold, and a third of massy silver, all of one size then having left it to his will to take his choice, if he takehis own, and be satisfied with it, give him the other two: if he take another, chop his head off with his own: and henceforth serve me all those losers of hatchets after that manner. Having said this,Jupiter, with an awkward turn of his head, like a jackanapes swallowing of pills, made so dreadful a phiz, that all the vast Olympus quaked again. Heaven's foot messenger, thanks to his low- crowned narrow-brimmed hat, his plume of feathers, heel pieces, and run- ning stick with pigeon wings, flings himself out at heaven's wicket,through the empty deserts of the air, and in a trice nimbly alights on the earth, and throws at friend Tom's feet the three hatchets,saying unto him; Thou hast bawled long enough to be a-dry: thy prayers and request are granted by Jupiter; see which of thesethree is thy hatchet, and take it away with thee. Wellhung lifts up the golden hatchet, peeps upon it, and finds it very heavy: then staring on Mercury, cries, Codszouks this is none of mine; I will not have it the same he did with the silver one, and said, it is not this neither, you may even take them again. At last, he takes up his own hatchet, examines the end of the helve, and finds his markthere; then, ravished with joy, like a fox that meets some straggling poultry, and sneering from the tip of his nose, he cried, By the mass, this is my hatchet, master god; if you will leave it me,I will sacrifice to you a very good and huge pot of milk, brim full,covered with fine strawberries, next ides, i. e. the 15th of May.Honest fellow, said Mercury, I leave it thee; take it; and because thou hast wished and chosen moderately, in point of hatchet,by Jupiter's command, I give thee these two others; thou hast now wherewith to make thyself rich: be honest. Honest Tom gaveMercury a whole cartload of thanks, and revered the most greatJupiter. His old hatchet he fastens close to his leathern girdle,and girds it above his breech like Martin of Cambray: " the two 3938 He danced the trihori of Bretagne. This, says Cotgrave, isa kind of Breton, and peasantly or boorish dance, consisting ofthree steps, and performed by those hobbling youths, commonly in a round. 39 Martin and Martine are the nameswhich are given to two figures, who each with a (marteau) ham- mer, strike the hours on the clock at Cambray. And Martin being represented as a peasant in a jacket, girded about the waist very tight;thence comes it that when a man is ridiculously girt with a belt over his clothes, people say, proverbially, he is girt like Martin of Cambray.LOOK IVv.. ]THE AUTHOR'S PROLOGUE. 201others, being more heavy, he lays on his shoulder. Thus he plodson, trudging over the fields, keeping a good countenance amongst his neighbours and fellow-parishioners, with one merry saying orother after Patelin's way. The next day, having put on a clean white jacket, he takes on his back the two precious hatchets,and comes to Chinon, the famous city, noble city, ancient city,tea the first city in the world, according to the judgment and assertion of the most learned massorets. At Chinon he turnedhis silver hatchet into fine testons, crown- pieces, and other whiteash; his golden hatchet into fine angels, curious ducats, substantial ridders, spankers, and rose nobles: then with them purchasesa good number of farms, barns, houses, out- houses, thatched- houses, stables, meadows, orchards, fields, vineyards, woods, arablelands, pastures, ponds, mills, gardens, nurseries, oxen, cows, sheep,goats, swine, hogs, asses, horses, hens, co*cks, capons, chickens,geese, ganders, ducks, drakes, and a world of all other necessaries,and in a short time became the richest man in the country, nayeven richer than that limping scrape-good Maulevrier. His brotherbumpkins, " and the other yeomen and country-puts thereabouts,perceiving his good fortune, were not a little amazed, insomuch that their former pity, of Tom was soon changed into an envy of his so great and unexpected rise; and as they could not for theirsouls devise how this came about, they made it their business topry up and down, and lay their heads together, to inquire, seek,and inform themselves by what means, in what place, on what day,what hour, how, why, and wherefore, he had come by his great treasure.At last, hearing it was by losing his hatchet, Ha, ha! said they,was there no more to do but to lose a hatchet to make us rich?Mum for that; it is as easy as pissing a bed, and will cost but little.Are then at this time the revolutions of the heavens, the constellations of the firmament, and aspects of the planets such, that whosoever shall lose a hatchet, shall immediately grow rich? Ha, ha,ha! by Jove, you shall even be lost, and it please you, my dear hatchet. With this they all fairly lost their hatchets out of hand.40 Rabelais' words are " Les francs gontiers et Jaques bons hom- mes." Franc-gontier is one of the better sort of peasants, and such whose circ*mstances enable them to help their poor neighbours, such as our Tom was before his good fortune. Gunter is a high- Dutch word made by contraction, from gunstiger, (derived originally from the verb gonnon); it signifies properly a man able to do others aservice. Franc-gontier is a word of long standing in France. As for Jaques bons-hommes, they are the next step below the other:a good sort of country folks, to whom our romances give the name of Jaques, from their wearing a cotton sleeveless waistcoat called jaques.202 [BOOK IV. BABELAIS' WORKS.The devil of one that had a hatchet left: he was not his mother'sson, that did not lose his hatchet. No more was wood felled orcleaved in that country, through want of hatchets. Nay, the sopian apologue even saith, that certain petty country gents, " of the lower class, who had sold Wellhung their little mill and little field,to have wherewithal to make a figure at the next muster, havingbeen told that his treasure was come to him by this only means,sold the only badge of their gentility, their swords, to purchase hatchets to go lose them, as the silly clodpates did, in hopes to gainstore of chink by that loss.Youwould have truly sworn they had been a parcel of your petty spiritual usurers, Rome-bound, selling their all, and borrowing of others to buy store of mandates, a pennyworth of a new-made pope.Now they cried out and brayed, and prayed and bawled, and invoked Jupiter: My hatchet! my hatchet! Jupiter, my hatchet!on this side, my hatchet! on that side, my hatchet! ho, ho, ho,ho, Jupiter, my hatchet! The air round about rung again withthe cries and howlings of these rascally losers of hatchets.Mercury was nimble in bringing them hatchets; to each offering that which he had lost , as also another of gold, and a third of silver.Every he still was for that of gold, giving thanks in abundanceto the great giver, Jupiter; but in the very nick of time, that theybowed and stooped to take it from the ground, whip, in a trice,Mercury lopped off their heads, as Jupiter had commanded; andof heads, thus cut off, the number was just equal to that ofthe lost hatchets .You see how it is now; you see how it goes with those, who inthe simplicity of their hearts wish and desire with moderation.Take warning by this, all you greedy, fresh- water shirks, who scornto wish for anything under ten thousand pounds: and do not forthe future run on impudently, as I have sometimes heard you wishing, Would to God, I had now one hundred seventy- eight millionsof gold! Oh! how I should tickle it off. The deuce on you, what more might a king, an emperor, or a pope wish for? For that reason, indeed, you see that after you have made such hopeful wishes,all the good that comes to you of it is the itch or the scab, and not a cross in your breeches to scare the devil that tempts you to make these wishes: no more than those two mumpers, wishers after thecustom of Paris; one of whom only wished to have in good oldgold as much as hath been spent, bought, and sold in Paris , since its first foundations were laid, to this hour; all of it valued at theprice, sale, and rate of the dearest year in all that space of time.Do you think the fellow was bashful? Had he eaten sour plums41 Janspill' hommes, a sort of small gentry, a little given to pillage;thence the word. 42 At Paris everything goes by grandeur:divine service lasts longer there than it does anywhere else, and the ell here exceeds in measure the ell of other places.BOOK IV THE AUTHOR'S PROLOGUE. v. ]203unpeeled? Were his teeth on edge, I pray you? The other wished our lady's church brim full of steel needles, from the floor to thetop of the roof, and to have as many ducats as might be crammed into as many bags as might be sewed with each and every one ofthese needles, till they were all either broke at the point or eye.This is to wish with a vengeance! What think you of it? What didthey get by it, in your opinion? Why at night both my gentlemen had kibed- heels , a tetter in the chin, a church-yard cough in the lungs,a catarrh in the throat, a swingeing bo the rump, and the devilof one musty crust of a brown george the poor dogs had to scour their grinders with. Wish therefore for mediocrity, and it shall be given unto you, and over and above yet; that is to say, providedyou bestir yourself manfully, and do your best in the meantime.Ay, but say you, God might as soon have given me seventy- eight thousand as the thirteenth part of one half: for he is omnipotent.and a million of gold is no more to him than one farthing. Oh, oh! pray tell me who taught you to talk at this rate of the power and predestination of God, poor silly people? Peace, tush, st, st,st! fall down before his sacred face, and own the nothingness ofyourUponnothing this,. O ye that labour under the affliction of the gout, Iground my hopes; firmly believing, that if it so pleases the divine goodness, you shall obtain health; since you wish and ask for nothing else, at least for the present . Well, stay yet a little longerwith half an ounce of patience. The Genoese do not use, like you, to be satisfied with wishing health alone, when after they have all the live - long morning been in a brown study, talked, pondered, ruminated, and resolved in the counting-houses, of whom and how they may squeeze the ready,and who by their craft must be hooked in, wheedled, bubbled,sharped, over-reached, and choused; they go to the exchange, and greet one another with a Sanità et guadagno messer;43 health Health alone will not go down with the greedy and gaincurmudgeons to you, sir:. they over and above must wish for gain, with a pox to them; ay, and for the fine crowns, or scudi di Guadaiyne:" whence, heaven be praised, it happens many a time, that the sillywishers and woulders are baulked , and get neither. Now, my lads, as you hope for good health, cough once aloudth lungs of leather; take me off three swingeing bumpers; prick your ears; and you shall hear me wonders of the noble andoodON Pantagruel THE AUTHOR'S. PROLOGUE.-The main design of this prologue is to teach us to be moderate in our wishes. The author brings several exam43 At Florence, and throughout Italy, the middling sort of people 44 Thomas de Gua any otherwise .scarce ever salute one another daigne, who is said to have lent Francis the First fifty thousand crowns,when he was first imprisoned. See Moreri, at the word Guadaigne.204 RABELAIS' WORKS. BOOK IV.ples to prove what advantages arise from it; particularly he makes use of a fable, in which (after some long but most diverting ex- cursions) the moderation of a poor country fellow, who had lost his hatchet, and wished only to have it again, was largely rewarded;and others, who lost theirs on purpose, to be thus made rich, were undone. This is thought by some, to mean a gentleman of Poic- tou, who came to Paris with his wife about some business, whereFrancis the First fell in love with her; and having bestowed large sums of money on the husband, who some time after returned into the country, some of the neighbouring gentlemen, who had handsome wives or daughters, made their appearance with them at court, in hopes of the like fortune; but instead of it were forced to sneak into thecountry, after they had spent their estates, which was all they got for their pains.Jupiter is brought in complaining of Ramus and Galland, who, sur- rounded with a swarm of their scullions , ragamuffins, sizers, vouchers,&c., set together by the ears the whole university of Paris. Petrus Ramus, or de la Ramée, was royal philosophy and oratory professor at that time; and Petrus Gallandus, or Galland, royal Greek professor;both were learned men, and Ramus particularly famous for rhetoric and oratory; he also wrote three books of dialectic institutions. But whatdivided the university, was his elegant, but too passionate animadver- sions on Aristotle's physics and metaphysics. Carpentarius, Schekius,and Riolanus, answered him, and particularly the first. I cannot find that Gallandus wrote against Ramus; yet either he has done it, or op- posed him viva voce. Priapus is of opinion, they ought to be turned into stone, and associated to their name-sake , master Peter de Coignet,formerly petrified for such a reason. This du Coignet can be no otherthan Peter de Coigneres, the king's advocate in his parliament, men- tioned by Pasquier. In 1329 he caused all the prelates of France to be summoned before King Philip, who sat in his court of parliament attended by several princes and lords. There the advocate represented many abuses committed by the ecclesiastical court, which had encroached upon the parliament's rights, and used to take cognizance of all civil matters, under divers pretences of conscience, and unjustly fa- voured those that appealed or removed their causes to the spiritual court. The Archbishop of Sens, and the Bishop of Autun, spoke in behalf of the church's right, grounded on custom, time out of mind,and of equal validity of the law; then proffered to rectify every thing;and in short, so cunningly worked upon the king, that he told them he would make no innovations, nor would show his successors a way to molest the church. This made the clergy triumph, as if they hadgained their point; and to be revenged on Pierre de Coigneres, they got a monkey hewed out of stone, and had it set up in a corner of Notre Dame at Paris: which figure, says Pasquier, by a kind of pun, was called Maitre Pierre du Coignet.45 So Priapus advises Jupiter to petrifyRamus and Galland, saying, that Peter du Coignet had been turned into stone for the same cause, that is , for setting the learned at variance.Though after all, France is much obliged to that advocate, who seems to have laid the foundation of the liberties of the Gallican church.44 Recherches de Pasquier, lib. iii, chap. xxvii.45 That is the chief corner- stone.BOOK IV. ]PANTAGRUEL. 205In the same council of the gods, Jupiter says, Here are the Gascons cursing and damning, demanding the restitution of their bells. I find in Du Tillet, that they had been taken from them in 1548. It appearsthat this prologue was written in 1548 or 1549; and I am apt to be- lieve that these are the bells for whose recovery master Janotus de Brag- mardo made the comical speech in the 19th chapter of the first book;the rather, because Henry d'Albret, King of Navarre (Rabelais' Gargantua) was then governor of Guienne, and acted against the rebels. -M.CHAPTER I.How Pantagruel went to sea to visit the oracle of Bacbuc, aliasthe Holy Bottle.IN the month of June, on Vesta's Holiday, ' the very numerical day on which Brutus, conquering Spain, taught itsstrutting dons to truckle under him, and that nigg*rdly miserCrassus was routed and knocked on the head by the Parthians,Pantagruel took his leave of the good Gargantua, his royal father . The old gentleman, according to the laudable customof the primitive Christians, devoutly prayed for the happyvoyage of his son and his whole company, and then they took shipping at the port of Thalassa. Pantagruel hadwith him Panurge, Friar John des Entomeures, alias of thefunnels, Epistemon,3 Gymnast, Eusthenes, Rhizotomus,"Carpalim, cum multis aliis, his ancient servants and domestics also Xenomanes, the great traveller, who had crossedThe 9th of June, Ovid, 1. 6. of the Fasti. 2 I should rather translate it Friar John ofthe chopping-knives, that being the true meaning of entomeures, as the anonymous Dutch scholiast rightly says on the words entomeur, and entomer: instead of the modern French wordentamer, which signifies to have the first cut of a loaf or a joint of meat, or anything else, from the Greek ivroμn, ivréμver, to cut, slice,sliver; all very agreeable and suitable virtues to Friar John des Ento- meures, who loved to be perpetually running his nose into every kitchen,and playing at snicker- snee with any edible that came in his way; as the author describes him in chap. 10. and 11. oflib. 4. and lib. 1 , chap. 27.3 Epistémon. ] With the accent on the last syllable but one: ' ETIO- Thμwv, scientia præditus; a man of learning. Eusthenes. ] Ro- bust, strong, well- proportioned; or a brave man. Ευσθενής, validus.5 Rhizotomus. ] Was a young page that served Gargantua as anapothecary, lib. 1. c. 23. It comes from the Greek ' pioróμos, root- cutter, as apothecaries and druggists are. Carpalim.] Pantagruel's lacquey; thus named from the Greek kapwaλuws, i . e. suddenly,swiftly, the properties of a lackey, 1. 2, c. 9. Carpalim's swiftness has already appeared.206 {BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.so many dangerous roads, dikes, ponds, seas, and so forth,and was come some time before, having been sent for byPanurge.For certain good causes and considerations him thereuntomoving, he had left with Gargantua, and marked out, in hisgreat and universal hydrographical chart, the course whichthey were to steer to visit the Oracle of the Holy Bottle Bacbuc. The number of ships were such as I described in thethird book, convoyed by a like number of triremes, men ofwar,' galleons, and feluccas, well- rigged, caulked, and storedwith a good quantity of Pantagruelion.All the officers, dragomen, (interpreters, ) pilots, captains,mates, boatswains, midshipmen, quartermasters, and sailors,met in the Thalemege, Pantagruel's principle flag- ship,which had in her stern, for her ensign, a huge large bottlehalf silver, well polished, the other half gold, enamelledwith carnation; whereby it was easy to guess that white andred were the colours of the noble travellers , and that they went for the word of the Bottle.10.On the stern of the second was a lantern, like those oftheancients, industriously made with diaphanous stone, implying that they were to pass by Lanternland. The third ship had for her device a fine deep China ewer. The fourth , adouble-handed jar of gold, much like an ancient urn. Thefifth, a famous can made of sperm of emerald . The sixth ,a monk's mumping bottle made of the four metals together.The seventh, an ebony funnel, all embossed and wroughtwith gold after the tauchic manner. The eighth, an ivy gobletvery precious, inlaid with gold. The ninth, a cup of fineobriz gold. The tenth, a tumbler of aromatic agoloch (youcall it lignum aloes ) edged with Cyprian gold, after the Azemine make. " The eleventh, a golden vine- tub of mosaicHebrew for a bottle; called so from the sound it makes when emptying. 8 A galley with three banks of oars, one above another; or with three oars (tres remi) on each side or bank.Remberges in the original. Both by its name and make, it should be but a sort of row- barge, not man of war. Howell's Cotgrave says,it is a long ship or sea - vessel, narrower than a galley, but swift and easy to be governed. 10 The Prasius lapis of Pliny, 1. 37, c. 8.a sort of bastard emerald. 11 Persian make or work. FromAgem. the name by which the Arabians call Persia. Horace, Carm.1. 2. od. 12 , speaks of the first King of Persia, Achémes; from whom,Recording to Herodotus, the Persians were called Achemenians.CHAP. I.]PANTAGRUEL. 207work. The twelfth, a runlet of unpolished gold, coveredwith a small vine of large Indian pearl of topiarian work.Insomuch that there was not a man, however in the dumps,musty, sourlooked , or melancholic he were, not even excepting that blubbering whiner Heracl*tus, had he been there,but seeing this noble convoy of ships and their devices, musthave been seized with present gladness of heart, and smilingat the conceit, have said, that the travellers were all honesttopers, true-pitcher men; and have judged by a most sureprognostication, that their voyage both outward and homeward-bound, would be performed in mirth and perfect health.In the Thalamege, where was the general meeting, Pantagruel made a short but sweet exhortation, wholly backedwith authorities from Scripture upon navigation; which beingended, with an audible voice prayers were said in the presence and hearing ofall the burghers of Thalassa, who had flockedto the mole to see them take shipping. After the prayers,was melodiously sung a psalm of the holy King David, whichbegins, "When Israel went out of Egypt; 12 and that beingended, tables were placed upon deck, and a feast speedily served up. The Thalassians, who had also borne a chorus inthe psalm, caused store of bellytimber and vinegar to bebrought out of their houses. All drank to them: they drankto all which was the cause that none ofthe whole companygave up what they had eaten, nor were sea- sick, with a painat the head and stomach; which inconveniency they couldnot so easily have prevented by drinking, for some time before, salt water, either alone or mixed with wine; usingquinces, citron peel, juice of pomegranates, sourish sweetmeats, fasting a long time, covering their stomachs withpaper, or following such other idle remedies, as foolishphysicians prescribe to those that go to sea.Having often renewed their tipplings, each mother's sonretired on board his own ship , and set sail all so fast with amerry gale at south east; to which point of the compass thechief pilot, James Brayer by name, had shaped his course,and fixed all things accordingly. For seeing that the Oracleof the Holy Bottle lay near Cathay, in the Upper India, hisadvice, and that of Xenomanes also, was not to steer thecourse which the Portuguese use, while sailing through the12 In Rabelais' time, the Psalms of David were sung publicly at cort, being newly put into rhyme by Marot.208 RABELAIS' WORKS. [BOOK IV.torrid zone, and Cape Bona Speranza, at the south point ofAfrica, beyond the equinoctial line, and losing sight of thenorthern pole, their guide, they make a prodigious longvoyage; but rather to keep as near the parallel of the saidIndia as possible, and to tack to the westward of the saidpole, so that winding under the north, they might find themselves in the latitude of the port of Olone, without comingnearer it for fear of being shut up in the frozen sea; whereas, following this canonical turn, by the said parallel, theymust have that on the right to the eastward, which at theirdeparture was on their left.This proved a much shorter cut; for without shipwreck,danger, or loss of men, with uninterrupted good weather,except one day near the island of the Macreons , they performed in less than four months the voyage of Upper India,which the Portuguese, with a thousand inconveniences andinnumerable dangers, can hardly complete in three years.And it is my opinion, with submission to better judgments,that this course was perhaps steered by those Indians whosailed to Germany, and were honourably received by theKing of the Swedes,13 while Quintus Metellus Celer was proconsul of the Gauls; as Cornelius Nepos, Pomponius Mela,and Pliny after them tell us .ON CHAP. I. -By Pantagruel and his attendants, who embarked for the Oracle of the Holy Bottle, we may understand Anthony Duke of Vendome, afterwards King of Navarre, setting out of the world of error,to search after truth; which Rabelais places in the bottle, because,drinking its wine, we are inspired with spirit and invention, and freely imparting our sentiments, discover those of others." Tulene tormentum ingenio admoves Plerumque duro; tu sapientium Curas et arcanum jocosoConsilium retegis Lyæo. " -Horat.As much is implied by the Greek proverb, iv oívy áλŋdɛĩa; by the Latin, in vino veritas; and as some have it among us, True philosophylies in the bottle. Our author, like skilful dramatic writers, gives us ahint of his design in the first chapter, when just before Pantagruel sets sail, he makes him and his men go to prayers, and sing the 114th Psalm,"When Israel went out of Egypt, " which country all know is generally taken, in a mystical sense, for error, or being a slave to it.Bacbuc is a bottle in Hebrew, and the ships have all bottles, cups, or13 Of the three passages concerning this piece of history, in as many ancient authors, the first in date is lost, namely, that of Corn. Nepos,whom Pomp. Mela has but copied, 1. 3. c. 5. De Situ Orbis.CHAP. II . ]PANTAGRUEL. 209wine vessels on their stern, to show that the whole fleet are for wine:only one has a lantern , to confirm what is said, that the guidance ofgood lights, i. e. learned men, is requisite in such an attempt. If we had a mind to say that our author had a double meaning all along, as he has in many places, we might suppose one easily; for this was written at the time of the Council of Trent, in which the restitution of the cup to the laity, and of marriage to the clergy were debated . Panurge goes to the Oracle of the Bottle near Lanternland, where the lanterns, whichmay be the clergy, who think themselves the lights of the world, held then their provincial chapter. His business is , with the Bottle, to know whether he should marry or no! all his company there are made to drink water, which had the taste of wine; the word of the bottle is trinch, which is drink in High Dutch; and Panurge, having drunk,foretells that he shall be married; as indeed Montluc, Bishop of Valence,whom I take to be Rabelais' Panurge, is owned by all the historians of his age to have been: the application is easy.-M.CH. II. -How Pantagruel bought many rarities in the islandofMedamothy.THAT day and the two following, they neither discoveredland nor anything new; for they had formerly sailed thatway but on the fourth they made an island called Medamothy, of a fine and delightful prospect, by reason of thevast number of lighthouses, and high marble towers in itscircuit, which is not less than that of Candia. Pantagruel,inquiring who governed there, heard that it was King Philophanes, absent at that time upon account of the marriageof his brother Philotheamon with the infanta of the kingdom of Engys.Hearing this, he went ashore in the harbour, and whileevery ship's crew watered, passed his time in viewing diverspictures, pieces of tapestry, animals, fishes, birds, and otherexotic and foreign merchandises, which were along thewalks of the mole, and in the markets of the port. For itwas the third day of the great and famous fair of the place,to which the chief merchants of Africa and Asia resorted.Out of these Friar John bought him two rare pictures; inone of which, the face of a man that brings in an appeal (orthat calls out to another) was drawn to the life; and in theother a servant that wants a master, with every needful particular, action, countenance, look, gait, feature, and deportment, being an original, by Master Charles Charmois, principal painter to King Megistus; and he paid for them inthe1 The King of France, whom in chap. 35 , of lib. 3, Rabelais callsthe great king, and whom he here represents under the idea of the greatest king in Christendom.VOL. II.210 [ BOOK IV RABELAIS' WORKS.court fashion, with congé and grimace. Panurge bought alarge picture, copied and done from the needle- work formerly wrought by Philomela, showing to her sister Progne how her brother-in-law Tereus had by force handselled hercopyhold, and then cut out her tongue, that she might not(as women will) tell tales . I vow and swear by the handleof my paper lantern, that it was a gallant, a mirific, nay,a most admirable piece. Nor do you think, I pray you,that in it was the picture of a man playing the beast with two backs with a female; this had been too silly and gross:no, no; it was another- guise thing, and much plainer. You may, if you please, see it at Theleme, on the left hand, asyou go into the high gallery. Epistemon bought another,wherein were painted to the life, the ideas of Plato, andthe atoms of Epicurus. Rhizotomus purchased another,wherein Echo was drawn to the life. Pantagruel caused tobe bought, by Gymnast, the life and deeds of Achilles, inseventy- eight pieces of tapestry, four fathoms long, andthree fathoms broad, all of Phrygian silk, embossed withgold and silver; the work beginning at the nuptials ofPeleus and Thetis, continuing to the birth of Achilles: hisyouth, described by Statius Papinius; his warlike achievements, celebrated by Homer; his death and obsequies, writ- ten by Ovid and Quintus Calabar; and ending at the ap- pearance of his ghost, and Polyxena's sacrifice , rehearsedby Euripides.He also caused to be bought three fine young unicorns;one of them a male of a chesnut colour, and two grey dappled females; also a tarand, whom he bought of a Scythianof the Gelone's country.A tarand is an animal as big as a bullock, having a headlike a stag, or a little bigger, two stately horns with largebranches, cloven feet, hair long like that of a furred Muscovite, I mean a bear, and a skin almost as hard as steel ar- mour. The Scythian said that there are but few tarands tobe found in Scythia, because it varieth its colour accordingto the diversity of the places where it grazes and abides,and represents the colour of the grass, plants, trees, shrubs,2 Enmonnoye de singe, monkey's money, that is, in mumbling over (like a chattering monkey) some prayers on behalf of the merchant,who was satisfied with that sort of cash. This puts one inmind of that other picture in Tiberius's closet, not unlike it both for the subject and artifice, mentioned by Suetonius and Martial.Sec Pliny, 1. 8, c. 34CHAP. II. ] PANTAGRUEL. 211flowers, meadows, rocks, and generally of all things nearwhich it comes. It hath this common with the sea- pulp,or polypus, with the thoes, with the wolves' of India, andwith the chameleon; which is a kind of a lizard so wonderful, that Democritus hath written a whole books of itsfigure, and anatomy, as also of its virtue and property inmagic. This I can affirm, that I have seen it change itscolour, not only at the approach of things that have acolour, but by its own voluntary impulse, according to its fear or other affections: as for example, upon a green carpet, I have certainly seen it become green; but having remained there some time, it turned yellow, blue, tanned, andpurple in course, in the same manner as you see a turkeyco*ck's comb change colour according to its passions. Butwhat we find most surprising in this tarand is, that not onlyits face and skin, but also its hair could take whatevercolour was about it. Near Panurge, with his kersey coat,its hair used to turn gray: near Pantagruel with its scarletmantle, its hair and skin grew red; near the pilot, dressedafter the fashion of the Isiaci of Anubis, in Egypt, its hairseemed all white; which two last colours the chameleon cannot borrow.9When the creature was free from any fear or affection ,the colour of its hair was just such as you see that of theasses of Meung.ON CHAP. II.-As our author satirizes all conditions of men in thisvoyage, he thought he could not begin better than by reflecting on the follies and lies of travellers; which he does in this chapter. The first place at which our travelling Pantagruelists touch, is the island of Medamothi. All the countries in this voyage are islands, and he styled himself Caloier des isles hierres, in the editions of 1553.The island Medamothi, Mŋdaµó‡ı nusquam nullo in loco, means an island that is no-where, and so cannot be found; and indeed most travellers and seafaring men are for going where no other went before,still bent on discoveries: and accordingly our Pantagruelion journalist tells us, that till they came to that island, they saw nothing new. Phi- lophanes, who is king of the country, signifies one who desires to be He is made absent from home (as travellers are) on account of his brother Philotheamon's marriage with the infanta of Engys that is the neighbourhood . Philotheamon signifies, One who desires to see things: thus many travel either to see, or be seen, or for both. Now5 I do not understand the reasonableness of this reason; but it is aScythian that speaks. 6 See Pliny, 1. 9, c. 29. 7 Ibid. 1. 8,9 See Plutarch in his Treatise ofseen.c. 34. 8 Ibid. 1. 22, c. 8. Natural Causes.P 2212 [ BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.as this kingdom of Medamothi is no where, so those exotic rarities,which our travellers purchase there, are nothing but fictions and chimeras. As for example: the voice of a man who brings in an appeal;the picture of a servant who wants a master; that of echo drawn to the life; that of the ideas of Plato, and the atoms of Epicurus; that copied from Philomela's needle-work; Achilles's deeds in seventy- eight pieces of tapestry, all of Phrygian silk, embossed with gold andsilver, some twenty- four feet long, and twenty broad; things which either are not, never were, or cannot be expressed with the pencil , as for example, the voice of a man who appeals , or who calls-for the French means both.CH. III. -How Pantagruel received a letter from his fatherGargantua, and of the strange way to have speedy news fromfar distant places.WHILE Pantagruel was taken up with the purchase of thoseforeign animals, the noise of ten guns and culverins, together with a loud and joyful cheer of all the fleet, was heardfrom the mole. Pantagruel looked towards the haven, andperceived that this was occasioned by the arrival of one ofhis father Gargantua's celoces, or advice- boats , named theChelidonia; because on the stern of it was carved in Corinthian brass, a sea swallow; which is a fish as large as adare-fish of Loire, all flesh, without scale, with cartilaginouswings, (like a bat's , ) very long and broad, by the means ofwhich, I have seen them fly a fathom above water, about abow-shot. At Marseilles this flying fish is called lendole.And indeed that ship was as light as a swallow; so that itrather seemed to fly on the sea than to sail. Malicorne,Gargantua's esquire carver, was come in her, being sent expressly by his master to have an account of his son's healthand circ*mstances, and to bring him credentials. WhenMalicorne had saluted Pantagruel, and the prince had embraced him about the neck, and showed him a little of thecap- courtesy, before he opened the letters , the first thing hesaid to him, was, Have you here the Gozal, ' the heavenlymessenger? Yes, sir, said he, here it is swaddled up inthis basket. It was a gray pigeon, taken out of Gargantua'sdove-house, whose young ones were just hatched when theadvice-boat was going off.Hebrew word for a (flitting) pigeon. 2 This pieceof ingenuity, or political contrivance, was not unknown to the an- cients. See Pliny, 1. 10, c. 24, and Frontinus, 1. 3, but it was most happily practised in 1573, by the Dutch, when the Spaniards were be- sieging Harlem.CHAP. III.]PANTAGRUEL. 213If any ill fortune had befallen Pantagruel, he would havefastened some black riband to his feet; but because allthings had succeeded happily hitherto, having caused it tobe undressed, he tied to its feet a white riband, and, without any further delay, let it loose. The pigeon presentlyflew away, cutting the air with an incredible speed; as youknow that there is no flight like a pigeon's, especially whenit hath eggs or young ones, through the extreme care whichnature hath fixed in it to relieve and be with its young; insomuch, that in less than two hours it compassed in the airthe long tract which the advice- boat, with all her diligence,with oars and sails, and a fair wind, could not go through inless than three days and three nights, and was seen as it wasgoing into the dove-house to its nest. Whereupon the worthy Gargantua, hearing that it had the white riband on,was joyful and secure of his son's welfare. This was thecustom of the noble Gargantua and Pantagruel, when theywould have speedy news of something of great concern; asthe event of some battle, either by sea or land; the surrendering or holding out of some strong place; the determination of some difference of moment; the safe or unhappydelivery of some queen or great lady; the death or recoveryof their sick friends or allies, and so forth. They used totake the gozal, and had it carried from one to another bythepost, to the places whence they desired to have news.gozal, bearing either a black or white riband, according to the occurrences and accidents, used to remove their doubtsat its return, making , in the space of one hour, more waythrough the air, than thirty post-boys could have done inone natural day. May not this be said to redeem and gaintime with a vengeance, think you? For the like service,therefore, you may believe , as a most true thing, that, in thedove-houses of their farms, there were to be found, all theyear long, store of pigeons hatching eggs, or rearing theiryoung . Which may be easily done in aviaries and voleries,by the help of saltpetre and the sacred herb vervain.TheThe gozal being let fly, Pantagruel perused his fatherGargantua's letter, the contents of which were as followeth:My dearest Son, -The affection that naturally a fatherbears to a beloved son, is so much increased in me, by reflecting on the particular gifts which by the divine goodnesshave been heaped on thee, that since thy departure it hath214 [BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.often banished all other thoughts out of my mind; leavingmy heart wholly possessed with fear, lest some misfortunehas attended thy voyage: for thou knowest that fear wasever the attendant of true and sincere love. Now because,as Hesiod sayeth, A good beginning of any thing is the halfof it; or, Well begun is half done, according to the old saying; to free my mind from this anxiety, I have expresslydispatched Malicorne, that he may give me a true accountof thy health at the beginning of thy voyage. For if it begood, and such as I wish it , I shall easily foresee the rest.I have met with some diverting books, which the bearerwill deliver thee; thou mayest read them when thou wantest to unbend and ease thy mind from thy better studies. Hewill also give thee at large the news at court. The peaceof the Lord be with thee. Remember me to Panurge, FriarJohn, Epistemon, Xenomanes, Gymnast, and the other principal domestics, my good friends. Dated at our paternalseat, this 13th day of June.Thy father and friend , GARGANTUA.CH. IV. How Pantagruel writ to his father Gargantua, and sent him several curiosities.PANTAGRUEL, having perused the letter, had a long conference with the esquire Malicorne; insomuch, that Panurgeat last interrupting them, asked him, Pray, sir, when do you design to drink? when shall we drink? When shall theworshipful esquire drink? What a devil! have you nottalked long enough to drink? It is a good motion, answeredPantagruel; go, get us something ready at the next inn; Ithink it is the Satyr on horseback. In the meantime hewrit to Gargantua as followeth, to be sent by the aforesaidesquire.Most gracious Father, -As our senses and animal facultiesare more discomposed at the news of events unexpected,though desired, (even to an immediate dissolution of thesoul from the body, ) than if those accidents had been foreseen; so the coming of Malicorne hath much surprised and disordered me. For I had no hopes to see any of your servants, or to hear from you, before I had finished our voyage; and contented myself with the dear remembrance of3 There was one Sieur de Malicorne, &c. , as appears by the recordsof Touraine, in 1559.CHAP. IV. ] PANTAGRUEL. 215your august majesty, deeply .mpressed in the hindmost ventricle of my brain, often representing you to my mind.But since you have made me happy beyond expectation,by the perusal of your gracious letter, and the faith I havein your esquire hath revived my spirits by the news of yourwelfare; I am, as it were, compelled to do what formerly Idid freely, that is , first to praise the Blessed Redeemer, who by his divine goodness preserves you in this long enjoymentof perfect health; then to return you eternal thanks for thefervent affection which you have for me your most humbleson and unprofitable servant.Formerly a Roman, named Furnius, said to Augustus, whohad received his father into favour, and pardoned him afterhe had sided with Anthony, that by that action the emperorhad reduced him to this extremity, that for want of powerto be grateful, both while he lived and after it, he should beobliged to be taxed with ingratitude. So I may say, thatthe excess of your fatherly affection drives me into such astraight, that I should be forced to live and die ungrateful;unless that crime be redressed by the sentence of the stoics ,who say, that there are three parts in a benefit, the one ofthe giver, the other of the receiver, the third of the remunerator; and that the receiver rewards the giver , when hefreely receives the benefit, and always remembers it; as onthe contrary, that man is most ungrateful who despises andforgets a benefit. Therefore, being overwhelmed with infinite favours, all proceeding from your extreme goodness,and on the other side wholly incapable of making the smallest return, I hope, at least, to free myself from the imputation of ingratitude, since they can never be blotted out of mymind; and my tongue shall never cease to own, that, tothank you as I ought, transcends my capacity.As for us, I have this assurance in the Lord's mercy andhelp, that the end of our voyage will be answerable to itsbeginning, and so it will be entirely performed in health andmirth. I will not fail to set down in a journal a full accountof our navigation, that, at our return, you may have an exact relation of the whole.I have found here a Scythian tarand, an animal strange and wonderful for the variations of colour on its skin andair, according to the distinction of neighbouring things: it is as tractable and easily kept as a lamb; be pleased to accept of it.216 [ BOOK IV. RABELAIS WORKS.I also send you three young unicorns, which are the tamest of creatures.I have conferred with the esquire, and taught him howthey must be fed. These cannot graze on the ground, byreason of the long horn on their forehead, but are forced tobrowse on fruit trees, or on proper racks, or to be fed byhand, with herbs, sheaves, apples, pears , barley, rye, andother fruits and roots, being placed before them.I am amazed that ancient writers should report them tobe so wild, furious, and dangerous, and never seen alive:far from it, you will find that they are the mildest things inthe world, provided they are not maliciously offended. Like.wise I send you the life and deeds of Achilles, in curioustapestry; assuring you whatever rarities of animals, plants,birds, or precious stones, and others, I shall be able to findand purchase in our travels, shall be brought to you, Godwilling, whom I beseech, by his blessed grace, to preserveyou.From Medamothy, this 15th of June. Panurge, Friar John,Epistemon, Xenomanes, Gymnast, Eusthemes, Rhizotomus, and Carpalim, having most humbly kissed your hand,return your salute a thousand times.Your most dutiful son and servant, PANTAGRUEL.While Pantagruel was writing this letter, Malicorne wasmade welcome with a thousand goodly good-morrows andhowd'ye's: they clung about him so, that I cannot tell youhow much they made of him, how many humble services , howmany from my love and to my love were sent with him.Pantagruel, having writ his letters, sat down at table withhim, and afterwards presented him with a large chain ofgold, weighing eight hui red crowns; between whose septenary links, some large diamonds, rubies, emeralds, turquoise stones, and unions were alternately set in. To eachof his bark's crew, he ordered to be given five hundred crowns. To Gargantua, his father, he sent the tarandcovered with a cloth of satin, brocaded with gold: and thetapestry containing the life and deeds of Achilles, withthethree unicorns in frized cloth of gold trappings and so theyleft Medamothy; Malicorne, to return to Gargantua; andPantagruel, to proceed in his voyage: during which, Epis temon read to him the books which the esquire had brought;CHAP. V. ] PANTAGRUEL. 217and because he found them jovial and pleasant, I shall giveyou an account of them, if you earnestly desire it.CH. V.-How Pantagruel met a ship with passengers returningfrom Lanternland.On the fifth day, beginning already to wind by little andlittle about the pole, going still farther from the equinoctialline, we discovered a merchant- man to the windward of us.The joy for this was not small on both sides; we in hopesto hear news from sea, and those in the merchantman from land. So we bore upon them, and coming up with themwe hailed them: and finding them to be Frenchmen ofXaintonge, backed our sails and lay by to talk to them.Pantagruel heard that they came from Lanternland; whichadded to his joy, and that of the whole fleet. We inquiredabout the state of that country, and the way of living of theLanterns and were told, that about the latter end of thefollowing July, was the time prefixed ' for the meeting ofthe general chapter of the Lanterns; and that if we arrivedthere at that time, as we might easily, we should see a handsome, honourable, and jolly company of Lanterns; and thatgreat preparations were making, as if they intended to lan- ternise there to the purpose. We were told also , that if wetouched at the great kingdom of Gebarim, we should behonourably received and treated by the sovereign of thatcountry, King Ohabé, who, as well as all his subjects , speaks Touraine French.While we were listening to this news, Panurge fell outwith one Dingdong, a drover or sheep merchant of Taillebourg. The occasion of the fray was thus.1 The council of Trent, which, in concert with the Emperor andPope, at this time continued sitting, in spite of the opposition madeto it by the King of France. Rabelais, by the word lanterns, meansthe prelates and divines of that assembly; because, instead of enlightening the people, (as they would do if they answered the end of theirfunction,) they consumed abundance of time in lanterning, as theFrench say, ( i . e. trifling and playing the fool, ) and in no wisehealed or composed the differences of religion . To lanternize pro- foundly, as the author a little lower says they would do at this council,means to put one's self into a deep meditation, as the monks do, whenthe hood of their habit, being brought over their faces, looks like thetop of a lantern. [ Some of Rabelais' editors conceive that by Lanternland he alludes rather to Rochelle, where the Calvinists at that timoseemed desirous of founding a second Geneva. ]218 [ BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.This same Dingdong, seeing Panurge without a codpiece,with his spectacles fastened to his cap, said to one of hiscomrades, Prithee, look, is there not a fine medal of a cuсKold? Panurge, by reason of his spectacles, as you may wellthink, heard more plainly by half with his ears than usually;which caused him ( hearing this) to say to the saucy dealer inmutton, in a kind of a pet:How the devil should I be one of the hornified fraternity,since I am not yet a brother of the marriage- noose, as thouart; as I guess by thy ill -favoured phiz?Yea, verily, quoth the grazier, I am married, and wouldnot be otherwise for all the pairs of spectacles in Europe;nay, not for all the magnifying gim- cracks in Africa; for Ihave got me the cleverest, prettiest, handsomest, properest,neatest, tightest, honestest, and soberest piece of woman'sflesh for my wife , that is in all the whole country of Xaintonge; I will say that for her, and a fart for all the rest. Ibring her home a fine eleven- inch- long branch of red coralfor her Christmas-box. What hast thou to do with it? whatis that to thee? who art thou? whence comest thou, O darklanthorn of antichrist Answer, if thou art of God. I askthee, bythe way of question , said Panurge to him very seriously, if with the consent and countenance of all the elements, I had gingumbob'd, codpieced, and thumpthumpriggledtickledtwidled thy so clever, so pretty, so handsome,so proper, so neat, so tight, so honest, and so sober femaleimportance, insomuch that the stiff deity that has no forecast, Priapus, (who dwells here at liberty, all subjection offastened codpieces, or bolts, bars, and locks, abdicated , ) remained sticking in her natural Christmas- box in such alamentable manner, that it were never to come out, but eternally should stick there, unless thou didst pull it out withthy teeth; what wouldst thou do? Wouldst thou everlastingly leave it there, or wouldst thou pluck it out with thygrinders? Answer me, O thou ram of Mahomet, since thouart one of the devil's gang. I would, replied the sheepmonger, take thee such a woundy cut on this spectaclebearing lug of thine, with my trusty bilbo, as would smitethee dead as a herring. Thus, having taken pepper in the2 Sacsachezevezinemasse, in the original. A word not much shorterthan nastypatiturdifacilowsifartical fellow, which we see quoted in the Cambridge dictionary,CHAF. VI. ] PANTAGRUEL. 219nose, he was lugging out his sword, but alas! cursed cowsLave short horns; it stuck in the scabbard; as you knowthat at sea, cold iron will easily take rust, by reason of theexcessive and nitrous moisture. Panurge, so smitten withterror, that his heart sunk down to his midriff, scoured off toPantagruel for help: but Friar John laid hand on his flashing scymitar that was new ground, and would certainly havedispatched Dingdong to rights, had not the skipper, andsome of his passengers, beseeched Pantagruel not to suffersuch an outrage to be committed on board his ship . So thematter was made up, and Panurge and his antagonist shakedfists, and drank in course to one another, in token of a perfect reconciliation .CH. VI. - How the fray being over, Panurge cheapened one ofDingdong's sheep.THIS quarrel being hushed, Panurge tipped the wink uponEpistemon and Friar John, and taking them aside, -Standat some distance out of the way, said he, and take your shareof the following scene of mirth: you shall have rare sportanon, if my cake be not dough, and my plot do but take.Then addressing himself to the drover, he took off to him abumper of good lantern wine. ' The other pledged himbriskly and courteously. This done, Panurge earnestly entreated him to sell him one of his sheep.But the other answered him, Is it come to that, friendand neighbour? Would you put tricks upon travellers?Alas, how finely you love to play upon poor folk! Nay,you seem a rare chapman, that is the truth on it. Oh whata mighty sheep merchant you are! In good faith , you lookliker one of the diving trade, than a buyer of sheep. Adzookers, what a blessing it would be to have one's purse,well lined with chink, near your worship at a tripe-house,when it begins to thaw 2 Humph, humph, did not we knowyou well, you might serve one a slippery trick! Pray do3 Friar John had got it new ground, upon Panurge's telling him (1.3, c. 23, ) that for want of occupation, it was become more rusty than the keyhole of an old powdering tub. 1 Excellent wine, winetheological. 2 In athaw, when tripe may be had almost for nothing, it would not be over- safe to be near you in a crowd of poor people striving to buythat sort of mouth ammunition. An honest man'spurse would stand a bad chance in company of such an odd, ill- looking sort of chap as you.220 [ BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.but see, good people, what a mighty conjuror the fellowwould be reckoned. Patience, said Panurge: but wavingthat, be so kind as to sell me one of your sheep. Come,how much? What do you mean, master of mine? answeredthe other. They are long-woolled sheep: from these didJason take his golden fleece . The order of the house ofBurgundy was drawn from them. Zwoons, man, they areoriental sheep, topping sheep, fatted sheep, sheep of quality.Be it so, said Panurge: but sell me one of them, I beseechyou, and that for a cause, paying you ready money upon the nail, in good and lawful occidental current cash. Wilt sayhow much? Friend , neighbour, answered the seller of mutton, hark ye me a little, on the ear.PANURGE. On which side you please; I hear you.DINGDONG. You are going to Lantern-land, they say.PAN. Yea, verily.DING. To see fashions?PAN. Yea, verily.DING. And be merry?PAN. Yea, verily.DING. Your name is , as I take it, Robin Mutton?PAN. As you please for that, sweet sir.DING. Nay, without offence.PAN. So I understand it.³DING. You are, as I take it, the king's jester; are not you?PAN. Yea, verily.DING. Give me your hand-humph, humph, you go tosee fashions, you are the king's jester, your name is RobinMutton! Do you see this same ram? His name, too, is3 The first edition of the 2nd book of Rabelais, contained nothing injurious against Calvin: but Calvin, in the first of his letters, inthe year 1553, having ranked Pantagruel among obscene and pro- hibited books, the reader has already seen how in his turn Rabe- belais delineates Calvin under the names of predestinator and impostorin the preface to the last editions of the said 2d book. Here, from scurrility he passes to raillery, and when he brings in Panurge answer- ing Dingdong by "so I understand it," and by four " yea verilys"running, it is visible he ridicules the too frequent use of words in Cal- vin's catechism . To call any one un plaisant Robin, is as much as to call him simpleton, because a sheep is accounted the silliest of all quadrupeds. As for Robin, in the signification of mutton,that word may come from Rupinus; for sheep must have heads as hardas a rock (rupes) to push at one another as they do.CHAP. VII. ]PANTAGRUEL. 221Robin. Here Robin, Robin, Robin! Baea, baea, baea.Hath he not a rare voice?PAN. Ay, marry has he, a very fine and harmonious voice.DING. Well, this bargain shall be made between you andme, friend and neighbour; we will get a pair of scales , thenyou Robin Mutton shall be put into one of them, and TupRobin into the other. Now I will hold you a peck of Buschoysters, that in weight, value, and price, he shall outdoand you shall be found light in the very numerical manner,as when you shall be hanged and suspended.you,Patience, said Panurge: but you would do much for me,and your whole posterity, if you would chaffer with me forhim, or some other of his inferiors. I beg it of you; goodyour worship, be so kind. Hark ye, friend of mine, answered the other, with the fleece of these, your fine Rouencloth is to be made; your Leominster superfine wool is minearse to it; mere flock in comparison . Of their skins thebest cordovan will be made, which shall be sold for Turkeyand Montelimart, or for Spanish leather at least. Of theguts shall be made fiddle and harp strings, that will sell asdear as if they came from Munican or Aquileia. What doyou think of it, hah? If you please, sell me one of them,said Panurge, and I will be yours for ever. Look, here isready cash. What's the price? This he said, exhibiting his purse stuffed with new Henricuses.5CH. VII . -Which if your read, you will find how Panurge bargained with Dingdong.NEIGHBOUR, my friend, answered Dingdong, they are meatfor none but kings and princes: their flesh is so delicate , so savoury, and so dainty, that one would swear it melted inthe mouth. I bring them out of a country where the veryhogs, God be with us, live on nothing but myrobalans. Thesows in the styes, when they lye- in (saving the honour of5 Some may understand, by this, the city of Munich, the capital of Bavaria; but I rather think the author had in his eye Monaco in Liguria; the best lutestrings coming from Italy. 6 Itis in the original, " j'en seray bien fort tenu au courrail de vostre huys. " I shall be so much obliged to you, that for the time to come you shall do with me just what you please, even as if I were for ever fastened to the bolt of your door, and consequently must move forwards and backwards according to the action of your hand upor me.222 [BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.this good company) are fed only with orange- flowers . But,said Panurge, drive a bargain with me for one of them,¹and I will pay you for it like a king, upon the honest wordof a true Trojan: come, come, what do you ask? Not sofast, Robin, answered the trader, these sheep are lineallydescended from the very family of the ram that waftedPhryxus and Helle over the sea, since called the Hellespont.A pox on it, said Panurge, you are clericus vel addiscens! ²Ità is a cabbage, and verè a leek, answered the merchant.But rr, rrr, rrrr, rrrrr, hoh Robin, rr, rrrrrrr, you do not understand that gibberish, do you? 3 Now I think of it, overall the fields, where they piss, corn grows as fast as if theLord had pissed there; they need neither be tilled nordunged. Besides, man, your chemists extract the best saltpetre in the world out of their urine. Nay, with their verydung (with reverence be it spoken) the doctors in our countrymake pills that cure seventy- eight kinds of diseases, theleast of which is the evil of St. Eutropius of Xaintes, from which, good Lord deliver us! Now what do you think on't,neighbour, my friend? The truth is, they cost me money,that they do. Cost what they will, cried Panurge, tradewith me for one of them, paying you well. Our friend,quoth the quack-like sheep man, do but mind the wondersof nature that are found in those animals, even in a member which one would think were of no use. Take me but thesehorns, and bray them a little with an iron pestle, or with anandiron, which you please, it is all one to me; then burythem wherever you will, provided it be where the sun mayshine, and water them frequently; in a few months I willengage you will have the best asparagus in the world noteven excepting those of Ravenna. Now, come and tell mewhether the horns of you other knights of the bull's feather have such a virtue and wonderful propriety?This is all taken from Merlinus Coccaius Macaronic XI at thebeginning ." Fraudifer ergo loquit pastorem Cingar ad unum .Vis, compagne, mihi castorem vendere grossum?""2 You know so many fine things, that if you are not a clerk, you are at least aspiring to be one. 3 The canine voice of a shepherd or drover, getting together, or putting forward, a flock of sheep: r,tera, quæ in rixando prima est, canina vocatur.' says Erasmus.See his Adages at the word canina facundiu.99CHAP. VII.]PANTAGRUEL. 223Patience, said Panurge. I do not know whether you bea scholar or no, pursued Dingdong: I have seen a world of scholars, I say great scholars, that were cuckolds, I'll assureyou. But hark you me, if you were a scholar, you should know that in the most inferior members of those animals—which are the feet-there is a bone-which is the heel-theastragalus, if you will have it so, wherewith, and with thatof no other creature breathing, except the Indian ass , andthe dorcades of Libya, they used in old times to play at the royal game of dice, whereat Augustus the emperor wonabove fifty thousand crowns one evening. Now such cuckolds as you will be hanged ere you get half so much at it.Patience, said Panurge; but let us dispatch . And when myfriend and neighbour, continued the canting sheep- seller , shall I have duly praised the inward members, the shoulders , thelegs, the knuckles, the neck, the breast, the liver, the spleen,the tripes, the kidneys, the bladder, wherewith they makefootballs; the ribs, which serve in Pigmy-land to make little cross-bows, to pelt the cranes with cherry- stones; the head,which with a little brimstone serves to make a miraculous decoction to loosen and ease the belly of costive dogs? A turd on it, said the skipper to his preaching passenger, what afiddle-faddle have we here? There is too long a lecture by half sell him if thou wilt; if thou wilt not, do not let theman lose more time. I hate a gibble-gabble, and a rimble- ramble talk I am for a man of brevity. I will, for your sake,replied the holder forth; but then he shall give me three livres ,French money, for each pick and choose. It is a woundyprice, cried Panurge; in our country, I could have, five , nay six for the money: see that you do not overreach me, master.You are not the first man whom I have known to have fallen,even sometimes to the endangering, if not breaking, of his own neck, for endeavouring to rise all at once. A murrainseize thee for a blockheaded booby, cried the angry seller ofsheep; by the worthy vow of our lady of Charroux," the worst in this flock is four times better than those which in.4 See Suetonius, ch. 71 , of the life of Augustus. 5 Rabelais'words are, par le digne vœu de Charrous, i. e. by the worthy vow of Charroux. M. Motteux has added our lady: neither was that relict the image of our lady, or of any other female, but of a very large man;none of the female sex were suffered to come near it. See more of itin Explanatory Remarks at the end of this chapter.224 [BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.days of yore the Coraxians in Tuditania," a country of Spain,used to sell for a gold talent each; and how much dost thouthink, thou Hibernian fool, that a talent of gold was worth?Sweet sir, you fall into a passion, I see, returned Panurge:well hold, here is your money. Panurge, having paid hismoney, chose him out of all the flock a fine topping ram;and as he was hauling it along, crying out and bleating,all the rest, hearing and bleating in concert, stared, to see whither their brother ram should be carried . In the mean.while the drover was saying to his shepherds: Ah! howwell the knave could choose him out a ram; the whor*- sonhas skill in cattle. On my honest word, I reserved that verypiece of flesh for the Lord of Cancale, well knowing his disposition: for the good man is naturally overjoyed when heholds a good- sized handsome shoulder of mutton instead ofa left-handed racket, in one hand, with a good sharp carverin the other got wot howhe bestirs himself then.ON CHAP. VII .-Our author, to ridicule a foolish relique that was in great repute in Poictou in his time, makes Dingdong swear by it. It was called , The worthy vow of Charroux. The people gave that name to a large wooden statue, in the shape of a man, covered with plates of silver, which the monks kept in a corner of their monastery.They used to show it but every seventh year, and then shoals of people thronged to see it; but none of the female sex were suffered to come near to kiss it; this mighty blessing was wholly reserved for men or boys; but the women used to watch to catch the men who had kissed it at unawares, and clipt them about the neck and kissed them; bywhich means they were persuaded they drew to themselves, and sucked in, the virtuous efficacy which they had got by touching the shrine. Atall lady was so very presumptuous as to dare kiss that blessed worthy vow, and, behold! the angry wooden saint in an instant grew five feet taller than he was before; at least the people said so, and the monksreported it for gospel-truth. Yet all its worth and virtue could not pro- tect it against the sieur Bouganet, and other protestant gentlemen, who in the year 1562, stripped it of its silver robes, and since that they were called, the valets de chambre of the worthy vow of Charroux. -M.Rabelais does indeed express himself exactly as it is translated,which would make one believe the Coraxians were a people of Tuditania.They were far from being so: Tuditania is Andalusia: the Coraxians were a people of Colchis. It was a troublesome, expensive, and difficult thing to carry sheep from Colchis to Andalusia (from one end of the Mediterranean to the other. ) This was what made the Coraxian sheep sell so dear among the Andalusians, who, besides abounding withgold, as they did, stuck at no price, and valued no money, so they could but furnish themselves with a breed of such sheep. See Strabo's Geography, 1. 3.CHAP. VIII. ]PANTAGRUEL. 225CH. VIII.-How Panurge caused Dingdong and his sheep to be drowned in the sea.On a sudden, you would wonder how the thing was so soondone; for my part I cannot tell you , for I had not leisure tomind it our friend Panurge, without any further tittletattle, throws you his ram overboard into the middle of thesea, bleating and making a sad noise. Upon this all theother sheep in the ship, crying and bleating in the sametone, make all the haste they could to leap nimbly into thesea, one after another; and great was the throng who shouldleap in first after their leader. It was impossible to hinderthem for you know that it is the nature of sheep always tofollow the first, wheresoever it goes; which makes Aristotle,lib. 9. De Hist. Animal. , mark them for the most silly andfoolish animals in the world. Dingdong, at his wit's end ,and stark staring mad, as a man who saw his sheep destroy anddrown themselves before his face, strove to hinder and keepthem by might and main; but all in vain: they all , one afterthe other frisked and jumped into the sea, and were lost.At last he laid hold on a huge sturdy one by the fleece, uponthe deck of the ship, hoping to keep it back, and so save thatand the rest but the ram was so strong that it proved toohard for him, and carried its master into the herring pond inspite of his teeth; where it is supposed he drank somewhatmore than his fill; so that he was drowned, in the samemanner as one- eyed Polyphemus' sheep carried out of theden Ulysses and his companions. The like happened to theshepherds and all their gang, some laying hold on their beloved tup, this by the horns, the other by the legs, a thirdby the rump, and others by the fleece; till in fine they wereall of them forced to sea, and drowned like so many rats.Panurge on the gunnel of the ship, with an oar in his hand,not to help them you may swear, but to keep them fromswimming to the ship, and saving themselves from drowning, preached and canted to them all the while, like any littleFriar Oliver Maillard, or another Friar John Burgess; layingbefore them rhetorical common- places concerning the miseriesof this life, and the blessings and felicity of the next; assuring them that the dead were much happier than the livingin this vale of misery, and promising to erect a stately cenotaph and honorary tomb to every one of them, on the highest VOL. II. Q226 RABELAIS' WORKS. [ BOOK .summit of Mount Cenis, at his return from Lantern-land;wishing them, nevertheless , in case they were not disposedto shake hands with this life , and did not like their saltliquor, they might have the good luck to meet with somekind whale which might set them ashore safe and sound, onsome land of Gotham, after a famous example.¹The ship being cleared of Dingdong and his tups: Isthere ever another sheepish soul2 left lurking on board?cried Panurge. Where are those of Toby Lamb, and RobinRam, that sleep whilst the rest are a feeding? Faith Icannot tell myself. This was an old coaster's trick . Whatthinkest ofit, Friar John, hah? Rarely performed, answeredFriar John: only methinks that as formerly in war, on theday of battle, a double pay was commonly promised thesoldiers for that day: for if they overcome, there was enough to pay them; and if they lost, it would have been shamefulfor them to demand it, as the cowardly foresters³ did afterthe battle of Cerizoles: so likewise, my friend , you oughtnot to have paid your man, and the money had been saved.A fart for the money, said Panurge: have I not had abovefifty thousand pounds worth of sport? Come now, let usbe gone; the wind is fair. Hark you me, my friend John:never did man do me a good turn , but I returned, or at leastacknowledged it: no, I scorn to be ungrateful; I never was,nor ever will be: never did man do me an ill one withoutrueing the day that he did it , either in this world or theA l'example de Jonas, says Rabelais, which I think is less shocking.2 Sheepish soul. ] Ame mouttoniere; alluding to those who, like truesheep, are incapable of determining upon anything of themselves.According to that of Juvenal;" Vervecum in patria, crassoque sub aëre nasci."3 Cowardlyforesters . ] Les fuyars gruyers, in the original. M. Mot- teux, in the explanation of this word, follows Cotgrave, who says gruyer is a general name for all the king's officers belonging to a forest,as keepers, verdurers, woodwards, and the like. But that it cannotmean so here, is plain to a demonstration . Gruyers, says M. Duchat,were soldiers raised and levied for Swiss, in the county of Gruyere.situated between Berne and the city of Sion , hard by Lausanne and the lake of Geneva. See Paulus Jovius, hist . 1. 44. There were some ofthese Gruyers in the French army at the battle of Cerizol; and as their bravery was no less depended upon than that of the Swiss themselves,they were posted promiscuously among the true Swiss in the rear; but they turned tail at the very first onset, which gave occasion to Martin Bellay to say, that it was a very difficult thing to disguise an ass like awar-horse. See his Mem. in the year 1543.CHAP. IX. ] PANTAGRUEL. 227next. I am not yet so much a fool neither. Thou damnestthyself like any old devil, quoth Friar John: it is written,Mihi vindictam, &c. Matter of breviary, mark ye me.ON CHAP. V. TO VIII . -From Panurge's quarrel with Dindenault the drover, whom I have called Dingdong, and that sheepmonger's misfortune, we may raise this moral; that the private broils of pas- tors often prove the ruin of their flocks; foolish, headstrong, and ready, right or wrong, one and all, to rise and fall with the bell- wether.Dingdong's quack-like canting stuff does not hinder him from selling the sheep by which he lives.After all, this may be the relation of some of Montluc's adventures,burlesqued after our author's way. For, as we have observed in the preface to the first three books, that the Bishop of Valence was a pro- testant, at least in his opinions: everybody knew it, and the Mareschalde Montluc, his brother, made no mystery of it in his memoirs; he wasmolested more than once about it, and particularly by the Dean of Valence, of whom we have spoke in the said preface, and for whom the bishop proved too hard by his subtlety and credit, which inclined himto make use of all possible means to be revenged on one who had plagued him so long.-M.CH. IX. -How Pantagruel arrived at the island of Ennasin,and ofthe strange ways of being akin in that country.WE had still the wind at south south west, and had been awhole day without making land. On the third day, at theflies up rising, (which, you know, is some two or threehours after the sun's, ) we got sight of a triangular island,very much like Sicily for its form and situation. It wascalled the Island of Alliances.The people there are much like your carrot -pated Poitevins, save only that all of them, men, women, and children,have their noses shaped like an ace of clubs . For thatreason the ancient name of the country was Ennasin. ' Theywere all akin, as the mayor of the place told us, at least they boasted so.You people of the other world esteem it a wonderful thing,that, out of the family of the Fabii ' at Rome, on a certainday, which was the 13th of February, at a certain gate,which was the Porta Carmentalis, since named Scelerata,formerly situated at the foot of the Capitol, between the1 Ennasin. ] Noseless or flat-nosed. At Metz, enasé signifiesenchiffrené, because those who have flat-noses speak through the nose,or rather snuffle as if they had no nose. Enchiffrenégenerally means one whose nose is stopt with a rheum: one that hath the murr, or pose.2 Fabii. ] See Aulus Gellius, l . 17, c . 21 9 2228 [ BOOK IV.. RABELAIS' WORKS.Tarpeian rock and the Tiber, marched out against theVeientes of Etruria, three hundred and six men bearingarms, all related to each other, with five thousand othersoldiers, every one of them their vassals, who were all slainnear the river Cremera, that comes out of the lake of Bec- cano. Now from this same country of Ennasin, in case ofneed, above three hundred thousand, all relations, and of onefamily, might march out. Their degrees of consanguinityand alliance are very strange: for being thus akin and alliedto one another, we found that none was either father ormother, brother or sister, uncle or aunt, nephew or niece,son-in-law, or daughter- in-law, godfather or godmother, tothe other; unless, truly, a tall flat-nosed old fellow, who, asI perceived, called a little sh*tten-arsed girl, of three or fouryears old, father, and the child called him daughter.Their distinction of degrees of kindred was thus: a manused to call a woman, my lean bit; 3 the woman called him,my porpoise. Those, said Friar John, must needs stinkdamnably of fish, when they have rubbed their bacon one with the other. One smiling on a young buxom baggage,said, Good morrow, dear currycomb. She, to return himhis civility, said, The like to you, my steed . Ha! ha! ha!said Panurge, that is pretty well in faith; for indeed it standsher in good stead to curry- comb this steed . Another greetedhis buttock with a Farewell, my case. She replied, Adieutrial. By St. Winifred's placket, cried Gymnast, this case has been often tried. Another asked a she -friend of his,How is it, hatchet? She answered him, At your service,dear helve. Odds belly, saith Carpalim, this helve and thishatchet are well matched . As we went on, I saw one who,calling his she- relation , styled her my crum, and she calledhim, my crust.Quoth one to a brisk, plump, juicy female, I am glad tosee you, dear tap. So am I to find you so merry, sweet spiggot, replied she. One called a wench, his shovel; shecalled him, her peal: one named his, my slipper and she my foot another, my boot; she, my shasoon.

3 There is a fish called by the French, by way of antiphrasis, maigre lean bit). It is a sea fish as well as the porpoise, as this last is vul- garly written; though porc-pisce is known to be the true spelling; it being a sort of hog fish, or sea hog. Rabelais here quibbles upon the two words. I take the maigre to be a sort of halibut.• Estivallet. ] A buskin or summer-boot, called so from the HighCHAP. IX. ]PANTAGRUEL. 229In the same degree of kindred, one called his, my butter ,she called him, my eggs; and they were akin just like a dishof buttered eggs. I heard one call his, my tripe, and shecalled him, my fa*ggot. Now I could not, for the heart'sblood of me, pick out or discover what parentage, alliance,affinity, or consanguinity was between them, with referenceto our custom; only they told us that she was fa*ggot's tripe.(Tripe defa*got, means the smallest sticks in a fa*ggot. ) Another complimenting his convenient, said, Yours, my shell:she replied, I was yours before , sweet oyster. I reckon,said Carpalim, she hath gutted his oyster. Another longshanked ugly rogue, mounted on a pair of high- heeledwooden slippers, meeting a strapping, fusty, squobbeddowdy, says he to her, How is it, my top? She was shortupon him, and arrogantly replied, Never the better for you,mywhip. By St. Anthony's hog, said Xeomanes, I believeso; for how can this whip be sufficient to lash this top?A college professor, well provided with cod , and powderedand prinked up, having a while discoursed with a great lady,taking his leave, with these words, Thank you, sweet-meat;she cried, There needs no thanks, sour- sauce. Saith Pantegruel, This is not altogether incongruous, for sweetmeat must have sour sauce. A wooden loggerhead said to a youngwench, It is long since I saw you, bag: All the better, criedshe, pipe. Set them together, said Panurge, then blow intheir arses, it will be a bagpipe. We saw, after that, adiminutive hump-backed gallant, pretty near us, taking leaveof a she relation of his, thus: Fare thee well, friend hole:she reparteed, Save thee, friend peg. Quoth Friar John,What could they say more, were he all peg and she all hole?But now would I give something to know if every cranny ofthe hole can be stopped up with that same peg.A bawdy bachelor, talking with an old trout, was saying,Remember, rusty gun. I will not fail, said she, scourer. "Do you reckon these two to be akin? said Pantagruel to themayor: I rather take them to be foes: in our country awoman would take this as a mortal affront. Good peopleof the other world, replied the mayor, you have few suchand so near relations as this gun and scourer are to cneanother; for they both come out of one shop. What, wasDutch, stiefel, or rather the Latin, æstivale, because used in summer (astas). Scourer. ] Fyste, in the original: (vesse. )shod. ] One hole in the original: (d'ung trou.)• One230 RABELAIS [BOOK IV. ' WORKS.•the shop their mother?' quoth Panurge. What mother,said the mayor, does the man mean? That must be someof your world's affinity; we have here neither father normother: your little paltry fellows, that live on the other sidethe water, poor rogues, booted with whisps of hay, may indeed have such; but we scorn it. The good Pantagruelstood gazing and listening; but at those words he had liketo have lost all patience.Having very exactly viewed the situation of the island,and the way of living of the Enasséd nation, we went to takea cup of the creature at a tavern, where there happened tobe a wedding after the manner of the country. Bating thatshocking custom, there was special good cheer.While we were there, a pleasant match was struck up betwixt a female called Pear (a tight thing, as we thought, butby some, who knew better things, said to be quaggy andflabby, ) and a young soft male, called Cheese, somewhatsandy. (Many such matches have been, and they wereformerly much commended. ) In our country we say, Il nefut oncques tel mariage, qu'est de la poire et du fromage; thereis no match like that made between the pear and the cheese:and in many other places good store of such bargains have been driven. Besides, when the women are at their lastprayers, it is to this day a noted saying, that after cheesecomes nothing.In another room I saw them marrying an old greasy bootto a young pliable buskin. Pantagruel was told, that young buskin took old boot to have and to hold, because she wasof special leather, in good case, and waxed, seared, liquored,and greased to the purpose, even though it had been for the fisherman that went to bed with his boots on. In anotherroom below, I saw a young brogue taking a young slipperfor better for worse: which, they told us, was neither forthe sake of her piety, parts, or person, but for the fourthcomprehensive p, portion; the spankers, spur-royals , rose7 In the original, was the wind their mother. Alluding, though jestingly, to what the ancient naturalists have advanced concerning the winds making the mares in Spain conceive.Une jeune escafignon. Under the idea of a escafignon (i . e. a single-soled shoe of thin leather; a rope-dancer, or tumbler's pump) Rabe- lais ridicules a young thread- bare, single-soled gentleman: a gentle- man of low degree.CHAP. X. ] PANTAGRUEL. 231nobles, and other coriander seed with which she was quilted all over.ON CHAP. IX.- By the island of Ennasin, where such strange alliances are made, Rabelais at once exposes unequal matches, and the dull jests and stupidity of gross clowns; which, as the Latin hath it, have nonose, that is, no wit. Thus he tells us, that all the men, women, and children of the Ennaséd, or noseless, island are like your carrot- patedPoictevins, who are a boorish sort of people. I must own that the comments, which Pantagruel's companions make on their ridiculous manner of being akin, are little better than the text. Yet thosewretched quibbles and conundrums, are what your country.fellows ad- mire mightily; and all this chapter would be read or (to speak more properly) be heard read by such people with as much pleasure, as Itranslated most of it with pain. But in the main, the meaning is ad- mirable; for what more deserves a reproof, than the foolish unequal marriages made every day, which are as odd jests, and as improper as some of those in the chapter? The match struck up between the pear (which seemed right and firm, but was known by some to be flabby)and the soft cheese, is more natural, and made very often in our world;and bating its emblem, which is of the nature of the island, there is saltand nose in that conjunction: nor is there less in that of the old greasy boot, and the young pliable buskin; and the brogue and the slipper;which are in a manner a key to the rest.-M.CH. X. -How Pantagruel went ashore at the island of Chely,where he saw King St. Panigon.WE sailed right before the wind, which we had at west,leaving those odd alliancers with their ace- of- clubs snouts,and having taken height by the sun, stood in for Chely, ' alarge, fruitful, wealthy, and well-peopled island. King St.Panigon, first of the name, reigned there, and, attended bythe princes, his sons, and the nobles of his court, came asfar as the port to receive Pantagruel, and conducted him tohis palace; near the gate of which, the queen, attended bythe princesses her daughters, and the court ladies , receivedPanigon directed her and all her retinue to salute Pantagruel and his men with a kiss; for such was the civilcustom ofthe country: and they were all fairly bussed accordingly, except Friar John, who stepped aside, and sneakedus.1 Read (instead of stood in for Chely) stood out to sea. (Montasmes en haulte mer.) Read likewise (instead of having taken the height of the sun) about sunset (sus la declination du soliel, &c. ) As for taking the height of the sun, it is certain that the translator did not take the height of the author's meaning, in this place; his words are, " feismes scalle en l'isle de Chely. " We landed on the island of Chely. Faire scale, is to land,set foot on land, to go ashore, says Cotgrave expressly.232 [BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKSoff among the king's officers. Panigon used all the entreaties imaginable to persuade Pantagruel to tarry therethat day and the next: but he would needs be gone, andexcused himself upon the opportunity of wind and weather,which being oftener desired than enjoyed, ought not to beneglected when it comes. Panigon, having heard thesereasons, let us go, but first made us take off some five andtwenty or thirty bumpers each.Pantagruel, returning to the port, missed Friar John, andasked why he was not with the rest of the company? Panurge could not tell howto excuse him, and would have goneback to the palace to call him, when Friar John overtook them, and merrily cried , long live the noble Panigon! As Ilove my belly, he minds good eating, and keeps a noble house and a dainty kitchen. I have been there, boys.Every thing goes about by dozens . I was in good hopes to have stuffed my puddings there like a monk. What! alwaysin a kitchen, friend? said Pantagruel. By the belly of St. Crampacon, quoth the Friar, I understand the customs andceremonies which are used there, much better than all theformal stuff, antic postures, and nonsensical fiddle - faddle that must be used with those women, magni magna, sh*ttenc*msh*ta, cringes, grimaces, scrapes, bows, and congées; doublehonours this way, triple salutes that way, the embrace, the grasp, the squeeze, the hug, the leer, the smack, baso lasmanos de vostra mercé, de vostra maestá. You are most tarabin,tarabas, Stront; that is downright Dutch. Why all thisado? I do not say but a man might be for a bit by the byeand away, to be doing as well as his neighbours; but thislittle nasty cringing and courtesying made me as mad as any March devil . You talk of kissing ladies; by the worthy andsacred frock I wear, I seldom venture upon it, lest I beserved as was the Lord of Guyercharois. What was it? said Pantagruel; I know him; heis one ofthe best friends I have.He was invited to a sumptuous feast, said Friar John, bya relation and neighbour of his, together with all the gentle2 Stront. ] Bren c'est merde à Rouen, i . e. turd; turd is the Rouen word. And, indeed, it is hardly used any where else but there; nor therebut in the suburbs and country round about; a rustical, clownish word.3 After this add, St. Benedict never dissembled for the matter. " St.Benoist n'en mentit jamais" (a rhyme) . On this M. Duchat observes, that neither the Benedictine, nor any other monks, ever saluteanybody otherwise than by bowing their head and bodyCHAP. XI. ]PANTAGRUEL. 233men and ladies in the neighbourhood. Now some of thelatter [ the ladies] expecting his coming, dressed the pages inwomen's clothes, and finified them like any babies; thenordered them to meet my lord at his coming near the drawbridge; so the complimenting monsieur came, and therekissed the petticoated lads with great formality. At last theladies, who minded passages in the gallery, burst out withlaughing, and made signs to the pages to take off their dress;which the good lord having observed, the devil a bit he durstmake up to the true ladies to kiss them, but said, that sincethey had disguised the pages, by his great grandfather'shelmet, these were certainly the very footmen and groomsstill more cunningly disguised. Odds fish, da jurandi, whydo not we rather remove our humanities into some good warmkitchen of God, that noble laboratory; and there admire theturning of the spits, the harmonious rattling of the jacks andfenders, criticise on the position of the lard, the temperatureof the pottages, the preparation for the dessert, and the orderof the wine service? Beati immaculati in via. Matter ofbreviary, my masters.CH. XI. -Why monks love to be in kitchens.THIS, said Epistemon, is spoke like a true monk: I meanlike a right monking monk,' not a bemonked monasticalmonkling. Truly you put me in mind of some passages thathappened at Florence, some twenty years ago, in a companyof studious travellers, fond of visiting the learned, and seeing the antiquities of Italy, among whom I was. As we viewed▲ Like any babies. ] En damoiselles bien pimpantes et atourées. Like young girls curiously pranked up and dizened out. 5 It was thenthe custom for a gentleman, as soon as he lighted among the ladies,to kiss them all on the cheek; and this mode continued in France till Henry the Third's time. See H. Stephens, p . 379, of his Dial. con- cerning the new French Lang. Italianized. 6 Beati, &c. ] Blessedare those that are undefiled in their way. The first words of the 119th Psalm, profaned by Friar John, who applies them to such as get no spots on their clothes, when they visit from time to time the convent kitchen.1 Monking monk. ] Moine moinant is he that has the direction and government of the other monks of his convent. Whereas a bemonkedmonk (moynemoyné) means any monk who is obliged to obey the monk- ing monk, and to suffer himself to be led by him. In which sense,when any brother friar seems to make scorn of the post he is advanced to in the house, they tell him jocularly, by way of consolation, it is better however to be a horse than a cart234 .[BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.the situation and beauty of Florence, the structure of thedome, the magnificence ofthe churches and palaces, we stroveto outdo one another in giving them their due; when a cer- tain monk of Amiens, Bernard Lardon by name, quite angry,scandalized, and out of all patience , told us, I do not knowwhat the devil you can find in this same town, that is so muchcried up for my part I have looked and pored and stared aswell as the best of you: I think my eyesight is as clear asanother body's; and what can one see after all? There arefine houses, indeed, and that is all. But the cage does notfeed the birds. God and Monsieur St. Bernard, our goodpatron, be with us! in all this same town I have not seen onepoor lane of roasting cooks; and yet I have not a littlelooked about, and sought for so necessary a part of a commonwealth: ay, and I dare assure you that I have pried upand down with the exactness of an informer; as ready tonumber both to the right and left, how many, and on whatside, we might find most roasting cooks, as a spy would beto reckon the bastions of a town. Now at Amiens,3 in four,nay five times less ground than we have trod in our contemplations, I could have shown you above fourteen streets ofroasting cooks, most ancient, savoury, and aromatic. I cannot imagine what kind of pleasure you can have taken ingazing on the lions and Africans, ( so methinks you call theirtigers, ) near the belfry; or in ogling the porcupines andostriches in the Lord Philip Strozzi's palace. Faith and truth I had rather see a good fat goose at the spit. Thisporphyry, those marbles are fine; I say nothing to the contrary: but our cheesecakes at Amiens are far better in mymind. These ancient statues are well made; I am willingto believe it but by St. Ferreol of Abbeville, we haveyoung wenches in our country, which please me better athousand times.What is the reason, asked Friar John, that monks are3 The reason of the vast number of cooks' shops, with which, for along time, the whole province of Picardy, and especially the city of Amiens, has abounded, is because the inns there find travellers innothing but a table-cloth, and a cover (i . e. ) a plate with a napkin ,knife, fork, and spoon) with glasses: not forgetting bread and wine,you may be sure. See Jodoc. Sincer. Itiner. Gall. p. 315.Friar Bernard Lardon loved the fat-bacon- like lasses of this country, and he swears it too by the saint that has the superintendency of the fattening of geese. See Apol. for Herodotus , ch. 38.CHAP. XI. ]PANTAGRUEL. 235always to be found in kitchens; and kings, emperors, andpopes are never there? Is there not, said Rhizotomus, somelatent virtue and specific property hid in the kettles and pans,which, as the loadstone attracts iron, draws the monk there,Or is it aand cannot attract emperors, popes, or kings?natural induction and inclination, fixed in the frocks andcowls, which of itself leads and forceth those good religiousHe means,men into kitchens, whether they will or no? forms following matter, as Averoës calls them, answeredEpistemon. Right, said Friar John. I will not offer to solve this problem, said Pantagruel; for it is somewhat ticklish, and you can hardly handle it without coming off scurvily; but I will tell you what I have heard." Antigonus, King of Macedon, one day coming to one ofhis tents, where his cooks used to dress his meat, and findingthere poet Antagoras frying a conger, and holding the pan himself, merrily asked him, Pray, Mr. Poet, was Homerfrying congers when he wrote the deeds of Agamemnon Antagoras readily answered; but do you think, sir, that when Agamemnon did them, he made it his business to know ifany in his camp were frying congers? The king thought itan indecency that a poet should be thus a frying in a kitchen;and the poet let the king know, that it was a more indecentthing for a king to be found in such a place. I will clap another story upon the neck of this, quoth Panurge, and willtell you what Breton Villandry answered one day to theDuke of Guise.itThey were saying that at a certain battle of King Francis,against the Emperor, Charles the Fifth , Breton, armed capa-pé to the teeth, and mounted like St. George; yet sneakedoff, and played least in sight during the engagement. Bloodan'ouns, answered Breton, I was there, and can prove easily; nay, even where you, my lord , dared not have been.The duke began to resent this as too rash and saucy: butBreton easily appeased him, and set them all a laughing. I5 What I have read, it should be; avois leu. It is in Plutarch'snotable sayings of ancient kings, princes, and captains.John le Breton , Lord of Villandry, favourite of Francis I. , and secretary to that prince, and Henry II . in 1537. See Cardan, De Vita He wrote several memoirs of the most considerablePropria, ch. 32.occurrences of France under the kings, his masters, and la Croix-du- Maine was possessed of some written with the author's own hand.236 [ BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.gad, my lord, quoth he, I kept out of harm's way; I was allthe while with your page Jack, skalking in a certain place where you had not dared hide your head, as I did. Thusdiscoursing, they got to their ships, and left the island of Chely.ON CHAP. X. AND XI. -The island of Cheli, which comes after that ofthe Ennaséd alliancers, is as it were its antipodes; and the one is as courtly as the other is clownish. The word Cheli is Greek, and signiGes the lips, χείλεα, χείλη; thus it may be called the island of the lips, or of compliments. King St. Panigon, first of the name,reigned in that large, well-peopled, fruitful kingdom, and being attended by the princes his sons, and the nobles of his court, comes as far as theport to receive Pantagruel, and conducts him to his palace; the queen,the princesses, the court-ladies, receive him at the gate; Panigon makes them all salute Pantagruel and his men with a kiss, according to the civil custom of the country; all the compliments and entreaties imagin- able are used to persuade Pantagruel to stay there a day or two; he excuses himself, but is not suffered to go, till he and his men have drank with the king: all this is compliment. Friar John alone inveighsagainst this formal stuff, antic postures, and nonsensical fiddle- faddle,cringes, grimaces, scrapes, embraces, leers, &c. , and slinks into thekitchens, where there was something more substantial for a monk, who does not use to feed on empty talk. So, though the island was popuous, fertile, and of large extent, he admires nothing but the culinary laboratories, the turning of the spits , the harmonious rattling of the jacks and fender; and is for criticising on the position of the lard, the temperature of the pottages, the preparation for the dessert, and the order of the wine- service. All the eleventh chapter illustrates thatmonastical inclination to frequent kitchens. -M.CH. XII. -How Pantagruel passed through the land of Pettifogging, andofthe strange way ofliving among the Catchpoles.STEERING our course forwards the next day, we passedthrough Pettifogging, a country all blurred and blotted, sothat I could hardly tell what to make on it. There we sawsome pettifoggers and catchpoles, rogues that will hang theirfather for a groat. They neither invited us to eat or drink;but, with a multiplied train of scrapes and cringes , said theywere all at our service, for a consideration.One of our interpreters related to Pantagruel their strangeway of living, diametrically opposite to that of our modernRomans; for at Rome a world of folks get an honest livelihood by poisoning, drubbing, lambasting, stabbing, and murdering; but the catchpoles earn theirs by being thrashed;so that if they were long without a tight lambasting, the poorCHAP. XII.]PANTAGRUEL. 237dogs with their wives and children would be starved. Thisis just, quoth Panurge, like those who, as Galen tells us,cannot erect the cavernous nerve towards the equinoctialcircle, unless they are soundly flogged . ' By St. Patrick'sslipper, whoever should jirk me so, would soon, instead ofsetting me right, throw me off the saddle, in the devil's name.The way is this , said the interpreter . When a monk,levite, close-fisted usurer, or lawyer owes a grudge to someneighbouring gentleman, he sends to him one of those catchpoles, or apparitors, who nabs, or at least cites him, serves awrit or warrant upon him, thumps, abuses, and affronts himimpudently by natural instinct, and according to his piousinstructions: insomuch, that if the gentleman hath but anyguts in his brains, and is not more stupid than a gyrin frog,3he will find himself obliged either to apply a fa*ggot- stick orhis sword to the rascal's jobbernol, give him the gentle lash,or make him cut a caper out at the window, by way of cor- rection. This done, Catchpole is rich for four months atleast, as if bastinadoes were his real harvest: for the monk,levite, usurer, or lawyer, will reward him roundly; and mygentleman must pay him such swingeing damages, that hisacres must bleed for it, and he be in danger of miserablyrotting within a stone doublet, as if he had struck the king.Quoth Panurge, I know an excellent remedy against this;used by the Lord of Basché. What is it? said Pantagruel.The Lord of Basché, said Panurge, was a brave, honest,noble- spirited gentleman, who, at his return from the longwar, in which the Duke of Ferrara, with the help of theFrench, bravely defended himself against the fury of Pope1 Cœlius Rhodiginus, 1.6 , c. 37, of his ancient readings, and be- fore him J. Picus de la Mirandola , 1. 3, of his treatise against JudicialAstrology, speak of a certain man, who, to raise his lechery, would cause himself to be flogged with rods steeped in vinegar, till he was all over of a gore blood. Simon Goulard, 1.4, p . 635 of his won- derful and memorable stories, relates this fact as a very singular and uncommon thing; and it may have been so perhaps in his time; butnow-a-days some people will tell ye the thing is frequently practised in France, and elsewhere, in houses of bad repute. See De Lolme's History of the Flagellants. 2 Hath but, &c. ] Hath not the deadpalsy. 3 Gyrin frog. ] A tad-pole. An unformed frog; fromthe Greek yvoivoi, frog-spawn. 4 Lord of Basché. ] Doubt- less a descendant of Perron de Basché, steward of the household toKing Charles VIII. , who sent him into Italy, before he went thitherhimself at the head of his army. See Commines, 1. 7, c. 3.238 [ BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.Julius the Second, was every day cited, warned, and prosecuted at the suit, and for the sport and fancy of the fat prior of St. Louant.5One morning, as he was at breakfast with some of his domestics ( for he loved to be sometimes among them) he sentfor one Loire his baker, and his spouse, and for one Oudart,the vicar of his parish, who was also his butler, as the custom was then in France; then said to them before his gen- tleman and other servants: You all see how I am dailyplagued with these rascally catchpoles: truly if you do notlend me your helping hand, I am finally resolved to leavethe country, and go fight for the sultan, or the devil, ratherthan be thus eternally teazed. Therefore to be rid of theirdamned visits , hereafter, when any of them come here, beready you baker and your wife, to make your personal appearance in my great hall, in your wedding clothes, as if youwere going to be affianced. Here take these ducats, whichI give you to keep you in a fitting garb. As for you, SirOudart, be sure you make your personal appearance there inyour fair surplice and stole, not forgetting your holy water,as if you were to wed them. Be you there also , Trudon,said he to his drummer, with your pipe and tabour. The formof matrimony must be read, and the bride kissed at the beatof the tabour; then all of you, as the witnesses used do in thiscountry, shall give one another the remembrance ofthe wedding, which you know is to be a blow with your fist, bidding the party struck, remember the nuptials by that token.This will but make you have the better stomach to yoursupper; but when you come to the catchpole's turn , thrashhim thrice and threefold, as you would a sheaf of green corn;do not spare him; maul him, drub him, lambast him, swinge him off, I pray you. Here, take these steel gauntlets,covered with kid. Head, back, belly, and sides, give himblows innumerable: he that gives him most, shall be mybest friend. Fear not to be called to an account about it;I will stand by you: for the blows must seem to be given injest, as it is customary among us at all weddings.-Ay, but how shall we know the catchpole, said the manof God? All sorts of people daily resort to this castle . Ihave taken care of that, replied the lord. When some fellow,5 St. Lovant. Liventius. The priory of St. Louens, in the dioceseof Tours, &c.CHAP. XII . ]PANTAGRUEL. 239either on foot, or on a scurvy jade, with a large broad silverring on his thumb, comes to the door, he is certainly acatchpole the porter, having civilly let him in, shall ringthe bell; then be all ready, and come into the hall, to actthe tragi- comedy, whose plot I have now laid for you.

That numerical day, as chance would have it, came an oldfat ruddy catchpole. Having knocked at the gate, and thepissed, as most men will do, the porter soon found him out,by his large greasy spatterdashes, his jaded hollow-flankedmare, his bag full of writs and informations dangling at hisgirdle, but, above all, by the large silver hoop on his left thumb.The porter was civil to him, admitted him kindly, andrung the bell briskly. As soon as the baker and his wifeheard it, they clapped on their best clothes, and made theirpersonal appearance in the hall, keeping their gravities like anew-made judge. The dominie put on his surplice and stole,and as he came out of his office, met the catchpole, had himin there, and made him suck his face a good while, while thegauntlets were drawing on all hands; and then told him, youare come just in pudding-time; my lord is in his right cue:we shall feast like kings anon, here is to be swingeing doings;we have a wedding in the house; here, drink and cheer up;pull away.While these two were at hand-to-fist, Basché, seeing allhis people in the hall in their proper equipages, sends for the vicar. Oudart comes with the holy water pot, followed bythe catchpole, who, as he came into the hall, did not forgetto make good store of awkward cringes, and then servedBasché with a writ. Basché gave him grimace for grimace,slipped an angel into his mutton fist, and prayed him toassist at the contract and ceremony: which he did. Whenit was ended, thumps and fisticuffs began to fly about amongthe assistants; but when it came to the catchpole's turn, theyall laid on him so unmercifully with their gauntlets , thatthey at last settled him, all stunned and battered, bruised andmortified, with one of his eyes black and blue, eight ribsbruised, his brisket sunk in, his omoplates in four quarters,his under jawbone in three pieces; and all this in jest, and no harm done. God wot how the levite belaboured him,To seal the writs and writings, belike; for they were not signed in those days.240 [BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.hiding within the long sleeve of his canonical shirt his hugesteel gauntlet lined with ermine: for he was a strong builtball, and an old dog at fisticuffs. The catchpole , all of abloody tiger-like stripe,' with much ado crawled home toL'Isle Bouchart, well pleased and edified however withBasché's kind reception; and, with the help of the goodsurgeons ofthe place, lived as long as you would have him.From that time to this, not a word of the business; the memoryof it was lost with the sound of the bells that rung with joyat his funeral.Cн. XIII.-How, like Master Francis Villon, the Lord of Basché commended his servants.THE catchpole being packed off on blind Sorrel,-so he calledhis one-eyed-mare, -Basché sent for his lady, her women,and all his servants, into the arbour of his garden; hadwine brought, attended with good store of pasties, hams,fruit, and other table- ammunition, for a nunchion; drankwith them joyfully, and then told them this story.Master Francis Villon , in his old age, retired to St. Maxent,in Poictou, under the patronage of a good honest abbot ofthe place. There to make sport for the mob, he undertookto get "The Passion" acted, after the way, and in the dialectof the country. The parts being distributed , the playhaving been rehearsed, and the stage prepared, he told themayor and aldermen, that the mystery would be ready afterNiort fair, and that there only wanted properties and necessaries, but chiefly clothes fit for the parts: so the mayor andhis brethren took care to get them.Villon, to dress an old clownish father grey-beard, whowas to represent G-d the father, begged of Friar StephenTickletoby, sacristan to the Franciscan friars of the place, tolend him a cope and a stole. Tickletoby refused him,alleging, that by their provincial statutes, it was rigorouslyforbidden to give or lend any thing to players. Villon replied, that the statute reached no farther than farces, drolls,antics, loose and dissolute games, and that he asked no morethan what he had seen allowed at Brussels and other places.Tickletoby, notwithstanding, peremptorily bid him provide himself elsewhere if he would, and not to hope for any thingout of his monastical wardrobe. Viilon gave an account, of7 Dappled with variety of contusions.CHAP. XIII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 241this to the players, as of a most abominable action; adding,that God would shortly revenge himself, and make an example of Tickletoby.The Saturday following, he had notice given him, thatTickletoby, upon the filly of the convent-so they call ayoung mare that was never leaped yet was gone a mumping to St. Ligarius, and would be back about two in theafternoon. Knowing this, he made a cavalcade of his devilsof " The Passion" through the town. They were all riggedwith wolves' , calves' , and rams' skins , ' laced and trimmedwith sheep's heads, bull's feathers, and large kitchen tenterhooks, girt with broad leathern girdles; whereat hangeddangling huge cow-bells and horse-bells , which made ahorrid din. Some held in their claws black sticks full ofsquibs and crackers: others had long lighted pieces of wood,upon which, at the corner of every street, they flung whole handfuls of rosin- dust, that made a terrible fire and smoke.Having thus led them about, to the great diversion of themob, and the dreadful fear of little children, he finallycarried them to an entertainment at a summer-house, withoutthe gate that leads to St. Ligarius .As they came near to the place, he espied Tickletoby afaroff, coming home from mumping, and told them in maca- ronic verse.Hic est de patria, natus, de gente belistra, 2Qui solet antiquo bribas portare bisacco.³A plague on his friarship, said the devils then; the lousybeggar would not lend a poor cope to the fatherly father;let us fright him. Well said, cried Villon; but let us hideourselves till he comes by, and then charge him home brisklywith your squibs and burning sticks. Tickletoby being come to the place , they all rushed on a sudden into the roadto meet him, and in a frightful manner threw fire from all sides upon him and his filly foal, ringing and tingling theirbells, and howling like so many real devils, Hho, hho, hho,hho, brrou, rrou, rrourrs, rrrourrs, hoo, hou, hou hho, hho,hhoi. Friar Stephen, don't we play the devils rarely? Thefilly was soon scared out of her seven senses , and began to1 This masquerade which generally was performed on New Year's day, was prohibited as impious: but Villon gave himself very little concern about that. A beggarly race. 3 A monk's double pouch.VOT.!!. R242 RABELAIS' WORKS [BOOK IV..start, to funk it, to squirt it, to trot it, to fart it, to bound it,to gallop it, to kick it , to spurn it, to calcitrate it, to wince it,to frisk it, to leap it, to curvet it, with double jerks, andbum-motions; insomuch that she threw down Tickletoby,though he held fast by the tree of the pack- saddle withmight and main. Nowhis straps and stirrups were of cord;and on the right side , his sandals were so entangled andtwisted, that he could not for the heart's blood of him getout his foot. Thus he was dragged about by the filly throughthe road, scratching his bare breech all the way; she stillmultiplying her kicks against him, and straying for fear overhedge and ditch; insomuch that she trepanned his thickskull so , that his co*ckle brains were dashed out near theOsanna or high- cross . Then his arms fell to pieces, one thisway, and the other that way; and even so were his legs served at the same time. Then she made a bloody havocwith his puddings; and being got to the convent, broughtback only his right foot and twisted sandal, leaving them toguess what had become of the rest.Villon, seeing that things had succeeded as he intended,said to his devils, You will act rarely, gentlemen devils , youwill act rarely; I dare engage you will top your parts. Idefy the devils of Saumur, Douay, Montmorillon, Langez,St. Espain, Angers; nay, by gad, even those of Poictiers, forall their bragging and vapouring, to match you.Thus, friends , said Basché, I foresee, that hereafter youwill act rarely this tragical farce , since the very first time youhave so skilfully hampered, bethwacked, belammed, and bebumped the catchpole. From this day I double your wages,As for you, my dear, said he to his lady, make your gratifications as you please; you are my treasurer, you know. Formy part, first and foremost, I drink to you all . Come on,box it about, it is good and cool . In the second place, you,Mr. Steward, take this silver basin, I give it you freely.Then you, my gentlemen of the horse, take these two silvergilt cups, and let not the pages be horse-whipped these threemonths. My dear, let them have my best white plumes offeathers, with the gold buckles to them. Sir Oudart, thissilver flagon falls to your share this other I give to thecooks. To the valets de chambre I give this silver basket;to the grooms, this silver gilt boat; to the porter, these twoplates; to the hostlers, these ten porringers. Trudon, takeCHAP. XIV.]PANTAGKUEL. 243you nesc silver spoons and this sugar box. You, footman,take his large salt. Serve me well, and I will rememberyou. Fo on the word of a gentleman, I had rather bear inwar one hundred blows on my helmet in the service of mycountry, than be once cited by these knavish catchpoles,merely to humour this same gorbellied prior.CH. XIV. Afurther account ofcatchpoles who were drubbed at Basche's house.FOUR days after, another, young, long- shanked, raw- bonedcatchpole, coming to serve Baschè with a writ at the fatprior's request, was no sooner at the gate, but the portersmelt him out, and rung the bell; at whose second pull, allthe family understood the mystery. Loire was kneading hisdough; his wife was sifting meal; Oudart was toping in hisoffice; the gentlemen were playing at tennis; the LordBasché at in and out with my lady; the waiting- men andgentlewomen at push-pin; the officers at lanterlue , and thepages at hot- co*ckles, giving one another smart bangs. Theywere all immediately informed that a catchpole was housed.Upon this, Oudart put on his sacerdotal, and Loire andhis wife their nuptial badges: Trudon piped it, and then taboured it like mad: all made haste to get ready, not forgetting the gauntlets . Basché went into the outward yard:there the catchpole meeting him fell on his marrow- bones,begged of him not to take it ill , if he served him with a writat the suit of the fat prior; and in a pathetic speech, lethim know that he was a public person, a servant to themonking tribe, apparitor to the abbatial mitre, ready to doas much for him, nay, for the least of his servants, whensoever he would employ and use him.Nay, truly, said the lord, you shall not serve your writtill you have tasted some of my good quinquenays wine, andbeen a witness to a wedding which we are to have this veryminute. Let him drink and refresh himself, added he,turning towards the levitical butler, and then bring him intothe hall. After which, Catchpole, well stuffed and moistened, came with Oudart to the place where all the actors inthe farce stood ready to begin. The sight of their game setthem a laughing, and the messenger of mischief grinnedalso for company's sake. Then the mysterious words ' wers 1 Sacramental words.R 2244 RABELAIS' WORKS LBOOK IV, .muttered to and by the couple, their hands joined, the bridebussed, and all besprinkled with holy water.While theywere bringing wine and kickshaws, thumps began to trotabout by dozens. The catchpole gave the levite severalolows. Oudart, who had his gauntlet hid under his canonical shirt, draws it on like a mitten, and then, with hisclenched fist , souse he fell on the catchpole, and mauledhim like a devil: the junior gauntlets dropped on him likewise like so many battering rams. Remember the weddingby this, by that, by these blows, said they. In short theystroked him so to the purpose, that he pissed blood outat mouth, nose, ears, and eyes, and was bruised, thwackt,battered, bebumped, and crippled at the back, neck, breast,arms, and so forth. Never did the bachelors at Avignon, incarnival time. play more melodiously at raphe, than wasthen played on the catchpole's microcosm: at last down he fell.They threw a great deal of wine on his snout, tied roundthe sleeve of his doublet a fine yellow and green favour, andgot him upon his snotty beast, and God knows how he gotto L'Isle Bouchart; where I cannot truly tell you whether he was dressed and looked after or no, both by his spouseand the able doctors of the country; for the thing nevercame to my ears.The next day they had a third part to the same tune, because it did not appear by the lean catchpole's bag, that hehad served his writ. So the fat prior sent a new catchpole,at the head of a brace of bums, for his guard du corps, tosummon my lord. The porter ringing the bell, the wholefamily was overjoyed, knowing that it was another rogue.Basché was at dinner with his lady and the gentlemen; sohe sent for the catchpole, made him sit by him, and thebums by the women, and made them eat till their belliescracked with their breeches unbuttoned. The fruit beingserved, the catchpole arose from table, and before the bumscited Basché. Basché kindly asked him for a copy of thewarrant, which the other had got ready: he then takes witness, and a copy of the summons. To the catchpole and his bums he ordered four ducats for civility money. In themeantime all were withdrawn for the farce. So Trudongave the alarm with his tabour. Basché desired the catchpole to stay and see one of his servants married, and witnessCHAP. XV. ] PANTAGRUEL. 245the contract of marriage, paying him his fee. The catchpoleslap dash was ready, took out his ink-horn, got paper imme.diately, and his bums by him.Then Loire came into the hall at one door, and his wifewith the gentlewomen at another, in nuptial accoutrements.Oudart, in pontificalibus, takes them both by their hands,asketh them their will, giveth them the matrimonial blessing,and was very liberal of holy water. The contract written,signed, and registered , on one side was brought wine andcomfits; on the other, white and orange-tawny- colouredfavours were distributed: on another, gauntlets privatelyhanded about.CH. XV.-How the ancient custom at nuptials is renewed by thecatchpole.THE catchpole, having made shift to get down a swingingsneaker of Breton wine, said to Basché, Pray, Sir, what doyou mean? You do not give one another the memento ofthe wedding. By St. Joseph's wooden shoe, all good customs are forgot. We find the form, but the hare is scampered; and the nest, but the birds are flown . There are notrue friends now-a- days. You see how, in several churches,the ancient laudable custom of tippling, on account of the blessed saints O O, at Christmas , ' is come to nothing. Theworld is in its dotage, and doomsday is certainly coming allso fast. Now come on; the wedding, the wedding, thewedding; remember it by this. This he said, strikingIt was formerly a custom throughout France, and is still in some parts of it, to make, in the parish church, about seven o'clock in the evening for the nine days next before Christmas day, certain prayers or anthems called the Christmas O O's, because in the books which pre- scribe these anthems they begin with O O, as “ O sapientia, O adonai,O radix," &c. To him that was last married in the parish, especiallyif he be one in good circ*mstances, is carried a very large O, re- presented in burnished gold on a large piece of very thick parchment,with several ornaments of gold or other fine colours. This O was every evening of the nine days put on the top of the lutrin; there stayed the O all the time that the anthem was singing. The person to whom the O had been sent, was wont, in return , to make a present of a piece of money to the curate, who, on his part, spent some of it in regaling his friends. After the holidays, the O was carried back to the new- marriedman, who set it up in the most honourable place of his house. It was this ancient custom the catchpole laments the loss of, because most com monly he had a share in the booty, either from the curate or the mar ried man.246 [BOOK IV RABELAIS' WORKS.Basché and his lady; then her women and the levite. Thenthe tabor beat a point of war, and the gauntlets began to dotheir duty insomuch that the catchpole had his crowncracked in no less than nine places. One of the bums hadhis right arm put out of joint, and the other his upper jawbone or mandibule dislocated; so that it hid half his chin,with a denudation of the uvula, and sad loss of the molar,masticatory, and canine teeth. Then the tabor beat a retreat; the gauntlets were carefully hid in a trice, and sweet- meats afresh distributed to renew the mirth of the company.So they all drank to one another, and especially to the catch- pole and his bums. But Oudart cursed and damned thewedding to the pit of hell, complaining that one ofthe bums had utterly disincornifistibulated his nether shoulder- blade.Nevertheless, he scorned to be thought a flincher, and madeshift to tope to him on the square.The jawless bum shrugged up his shoulders, joined hishands, and by signs begged his pardon; for speak he could not. The sham bridegroom made his moan, that the crippled bum had struck him such a horrid thump with hisshoulder-of-mutton fist on the nether elbow, that he wasgrown quite esperruquanchuzelubelouzerireliced down to hisvery heel, to the no small loss of mistress bride.But what harm had poor I done? cried Trudon, hidinghis left eye with his kerchief, and showing his tabour crackedon one side: they were not satisfied with thus poaching,black and blueing, and morrambouzevezengouzequoquemorgasacbaquevezinemaffreliding my poor eyes, but they have also broke my harmless drum. Drums indeed are commonly beaten at weddings, —and it is fit they should; but drummers are well entertained, and never beaten. Now letBelzebub even take the drum, to make his devilship a nightcap.2 Brother, said the lame catchpole, never fret thyself;I will make thee a present of a fine, large, old patent, whichI have here in my bag, to patch up thy drum, and for Madame St. Ann's sake I pray thee forgive us. By Our Ladyof Riviere, the blessed dame, I meant no more harm thanthe child unborn. One of the querries, who hopping andhalting like a mumping cripple, mimicked the good limpingLord de la Roche Posay, directed his discourse to the bumwith the pouting jaw, and told him, What, Mr. Manhound,2 Either top or bottom was beat out.CHAP. XV. ]PANTAGRUEL. 247was it not enough thus to have morcrocastebezasteverestegrigeligoscopapopondrillated us all in our upper memberswith your botched mittens, but you must also apply suchmorderegripippiatabirofreluchamburelurecaquelurintimpaniments on our shin-bones with the hard tops and extremitiesof your cobbled shoes. Do you call this children's play?By the mass, it is no jest. The bum, wringing his hands,seemed to beg his pardon, muttering with his tongue, mon,mon, mon, vrelon, von, von, like a dumb man. The bridecrying laughed, and laughing cried, because the catchpolewas not satisfied with drubbing her without choice or distinction of members, but had also rudely roused and tousedher; pulled off her topping, and not having the fear of her husband before his eyes, treacherously trepignemanpenillorifrizonoufresterfumbledtumbled and squeezed her lower parts.The devil go with it, said Basché; there was much need indeed that this same Master King³ (this was the catchpole'sname) should thus break my wife's back: however, I forgivehim now; these are little nuptial caresses. But this I plainlyperceive, that he cited me like an angel, and drubbed melike a devil. He hath something in him of Friar Thump,well. Come, for all this, I must drink to him, and to youlikewise his trusty esquires. But, said his lady, why hathhe been so very liberal of his manual kindness to me,without the least provocation? I assure you, I by no meanslike it but this I dare say for him, that he hath the hardestknuckles that ever I felt on my shoulders. The stewardheld his left arm in a scarf, as if it had been rent and tornin twain: I think it was the devil, said he, that moved meto assist at these nuptials; shame on ill luck; I must needsbe meddling with a pox, and now see what I have got bythe bargain, both my arms are wretchedly engoulevezine- massed and bruised. Do you call this a wedding? By St.Bridget's tooth, I had rather be at that of a Tom T- -dman. This is, on my word, even just such another feast aswas that of the Lapithæ, described by the philosopher ' ofIn chap. 5. of 1. 3. of Fæneste, the serjeant of Doué, who came to serve a writ on la Roche Bosseau, is likewise named Monsieur le Roy (Mr. King. ) either because all of that profession execute their commis- sion in the king's name, and because, as is said before, he that strikes one of them had as good strike the king. They call the ushers and serjeants angels of the court. To drub, dauber, from dela.pare, is properly what that angel of Satan did, who buffeted St, Paul,5 Lucian, in his Lapithe.248 [ BOOK IV.RABELAIS WORKS.Samosata. One of the bums had lost his tongue. The twoother, though they had more need to complain, made theirexcuse as well as they could, protesting that they had noill design in this dumbfounding; begging that, for goodnesssake, they would forgive them; and so, though they couldhardly budge a foot, or wag along, away they crawled.About a mile from Basché's seat, the catchpole found himself somewhat out of sorts. The bums got to L'Isle Bouchard, publicly saying, that since they were born, they hadnever seen an honester gentleman than the Lord of Basché,or civiller people than his, and that they had never been atthe like wedding ( which I verily believe; but that it wastheir own faults if they had been tickled off, and tossedabout from post to pillar, since themselves had began thebeating. So they lived I cannot exactly tell you how manydays after this. But from that time to this it was held for acertain truth, that Basché's money was more pestilential,mortal, and pernicious to the catchpoles and bums, thanwere formerly the aurum Tholosanum and the Sejan horseto those that possessed them. Ever since this, he livedquietly, and Basché's wedding grew into a common proverb. 'CH. XVI. - How Friar John made trial of the nature ofthecatchpoles.THIS story would seem pleasant enough, said Pantagruel,were we not to have always the fear of God before our eyes.It had been better, said Epistemon, if those gauntlets hadfallen upon the fat prior. Since he took a pleasure in spending his inoney partly to vex Basché, partly to see those catchpoles banged, good lusty thumps would have done well onhis shaven crown, considering the horrid concussions now-adays among those puny judges. What harm had done thosepoor devils the catchpoles? This puts me in mind, said Pantagruel, of an ancient Roman named L. Neratius.¹ Hewas of noble blood, and for some time was rich; but hadthis tyrannical inclination , that whenever he went out ofdoors, he caused his servants to fill their pockets with goldand silver, and meeting in the street your spruce gallantsand better sort of beaux, without the least provocation, for• See Cicero, de Nat. Deorum, 1. 3; Justin , 1. 22 .; Strabo, I. 4 Tt became a Latin proverb. 7 See d'Aubigne, Baron de Feneste,1. 3, c. 5. 1 See Aulus Gellius, 1. 20, c. 1.CHAP. XVI. ]PANTAGRUEL. 219his fancy, he used to strike them hard on the face with hisfist; and immediately after that, to appease them, and hinderthem from complaining to the magistrates, he would givethem as much money as satisfied them according to the law of the twelve tables. Thus he used to spend his revenue,beating people for the price of his money. By St. Bennet'ssacred boot, quoth Friar John, I will know the truth of itpresently.This said, he went on shore, put his hand in his fob, andtook out twenty ducats; then said with a loud voice, in thehearing of a shoal of the nation of catchpoles, Who willearn twenty ducats, for being beaten like the devil? Io, Io,Io, said they all: you will cripple us for ever, sir, that is mostcertain; but the money is tempting. With this they wereall thronging who should be first, to be thus preciously beaten.Friar John singled him out of the whole knot of theserogues in grain, a red- snouted catchpole, who upon his right.thumb wore a thick broad silver hoop, wherein was set agood large toad- stone. He had no sooner picked him outfrom the rest, but I perceived that they all muttered andgrumbled; and I heard a young thin-jawed catchpole, anotable scholar, a pretty fellow at his pen, and, according topublic report, much cried up for his honesty at DoctorsCommons, making his complaint, and muttering, becausethis same crimson phiz carried away all the practice; and that if there were but a score and a half of bastinadoes³ tobe got, he would certainly run away with eight and twentyof them. But all this was looked upon to be nothing but mere envy.Friar John so unmercifully thrashed, thumped, and belaboured Red- snout, back and belly, sides, legs , and arms,head, feet, and so forth, with the home and frequently repeated application of one of the best members of a fa*ggot,that I took him to be a dead man: then he gave him thetwenty ducats; which made the dog get on his legs ,pleased like a little king or two. The rest were saying toFriar John, Sir, sir, brother devil, if it please you to do usthe favour to beat some of us for less money, we are all atyour devilship's command, bags, papers, pens, and all. Redsnout cried out against them, saying, with a loud voice,In the ecclesiastical court; en court d'ecclise: the old way of spelling eglise (church) . 3 See Racine, les Plaideurs , a. i . sc. 5.250 [BOOK IV. RABELAIS' WORKS.Body of me, you little prigs, will you offer to take the breadout of my mouth? will you take my bargain over my head;would you draw and inveigle from me my clients and cus- tomers? Take notice, I summon you before the official thisday sevennight; I will law and claw you like any old devil of Vauverd, that I will --Then turning himself towards FriarJohn, with a smiling and joyful look, he said to him, Reverend father in the devil, if you have found me a good hide, and have a mind to divert yourself once more, by beating yourhumble servant, I will bate you half in half this time, ratherthan lose your custom: do not spare me, I beseech you: Iam all, and more than all yours, good Mr. Devil; head, lungs,tripes, guts and garbage; and that at a pennyworth, I'll assure you. Friar John never heeded his proffers , but evenleft them. The other catchpoles were making addresses toPanurge, Epistemon, Gymnast, and others, entreating themcharitably to bestow upon their carcasses a small beating,for otherwise they were in danger of keeping a long fast:but none of them had a stomach to it. Some time after,seeking fresh water for the ship's company, we met a coupleof old female catchpoles of the place, miserably howling andweeping in concert. Pantagruel had kept on board, and already had caused a retreat to be sounded. Thinking thatthey might be related to the catchpole that was bastinadoed,we asked them the occasion of their grief, They replied,that they had too much cause to weep; for that very hourfrom an exalted triple tree , two of the honestest gentlemenin Catchpole- land had been made to cut a caper on nothing.Cut a caper on nothing; said Gymnast; my pages use to cut capers on the ground: to cut a caper on nothing, should be hanging and choking, or I am out. Ay, ay, said Friar John, you speak of it like St. John de la Palisse . "We asked them why they treated these worthy personswith such a choking hempen sallad . They told us they hadonly borrowed, alias stolen , the tools of the mass, and hidthem under the handle of the parish. This is a very allegorical way of speaking, said Epistemon.The palace of Vauvert, built by King Robert, on the actual site of the rue d'Enfer (street of Hell) was abandoned, as a rookery of devils,after the excommunication of its founder. 5 Allusion to theold fashion of saying l'apocalice for apocalypse. 6 The belfry.A Poitevin word, used only by the villagers of Poicton, in way of meta- phor stupid and coarse as themselves.CHAP. XVII.]PANTAGRUEL. 251ON CHAPS. XII. XIII . XIV. XV. AND XVI. -All these chapters are occasioned by Pantagruel's passing by Pettifogging, and give us an account of the way of living of the apparitors, serjeants, ard bailiffs, and such inferior ministers of the law. Nothing can seem dark in what our author has said of them, if we observe what hemakes one of Pantagruel's interpreters, or dragomen, relate: "Thatat Rome a world of folk get an honest livelihood by poisoning, rib roasting, and stabbing; but the catchpoles earn theirs by being drub- bed; so that if they were long without a tight lambasting, the poor dogs with their wives and children would even be starved!" Our authorsays this, because in Francis the First's and Henry the Second's reigns that rascally tribe had no income so beneficial, as that which came to them from a beating. The nobility thought it so great an affront to be cited, or arrested, by that vermin, that they stood too much on their punctilio, and for that reason they severely used those bailiffs or appa- ritors, who came to them to discharge their office, and who sometimes were sent out ofmalice. So when the man- catchers, who desired nothing more than to be banged, had been misused, they had swinging damages to make them amends. Rabelais exposes the folly, villany, and abuseof this practice on both sides; which has been since so well redressed,that if the bailiffs had nothing to depend on but bastinadoes, those ne- cessary evils would long since have all been starved.As the betrothing or nuptials of Basché grew into a proverb; so from that Villon, who was a famous poet in the reign of Louis the XIth. , but more famous yet for his cheats and villanies than for his poetry, came the word villoner, which has been long used to signify to cheat, or play some rogue's trick. I shall have occasion to takenotice of him in my remarks on the last chapter of the fourth book.Pantagruel's companions are told of two of the honestest men in all Catchpole- land, who were made " to cut a caper on nothing, " for steal- ing the tools of the mass, and hiding them under the handle of the parish. This must be some sacrilegious theft of church plate in those times; and, by the by, we may see what esteem Rabelais had for the catchpoles, since he makes those rogues the honestest in all that country.Friar John says, that this was as mysterious a way of speaking as St. John's de la pallise. De la Pallise is the name of a family in France;but he means, de l'apocalypse. The handle of the parish may mean the steeple of the church. -M.CH. XVII. -How Pantagruel came to the islands of Tohu andBohu; and ofthe strange death ofWidenostrils, the swallowerof windmills.THAT day Pantagruel came to the two islands of Tohu andBohu, where the devil a bit we could find any thing to frywith. For one Widenostrils, a huge giant, had swallowedThis is not exact to the French . Rabelais uses a proverbial phrase;ne trovasmes que frire, which properly means, the devil a bit found we there to fry; that is as Duchat observes, we found neither fish nor flesh.He goes on this is the very sacrum sinefumo of the ancients, mentionedby Erasmus in his Adages. 2 Bringuenarilles . Nose-slitters, says252 [ BOOK IV. RABELAIS' WORKS.every individual pan, skillet, kettle, frying-pan, dripping-pan,and brass and ironpot in the land, for want of windmills,which were his daily food. Whence it happened , that somewhat before day, about the hour of his digestion, the greedychurl was taken very ill, with a kind of a surfeit, or crudityof stomach, occasioned, as the physicians said, by the weakness of the concocting faculty ofhis stomach, naturally disposedto digest whole windmills at a gust, yet unable to consumeperfectly the pans and skillets; though it had indeed prettywell digested the kettles and pots; as they said, they knewby the hypostases and eneoremes of four tubs of secondhand drink which he had evacuated at two different timesthat morning. They made use of divers remedies, according to art, to give him ease: but all would not do; the distemper prevailed over the remedies, insomuch that the famousWidenostrils died that morning, of so strange a death, that,I think you ought no longer to wonder at that of the poetEschylus. It had been foretold him by the soothsayers,that he would die on a certain day, by the ruin of somethingthat should fall on him. That fatal day being come in itsturn, he removed himself out of town, far from all houses,trees, rocks, or any other things that can fall, and endangerby their ruin; and strayed in a large field , trusting himselfto the open sky; there, very secure, as he thought, unless,indeed, the sky should happen to fall, which he held to beimpossible. Yet, they say, that the larks are much afraidof it; for if it should fall, they must all be taken.The Celts that once lived near the Rhine-they are ournoble valiant French-in ancient times were also afraid ofthe sky's falling: for being asked by Alexander the Great,what they feared most in this world, hoping well they wouldsay that they feared none but him, considering his greatachievements; they made answer, that they feared nothingbut the sky's falling: however, not refusing to enter into aconfederacy with so brave a king; if you believe Strabo, lib.7, and Arrian, lib. 1 .M. Duchat, from the German brechen, and narilles for nasilles, after the Paris manner of pronouncing that word. Cotgrave, from whom M.Motteux takes it, says it means wide- nostrils. 2 A sediment in urine. 3 Cotgrave says encoresmes, the signs of urine,especially those that swim on the top thereof. I do not think there is any such word as encoresmes.CHAP. XVII. PANTAGRUEL. 253Plutarch also, in his book of the face that appears on thebody of the moon, speaks of one Pharnaces, who very muchfeared the moon should fall on the earth, and pitied thosethat live under that planet, as the Æthiopians and Taprobanians, if so heavy a mass ever happened to fall on them;and would have feared the like of heaven and earth , hadthey not been duly propped up and borne by the atlanticpillars as the ancients believed, according to Aristotle's testimony, lib. 5, Metaphys. Notwithstanding all this , poorEschylus was killed by the fall of the shell of a tortoise,which falling from betwixt the claws of an eagle high in theair, just on his head, dashed out his brains .Neither ought you to wonder at the death of another poet,I mean old jolly Anacreon, who was choked with a grapestone. Nor at that of Fabius the Roman prætor, who waschoked with a single goat's hair, as he was supping up aporringer of milk. Nor at the death of that bashful fool,who by holding in his wind, and for want of letting out abumgunshot, died suddenly in the presence of the EmperorClaudius. Nor at that of the Italian, buried on the ViaFlaminia at Rome, who, in his epitaph, complains that thebite of a she puss' on his little finger was the cause of his5 Thus far these examples are taken out of Pliny, 1. 7, c. 7.It is to be seen in the church of the monks of St. Austin; ardFrancis Schottus, a senator of Antwerp, gives it in these words in his travels over Italy:46 Hospes disce novum mortis genus improba felis Dum trahitur, digitum mordet, et intereo. "Hear a new kind of death, ye goers-by:A cat my finger bit, and lo! I die.7 Fût mort par estre mord d'une chatte, &c . Instead of mordu, bit,in Rabelais' time they used to say mords; and H. Stevens, p. 144, of his Dialogues " Du Nouveau Lang. Fran. Italianisé," insists upon it,that according to analogy, that way of speaking was right, and ought tobe continued. And indeed for proof that they did not in those days say mordu, but mords, I shall transcribe honest Clem. Marot's epigram ,Epouséefarouche:"L'epousé la premiere nuit Asseuroit sa femme farouche:Mordez-moi, dit it, s'il vous cuit:Voila mon doigt en vostre bouche.Elle y consent; il s'escarmouche;Et apres qu'il l'eust deshousée,Or ca, dit- il, tendre rosée,Vous ay je fait du mal ains?Adonc, respondit l'epousée,le ne vous ay pas mords aussi. "One, married to a country flirt Full skittish, said the youth," Bite me, my dear, if you I hurt;My finger's in your mouth."When all was o'er, he asked his bride,If any thing did sting her?She, by a question too, replied,"And did I bite your finger?"254 RABELAIS' WORKS. [ BOOK IV.death. Nor of that of Q. Lecanius Bassus, who died suddenlyof so small a prick with a needle on his left thumb, that itcould hardly be discerned. Nor of Quenelault, a Normanphysician, who died suddenly at Montpellier, merely forhaving side- ways took a worm out of his hand with a penknife. Nor of Philomenes, whose servant having got himsome new figs for the first course of his dinner, whilst hewent to fetch wine, a straggling well-hung ass got into thehouse, and seeing the figs on the table, without further invitation, soberly fell to . Philomenes coming into the room ,and nicely observing with what gravity the ass eat its dinner,said to his man, who was come back, Since thou hast set figshere for this reverend guest of ours to eat, methinks it is butreason thou also give him some of this wine to drink. Hehad no sooner said this, but he was so excessively pleased,and fell into so exorbitant a fit of laughter, that the use ofhis spleen took that of his breath utterly away, and he immediately died. Nor of Spurius Saufeius, who died suppingup a soft boiled egg as he came out of a bath. Nor of himwho, as Boccacio tells us, died suddenly by picking hisgrinders with a sage- stalk . 10 Nor of Phillipot Placut, whobeing brisk and hale, fell dead as he was paying an olddebt; which causes, perhaps, many not to pay theirs, forfear of the like accident. Nor of the painter Zeuxis, whokilled himself with laughing at the sight of the antic jobbernol of an old hag drawn by him. Nor, in short, of a thousand more of which authors write; as Varrius, Pliny, Valerius, J. Bapista Fulgosus, and Bacabery the elder. " Inshort, Gaffer Widenostrils choked himself with eating ahuge lump of fresh butter at the mouth of a hot oven, bythe advice of physicians.9They likewise told us there, that the King of Cullan inBohu had routed the grandees of King Mecloth, and madesad work with the fortresses of Belima.8 See Valerius Maximus and Lucian. 9 Rabelais might as well have called him by his right name, Appius Saufeius, as Pliny does, 1 , 7, c. 33, but having a mind to bamboozle his readers, and lead them a wild -goose- chase, he chooses to err with Fulgosus, who gives this Saufeius the prænomen of Spurius, 1.9, c. 12.huge toad had just before cast his venom upon it.10 A11 Thereare two Bacou-berys on the river Oise. Perhaps the person who re. ates this comical death of Phillipot Placut was born at one of them; as writers often assume the name of the place of their birth.CHAP. XVII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 255After this, we sailed by the islands of Nargues and Zargues? also by the islands of Teleniabin and Geleniabin,very fine and fruitful in ingredients for clysters; and then bythe islands of Enig and Evig,12 on whose account formerlythe Landgrave of Hesse was swinged off with a vengeance.ON CHAP. XVII.-From Catchpole-land Pantagruel comes to twoislands, which the author calls Tohu and Bohu, from two Hebrew words.which, I am told ,, are taken out of the first chapter of Genesis. where it is said, the earth was tohu va bohu, that is, void, and in confusion,without form or beauty, and in short, a chaos. This may well be applied to a country thatis ruined by war; the fury of the soldiers on oneside, and exactions of chiefs, many times leaving little or nothing be- hind them. This makes Rabelais say, that the devil a bit they couldfind anything there to fry with; which is an expression often used bythe French, when they would say, there is no subsisting in a place.The giant Bringuenarilles, or Wide- nostrils, had taken away the means of frying there by devouring every individual pan, skillet , kettle,frying pan, dripping- pan, and brass and iron pot in the land, for want of wind- mills, which used to be his daily food. By this giant we may understand those gigantic bodies of men, vast armies, that bring terror and destruction with them wherever they come; and in particular,those roaring hectors, freebooters, desperadoes, and bullying huff-snuffs,for the most part like those whom Tacitus styles hospitibus tantum me- tuendi, who at the beginning of the war or campaign, live profusely at the husbandman's cost; but when the poor boor has been ruined by those unwelcome guests, they even destroy, and in a manner devour,the straw of the beds, and the pans, kettles, and, in short, whatever comes in their way.15 Enig (einige) is a pronoun, and signifies any, (and I am apt to think our anycomesfrom enig. ) As for evig, (ewige) it is an adjective and signi- fies everlasting; (perhaps too from evig we have our word ever. ) How- everthis matterstands, the case Rabelais referred to was this. One clauseof the treaty between Charles V. and the Landgrave of Hesse, was,That the latter should remain in the court of the former among hisretinue ohne einige gefangniss, without any confinement; as much as to say, it was by no means as a prisoner that the landgrave should be obliged to abide a certain time about the Emperor, but purely and only that the conqueror might be sure the conquered would undertake nothing to the prejudice of the said treaty. Instead of the word einige, any,which joined with the particle ohne, without, manifestly means without any; the emperor had got the word ewige, perpetual, slipt into the act.So that the landgrave, who reckoned on being obliged to follow the em- peror, no longer than till the agreement made between them was fully executed, was filled with surprise when he was given to understand,that by virtue of the word ewige, foisted into the place einige, he had made and owned himself the emperor's prisoner for as many years as it should please that monarch to have him continue so. This is the foulplay which Rabelais calls the estifilade, or being swinged off as it werewith leather-straps; for that is the proper meaning of estifilade.256 [BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.Rabelais tells us, that at last Gaffer Wide- nostrils was choked witheating a huge lump of fresh butter at the mouth of a hot oven, by the advice of physicians; which very well represents the destiny of those swaggering bravos, who, when the war is over, too often either take to the highway, and other bad courses, for which they are choked some- times for as inconsiderable matters as a lump of butter taken from ahiggler; or else, being reduced to live obscurely on a narrow fortune,waste and pine away by the chimney- corner, half-starved with their small pittance, and lead a lingering sorrowful life , worn out with their former excesses, the fatigues of war, and old age; as little regarded as they were feared much, when by open violence they lived in riot and luxury at the expense of the unfortunate. -M.3CH. XVIII.-How Pantagruel met with a great storm at sea.THE next day we espied nine sail' that came spooning before the wind: they were full of Dominicans, Jesuits , Capuchins, Hermits, Austins, Bernardins, Egnatins, Celestins,Theatins, Amadeans,2 Cordeliers, Carmelites, Minims, andthe devil and all of other holy monks and friars, who weregoing to the Council of Chesil, to sift and garble some newarticles of faith against the new heretics. Panurge wasoverjoyed to see them, being most certain of good luck forthat day, and a long train of others. So having courteouslysaluted the blessed fathers, and recommended the salvationof his precious soul to their devout prayers and private ejacul*tions, he caused seventy- eight dozen of Westphalia hams,units of pots of caviare, tens of Bolonia sausages, hundredsof botargoes, and thousands of fine angels, for the souls ofthe dead, to be thrown on board their ships. Pantagruelseemed metagrabolized , dozing, out of sorts, and as melancholic as a cat. Friar John, who soon perceived it, was inquiring of him whence should come this unusual sadness?when the master, whose watch it was, observing the fluttering of the ancient above the poop, and seeing that it beganto overcast, judged that we should have wind; therefore he1 M. Duchat says, and it is manifested by the next chapter, that there was but one sail, which Rabelais calls une orque. An ourkis properly a sea-fish, enemy to the whale, of a prodigious, and,indeed, monstrous size, and almost round, known in Saintonge bythe name of epaulart. From the largeness of this fish, perhaps, it comesabout that the biggest sort of ships, designed for the ocean, are called ourks. 2 Augustin monks, founded at Rapaille by AmadæusDuke of Savoy, 1448, after he had renounced the papacy in favour of Nicholas V. They are a branch of the Franciscans. 3 Rabelais only says,and friars.46 et aultres saincts religieux; " i. e. and other holy monksCHAP. XVIII.] PANTAGRUEL. 257bid the boatswain call all hands upon deck, officers , sailors ,foremast-men, swabbers, and cabin-boys, and even the passengers; made them first settle their top- sails, take in theirsprit-sail; then he cried, in with your top-sails, lower thefore-sail, tallow under the parrels, brade up close all themsails, strike your top-masts to the cap, make all sure withyour sheepsfeet, lash your guns fast. All this was nimbly done. Immediately it blowed a storm; the sea began toroar, and swell mountain high: the rut ofthe sea was great,the waves breaking upon our ship's quarter; the north- west wind blustered and over-blowed; boisterous gusts , dreadfulclashing and deadly scuds of wind whistled through our yards,and made our shrouds rattle again. The thunder grumbledso horridly, that you would have thought heaven had beentumbling about our ears; at the same time it lightened, rained,hailed; the sky lost its transparent hue, grew dusky, thick ,and gloomy, so that we had no other light than that of theflashes of lightning, and rending of the clouds: the hurricanes, flaws, and sudden whirlwinds began to make a flameabout us, by the lightnings, fiery vapours, and other aerialejacul*tions. Oh how our looks were full of amazement and trouble, while the saucy winds did rudely lift up above us the mountainous waves ofthe main! Believe me, it seemedto us a lively image of the chaos, where fire, air, sea, land,and all the elements were in a refractory confusion. PoorPanurge having, with the full contents of the inside of hisdoublet, plentifully fed the fish, greedy enough of suchodious fare, sat on the deck all in a heap, with his nose and arse together, most sadly cast down, moping and half dead;invoked and called to his assistance all the blessed he andshe saints he could muster up; swore and vowed to confessin time and place convenient, and then bawled out frightfully,steward, maitre d'hotel, see hoe! my friend, my father, myuncle, prithee let us have a piece of powdered beef or pork;we shall drink but too much anon, for aught I see.little and drink the more, will hereafter be my motto, I fear.Would to our dear Lord, and to our blessed, worthy, andsacred Lady, I were now, I say, this very minute of an hour,Eat4 Panurge considers this steward as his all, because he was now the only person could do him any service, by giving him his fill of victuals,before an unlucky wave should have carried off both the one and theother.VOL. II.258 [BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.well on shore, on terra firma, hale and easy. O twice andthrice happy those that plant cabbages! O Destinies, whydid you not spin me for a cabbage- planter? O how few arethere to whom Jupiter hath been so favourable, as to predestinate them to plant cabbages! They have always one footon the ground, and the other not far from it. Dispute whowill of felicity, and summum bonum, for my part, whosoeverplants cabbages, is now, by my decree, proclaimed mosthappy; for as good a reason as the philosopher Pyrrho,being in the same danger, and seeing a hog near the shore,eating some scattered oats, declared it happy in two respects;first, because it had plenty of oats, and besides that, was on shore. Ha, for a divine and princely habitation, commendme to the cows floor.Murder! This wave will sweep us away, blessed Saviour!O my friends! a little vinegar. I sweat again with mereagony. Alas, the mizen sail is split, the gallery is washedaway, the masts are sprung, the main- top- mast- head divesinto the sea; the keel is up to the sun; our shrouds are almost all broke, and blown away. Alas! alas! where isour main course? Al is verlooren, by Godt; our top- mast is run adrift. Alas! who shall have this wreck? Friend,lend me here behind you one of these whales . Your lanthorn is fallen, my lads. Alas! do not let go the main tacknor the bowlin. I hear the block crack; is it broke?the Lord's sake, let us have the hull, and let all the riggingbe damned. Be, be, be, bous, bous, bous. Look to theneedle of your compass, I beseech you, good Sir Astrophil,and tell us, if you can, whence comes this storm. My heart'sFor5 Low German; all is lost by G-d. It is in the original, " tout est frelore, bigoth, " which means the same thing. When the Swiss werebeaten at the battle of Marignan, there was a song for four voices, set to music by the famous Clement Jannequin , and reprinted at Venice,by Jer. Scot. 1550, the burden of which was:Tout est frelore,La tintelore,Tout est frelore , bigot.After the farce of Patelin, which has these words, in it, they becameFrench, and the late gay Mademoiselle de Limueil sung them as she was dying. All is lost, by G-d. A gay lady indeed! Bigot, or by G-d, is the St. Picaut of Panurge, 1. 3, c. 29. Peter Larrivey, act 2nd, last scene of his comedy called Morfondu, calls him Saint Picot:so, to save the oath, they make the oath itself a saint; for there is no such saint as St. Picault in reality, nor ever was.CHAP. XIX.] PANTAGRUEL. 259sunk down below my midriff. By my troth, I am in a sadfright, bou, bou, bou, bous, bous, I am lost for ever. I conskite myself for mere madness and fear. Bou, bou, bou,bou, Otto to to to to ti. Bou, bou, bou, ou, ou, ou, bou,bou, bous. I sink, I am drowned, I am gone, good people,I am drowned.' CH. XIX .- What countenances Panurge and Friar John keptduring the storm.PANTAGRUEL, having first implored the help of the greatand Almighty Deliverer, and prayed publicly with ferventdevotion, by the pilot's advice held tightly the mast of theship. Friar John had stripped himself to his waistcoat, tohelp the seamen. Epistemon, Ponocrates, and the rest didas much. Panurge alone sat on his breech upon deck, weeping and howling. Friar John espied him going on thequarter-deck, and said to him, Odzoons! Panurge the calf,Panurge the whiner, Panurge the brayer, would it not become thee much better to lend us here a helping hand, thanto lie lowing like a cow, as thou dost, sitting on thy stoneslike a bald- breeched baboon? Be, be, be, bous, bous, bous,returned Panurge; Friar John, my friend, my good father,I am drowning, my dear friend! I drown! I am a deadman, my dear father in God, I am a dead man, my friend:your cutting hanger cannot save me from this: alas! alas!we are above ela. Above the pitch, out of tune, and affthe hinges. Be, be, be, bou, bous. Alas! we are nowabove g sol re ut. I sink, I sink, ha, my father, my uncle,my all. The water is got into my shoes by the collar;bous, bous, bous, paish, hu, hu, hu, he, he, he, ha, ha, Idrown. Alas! alas! Hu, hu, hu, hu, hu, hu, hu, be, be,bous, bous, bobous, bobous, ho, ho, ho, ho, ho, alas! alas!Now I am like your tumblers, my feet stand higher than myhead. Would to heaven I were now with those good holyfathers bound for the council, whom we met this morning,"so godly, so fat, so merry, so plump, and comely. Holos,bolos, holas, holas, alas! This devilish wave, (mea culpa1 Allusion from (helas) alas, to ela, a term in music. Panurge'smeaning is, that in their present imminent danger of death, their alas's would do no good. 2 Add in the ork, dedans l'orque. This con- firms M. Duchat's assertion, that there was but one sail loaded withmonks. See the first line of the preceding chapter.نا8 2260 [ BOOK IV. RABELAIS' WORKS.Deus,) I mean this wave of God,³ will sink our vessel. Alas,Friar John, my father, my friend , confession. Here I amdown on my knees; confiteor; your holy blessing. Comehither and be damned, thou pitiful devil, and help us, saidFriar, who fell a swearing and cursing like a tinker, —inthe name of thirty legions of black devils , come; will you come? Do not let us swear at this time, said Panurge;holy father, my friend, do not swear, I beseech you; tomorrow as much as you please. Holos , holos, alas , our ♫*ship leaks . I drown, alas, alas! I will give eighteen hun- Idred thousand crowns to any one that will set me on shore,all bewrayed and bedaubed as I am now. If ever there wasa man in my country in the like pickle . Confiteor, alas! aword or two of testament or codicil at least. A thousanddevils seize the cuckoldy cow-hearted mongrel, cried FriarJohn. Ods belly, art thou talking here of making thy will,now we are in danger, and it behoveth us to bestir ourstumps lustily, or never? Wilt thou come, ho devil? Midshipman, my friend; O the rare lieutenant; here Gymnast,nere on the poop. We are, by the mass, all besh*t now,our light is out. This is hastening to the devil as fast as itAlas, bou, bou, bou, bou , bou , alas , alas , alas, alas ,said Panurge, was it here we were born to perish Oh!ho! good people, I drown, I die. Consummatum est. I amsped-Magna, gna, gna, said Friar John. Fye upon him,howugly the sh*tten howler looks. Boy, younker, see hoyh.Mind the pumps, or the devil choke thee. Hast thou hurtthyself?, Zoons, here fasten it to one of these blocks. Onthis side, in the devil's name, hay-so my boy. Ah, FriarJohn, said Panurge, good ghostly father, dear friend, do notlet us swear, you sin. Oh ho, oh ho, be be be bous, bous,bhous, I sink, I die, my friends. I die in charity with all the world. Farewell, in manus. Bohus bohous, bhousowauswaus. St. Michael of Aure! St. Nicholas! now, now ornever, I here make you a solemn vow, and to our Saviour,that if you stand by me this time, I mean if you set meashore out of this danger, I will build you a fine large littlechapel or two, between Candé and Monsoreau, where neithertan.Panurge, who had just uttered a profane expression, corrects himself in complaisance to a friend, who represents to him the danger they are all in. 4 Panurge would say, a fine large chapel, or two little ones, but fear had disordered his sense. What he adds, viz.Where neither cow nor calf shall feed, alludes to the proverb:CHAP. XX. ]PANTAGRUEL. 261cow nor calf shall feed. Oh ho, oh ho. Above eighteenpailfuls or two of it are got down my gullet; bous, bhous,bhous, bhous, how dammed bitter and salt it is! By thevirtue, said Friar John, of the blood , the flesh , the belly, the head, if I hear thee again howling, thou cuckoldy cur, Iwill maul thee worse than any sea wolf. Ods fish , whydo not we take him up by the lugs and throw him over- board to the bottom of the sea? Here, sailor, ho honestfellow. Thus, thus , my friend, hold fast above. In truthhere is a sad lightning and thundering; I think that all thedevils are got loose; it is holiday with them; or elseMadame Proserpine is in child's labour: all the devils dance a morrice.CH. XX. -How the Pilots were forsaking their ships in thegreatest stress of weather.Он, said Panurge, you sin, Friar John, my former crony!former, I say, for at this time I am no more, you are no more. It goes against my heart to tell it you: for I believethis swearing doth your spleen a great deal of good; as it isa great ease to a wood cleaver to cry hem at every blow;and as one who plays at nine pins is wonderfully helped, if,when he hath not thrown his bowl right, and is like to makea bad cast, some ingenious stander by leans and screws his body half way about, on that side which the bowl shouldhave took to hit the pin. Nevertheless you offend, mysweet friend. But what do you think of eating some kind of cabirotadoes? Would not this secure us from this" Entre Candé et Monsoreau Between Candé and Montsorrow,La ne paist brebis ne veau." There feeds nor sheep, nor calf, nor cow.By this proverb we are informed that there is but a very small extent of land, and that too very barren, between the manor of Montsoreau and the village of Candé, which are only parted by the Vienne, and the sands on each side of that river. 5 It runs thus in Rabelais ,If I hear thee again pieping like a chicken, I will scratch thy back worse than a file . By this he compares Panurge to a hen, and himself to a co*ck, who would scratch him where he did not itch, and as it were en loup marin, i . e. with a sea-wolf's skin (such as joiners use to polish their work with. ) That fish ( called also a requiem) is very rough skinned, ravenous, and wide-mouthed, but good meat, says Cotgrave.1 Mind how our author drolls upon the name of this dish of meat,equivocating to that of the gods Cabiri; and how amidst a storm hebrings in their priests, who were always miraculously preserved in storins at sea, how violent soever they were, says the commentator ofApollonius. These Cabiri were gods highly revered in Samothrace, as262 [ BOOK IV. RABELAIS' WORKS.2storm? I have read, that in a storm at sea no harm everbefel the ministers of the gods Cabiri, so much celebratedby Orpheus, Apollonius, Pherecides, Strabo, Pausanias, andHerodotus. He doats, he raves, the poor devil! A thousand, a million, nay, a hundred million of devils seize thehornified doddipole. Lend us a hand here, hoh , tiger,wouldst thou? Here, on the starboard side . Ods me, thoubuffalo's head stuffed with relics, what ape's paternoster artthou muttering and chattering here between thy teeth? Thatdevil of a sea calf is the cause of all this storm, and is theonly man who doth not lend a helping hand. By G-, if Icome near thee, I'll fetch thee out by the head and ears witha vengeance, and chastise thee like any tempestative devil.Here mate, my lad, hold fast, till I have made a double knot.O brave boy! Would to heaven thou wert abbot of Talemouze, and that he that is were guardian of Croullay. Hold,brother Ponocrates, you will hurt yourself man. Epistemon,pray thee stand off out of the hatch-way. Methinks I saw the thunder fall there but just now. Con the ship, so honMind your steerage. Well said, thus, thus, steady, keepher thus, get the long boat clear-steady. Ods fish, thebeak- head is staved to pieces. Grumble, devils, fart, belch,sh*te, a turd on the wave. If this be weather, the devil isa ram. Nay, by G-, a little more would have washed meclear away into the current. I think all the legions of devilshold here their provincial chapter, or are polling, canvassing,and wrangling for the election of a new rector. Starboard;being the penates of those islanders. Cabir, in Syriac, signifies potent.Not only the priests belonging to the Cabiri, but all others of that sodality, were secure in time of storm, though the sea went never so high. As for the dish called cabirotades, or capilotades, according to Boyer, it is a French ragout of remnants of meat. Capilotade, Cotgrave says, is stewed meat, compounded of veal, capon, chicken, or partridge, minced, spiced, and laid upon several beds of cheese. Again;cabirots, says Cotgrave, is the sperm, or spawn of sturgeons, (cavear)spread upon bread, and eaten with vinegar, oil, and pepper.2 I am afraid I shall punish the reader with puns. But it is the author's fault, not mine. Rabelais concludes this sentence with Herodotus (Herodote) and begins the next with il radote: he dotes.Can there be a more manifest pun than Herodote and il radote, to such as speak French right; nay, it is so plain, that the famous Menage tells us, (under the word radoter) several have been induced, from this allu- sion of Rabelais, to believe that radoter properly signifies to tell stories as unlikely to be true, as many things seem to be that are related by the historian Herodotus.CHAP. XX. ] PANTAGRUEL. 263well said. Take heed; have a care of your noddle, lad, inthe devil's name. So ho, starboard, starboard. Be, be, be,bous, bous, bous, cried Panurge, bous, bous, be, be, be, bous,bous, I am lost. I see neither heaven nor earth; of thefour elements we have here only fire and water left. Bou,bou, bou, bous, bous, bous. Would it were the pleasure ofthe worthy divine bounty, that I were at this present hourin the close at Seville, or at Innocent's, the pastry- cook, overagainst the painted wine vault at Chinon, though I were tostrip to my doublet, and bake the petti-pasties myself.Honest man, could not you throw me ashore? you can doa world of good things, they say. I give you all Salmigondinois, and my large shore full of whilks, co*ckles , andperiwinkles, if, by your industry, I ever set foot on firmground. Alas, alas, I drown. Harkee, my friends, sincewe cannot get safe into port, let us come to an anchor intosome road, no matter whither. Drop all your anchors; let us be out of danger, I beseech you. Here honest tar, getyou into the chains, and heave the lead, if it please you.Let us know how many fathom water we are in. Sound,friend, in the Lord Harry's name. Let us know whether aman might here drink easily, without stooping. I am aptto believe one might. Helm a- lee, hoh, cried the pilot.Helm a-lee; a hand or two at the helm; about ships withher; helm a- lee , helm a-lee . Stand off from the leech ofthe sail. Hoh! belay, here make fast below; hoh, helma-lee, lash sure the helm a- lee, and let her drive. Is it cometo that? said Pantagruel: our good Saviour then help us. Lether lie under the sea, cried James Brahier, our chief mate,let her drive. To prayers, to prayers, let all think on theirsouls, and fall to prayers; nor hope to escape but by amiracle. Let us, said Panurge, make some good pious kindof vow; alas, alas, alas! bou, bou, be, be, be, bous, bous,bous, oho, oho, oho, oho, let us make a pilgrim: come,come, let every man club his penny towards it, come on.Here, here, on this side, said Friar John, in the devil'sname. Let her drive, for the Lord's sake unhang the rudder:hoh, let her drive, let her drive, and let us drink, I say, ofthe best and most cheering; do you hear, steward, produce,exhibit; for, do you see this, and all the rest will as well go to the devil out of hand. A pox on that wind- brokerolus, with his fluster- blusters. Sirrah, page, bring me264 [BOOK IV. RABELAIS' WORKS.here my drawer (for so he called his breviary); stay a littlehere, haul, friend, thus. Odzoons, here is a deal of hail andthunder to no purpose. Hold fast above, I pray you. Whenhave we All- saints day? I believe it is the unholy holiday of all the devil's crew. Alas, said Panurge, Friar Johndamns himself here as black as buttermilk for the nonce.Oh what a good friend I lose in him. Alas, alas, this isanother gats-bout than last year's . We are falling out ofScylla into Charybdis. Oho! I drown. Confiteor; onepoor word or two by way of testament, Friar John, myghostly father; good Mr. Abstractor, my crony, my Achates,Xenomanes, my all. Alas! I drown; two words of testament here upon this ladder.CH. XXI.-A continuation of the storm, with a short discourseon the subject of making testaments at sea.To make one's last will, said Epistemon, at this time thatwe ought to bestir ourselves and help our seamen, on thepenalty of being drowned, seems to me as idle and ridiculousa maggot as that of some of Cæsar's men, who, at theircoming into the Gauls, were mightily busied in making willsand codicils; bemoaned their fortune, and the absence of their spouses and friends at Rome; when it was absolutelynecessary for them to run to their arms, and use their utmoststrength against Ariovistus their enemy.This also is to be as silly, as that jolt-headed loblolly of acarter, who, having laid his waggon fast in a slough, downon his marrow- bones, was calling on the strong- backeddeity, Hercules, might and main, to help him at a dead lift,but all the while forgot to goad on his oxen, and lay hisshoulder to the wheels, as it behoved him: as if a Lord havemercy upon us, alone, would have got his cart out ofthe mire.What will it signify to make your will now? for eitherwe shall come off or drown for it. If we escape, it will notsignify a straw to us; for testaments are of no value or authority, but bythe death of the testators. If we are drowned,will it not be drowned too? Pr'ythee who will transmit itto the executors? Some kind wave will throw it ashore,like Ulysses, replied Panurge; and some king's daughter,going to fetch a walk in the fresco, on the evening, will findit, and take care to have it proved and fulfilled; nay, andhave some stately cenotaph erected to my memory, as DidoCHAP. XX1. ]PANTAGRUEL.8265had to that of her good man Sichæus; ¹ Æneas to Deiphobus,'upon the Trojan shore, near Rhote; Andromache to Hector, in the city of Buthrotus; Aristotle to Hermias andEubulus; the Athenians to the poet Euripides; the Romans to Drusus in Germany, and to Alexander Severus,'their emperor, in the Gauls; Argentier to Callaischre;'Xenocrates to Lysidices; Timares to his son Teleutagoras;Eupolis and Aristodice to their son Theotimus; Onestus toTimocles; Callimachus to Sopolis, the son of Dioclides;Catullus to his brother; " Statius to his father: 12 Germainof Brie to Hervé, the Breton tarpaulin.13 Art thou mad, said Perhaps he took for a1 Whence Rabelais had this, I know not.cenotaph, the funeral pile which gave occasion to Dido to burn herself with the sacrifice she had been offering to the manes of Sichæus. See3 Ibid. 1. 3, v. 302.2 Æneid, 1. 6, v. 505.Justin . 1. 18 , c. 6.6 See Suetonius ,See Diogenes Laertius, in the Life of Aristotle.in the Life of the Emperor Claudius.Life of that Emperor.106 See Lampridius, in the 7 Read Callaischrus; Kaλλaioxpoc.He perishing at sea, the poets, doubtless well paid by his heirs , set themselves at work to make cenotaphs, (honorary tombs) to his memory: two of which are extant, 1. 3. of the Anthologia, c. 22 .Leonidas, the other by Argentarius.Anthologia.8 Read, Xenocrites .One by See the 9 See the Anthologia, 1 , 3, p . 366, Wechel's edition.11 See. the 10 See the epigram of Callimachus, Epigram. 22. 12 See the Sylvæ of Statius , 1. 5. Epi- 103rd ced. 3.epigram13ofInCatullus the year. 1512, on St. Lawrence's day, there was off St. Mahe, in Bretagne, a great sea fight, between the French fleet and the English, who were above two to one in number of ships. [ So says M. Duchat of the English. He goes on. ] The English seeing ther admiral in danger, threw fire into that of France, commanded by Cap.tain Hervé, a Breton. He, after having in vain endeavoured to save his ship, finding the loss of her inevitable, grappled with the English ship, to which the wind having carried the fire, the Regent of England,and the Cordeliere (Franciscan nun) of France, (so were the two ships called) perished with all that were on board. Germain de Brie, in La- tin Germanus Brixeus, wrote, upon this occasion, a poem entituled Chordigera, (Cordeliere) dedicated to Queen Anne, at the conclusion whereof he raised this following cenotaph to the memory of CaptainHervei Cenotaphium.Hervé.66 Magnanimi manes Hervei , nomenque verendumHic lapis observat, non tamen ossa tegit Ausus enim Anglorum numerosæ occurrere classi,Qua patrium infestans jam prope littus erat, Chordigerâ invectus regali puppe; BritannisMarte prius sævo comminus edomitis, Arsit Chordigeræ in flammâ, extremoque cadentemServavit moriens excidio patriam. Prisca duos ætas Decios miratur: at unum Quem conferre queat, nostra duobus habet."266 [BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.Friar John, to run on at this rate? Help, here, in the nameof five hundred thousand millions of cart- loads of devils ,help! may a shanker gnaw thy moustachios, and the threerows of pock-royals and cauliflowers cover thy bum and turd- barrel, instead of breeches and cod- piece. Codsooks ourship is almost overset. Ods death, how shall we clear her?it is well if she do not founder. What a devilish sea thereruns! She will neither try nor hull; the sea will overtake her, so we shall never escape; the devil escape me. ThenPantagruel was heard to make a sad exclamation, saying,with a loud voice, Lord save us, we perish; yet not as wewould have it, but thy holy will be done. The Lord andthe blessed Virgin be with us, said Panurge. Holos, alas, Idrown; be be be bous, be bous, bous: in manus. Goodheavens, send me some dolphin to carry me safe on shore,like a pretty little Arion. I shall make shift to sound theharp, if it be not unstrung. Let nineteen legions of blackdevils seize me, said Friar John, (the Lord be with us, whispered Panurge, between his chattering teeth . ) If I comedown to thee, I will show thee to some purpose, that thebadge of thy humanity dangles at a calf's breech, thou ragged, horned, cuckoldy booby: " mgna, mgnan, mgnan: comeTo this Sir Thomas More made the following sharp answer:" Hervea cum Deciis unum conferre duobusEtas, te, Brixi, judice, nostra potest.Sed tamen hoc distant: illi quod sponte peribant;Hic periit, quoniam non potuit fugere."RaSee the epigrams of Sir Thomas More, and the poems of Germain de Brie. The latter have been reprinted in the collection made by Gru- terus, under the name of Rhanutius Gherus, of the Latin poems, published by the French in the 16th century. It is in 16mo. in 3 vols.printed in 1599. 14 Mr. Motteux here not only mistakes themeaning of the word cornart; (for how could Panurge be a cuckold that was not yet married? ) but likewise the rest of the sentence.belais' words are, veau coquart, cornat escorné. Upon which Duchatsays: veau coquart, raw sot, co*ckaded prig, who is always trimmed up with a co*ck's feather in his cap; the beaux of that age being used to adorn their bonnets with a co*ck's feather, from whence our word co*ckade, I suppose; though we ought to write it, as the French do , coquarde.M. Duchat goes on to the next word, veau cornart, which Mr. Motteux,as I said above, took for cuckold, as if it came from corne, horn;whereas veau cornart is an ignorant doctor, who, to procure the morerespect, is never seen abroad without his tippet or hood (cornette, in French) to show he is graduated . See chap. viii. des Illustres Pro- verbes. Lastly, veau escorné, an arrant scrub, who has, by his base pranks, already loaded himself with contempt and scorn; escorno, in Italian; from whence Rabelais borrows it.CHAP. XXII. ]PANTACRUEL. 267hither and help us, thou great weeping calf, or may thirtymillions of devils leap on thee. Wilt thou come, sea- calf?Fie! how ugly the howling whelp looks. What, always thesame ditty? Come on now, my bonny drawer. This hesaid, opening his breviary. Come forward, thou and I must be somewhat serious for a while; let me peruse theestiffly. Beatus vir qui non abiit. Pshaw, I know all this byheart; let us see the legend of Mons. St. Nicholas.Horrida tempestas montem turbavit acutum.15 Tempeste was a mighty flogger of lads, at MountaiguCollege. If pedants be damned for whipping poor little innocent wretches their scholars , he is, upon my honour, bythis time fixed within Ixion's wheel, lashing the crop- eared,bob-tailed cur that gives it motion. If they are saved forhaving whipped innocent lads , he ought to be above the "CH. XXII.- An end of the storm.16SHORE, shore! ' cried Pantagruel. Land to, my friends, Isee land! Pluck up a good spirit, 2 boys, it is within a kenning. So! we are not far from a port. -I see the sky clearing up to the northwards. -Look to the south- east! Courage,my hearts, said the pilot; now she will bear the hullock ofa sail the sea is much smoother; some hands aloft to themain-top. Put the helm a-weather. Steady! steady! Haulyour after mizen bowlings. Haul, haul, haul! Thus, thus,and no near. Mind your steerage; bring your main tackaboard. Clear your sheets; clear your bowlings; port, port.Helm a lee. Now to the sheet on the starboard side, thouson of a whor*. Thou art mightily pleased , honest fellow,quoth Friar John, with hearing make mention of thy mother.Luff, luff, cried the quartermaster that conned the ship ,keep her full, luff the helm. Luff. It is, answered the15 Anthony Tempeste, doctor of Paris, principal of Montaigu college,where his picture is still to be seen. Eutrapel's Tales, ch. 26. The Latin verse alludes to this of Horace." Horrida tempestas cœlum contraxit et imbres."16 The period interrupted by Pantagruel's crying out he saw land.1 Terre terre! land, land. This is the yñv opw or terram video of Diogenes, when he found he was got toward the conclusion of a certain voluminous book, with which he was quite tired. 2 In the original, couraige de brebis: on with a sheep's courage. The nearer sheep draw to the fold, the more they bleat.268 RABELAIS' WORKS. BOOK IT.steersman. Keep her thus. Get the bonnets fixed. Steady,steady.That is well said, said Friar John; now, this is somethinglike a tansey. Come, come, come children , be nimble. Good,Luff, luff, thus. Helm a weather. That is well said and thought on. Methinks the storm is almost over. It washigh time, faith: however, the Lord be thanked. Our devils begin to scamper. Out with all your sails . Hoist yoursails. Hoist. That is spoke like a man, hoist, hoist. Here,a God's name, honest Ponocrates; thou art a lusty fornicator; the whor*son will get none but boys. Eusthenes,thou art a notable fellow. Run up to the fore- top sail.Thus, thus. Well said, I faith; thus, thus. I dare not fearanything all this while, for it is holiday. Vea, vea, vea!huzza! This shout of the seaman is not amiss, and pleases me, for it is holiday. Keep her full thus. Good. Cheerup my merry mates, all, cried out Epistemon; I see alreadyCastor on the right. Be, be, bous, bous, bous, said Panurge,I am much afraid it is the bitch Helen. It is truly Mixar- chagenas, returned Epistemon, if thou likest better that denomination, which the Argives give him. Ho, ho! I see land too let her bear in with the harbour: I see a goodmany people on the beach: I see a light on an obeliscolychny. Shorten your sails, said the pilot; fetch thesounding line; we must double that point of land, and mind the sands. We are clear of them, said the sailors. Soonafter, Away she goes, quoth the pilot, and so doth the restof our fleet help came in good season.By St. John, said Panurge, this is spoke somewhat like:O the sweet word! there is the soul of music in it. Mgna,mgna, mgna, said Friar John; if ever thou taste a drop ofit, let the devil's dam taste me, thou ballocky devil. Here,honest soul, here is a full sneaker ' of the very best. Bringthe flagons: dost hear, Gymnast? and that same large pastyjambic, or gammonic, even as you will have it. Take heedyou pilot her in right.Cheer up, cried out Pantagruel; cheer up, my boys let usbe ourselves again. Do you see yonder, close by our ship,3 See Pliny, 1. 2, c. 37, and the Scaligerana, at the word Noctilucæ.Read Mixarchagevas; for that is the true reading. See Plutarch,problem 23, question 63. Rabelais uses our English wordtankard, but spells it tanquart.CHAP. XXIII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 269two barks, three sloops , five ships, eight pinks, four yawls,and six frigates, making towards us, sent by the good people of the neighbouring island to our relief? But who is thisUcalegon below, that cried , and makes such a sad moan?Were it not that I hold the mast firmly with both my hands,and keep it straighter than two hundred tacklings-I would-It is , said Friar John, that poor devil, Panurge, who istroubled with a calf's ague; he quakes for fear when hisbelly is full. If, said Pantagruel, he hath been afraid duringthis dreadful hurricane and dangerous storm, provided hehath done his part like a man, I do not value him a jot theless for it. For as, to fear in all encounters, is the mark ofa heavy and cowardly heart; as Agamemnon did, who, forthat reason, is ignominiously taxed by Achilles with havingdog's eyes, and a stag's heart: so , not to fear when the caseis evidently dreadful, is a sign of want or smallness of judgment. Now, if anything ought to be feared in this life, nextto offending God, I will not say it is death. I will notmeddle with the disputes of Socrates and the academics , thatdeath of itself is neither bad nor to be feared; but, I willaffirm, that this kind of shipwreck is to be feared, or nothingis. For, as Homer saith, it is a grievous, dreadful, and unnatural thing, to perish at sea. And, indeed, Æneas, in thestorm that took his fleet near Sicily, was grieved that he hadnot died by the hand of the brave Diomedes; and said thatthose were three, nay four times happy, who perished in theconflagration at Troy. No man here hath lost his life , theLord our Saviour be eternally praised for it: but in truthhere is a ship sadly out of order. Well, we must take careto have the damage repaired . Take heed we do not runaground and bulge her.CH. XXIII.-How Panurge played the goodfellow when the storm was over.WHAT cheer, ho, fore and aft? quoth Panurge. Oh ho!all is well, the storm is over. I beseech ye, be so kind as tolet me be the first that is sent on shore; for I would by allmeans a little untruss a point. Shall I help you still? Here,let me see, I will coil this rope; I have plenty of courage,and of fear as little as may be. Give it me yonder, honesttar. No, no, I have not a bit of fear. Indeed, that sameIliad 1st.270 RABELAIS WORKS, [ BOOK IV.decumane wave, that took us fore and aft, somewhat alteredmy pulse. Down with your sails; well said. How now,Friar John? you do nothing. Is it time for us to drinknow? Who can tell but St. Martin's running footman ' maystill be hatching us some further mischief? shall I come andhelp you again? Pork and peas choke me, if I do heartilyrepent, though too late, not having followed the doctrine ofthe good philosopher, who tell us that to walk by the sea,and to navigate by the shore, are very safe and pleasantthings just as it is to go on foot, when we hold our horse by the bridle. Ha! ha! ha! by G- all goes well. ShallI help you here too? Let me see, I will do this as it should be, or the devil is in it.Epistemon, who had the inside of one of his hands allflayed and bloody, having held a tackling with might andmain, hearing what Pantagruel had said, told him: Youmay believe, my lord, I had my share of fear as well as Panurge; yet I spared no pains in lending my helping hand.I considered, that since by fatal and unavoidable necessity,we must all die, it is the blessed will of God that we die thisor that hour, and this or that kind of death: neverthelesswe ought to implore, invoke, pray, beseech, and supplicatehim but we must not stop there; it behoveth us also touse our endeavours on our side , and, as the holy writ saith,to co-operate with him.You know what C. Flaminius, the consul said, when byHannibal's policy he was penned up near the lake of Peruse,alias Thrasymene. Friends, said he to his soldiers, you mustnot hope to get out of this place barely by vows or prayersto the gods; no, it is by fortitude and strength we must escape and cut ourselves a way with the edge of our swordsthrough the midst of our enemies.Sallust likewise makes M. Portius Cato say this: Thehelp of the gods is not obtained by idle vows and womanishcomplaints; it is by vigilance, labour, and repeated endeavours, that all things succeed according to our wishes anddesigns. If a man, in time of need and danger, is negligent,heartless, and lazy, in vain he implores the gods; they arethen justly angry and incensed against him. The devil takeme, said Friar John (I'll go his halves, quoth Panurge), if1 The Devil. The legend of St. Martin assigns him the devil for arunning footman on a certain occasion.CHAP. XXIV. ] PANTAGRUEL. 271the close of Sevillé had not been all gathered, vintaged,gleaned, and destroyed, if I had only sung contra hostium in- sidias (matter of breviary) like all the rest of the monkish devils, and had not bestirred myself to save the vineyard asI did, despatching the truant picaroons of Lerné with the staff ofthe cross.Let her sink or swim a God's name, said Panurge, all's oneto Friar John; he doth nothing; his name is Friar John Do-little; for all he sees me here sweating and puffing tohelp with all my might this honest tar, first of the name.- Hark you me, dear soul, a word with you;-but pray be notangry. How thick do you judge the planks of our ship tobe? Some two good inches and upwards, returned the pilot;don't fear. Odskilderkins, said Panurge, it seems then weare within two fingers' breadth of damnation.Is this one of the nine comforts of matrimony? Ah, dearsoul, you do well to measure the danger by the yard of fear.For my part, I have none on't; my name is William Dreadnought. As for my heart, I have more than enough on't;I mean none of your sheep's heart; but of wolf's heart;"the courage of a bravo. By the pavilion of Mars, I fearnothing but danger.CH. XXIV.-How Panurge was said to have been afraid without reason, during the storm.Good morrow, gentlemen, said Panurge, good morrowto youall: you are in very good health, thanks to heaven and yourselves: you are all heartily welcome, and in good time. Letus go on shore.-Here co*ckswain, get the ladder over thegunnel; man the sides: man the pinnace, and get her by theship's side. Shall I lend you a hand here? I am stark mad' for want of business, and would work like any two yokes ofoxen. Truly this is a fine place, and these look like a very2 In opposition to Panurge, whose name comes from fac-totum, do - ali .A pleasant comparison between a man, however lucky in marrying,and another that is embarked, and on the sea; however good the ship be he has under him, yet is he not sure he shall not be cast away.He that in wedlock (twice) ventures his carcase(Twice) ventures a drowning, and faith that is a hard case,says a merry poet. A small book of the Fifteen Comforts of Mutri- mony, attributed to Antoine de la Sale, was several times reprinted in the sixteenth century. 4 Forced courage; for a wolf never turns head to fight, but when he cannot run away with his prey.272 [BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.good people. Children, do you want me still in anything?do not spare the sweat of my body, for God's sake, Adam—that is man-was made to labour and work, as the birdswere made to fly. Our Lord's will is , that we get our breadwith the sweat of our brows, not idling and doing nothing,like this tatterdamallion of a monk here, this Friar Jack, whois fain to drink to hearten himself up, and dies for fear.—Rare weather.-I now find the answer of Anacharsis, thenoble philosopher, very proper: being asked what ship hereckoned the safest? he replied , That which is in the harbour.He made yet a better repartee, said Pantagruel, when somebody inquiring which is greater, the number of the living orthat of the dead? he asked them, amongst which of the twothey reckoned those that are at sea? ingeniously implying,that they are continually in danger of death, dying alive, andliving die. Portius Cato also said, that there were but threethings of which he would repent; if ever he had trusted hiswife with his secret, if he had idled away a day, and if hehad ever gone by sea to a place which he could visit by land.By this dignified frock of mine, said Friar John to Panurge,friend, thou hast been afraid during the storm, without causeor reason for thou wert not born to be drowned , but ratherto be hanged, and exalted in the air, or to be roasted in themidst of a jolly bonfire . My lord, would you have a goodcloak for the rain; leave me off your wolf and badger- skinmantle: let Panurge but be flayed, and cover yourself with his hide. But do not come near the fire, nor near yourblacksmith's forges , a God's name; for in a moment you will see it in ashes. Yet be as long as you please in the rain,snow, hail, nay, by the devil's maker, throw yourself, or divedown to the very bottom of the water, I'll engage you'll not be wet at all. Have some winter boots made of it, they'llnever take in a drop of water: make bladders of it to lay1 After bonfire, add, like a father. " Pendu ou brulé comme ungpere," are Rabelais' words. M. Duchat tells us that Rabelais, by like a father, means like one of the Lutherans, or first reformers, who inFrance were denominated fathers ( peres, in French) because in those days, praying in French, ( as they still do) most of their prayers begin with, Father everlasting, (Pere eternel. ) So the returning thanks in Latin, which beginneth with the word agimus, has got the Catholics the surname of Agimus. S. Ange to Mascurat, who could not endure the Huguenots, says, " Tu devrois plustost dire avec moy;Pere eternel et agimus,Soyez tous deux les bien venus."CHAP. XXIV. ] PANTAGRUEL. 278under boys, to teach them to swim, instead of corks, and theywill learn without the least danger. His skin, then, saidPantagruel, should be like the herb called true maiden's hair,which never takes wet nor moistness, but still keeps dry ,though you lay it at the bottom of the water as long as youplease; and for that reason is called Adiantos.Friend Panurge, said Friar John, I pray thee never beafraid of water: thy life for mine thou art threatened with acontrary element. Ay, ay, replied Panurge, but the devil'scooks dote sometimes, and are apt to make horrid blundersas well as others: often putting to boil in water, what wasdesigned to be roasted on the fire: like the head cooks ofourkitchen, who often lard partridges, queests, and stock- doves,with intent to roast them, one would think; but it happenssometimes, that they even turn the partridges into the pot, tobe boiled with cabbages, the queests with leak pottage, andthe stock- doves with turnips. But hark you me, goodfriends, I protest before this noble company, that as for thechapel which I vowed to Mons. St. Nicholas, between Candéand Monsoreau, I honestly mean that it shall be a chapel ofrose- water, which shall be where neither cow nor calf shallbe fed for between you and I , I intend to throw it to the bottom of the water. Here is a rare rogue for you, saidEusthenes here is a pure rogue, a rogue in grain, a rogueenough, a rogue and a half. He is resolved to make good theLombardic proverb, Passato el pericolo, gabbato el santo.³The devil was sick, the devil a monk would be;The devil was well, the devil a monk was he..ON CHAP. XVIII. AND THE SIX FOLLOWING. -These chapters contain a description of a dreadful storm, which Pantagruel's fleet met with.It began immediately after they came up with nine sail laden with all sorts ofmonks, who were going to the Council of Chesil, to sift and garble some articles of faith against the new heretics.This council can be no other but that of Trent, then sitting, in which such sort of articles were framed. The word chesil , by thetransposition of a single letter, makes the Hebrew word chelis, three;whence comes chelism, thirty. which is trente in French: and, if you will keep to the number chelis, or three, the name of that town, which is Tridentum in Latin, is partly made up of it; so there is no doubt but in one of those senses the author had a mind to let us know his meaning.The storm in these chapters, is undoubtedly the cruel persecutionA distilling chapel, that is, a limbeck. The word chapelle, in the signification of an alembick, is to be found in Nicot and Oudin.The danger once over, the saint is despised.VOL. II. T274 RABELAIS' WORKS. [BOOK IV.that was raised in France in the reign of Henry II. It began in 1548,by a kind of inquisition to prosecute the Lutherans. These are DuTillet's words about it: Il fut ordonné qu'une seance extraordinaire seferoit des juges à Paris, pour connoistre particulierement du faict des heretiques. En icelle quelques miserables furent punis de cruels supplices à toute rigueur. It was ordered that the judges should meet in an ex- traordinary manner at Paris, to take particular cognizance of the cases ofthe heretics. Some wretches suffered cruel punishment, inflicted by that assembly with the utmost rigour.During that storm Pantagruel shows an heroic steadfastness and con- stancy of mind; Friar John an undaunted courage, and a great activity;all Pantagruel's household do their best to save the ship and help one another; Panurge alone sits on his tail upon deck, weeping and howling, and says a thousand ridiculous things suggested to him by his fear; sometimes he wishes himself with the blessed fathers, whomthey met steering their course for the Council of Chesil: presently he proves as great a milk- sop as most of his brother deists do on such occasions,and is most mightily godly; then he is for making his will. In short,nothing can be more unaccountable than the vows, wishes, and moans of that maudling coward, till the storm abates, and the fleet comes in sight of the island of the Macreons. Then he plays the good fellow,and is as busy as any six, seeming as resolute and active as he was fear- ful and unmanly before.The storm begins just as soon as they have been met by monks;mention is made in it of the thunder's falling on a part of the ship;which may mean the ecclesiastical censures, and the pope's thunder- bolts: then, when the storm abates, Friar John says, our devils began to scamper. I will show that by devils Rabelais has meant the monks,and persecuting tempters of the church of Rome. As for Panurge's seeming a papist in the midst of the storm, it give us exactly his cha- racter; for he was doubtless ready enough to make all the grimaces of a rank papist in the midst of the persecution; though, as soon as it was past, he laughed at St. Nicholas, the water saint, to whom he had pro- mised a chapel, if he escaped, between Candé and Monsoreau, where neither cow nor calf should feed. The word chapel is equivocal in French, signifying a limbeck; so he says he will throw one in the river, doubtless that which drowns up all the ground between those two towns, and thus he means to fulfil his vow. Perhaps this is also de- signed to ridicule the vows and behaviour of seamen in a storm .Pantagruel's holding the mast of the ship tight with both his hands all the while, by the skipper's advice, implies, that as the family of Navarre, and particularly Anthony of Bourbon, was best able to protect the great ones, who were embarked together for a reformation, it was fit he should do it with his power; and accordingly Du Tillet tells us,that none but miserables (poor wretches) suffered. If any one will say,that, perhaps Rabelais did not in this voyage mean any particular per- sons, I hope at least they will grant he has admirably described the aifferent behaviour of most men in danger, and chiefly in persecuting times.• Du Tillet, Crom. Abreg. des Rois de France, 1549.CHAP. XXV. ]PANTAGRUEL, 275CH. XXV. -How, after the Storm, Pantagruel went on shorein the Islands of the Macreons. IMMEDIATELY after, he went ashore at the port of an islandwhich they called the island of the Macreons.¹ The good people of the place received us very honourably. An old Macrobius (so they called their eldest elderman) desired Pan- tagruel to come to the town-house to refresh himself, and eatsomething but he would not budge a foot from the moletill all his men were landed. After he had seen them, hegave order that they should all change clothes, and that someof all the stores in the fleet should be brought on shore, thatevery ship's crew might live well: which was accordinglydone, and God wot how well they all toped and carouzed. Thepeople of the place brought them provisions in abundance.The Pantagruelists returned them more: as the truth is When their's were somewhat damaged by the late storm.they had well-stuffed the insides of their doublets, Pantagrueldesired every one to lend their help to repair the damage;which they readily did . It was easy enough to refit there;for all the inhabitants of the island were carpenters, and all such handicrafts as are seen in the arsenal at Venice. Nonebut the largest island was inhabited, having three ports andten parishes; the rest being overrun with wood, and desert,much like the forest of Arden. We entreated the old Macrobius to show us what was worth seeing in the island;which he did; and in the desert and dark forest we discovered several old ruined temples , obelisks, pyramids, mo- numents, and ancient tombs, with divers inscriptions and1 Some will have this to be Great Britain; others will have it take in likewise the province of Bretagne, in France wherein, as well as in England, the tales of Eutrapel, ch. 33, observe there are still to be seen a world of ancient monuments and singular rarities, as are mentionedin this chapter . The translator of Rabelais into English is of opinion it means England, and no other country; but, although it is certain that people live there to a very great age, yet that does not determine the question. The sole reason is , those who in Edward the Sixth's time, to avoid persecution in France, fled into England, found the secret there to prolong a life which they had not failed to have lost in their own country.Again, literally taken , may it not mean the Isle of Wight, which in the called the Isle of Life? and that romance,Romance which extends of Perceforest its heroes', lives to many ages, makes them live so longfor no other reason, but on account of his assigning them that island toreside in; from whence they are at last forced to be taken , in order toput them into a possibility of dying.T 2276 [BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.epitapas; some of them in hieroglyphic characters; othersin the Ionic dialect; some in the Arabic, Agarenian, Sclavonian, and other tongues; of which Epistemon took anexact account. In the interim, Panurge said to Friar John,is this the island of the Macreons? Macreon signifies inGreek an old man, or one much stricken in years. What isthat to me, said Friar John, how can I help it? I was notin the country when they christened it. Now I think on it,quoth Panurge, I believe the name of mackerel ( that is a bawdin French) was derived from it: for procuring is the provinceof the old, as buttock- riggling is that of the young. Therefore I do not know but this may be the bawdy or Mackerelisland, the original and prototype of the island of that name at Paris. Let us go and dredge for co*ck- oysters. OldMacrobius asked, in the Ionic tongue, How, and by whatindustry and labour, Pantagruel got to their port that day,there having been such blustering weather, and such a dread- ful storm at sea. Pantagruel told him that the AlmightyPreserver of mankind had regarded the simplicity and sincere affection of his servants, who did not travel for gain orsordid profit; the sole design of their voyage being a studiousdesire to know, see, and visit the Oracle of Bacbuc, and takethe word of the Bottle upon some difficulties offered by one of the company: nevertheless this had not been withoutgreat affliction, and evident danger of shipwreck. After that,he asked him what he judged to be the cause of that terribletempest, and if the adjacent seas were thus frequently subject to storms; as in the ocean are the Ratz of Sammaieu,2Maumusson, and in the Mediterranean sea the gulph of Sataly,2 In Bretagne, a dangerous passage, because of the rapidity of the currents there. 3 The canal so called, is likewise verydangerous, on account of the numberless banks and quicksands there,which are moving up and down continually. It is two leagues long, and one broad, and separates the isles of Alvert and Oleron.3Anciently Attalia, in Pamphylia. It is still very dangerous, but nothing near so much as it was heretofore, by reason of a sea-monster,which, if we believe Villamont in his travels, was wont to infest that part of the sea, till the Empress St. Helena, in her return from Jeru- salem, from whence she was bringing the nails with which our Saviour was fastened to the cross, threw one of them into the waves there; which has rendered that monster so gentle, that it is but seldom he now-adays meddles with any of the ships that come near the place of his abode. See Villamont's Voyages,! . 2, c. 5.CHAP. XXVI. ] PANTAGRUEL 2775Montargentan, Piombino, Capo Melio in Laconia, theStraits of Gibraltar, Faro di Messina, and others.CH. XXVI. -How the good Macrobius gave us an account ofthe Mansion and Decease of the Heroes.THE good Macrobius then answered , -Friendly strangers,this island is one of the Sporades; not of your Sporades thatlie in the Carpathian sea, but one of the Sporades of the ocean in former times rich, frequented, wealthy, populous,full of traffic, and in the dominions of the rulers of Britain,but now, by course of time, and in these latter ages of the world, poor and desolate, as you see. In this dark forest,above seventy- eight thousand Persian leagues in compass,is the dwelling- place of the demons and heroes, that aregrown old, and we believed that some one of them died yesterday; since the comet, which we saw for three days before together, shines no more: and now it is likely, that at hisdeath there arose this horrible storm; for while they arealive all happiness attends both this and the adjacent islands ,and a settled calm and serenity. At the death of every oneof them, we commonly hear in the forest, loud and mournfulgroans, and the whole land is infested with pestilence, earthquakes, inundations, and other calamities; the air with fogsand obscurity, and the sea with storms and hurricanes. Whatyou tell us, seems to me likely enough, said Pantagruel.For, as a torch or candle, as long as it hath life enough andis lighted, shines round about, disperses its light, delightsthose that are near it, yields them its service and clearness,and never causes any pain or displeasure; but as soon as itis extinguished, its smoke and evaporation infect the air,offend the by-standers , and are noisome to all: so, as long as those noble and renowned souls inhabit their bodies, peace,profit, pleasure, and honour never leave the places wherethey abide; but as soon as they leave them, both the continent and adjacent islands are annoyed with great commotions; in the air fogs, darkness, thunder, hail; tremblings ,pulsations, agitations of the earth; storms and hurricanes atsea; together with sad complaints amongst the people,broaching of religions, changes in governments, and ruins of commonwealths.5 Porto de Telamone, in Tuscano.Melleum Promontorium .6 Cabo de Malvasia; anciently278 [ BOOK IV.RABELAIS WORKS.We had a sad instance of this lately, said Eustemon, atthe death of that valiant and learned knight, William duBellay; during whose life France enjoyed so much happiness, that all the rest of the world looked upon it with envy,sought friendship with it, and stood in awe of its power; but now, after his decease, it hath for a considerable time been the scorn of the rest of the world.¹Thus, said Pantagruel, Anchises being dead at Drepani,in Sicily, Æneas was dreadfully tossed and endangered by astorm; and perhaps for the same reason, Herod, that tyrantand cruel King of Judea, finding himself near the passage ofa horrid kind of death, -for he died of a phthiriasis, devoured by vermin and lice; as before him died L. Sylla,Pherecydes, the Syrian, the preceptor of Pythagoras, theGreek poet Alemæon, and others, and foreseeing that theJews would make bonfires at his death, caused all the noblesand magistrates to be summoned to his seraglio, out of all thecities, towns, and castles of Judea, fraudulently pretendingthat he had some things of moment to impart to them. Theymade their personal appearance; whereupon he caused themall to be shut up in the hippodrome of the seraglio; then saidto his sister Salome, and Alexander her husband: I am certain that the Jews will rejoice at my death; but if you willobserve and perform what I tell you, my funeral shall behonourable, and there will be a general mourning. As soonas you see me dead, let my guards, to whom I have alreadygiven strict commission to that purpose, kill all the noblemen and magistrates that are secured in the hippodrome.By these means, all Jewry shall, in spite of themselves, beobliged to mourn and lament, and foreigners will imagine itto be for my death, as if some heroic soul had left her body.A desperate tyrant wished as much when he said, When I1 Soon after the death of William du Bellay, the Emperor Charles V. forced the Duke of Cleves to depart from the alliance he had made with France; and as Francis I. was generally reckoned to have brought into the Mediterranean , and even before the Castle of Nice, the corsairBarbarossa, the emperor, at that time almighty in Germany, not only hindered the ambassadors, sent by the king to the diet, from setting foot within the empire, but was going to hang a herald they had dispatched before for passports; so absolute was the emperor in Germany, after the death of M. de Langey, who, being present in all the diets, never failed to support the glory and interests of France, by representing to the Germans, in those assemblies, their true interest, and the measures they were to take to preserve their liberty. See Sleidan, 1. 15.CHAP. XXVII.]PANTAGRUEL. 279die, let earth and fire be mixed together; which was as goodas to say, let the whole world perish. Which saying the tyrant Nero altered , saying, While I live , as Suetonius affirms it. Thisdetestablesaying, of whichCicero, lib. De Finib.andSeneca, lib. 2, DeClementia, makemention, is ascribedto theEmperorTiberius, by DionNicæusandSuidas.CH. XXVII. -Pantagruel's discourse of the decease ofheroicsouls; and ofthe dreadful prodigies that happened before thedeath of the late Lord de Langey.I WOULD not, continued Pantagruel, have missed the stormthat haththus disordered us, were I also to have missed the relation of these things told us bythis good Macrobius. Neitheram I unwilling to believe what he said ofa comet that appearsin the sky some days before such a decease. For some ofthose souls are so noble, so precious, and so heroic that heavengives us notice of their departing some days before it happens.Andas a prudent physician, seeing by some symptoms that hispatient draws towards his end, some days before, gives noticeof it to his wife, children , kindred, and friends, that, in thatlittle time he hath yet to live, they may admonish him tosettle all things in his family, to tutor and instruct his children as much as he can, recommend his relict to his friends inher widowhood, and declare what he knows to be necessaryabout a provision for the orphans; that he may not be sur- prised by death without making his will , and may take careof his soul and family: in the same manner the heavens, asit were, joyful for the approaching reception of those blessedsouls, seem to make bonfires by those comets and blazingmeteors, which they at the same time kindly design shouldprognosticate to us here, that in a few days one of those venerable souls is to leave her body, and this terestrial globe.Not altogether unlike this was what was formerly done at Athens, by the judges of the Areopagus. For when theygave their verdict to cast or clear the culprits that were triedbefore them, they used certain notes according to the substance of the sentences; by e, signifying sentence to death; 'by T, absolution; 2 by A, ampliation³ or a demur, when the1 From the Greek Oavaros, death; and it is to this signification ofthe theta (in the judgments passed by the Greeks) that this verse of Persius alludes. " Et potis es vitio nigrum præfigere theta. "2 In Greek, τελέωσις. 3 Rabelais follows the error ofErasmus, who had no correct copy of Asconius to go by. That gram-280 [ BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.case was not sufficiently examined. Thus having publiclyset up those letters, they eased the relations and friends ofthe prisoners, and such others as desired to know their doom,of their doubts. Likewise by these comets, as in ætherialcharacters, the heavens silently say to us, Make haste mortals, if you would know or learn of the blessed souls anything concerning the public good, or your private interest;for their catastrophe is near, which being past, you will vainly wish for them afterwards.The good- natured heavens still do more: and that mankind may be declared unworthy of the enjoyment of thoserenowned souls , they fright and astonish us with prodigies ,monsters, and other foreboding signs, that thwart the order of nature.Of this we had an instance several days before the decease of the heroic soul of the learned and valiant Chevalier deLangey, of whom you have already spoken. I remember it,said Epistemon; and my heart still trembles within me, whenI think on the many dreadful prodigies that we saw five or six days before he died. For the Lords D'Assier, Chemant,one-eyed Mailly, St. Ayl, Villeneufue- la- Guyart, MasterGabriel, physician of Savillan, Rabelais, Cohuau, Massuau,Majorici, Bullou, Cercu , alias Bourgmaistre, Francis Proust,Ferron, Charles Girard, Francis Bourré, and many otherfriends and servants to the deceased, all dismayed, gazed oneach other without uttering one word; yet not without foreseeing that France would in a short time be deprived of aknight so accomplished, and necessary for its glory and protection, and that heaven claimed him again as its due. Bythe tufted tip of my cowl, cried Friar John, I am even resolved to become a scholar before I die. I have a prettygood head- piece of my own, you must confess . Now praygive me leave to ask you a civil question. Can these sameheroes or demigods you talk of, die? May I never bedamned, if I was not so much a lobco*ck as to believe theyhad been immortal, like so many fine angels. Heaven formarian says nothing absolutely of what we see here in Rabelais, andin the Adages of Erasmus, chil . 1 , cent. 5, ch. 56; since A, according to him, is the mark of absolution, C. of condemnation, and the two letters N.L., i.e. non liquet, denotes ampliation.• Seean account of all these gentlemen in M. Duchat and what legacieswere left them by the Chevalier de Langey. Our author had fifty .livres tournois yearly rent-charge, till such time as he should have benefice, worth at least 300 livres per annum.CHAP. XXVIII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 281"give me but this most reverend father, Macrobius, tells us they die at last. Not all, returned Pantagruel.The stoics held them all to be mortal, except one, whoalone is immortal, impassable, invisible . Pindar plainly saith,that there is no more thread, that is to say, no more life, spunfrom the distaff and flax of the hard- hearted fates for thegoddesses Hamadryades, than there is for those trees that arepreserved by them, which are good, sturdy, downright oaks;whence they derived their original , according to the opinion of Callimachus, and Pausanias in Phoci. With whom concurs Martianus Capella. As for the demigods, fauns, satyrs ,sylvans, hobgoblins, ægipanes, nymphs, heroes, and demons,several men have, from the total sum, which is the result ofthe divers ages calculated by Hesiod, reckoned their life to be9720 years that sum consisting of four special numbersorderly arising from one, the same added together, and multiplied by four every way, amounts to forty; these forties,being reduced into triangles by five times, make up the total of the aforesaid number. See Plutarch, in his book aboutthe Cessation of Oracles.This, said Friar John , is not matter of breviary; I maybelieve as little or as much of it as you and I please. Ibelieve, said Pantagruel, that all intellectual souls are exempted from Atropos's scissors . They are all immortal,whether they be of angels, of demons, or human: yet I willtell you a story concerning this , that is very strange, but iswritten and affirmed by several learned historians.CH. XXVIII -How Pantagruel related a very sad story ofthedeath of the heroes.EPITHERSES, the father of Emilian the rhetorician, sailingfrom Greece to Italy, in a ship freighted with divers goods and passengers, at night the wind failed them near theEchinades, some islands that lie between the Morea andTunis, and the vessel was driven near Paxos . When theygot thither, some of the passengers being asleep, othersawake, the rest eating and drinking, a voice was heard thatcalled aloud, Thamous! which cry surprised them all. Thissame Thamous was their pilot, an Egyptian by birth, butknown by name only to some few travellers . The voice washeard a second time, calling Thamous, in a frightful tone;and none making answer, but trembling, and remaining282 RABELAIS [BOOK IV.' WORKS.silent, the voice was heard a third time, more dreadful thanbefore.This caused Thamous to answer; Here am I; what dost thou call me for? What wilt thou have me do? Thenthe voice, louder than before, bid him publish, when heshould come to Palodes, that the great god Pan was dead.Epitherses related that all the mariners and passengers,having heard this, were extremely amazed and frighted; andthat consulting among themselves, whether they had bestconceal or divulge what the voice had enjoined; Thamoussaid, his advice was, that if they happened to have a fairwind, they should proceed without mentioning a word of it,but if they chanced to be becalmed, he would publish whathe had heard. Now when they were near Palodes, they hadno wind, neither were they in any current. Thamous thengetting up on the top ofthe ship's forecastle, and casting hiseyes on the shore, said that he had been commanded to proclaim that the great god Pan was dead. The words werehardly out of his mouth, when deep groans, great lamenta- tions, and doleful shrieks , not of one person, but of manytogether, were heard from the land.The news of this -many being present-was soon spreadat Rome; insomuch that Tiberius, who was then emperor,sent for this Thamous, and having heard him, gave credit tohis words. And inquiring of the learned in his court, andat Rome, who was that Pan? he found by their relationthat he was the son of Mercury and Penelope, as Herodotusand Cicero in his third book of the Nature of the Gods hadwritten before.For my part, I understand it of that great Saviour of thefaithful, who was shamefully put to death at Jerusalem, bythe envy and wickedness of the doctors, priests, and monks of the Mosaic law. And methinks, my interpretation is n timproper; for he may lawfully be said in the Greek tongue to be Pan, since he is our all. For all that we are, all thatwe live, all that we have, all that we hope, is him, by him ,from him, and in him. He is the god Pan, the great shepherd, who, as the loving shepherd Corydon affirms, hath notonly a tender love and affection for his sheep, but also fortheir shepherds. At his death, complaints, sighs, fears, andlamentations were spread through the whole fabric of theuniverse, whether heavens, land, sea or hell.CHAP. XXIX. ] PANTAGRuel. 283The time also concurs with this interpretation of mine: forthis most good, most mighty Pan, our only Saviour, diednear Jerusalem, during the reign of Tiberius Cæsar.Pantagruel, having ended this discourse, remained silent,and full of contemplation. A little while after, we saw thetears flow out of his eyes ' as big as ostrich's eggs. Godtake me presently, if I tell you one single syllable of a lie in the matter.ON CHAPS. XXV. XXVI. XXVII. AND XXVIII . —The island of theMacreons, where the fleet went into harbour after the storm, signifies the island where men are long-lived. Its eldest elderman is namedMacrobius, or Long-lived. We are told in the 26th chapter, that it was in the dominions of the ruler of Britain; consequently it was asafe port against the tempest of persecution , the reformation being openly professed at that time in England under King Edward VI. This causes Rabelais to make his persecuted fleet take shelter there, and to say that men lived long in that island; because none were put to death on account of their religion.The ruins of temples, obelisks, pyramids, ancient tombs and monu- ments, which they see there, denote the decay, downfall, and ruin of Popery, unfrequented, and left in dismal solitude. The souls of theheroes, who are lodged in those ruined mansions, are the true Christians who had cast off the yoke of Popery, and of the blind worship of saints, many of them fabulous, to which the superstition of the Papists had made them raise temples, obelisks, and monuments, as formerly the heathens did to their false gods.The old Macrobius says, that the death of one of those heroes had occasioned the storm . By which our author gives us to understand,that troubles and commotions are often raised in kingdoms at the death of those eminent persons who have governed them under their kings;and probably, he may have had a mind to mark the death of Margaret de Valois, Queen of Navarre, sister to King Francis I., which happened towards the latter end of the year 1549, about a year after the Lady Jane d'Albret, Princess of Navarre, had been married to Anthony de Bour- bon, Duke of Vendôme, Rabelais' Pantagruel. That princess, who had always protected the reformers and the reformed, as has been ob- served in the preface to the first three books, was not less eminent forher piety, wit, learning, and virtue, than for her royal extraction. Va- lentine d'Alsinois, a French lady, made the following epitaph on her- " Musarum decima et charitum quarta, inclyta regumEt soror et conjux Margaris illa jacet . "CH. XXIX.- How Puntagruel sailed by the Sneaking Island,where Shrovetide reigned.THE jovial fleet being refitted and repaired, new stores taken1 When before, 1. 3, c . 2, Rabelais describes Pantagruel as the best little and great good man that ever girded a sword to his side, he seems to hint that the great qualities of that prince were mixed with abund- ance of others not so great. Here, he makes him weep, out of the constitutional softness of his temper, and the tenderness of his disposition.284 [ BOOK IT.RABELAIS' WORKS.in, the Macreons over and above satisfied and pleased withthe money spent there by Pantagruel, our men in better humour than they used to be, if possible, we merrily put to seathe next day, near sunset, with a delicious fresh gale.Xenomanes showed us afar off the Sneaking Island, ' wherereigned Shrovetide, of whom Pantagruel had heard muchtalk formerly: for that reason he would gladly have seen himin person, had not Xenomanes advised him to the contrary:first, because this would have been much out of our way;and then for the lean cheer, (manger maigre, ) which he toldus was to be found at that prince s court, and indeed all overthe island.8You can see nothing there for your money, said he, but ahuge greedy guts, a tall woundy swallower of hot wardens'and muscles; a long-shanked mole- catcher; an overgrownbottler of hay; a mossy- chinned demi- giant, with a doubleshaven crown, of lantern breed; a very great loitering noddypeaked youngster, banner-bearer to the fish- eating tribe,"dictator of mustard land, 10 flogger of little children, " calciner¹ L'Isle de Tapinois, in French, means neither more or less than the habitation of the monks, which in ch. 46 of 1. 3. and in the Prol. of 1.4, Rabelais calls taupetiers, and their churches taupétieres; properly holes which the moles root in the ground; because the monks are shut up therein like so many moles (taupes, in French, from talpa, a mole,in Latin.) Lent is said to dwell in these monks' convents, where abstinence from flesh is supposed, and ought to reign.23Quaresme-prenant. Rabelais means the beginning of Lent, or if you will, the whole time of Lent; not what we call Shrovetide strictly.The popish ecclesiastics, begin their Lent before the laity; Shrove- Tuesday is to them a day of humiliation. Grey peas, in the original. Rabelais rather means herrings; his expression is ung grand cacquerotier ( not cacquerolier. ) Now cacquerotier is cacqueruptier; one that makes ruptures in cags (or barrels) of her- rings, which in time of Lent the cloistral folks are often doing , because it is a great article of their subsistence. 5 Lent is the chiefseason of the whole year for mole-catching. 6 Haybeginningto be scarce in Lent, there is much of it sold by bottles, or trusses.7 Lent is mossy, or downy- chinned, because it has not been long on the footing it now is . Demi-giant, because of its length. Of lanternbreed , and with shaven crown, because Lent was first established by the ecclesiastics, whom Rabelais elsewhere calls lanterniers.8 Bien grand lanternier, in French, and that is all . On which word M. Duchat observes: Lent makes fools of (lanterne) those that keep it; and furthermore, as there are in Lent many nocturnal devotions,there are lanterns then to be seen trotting about in proportion.Rabelais so calls the first day of Lent, because it precedes manyother days on which fish is always eaten. 10 Because in many of the Lent dishes there is mustard used 11 Partly because fast-CHAP. XXIX. ]PANTAGRUEL. 28514 of ashes,12 father and foster-father to physicians; swarmingwith pardons, indulgences, and stations; a very honest man;a good catholic, and as brimful of devotion as ever he can hold.He weeps the three- fourth parts of the day, and never assists at any weddings 15 but, give the devil his due, he isthe most industrious larding- stick and skewer- maker¹ inforty kingdoms.About six years ago, as I passed through Sneaking- land ,I brought home a large skewer " from thence, and made a present of it to the butchers of Quande, who set a great valueupon them, and that for a cause. Some time or other, ifever we live to come back to our own country, I will showyou two of them fastened on the great church porch. Hisusual food is pickled coats of mail, 18 salt helmets and headpieces, and salt sallads; which sometimes makes him pisspins and needles. As for his clothing, it is comical enough of conscience, both for make and colour; for he wears greyand cold, nothing before, and nought behind, with the sleeves of the same.ing, and likewise a melancholy bilious diet, in Lent, is apt to make parents and schoolmasters very peevish to their children; and partly because during the holy week, the whipping part is redoubled among the cucullated gentry. 12 Both on account of people'sgoing to church on Ash- Wednesday, to have ashes put on their heads;and also because in Lent there being plenty of brands on the hearths,then, or never, is the time to reduce the same to ashes, for lye to wash and cleanse their linen with. 13 In ch. 29 of 1. 5. The foodpeople use in Lent engenders the distempers of the whole year.14 In time of Lent people run a stationing, (i . e. visiting the churches)to gain the pardons and indulgencies each church abounds with.15 The church forbids marrying in Lent. 16 In Lent,especially towards the end, butchers begin to busy themselves to make skewers; and cooks, larding- sticks, and the like. 17 Itshould be a gross of skewers ( 12 dozen) . J'en emportay une grosse.Mr. Motteux took grosse for the feminine of gros, large.18 The original has salt coats of mail, salt casks , salt morrians, and salt sallads. On which M. Duchat's note is: all Lent food is high seasoned, and hard of digestion, and the name such meats go by,are those of salades, a sort of head- piece so called; morions, another sort of head-piece, &c. , (though this latter means, likewise, a small red delicious mushroom, called morillios salted for winter use.19 Lent weather is generally grey and cold; but that is not all Rabe- lais means. His "nothing before, nothing behind, and sleeves of thesame," alludes to Saint Francis's rule, enjoining the grey friars to wear no shirts, and to re-iterate in time of Lent the discipline (whip) on their naked skin.286 [BOOK IT.RABELAIS' WORKS.You will do me a kindness, said Pantagruel, if, as youhavedescribed his clothes, food, actions, and pastimes, you willalso give me an account of his shape and disposition in all itsparts. Prithee do, dear cod, said Friar John, for I have foundhim in my breviary, and then follows the moveable holy- days.With all my heart, answered Xenomanes; we may chance tohear more of him as we touch at the Wild Island, the dominions of the squob Chitterlings, his enemies; against whomhe is eternally at odds: and were it not for the help of thenoble Carnival, their protector, and good neighbour, thismeagre-looking Shrovetide would long before this have madesad work among them, and rooted them out of their habitation. Are these same Chitterlings , said Friar John, male orfemale, angels, or mortals, women or maids? They are , replied Xenomanes, females in sex, mortal in condition, someof them maids, others not. The devil have me, said FriarJohn, if I be not for them. What a shameful disorder innature, is it not, to make war against women? Let us goback, and hack the villain to pieces. -What! meddle withShrovetide? cried Panurge, in the name of Belzebub, I amnot yet so weary of my life. No, I am not yet so mad asthat comes to. Quid juris? Suppose we should find ourselves pent up between the Chitterlings and Shrovetide? between the anvil and the hammers 20 Shankers and buboesstand off! godzooks, let us make the best of our way, I bidyou good night, sweet Mr. Shrovetide; I recommend to youthe Chitterlings, and pray don't forget the puddings.CH. XXX. —How Shrovetide is anatomized and described by Xenomanes.As for the inward parts of Shrovetide, said Xenomanes;his brain is ( at least it was in my time) in bigness, ' colours,substance, and strength, much like the left cod of a hehand- worm.The ventricles of his said brain like The funnel, like a mason's chisel.an auger. The fornix, like a casket.The worm-like excrescence, like a The glandula pinealis, like a bag- christmas- box. pipe.The membranes, like a monk's cowl . The rete mirabile, like a gutter.20 It is Lent, ( called by the translator Shrove-tide, ) that is the striker and persecutor. The Chitterlings are the sufferers, the party struck and persecuted. 1 Whoever invented Lent, in Rabelais'opinion, had no great share of wisdom.СНАР. ХХХ PANTAGRUEL. 287The dug-like processus, like apatch. The blind gut like a breast- plate.The tympanums, like a whirly- gig. The colon like a bridle.The rocky bones, like a goose-wing. The arse-gut like a monk's leathern The nape of the neck, like a paper lantern.The nerves, like a pipkin.The uvula, like a sackbut.The palate, like a mitten.The spittle, like a shuttle.The almonds, like a telescope.The bridge of his nose, like a wheel- barrow.The head of the larynx, like a vin- tage- basket.The stomach, like a belt.The pylorus, like a pitchfork.The wind-pipe, like an oyster-knife.Thethroat, like a pincushion stuffed with oakum.bottle.The kidneys, like a trowel.The loins, like a padlock.The ureters, like a pot- hook.The emulgent veins, like two gilli.flowers.The spermatic vessels, like a cully- mully- puff.The parastata, like an ink-pot.The bladder, like a stone-bow.The neck, like a mill- clapper.The mirach, or lower parts of thebelly, like a high- crowned hat.The siphach, or its inner rind, like a wooden cuff.The muscles, like a pair of bellows.The lungs, like a prebend's fur- The tendons, like a hawking-glove.gown.The heart, like a cope.Themediastine, like an earthern cup.The pleura, like a crow's bill.The arteries, like a watch- coat.The midriff, like a montero- cap.The liver, like a double-tongued mattock.The veins, like a sash-window.The spleen, like a catcal.The guts, like a trammel.The gall, like a cooper's adze.The entrails , like a gantlet.Themesentery, like an abbot'smitre.The hungry-gut, like a button.Theligaments, like atinker's budget.The bones, like three cornered cheese- cakes.The marrow, like a wallet.The cartilages, like a field-tortoise,alias a mole.The glandules in the mouth, like apruning-knife.The animal spirits, like swingeing fisty- cuffs.The blood-fermenting, like a multiplication of flirts on the nose.The urine, like a fig- pecker.The sperm, like a hundred tenpenny nails.And his nurse told me, that being married to Mid-lent," he2 An Arabian word, thus defined by Leonellus Faventius, in his De Medendis Morbis: mirach, says he, " dicitur pars ventris exterior,composita ex cute, pinguedine, et octo musculis ventris.3 Est siphac, says the same author, " panniculus nervosus, solidus,continens inter se zirbum, stomachum, et hepar." 4 Alias a mole, isof Mr. Motteux's own putting in. Rabelais says, tortue de guarriges:which is a sort of land- tortoise, nothing of the mole-kind . It is not solarge as the water-tortoise, but has a much finer shell, and its belly isyellow. There's plenty of them in Languedoc, where the fields and bushes are called guarriges. 5 During the whole time of Lent,except on midlent- day, none, in the Romish communion, are allowedto marry. This suggested to Rabelais the thought of making a matchbetween la Mi-careme, i . e. Mid- lent, and le Careme, i . e. Lent himself;and as Lent, in point of marriages, is barren, thence it comes that, from such a match, can proceed nothing but local adverbs, and certain double-288 RABELAIS' WORKS [ BOOK IV.only begot a good number of local adverbs, and certain double fasts .His memory he had like a scarf.His common sense, like a buzzing of bees.His imagination , like the chime of a set of bells.His thoughts, like a flight of starl- ings.His conscience, like the unnestlingof a parcel of young herons.His deliberations, like aset of organs.His repentance, like the carriage of a double cannon.His undertakings, like the ballast of a galleon .His understanding, like a torn bre- viary.His notions like snails crawling out of strawberries.His will, like three filberts in aporringer.His desire, like six trusses of hay.His judgment, like a shoeing horn.His discretion, like the truckle of apully.His reason, like a cricket stool.CH. XXXI. -Shrovetide's outward parts anatomized.SHROVETIDE, continued Xenomanes, is somewhat betterproportioned in his outward parts, excepting the seven ribswhich he had over and above the common shape of men.His toes, were like a virginal on an His loins, like a butter- pot.organ.His nails, like a gimlet.His feet, like a guitar.His heels, like a club.The soles of his feet like a crucible.His legs, like a hawk's lure.His knees, like a joint-stool.His thighs, like a steel cap.The peritoneum, or caul, wherein 6his bowels were wrapped, like abilliard- table.His back, like an overgrown rack- bent cross- bow.The vertebræ, orjoints of his back- bone, like a bagpipe.His ribs, like a spinning-wheel.His brisket, like a canopy.His shoulder- blades like a mortar.after the old fashion , with a girdle His breast, like a game at nine-pins.His hips, like a wimble.His belly as big as a tun, buttonedriding over the middle of his bo- som.His navel, like a cymbal.His groin, like a minced pie.His member, like a slipper.His purse, like an oil cruet.His genitals, like a joiner's plainer.Their erectingmuscles, like a racket.The perineum, like a flageolet.His arse-hole, like crystal looking- glass.His bum, like a harrow.His paps, like a horn- pipe.His arm- pits, like a chequer.His shoulders like a hand- barrow..His arms, like a riding- hood.Hisfingers like a brotherhood's and- irons.The fibulæ, or lesser bones of his legs, like a pair of stilts.His shin-bones, like sickles.His elbows, like a mouse trap.His hands, like a curry-comb.His neck, like a talboy.fasts: the fastings indeed beginning to increase after mid-lent, andeverybody desiring to know, whither they must go, [ i . e. to what church; ] whence [from what church ] they must come; and lastly through what church they must pass to gain the indulgences.Slow, and attended with great preparatives.CHAP. XXXII.] PANTAGRUEL. 289His throat, like a felt to distil hip. His jaws, like a caudle cup.pocras.The knob in his throat, like a barrel, where hanged two brazen wens, very fine and harmonious,in the shape of an hour-glass.His beard, like a lantern.His chin, like a mushroom.His ears, like a pair of gloves.His nose, like a buskin.His nostrils , like a forehead cloth .His eye-brows, like a dripping- pan.On his left brow was a mark of the shape and bigness of an urinal.His eye-lids, like a fiddle.His eyes, like a comb-box.His optic nerves, like a tinder-box.His forehead, like a false cup.His temples, like the co*ck of a cis.tern.His cheeks, like a pair of wooden shoes.His teeth, like a hunter's staff.¹ Of such colt's teeth as his, you will find one at Co.onges les Royaux in Poictou, and two at la Brosse2 in Xaintonge, on the cellar door.His tongue, like a jew's harp.His mouth, like a horse-cloth.His face embroidered like a mule's pack saddle.His head contrived like a still.His skull, like a pouch.The suturæ, or seams of his skull,like the annulus piscatoris, or the fisher's signet.3 His skin, like a gabardine.His epidermis, or outward skin , like a bolting- cloth.His hair, like a scrubbing- brush.His fur, such as above said.CH. XXXII.—A continuation of Shrovetide's countenance, postures, and way of behaving.It is a wonderful thing, continued Xenomanes, to hear and see the state of Shrovetide.If he chanced to spit, it was whole When he yawned, it was pots full baskets full of goldfinches.Ifhe blowed his nose, it was pickled grigs.When he wept, it was ducks with onion sauce.When he trembled, it was large venison pasties.of pickled pease.When he sighed, it was dried neat's tongues.When he whistled, it was a whole scuttle full of green apes.When he snored, it was pan full of fried beans.wholeWhen he did sweat, it was oid ling When he frowned, it was soused with butter sauce. hogs' feet.When he belched, it was bushels of When he spoke, it was oysters.When he sneezed, it was whole tubs full of mustard,When he coughed, it was boxes of marmalade.When he sobbed, it was water- cresses.1 Long, by much fasting.coarsebrown russet cloth; so little it was like crimson silk, with which Parisatis desired that the wordsofsuch as spoke to her son Cyrus,King of Persia, should be inter- woven.2 Boccace, in his Genealogy of the Gods gives an historical account of some giant's teeth, two whereof were foundat Drepano, in Sicily, fastened to the roof of our lady's church.there, bytwo iron chains. 3The pope's seal is doubtless meant bythis.VOL. II. U290 RABELAIS' WORKS. [BOOK IV.When he blowed, it was indulgence When he broke wind, it was dun money- boxes. cows' leather spatterdashes.When he winked, it was buttered When he funcked, it was washed- buns. leather boots.When he grumbled, it was March When he scratched himself, it was cats.Whenhe nodded, it was iron-bound waggons.When he made mouths, it was broken staves.When he muttered, it was lawyers'revels.When he hopped about, it was letters of licence and protections.When he stepped back, it was sea co*ckle-shells.When he slabbered, it was common ovens.When he was hoarse, it was an entry of morrice- dancers.new proclamations.When he sung, it was peas in cods.When he evacuated, it was mush- rooms and morilles.When he puffed, it was cabbages with oil, alias caules amb'olif.When he talked, it was the last year's snow.When he dreamt, it was of a co*ck and a bull.When he gave nothing, so much for the bearer.If he thought to himself, it was whimsies and maggots.5If he dozed, it was leases of lands.What is yet more strange, he used to work doing nothing,and did nothing though he worked; caroused sleeping, andslept carousing, with his eyes open, like the hares in ourcountry, for fear of being taken napping by the Chitterlings,his inveterate enemies; biting he laughed, and laughing bit;eat nothing fasting, and fasted eating nothing; mumbledupon suspicion, drank by imagination, swam on the tops ofhigh steeples, dried his clothes in ponds and rivers, fished.in the air, and there used to catch decumane lobsters; huntedat the bottom of the herring- pond, and caught there ibices,stamboucs, chamois, and other wild goats; used to put outthe eyes of all the crows which he took sneakingly; feared4 Caules amb'olif in Rabelais: on which M. Duchat says, cabbagesor coleworts, with oil , is a common dish among the people of Gas- cony and Languedoc, who abound more with oil than butter. Ambed'oli, avec d'huile, is the true Languedocian word, though Rabelais spells it otherwise. 5 Rabelais says, " S'il songeoit, c'etoientvits volants et rampans contre une muraille. " If he dreamt, it waswhim-whams, men's pissing tools, flying in the air, or creeping up a wall.Such dreams prove sometimes dangerous, especially to the fair sex, as we learn from Verville's Moyen de Parvenir. Mademoiselle de Lescar,says he, dreaming one night that she was in a p.oughed field, wherethey were sowing catzoes, she sprung out of bed on a sudden, andbroke her arm in straining to catch a catzoe, one of the largest size,as it was falling to the ground. This she confessed to the king's surgeon.From the German word stein-bock, i . e. rock or mountain goats,not unlike a roe- buck. 7 In the Sneaking island rather. EnTapinois. By the crows whose eyes he put out, may be meant theCHAP. XXXII. ]PANTAGRUEL. 2918nothing but his own shadow, and the cries offat kids; used togad abroad some days, like a truant school- boy; played withthe ropes of bells on festival days of saints; made a malletof his fist, and writ on hairy parchment¹" prognosticationsand almanacks with his huge pin- case.Is that the gentleman? said Friar John: he is my man:this is the very fellow I looked for; I will send him a challenge immediately. This is, said Pantagruel, a strange andmonstrous sort of man, if I may call him a man. You put me in mind of the form and looks of Amodunt and Dissonance.How were they made, said Friar John? May I be peeledlike a raw onion, if ever I heard a word of them . I'll tell you what I read of them in some ancient apologues, replied Pantagruel.Physis-that is to say Nature-at her first burthen begatBeauty and Harmony, without carnal copulation, being ofherself very fruitful and prolific. Antiphysis, who ever wasthe antagonist of Nature, immediately, out of a maliciousspite against her for her beautiful and honourable productions,in opposition begot Amodunt and Dissonance, " by copula- tion with Tellumon.12 Their heads were round like a footmonks, who, the moment they make profession, are to see nothing but with their superior's eyes. 8 Rabelais seems here to point atsuch monks as long to eat flesh, but are afraid of two things: first,lest their companion should betray them; secondly, lest the cries of the kid they have a mind to feast upon, should discover them.Monks usually go abroad in couples to visit the sick or to gather contri- butions for the sick, &c. &c. &c. 9 This is far from whatRabelais means by, sejouoit és cordes des ceincts. Ceinct (from cinctus in Latin) is one that is girded about or cinctured, as the cordeliers arewith a cord (crorde, in French; ) with which cord or rope they play,and divert themselves, when they are within the walls oftheir convent;but abroad they trumpet forth its praises, and extol its merit and virtue to the skies. Some of the new editions of Rabelais have it indeed,sejoüoit ès cordes des saincts: but Rabelais, even in that case, doesnot allude at all to church bell -ropes, but puns upon the coincidence of sounds between cordes and corps des saincts; as if he had said, they play with the bodies of saints and reliques, and make use ofthem as ways and means to get money. 10 Took a great deal of pains to no purpose. Towrite with a pen on hairy parchment, is losingone's labour and time too.11 Or Amodun, that is, says the Dutch scholiast, sine modo, fromthe primitive a, and the noun modus. ) A deformed, irregular, enor- mous thing. Thus says our author, Amodunt and Discordance werethe offspring of Antiphysis, i. e. repugnant to, or against nature.12 As all the learned men I have hitherto consulted (says M. Duchat)on this pretended ancient apologue, have confessed themselves to be U 2292 [BOOK IV. RABELAIS WORKS.ball, and not gently flatted on both sides, like the commonshape of men. Their ears stood pricked up like those ofasses; their eyes, as hard as those of crabs, and withoutbrows, stared out of their heads, fixed on bones like those ofour heels; their feet were round, like tennis - balls; theirarms and hands turned backwards towards the shoulders;and they walked on their heads, continually turning roundlike a ball, topsy- turvy, heels over head.Yet as you know that apes esteem their young the handsomest in the world-Antiphysis extolled her offspring, andstrove to prove, that their shape was handsomer and neaterthan that of the children of Physis: saying, that thus to havespherical heads and feet, and walk in a circular manner, wheel.ing round, had something in it of the perfection of the divinepower, which makes all beings eternally turn in that fashion;and that to have our feet uppermost, and the head belowthem, was to imitate the Creator of the universe; the hairbeing like the roots, " and the legs like the branches of man:for trees are better planted by their roots, than they couldbe by their branches. By this demonstration she implied,that her children were much more to be praised for beinglike a standing tree, than those of Physis, that made a figureof a tree upside down. As for the arms and hands, shepretended to prove that they were more justly turned towardsthe shoulders, because that part of the body ought not to bewithout defence, while the forepart is duly fenced with teeth ,which a man cannot only use to chew, but also to defendhimself against those things that offend him. Thus, by thetestimony and astipulation of the brute beasts, she drew allthe witless herd and mob of fools into her opinion, and wasadmired by all brainless and nonsensical people.Since that, she begot the hypocritical tribes of eaves- droputterly ignorant who was the author of it: till such time as it is dis- covered, adds he, supposing it not to be Rabelais himself, which is very possible, I shall only take notice, after Varro, in the fragments of his De Diis; S. Augustin, l . 7 , c. 23, of the City of God; and Stuckius de Gentilium sacris, &c. Zurich edition, 1598; I say, I shall content my- self with observing, that the Romans who made Tellumon one oftheirdivinities, distinguished him from their deity Tellus in this, viz. the latter, Tellus. according to their theology, was the earth, as to concep- tion , and Tellumon the same earth as to production. [ It is copied from Cœlius Calcagninus, Opera, Bâle, 1544, folio, page 622. ]13 Hardly intelligible . Read therefore as Rabelais wrote it; seeing the hair is in man like roots, and the legs like branches.CHAP. XXXII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 293ping dissemblers, superstitious pope-mongers, and priestridden bigots, the frantic Pistolets, " the demoniacal Calvins ,impostors of Geneva, " the scrapers of benefices, apparitors with the devil in them, and other grinders and squeezers oflivings, herb- stinking hermits, gulligutted dunces of the cowl, church vermin, false zealots , devourers of the substance of men, and many more other deformed and ill-favouredmonsters, made in spite of nature.16ONCHAPS. XXIX. XXX. XXXI.AND XXXII .-The sneaking island,which Pantagruel sailed by when he left that of the Macreons, is thedwelling of Shrovetide; by which we must understand Lent; for theecclesiastics of the church of Rome begin their Lent before the laity;Shrove-Tuesday is to them a day of humiliation, and is properly thetime when men are shriven; our author calls it Quaresmeprenant, thatis, the beginning of Quadragesima; in opposition to Mardigras, ShroveTuesday. The Cardinal de Lorraine, says a book called " L'Heracl*teFrançois, " made three clergymen in a manner titular bishops of Metz,Toul, and Verdun, reserving the whole income of those bishoprics tohimself, and leaving them little of them besides the title of bishops.For this reason they were called les evesques de caresmeprenant; be- cause they looked as meagre and starved as if it had been Lent withthem all the year; but I cannot think that our author reflects here on that cardinal. His design seems rather to expose the superstition ofthe Papists about Lent, and how much the practice of it, their way,shocked good sense; this made him run on for two or three chapterswith an odd description of that ridiculous monster; and probably alsoto secure himself from the informations of his prying enemies, by that mixture of comical seeming nonsense. For, as in the time of Lent, thesuperstition, grimaces, and hypocrisy of the Papists are most observable,and they look on it in a manner as the basis of the Christian religion, it would have been dangerous to have attacked them openly in point.We find that the wise Xenomanes, one of Pantagruel's most ex- perienced companions, advises him not to go where Shrovetide reigned,and says it would be much out of their way to the Oracle of Truth: that there is very lean cheer at this court; that he is a double- shaveling,banner-bearer to the fish-eating tribe, a flogger of little children , because14 Under the name of Pistolets, Rabelais alludes to the black andwhite factions, a sort of Guelphs and Ghibellines, who, about the year 1300, sprung up in Italy, in the little town of Pistoia; which placelikewise gave name afterwards to (pistolets de poche) pocket- pistols.15 Rabelais here avenges himself on Calvin, who had attacked him in his work, De Scandalis, published in 1550.16 Enraigez putherbes, it is in Rabelais; who does not thereby al- lude to any- herb- stinking hermits, but to a certain monk, a great enemy to our author, whose name was Puy- Herbaut, calling himself utherbeus; which, in old French, signifies a well, infected with herbs which make folks mad. He had but ill - Latinized his own name to abook he wrote against Rabelais: published in 1519, entitled, Theotinus,sive de expungendis et tollendis malis libris.294 RABELAIS' WORKS. BOOK IV.Papists do penance, and whip themselves then; a calciner of ashes,because of Ash- Wednesday; that he swarms with pardons, indulgen- ces and stations; which makes the author say, in the 31st chapter, that Shrovetide being married to Mid- Lent, only begot a good number oflocal adverbs; that is, the stations, the churches, and chapels, whitherthe guiled mob must go, whence they come, and through which they must pass to gain the indulgences. We are told besides, that he neverassists at weddings, but, give the devil his due, is the most industriouslarding-stick and skewer-maker in forty kingdoms; because the butchershave then little else to do but to make some. Lent is an enemy to sausages and chitterlings, because, as well as all other flesh ( I mean dead flesh) the people are forbid to taste of any then.Friar John, always daring and hasty, is for destroying Lent; but Pa- nurge, still fearful and wary, is not of his mind. Rabelais calls thatisland Tapinois; that word in French is generally used adverbially,with the preposition en, to signify an underhand way of acting. Some derive it from the Greek verb razuvów, humilem reddo; and so it suitswith the true design of Lent, to humble man and make him look sneak.ingly. Besides, Lent, sneaking in some years sooner, and others later,may also for that reason well be said to dwell in Tapinois . The inge- nious fable ofnature and her counterpart, is brought in to shewthat thosewho enjoin things that shock nature, as is the church of Rome's way ofkeeping Lent, have the confidence to make laws contrary to those ofGod, and the impudence to pretend to justify them by reason: so Rabelais tells us, that Antiphysis, the mother of Lent, begot also the eavesdropping dissemblers, superstitious pope-mongers and priest- riddenbigots, scrapers of benefices, mad herb- stinking hermits, gulli-gutted dunces of the cowl , church vermin, devourers of the substance of men,and other deformed and ill- favoured monsters, made in spite of nature.-M.CH. XXXIII. —How Pantagruel discovered a monstrous physeter, or whirlpool, near the Wild Island.ABOUT sunset, coming near the Wild Island, Pantagruelspied afar off a huge monstrous physeter, ' -a sort of whale,which some call a whirlpool, -that came right upon us,neighing, snorting, raised above the waves higher than ourmain- tops, and spouting water all the way into the air, beforeitself, like a large river falling from a mountain: Pantagruelshowed it to the pilot, and to Xenomanes.By the pilot's advice, the trumpets of the Thalamege were sounded, to warn all the fleet to stand close , and look tothemselves. This alarm being given, all the ships, galleons,frigates, brigantines, -according to their naval discipline,1 A species of whale, seen sometimes off the French coast particu larly towards Bayonne. The Greeks have named this fish Physeter, as much as to say, the blower, on account of the vast quantity of water it blows, as it were, out of a hole in the upper part of his head.·CHAP. XXXIII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 295-placed themselves in the order and figure of a Greek up.silon, (v) the letter of Pythagoras, as cranes do in theirflight; and like an acute angle, in whose cone and basis theThalamege placed herself ready to fight smartly. Friar John,with the grenadiers, got on the forecastle.3Poor Panurge began to cry and howl worse than ever:Babillebabou, said he, shrugging up his shoulders, quiveringall over with fear, there will be the devil upon dun. Thisis a worse business than that the other day, Let us fly, letus fly; old Nick take me if it is not Leviathan, described bythe noble prophet Moses, in the life of patient Job. It willswallow us all, ships and men, shag, rag, and bobtail, like adose of pills. Alas, it will make no more of us, and we shallhold no more room in its hellish jaws, than a sugar- plum inan ass's throat. Look, look, it is upon us; let us wheel off,whip it away, and get ashore. I believe it is the very individual sea monster that was formerly designed to devour Andromeda we are all undone. Oh! for some valiant Perseushere now to kill the dog.I'll do its business presently, said Pantagruel; fear nothing. Odds-belly, said Panurge, remove the cause of myfear then. When the devil would you have a man be afraid,but when there is so much cause? If your destiny be such,as Friar John was saying a while ago, replied Pantagruel,you ought to be afraid of Pyroeis, Eous , Ethon, and Phlegon,the sun's coach horses, that breathe fire at the nostrils; andnot of physeters, that spout nothing but water at the snout and mouth. Their water will not endanger your life; andthat element will rather save and preserve than hurt or en- danger you.Ay, ay, trust to that, and hang me, quoth Panurge: yoursis a very pretty fancy. Odd's fish: did I not give you asufficient account of the element's transmutation, and theblunders that are made of roast for boiled , and boiled forroast? Alas, here it is; I'll go hide myself below. Weare dead men, every mother's son of us: I see upon ourmain-top that merciless hag Atropos," with her scissors new2 This observation on the manner of the cranes flying, is Plutarch's in the treatise where he examines what creatures show most sense.3 Bombardiers in Rabelais. 4 In ch. 24, Friar John ad vises Panurge not so much to fear water as fire." The physeter, which Panurge's fear represented to him as lifting upits head higher than the main-top .296 [ BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.ground, ready to cut our threads all at one snip. Oh! how dreadful and abominable thou art; thou hast drowned agood many beside us, who never made their brags of it.Did it but spout good, brisk, dainty, delicious white wine,.nstead of this damned bitter salt water, one might better bear with it, and there would be some cause to be patient; like that English lord, who being doomed to die,and had leave to choose what kind of death he would, choseto be drowned in a butt of malmsey. Here it is . —Oh, oh!devil! Sathanas! Leviathan! I cannot abide to look uponthee, thou art so abominably ugly. -Go to the bar, go takethe pettifoggers.CH. XXXIV.-How the monstrous physeter was slain byPantagruel.THE physeter, coming between the ships and the galleons ,threw water by whole tuns upon them, as if it had been thecataracts of the Nile in Ethiopia. On the other side, arrows, darts, gleaves, javelins, spears, harping- irons, and partizans, flew upon it like hail. Friar John did not sparehimself in it. Panurge was half dead for fear. The artillery roared and thundered like mad, and seemed to gall itin good earnest, but did but little good: for the great ironand brass cannon- shot, entering its skin, seemed to melt like tiles in the sun.Pantagruel then, considering the weight and exigency ofGeorge Duke of Clarence, whom his brother, Edward IV. King ofEngland, put to that sortof death in Feb., 1477, or, according to the Ro- man calendar, 1478, through a conceit that Merlin's prophecies were re- lative to the Duke of Clarence, as the person that would one day deprive his (the King's) children of the crown. See the continuation of Monstrelet, fol. 196. Fulgosus, 1. 9, c. 12, and Martin du Bellais' memoirs,1. 1 , onthe year 1514. Some historians [ see Georg. Lilii Chronicon,1568 ] satisfy themselves with saying, that this unfortunate Duke George was suffocated in the tower of London, without specifying whether itwasby means of wine or otherwise. But supposing that the Duke had really made choice of this way of going out of the world, as is related by Rabelais: yet this lord's mad fancy would not be without ex- ample: witness the following epigram, among the Tombeaux of Michael Harslob, of Berlin, printed in 8vo, at Franckfort on the Oder, in the year 1571." In cyatho vini pleno cum musca periret,Sic, ait Oeneus, sponte perire velim."When in a cup of wine a fly was drowned.So, said Vinarius, may my days be crowned!CHAP. XXXIV. ] PANTAGRUEL. 297the matter, stretched out his arms, and showed what hecould do. You tell us, and it is recorded, that Commodus,the Roman emperor, could shoot with a bow so dexterously,that at a good distance he would let fly an arrow through achild's fingers , and never touch them. You also tell us ofan Indian archer, who lived when Alexander the Great conquered India, and was so skilful in drawing the bow, that at a considerable distance he would shoot his arrows through aring, though they were three cubits long, and their iron solarge and weighty, that with them he used to pierce steel cutlasses , thick shields , steel breast-plates, and generally whathe did hit, how firm, resisting, hard, and strong soever it were. You also tell us wonders of the industry of the ancient Franks, who were preferred to all others in point ofarchery; and when they hunted either black or dun beasts ,used to rub the head of their arrows with hellebore, because the fesh of the venison struck with such an arrow, was moretender, dainty, wholesome, and delicious -paring off, nevertheless, the part that was touched round about. You alsotalk of the Parthians, who used to shoot backwards, moredexterously than other nations forwards; and also celebratethe skill of the Scythians in that art, who sent once to Darius,King of Persia, an ambassador, that made him a present ofa bird, a frog, a mouse, and five arrows, without speakingone word; and being asked what those presents meant, andf he had commission to say anything , answered, that he hadnot which puzzled and gravelled Darius very much, tillGobrias, one of the seven captains that had killed the magi,explained it, saying to Darius: By these gifts and offeringsthe Scythians silently tell you , that except the Persians, likebirds, fly up to heaven, or like mice, hide themselves nearthe centre of the earth, or, like frogs, dive to the very bottom of ponas ana lakes, they snaïi be destroyed by the powerand arrows of the Scythians.The noble Pantagruel was, without comparison, more admirable yet in the art of shooting and darting: for with hisdreadful piles and darts, nearly resembling. the huge beams.that support the bridges of Nantes, Saumur, Bergerac, andat Paris the millers and the changers bridges, in length, size,weight, and iron- work, he, at a mile's distance, would open anoyster, and never touch the edges; he would snuff a candle,without putting it out; would shoot a mag-pie in the eye:༡༩༩ {BOOK IV. RABELAIS' WORKS.take off a boot's under- sole, or, a riding-hood's lining, without soiling them a bit; turn over every leaf of Friar John'sbreviary, one after another, and not tear one.With such darts, of which there was good store in theship, at the first blow he ran the physeter in at the foreheadso furiously, that he pierced both its jaws and tongue: sothat from that time to this it no more opened its gutturaltrap-door, nor drew and spouted water. At the second blowhe put out its right eye, and at the third its left: and wehad all the pleasure to see the physeter bearing those threehorns in its forehead, somewhat leaning forwards in an equilateral triangle.Meanwhile it turned about to and fro, staggering andstraying like one stunned, blinded, and taking his leave ofthe world. Pantagruel, not satisfied with this, let fly another dart, which took the monster under the tail likewisesloping; then with three other on the chine, in a perpendicular line, divided its flank from the tail to the snout at anequal distance: then he larded it with fifty on one side, andafter that, to make even work, he darted as many on itsother side: so that the body of the physeter seemed likethe hulk of a galleon with three masts, joined by a competent dimension of its beams, as if they had been the ribs and chain-wales of the keel; which was a pleasant sight. Thephyseter then giving up the ghost, turned itself upon itsback, as all dead fishes do; and being thus overturned, withthe beams and darts upside down in the sea, it seemed ascolopendra or centipede, as that serpent is described by theancient sage Nicander.ON CHAPS. XXXIII. AND XXXIV. -The monstrous physeter, orwhirlpool, a huge fish which dies of the wounds given him by Pantagruel near the Wild Island, where lived the Chitterlings; Shrovetide'smortal foes, seem to have a relation to the expiration of Lent; aboutwhich time in France they have conquered all their stores of salt fish ,and after which flesh rules on the tables; and many are so wild forchitterlings, and other meat, that they get flesh dressed on Easter-eve late at night, and fall to like mad, as soon as the clock strikes twelve:for that reason he makes the fish die near a flesh country. -M.CH. XXXV. -How Pantagruel went on shore in the wild island,the ancient abode of the Chitterlings.¹THE boat's crew of the ship Lantern towed the physeterAndouilles, which is the word Rabelais has all along used, is properly a big hog's gut stuffed with chitterlings cut small, and other entrails catCHAP. XXXV.] PANTAGRUEL. 299ashore on the neighbouring shore, which happened to be theWild Island, to make an anatomical dissection of its body,and save the fat of its kidneys, which, they said, was veryuseful and necessary for the cure of a certain distemper,which they called want of money. As for Pantagruel, hetook no manner of notice of the monster; for he had seenmany such, nay, bigger, in the Gallic ocean. Yet he condescended to land in the Wild Island, to dry and refreshsome of his men, (whom the physeter had wetted and bedaubed, ) at a small desert sea- port towards the south,seated near a fine pleasant grove, out of which flowed a delicious brook of fresh, clear, and purling water. Here theypitched their tents, and set up their kitchens; nor did theyspare fuel.Every one having shifted, as they thought fit, Friar Johnrang the bell, and the cloth was immediately laid, and supperbrought in. Pantagruel eating cheerfully with his men,much about the second course, perceived certain little slyChitterlings clambering up a high tree near the pantry, as still as so many mice. Which made him ask Xenomanes,what kind of creatures these were; taking them for squirrels, weazels, martins, or ermines. They are Chitterlings,replied Xenomanes. This is the Wild Island, of which Ispoke to you this morning: there hath been an irreconcilablewar, this long time, between them and Shrovetide, theirmalicious and ancient enemy. I believe that the noise ofthe guns, which we fired at the physeter, hath alarmed them ,and made them fear their enemy hath come with his forces to surprise them, or lay the island waste; as he hath oftenattempted to do, though he still came off but bluely; byreason of the care and vigilance of the Chitterlings , who, ( asDido said to Æneas's companions, that would have landedat Carthage without her leave or knowledge, ) were forced towatch and stand upon their guard, considering the malice of their enemy, and the neighbourhood of his territories.Pray, dear friend, said Pantagruel, if you find that bysome honest means we may bring this war to an end, andinto small pieces, and seasoned with pepper and salt, not forgetting sweet herbs. 2 There is reason to believe, that bythe wild island Rabelais means culinary fire, fire in the kitchens. The company go thither to dry themselves, and the ships' crews to melt the physeter's fat. What is more; it is the very element of chitterlings;and, lastly, nothing is so wild as fire is, since it devours every thing,800 [BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.reconcile them together, give me notice of it; I will use my endeavours in it, with all my heart, and spare nothing onmy side to moderate and accommodate the points in dispute between both parties.That is impossible at this time, answered Xenomanes.About four years ago, passing incognito by this country, Iendeavoured to make a peace, or at least a long truce amongthem; and I certainly had brought them to be good friendsand neighbours, if both one and the other parties wouldhave yielded to one single article. Shrovetide would notinclude in the treaty of peace, the wild puddings, nor thehighland sausages, their ancient gossips and confederates.The Chitterlings demanded, that the fort of Cacques³ mightbe under their government, as is the Castle of Sullouoir, "and that a parcel of I don't know what stinking villains,murderers, robbers, that held it then, should be expelled.But they could not agree in this, and the terms that wereoffered seemed too hard to either party. So the treaty brokeoff, and nothing was done. Nevertheless, they became lesssevere, and gentler enemies than they were before; butsince the denunciation of the national Council of Chesil,whereby they the Chitterlings -were roughly handled,hampered, and cited; whereby also Shrovetide was declaredfilthy, besh*tten, and bewrayed,' in case he made any league,or agreement with them; they are grown wonderfully inveterate, incensed, and obstinate against one another, and there .is no way to remedy it. You might sooner reconcile catsand rats, or hounds and hares together.-3 Cacque is what we call a cag, keg, or barrel, or other vessel, to keep salt fish in, and herrings, which two are Shrovetide's chief ammunition.4 In some editions, Sallouoir. Allusion between the castle of Soleurre in Switzerland (castrum Salodorense) and saloir, a powdering tub which is commonly shaped like an antique tower, and the chit- terlings for the most part keep garrison therein. Stinking herring, and putrified stock- fish, which are in the cags, enough to poison such as come near them, or eat of them.56 Read, towzed, groped , grabbled, ruffled , tumbled, crumpled , andberumpled. Farfouillèes, godelurèes, &c. It means the council branded the chitterlings with infamy, for suffering themselves, and the en- trails to be so handled. 7 Add unfledged and stock-fishified:hallebrené, and stocfisé. Hallebrené; incapable of supporting themselves, or flying, like unfledged wild ducklings, called hallebrens.Stocfise, excommunicated, or headless like a dried cod, which the Germans call stoc- fisch, from a word which in their language signifies fish without a head.CHAP. XXXVI. ]PANTAGRUEL. 301CH. XXXVI. - How the wild Chitterlings laid an ambuscadefor Pantagruel.WHILE Xenomanes was saying this, Friar John spied twentyor thirty young slender- shaped Chitterlings, posting as fastas they could towards their town, citadel, castle, and fort ofChimney, and said to Pantagruel, I smell a rat: there willbe here the devil upon two sticks , ' or I ammuch out. Theseworshipful Chitterlings may chance to mistake you for Shrovetide, though you are not a bit like him. Let us once in ourlives leave our junketing for a while, and put ourselves in aposture to give them a bellyful of fighting, if they would beat that sport. There can be no false Latin in this, saidXenomanes; Chitterlings are still Chitterlings, always doublehearted, and treacherous,Pantagruel then arose from table, to visit and scour thethicket, and returned presently; having discovered, on theleft, an ambuscade of squab Chitterlings; and on the right,about half a league from thence, a large body of huge giantlike armed Chitterlings, ranged in battalia along a little hill,and marching furiously towards us at the sound of bagpipes,sheep's paunches, and bladders, the merry fifes and drums,trumpets, and clarions, hoping to catch us as Moss caught his mare. By the conjecture of seventy- eight standards,which we told, we guessed their number to be two and fortythousand, at a modest computation.Their order, proud gait, and resolute looks, made us judgethat they were none of your raw, paltry links , but old warlike Chitterlings and Sausages. From the foremost ranksto the colours they were all armed cap-à- pié with smallarms, as we reckoned them at a distance: yet, very sharp,and case-hardened . Their right and left wings were linedwith a great number of forest puddings, heavy pattipans ,and horse sausages, all of them tall and proper islanders,banditti, and wild.Pantagruel was very much daunted, and not withoutcause; though Epistemon told him that it might be the use1 Rabelais, " il y aura icy de l'asme, je le prevoy." We shall have the braying scene here, or I am much out. That is, says M. Duchat,there will be a scene of errors, as between the two country- bumpkins, in Don Quixote, who, by their counterfeit brayings, always met each other, instead of meeting with the ass they were in quest of.quibbles upon andouilles being (doublées) lined with small guts2 Ha802 [BOOK IV. RABELAIS' WORKS.and custom of the Chitterlingonians to welcome and receivethus in arms their foreign friends, as the noble kings ofFrance are received and saluted at their first coming intothe chief cities of the kingdom, after their advancement tothe crown. Perhaps, said he, it may be the usual guard ofthe queen of the place; who, having notice given her, bythe junior Chitterlings of the forlorn hope whom you sawon the tree, of the arrival of your fine and pompous fleet,hath judged that it was, without doubt, some rich and potent prince, and is come to visit you in person.Pantagruel, little trusting to this, called a council, to havetheir advice at large in this doubtful case. He brieflyshowed them how this way of reception, with arms, hadoften, under colour of compliment and friendship, been fatal.Thus, said he, the Emperor Antonius Caracalla, at one time,destroyed the citizens of Alexandria, and at another time, cutoff the attendants of Artabanus, King of Persia, under colourof marrying his daughter: which, by the way, did not pass unpunished for, a while after, this cost him his life .Thus Jacob's children destroyed the Sichemites, to revengethe rape of their sister Dinah. By such another hypocriticaltrick , Gallienus the Roman emperor, put to death the military men in Constantinople. Thus, under colour of friendship, Antonius enticed Artavasdes, King of Armenia; then,having caused him to be bound in heavy chains, and shackled,at last put him to death.We find a thousand such instances in history; and KingCharles VI. is justly commended for his prudence to thisday, in that, coming back victorious over the Ghenters andother Flemings , to his good city of Paris, and when he cameto Bourget, a league from thence, hearing that the citizenswith their mallets-whence they got the name of Maillotins ³ -were marched out of town in battalia, twenty thousand strong. he would not go into the town, till they hadlaid down their arms, and retired to their respective homes;though they protested to him, that they had taken arms withno other design than to receive him with the greater demonstration of honour and respect.$Maillotins. The Parisians had taken these two- headed hammers(maillets, ) out of the town house, and this happened in 1413.´ ,JAP. XXXVII.]PANTAGRUEL. 300CH. XXXVII. -How Pantagruel sent for Colonel Maul- Chitterling, and Colonel Cut- Pudding; with a discourse well worthyour hearing, about the names ofplaces and persons.THE resolution of the council was, that, let things be howthey would, it behoved the Pantagruelists to stand upontheir guard. Therefore Carpalim and Gymnast were orderedby Pantagruel to go for the soldiers that were on board theCup galley, under the command of Colonel Maul- chitterling,and those on board the Vine-tub frigate, under the commandof Colonel Cut-pudding the younger. I will ease Gymnastof that trouble, said Panurge, who wanted to be upon therun you may have occasion for him here. By this worthyfrock of mine, quoth Friar John, thou hast a mind to slipthy neck out of the collar, and absent thyself from the fight,thou white-livered son of a dunghill! upon my virginity thouwilt never come back. Well, there can be no great loss inthee; for thou wouldest do nothing here but howl, bray,weep, and dishearten the good soldiers. I will certainlycome back, said Panurge, Friar John, my ghostly father,and speedily too: do but take care that these plaguy Chitterlings do not board our ships. All the while you will bea fighting, I will pray heartily for your victory, after the example of the valiant captain and guide of the people ofIsrael, Moses. Having said this , he wheeled off.Then said Epistemon to Pantagruel, the denomination ofthese two colonels of yours, Maul- chitterling and Cut- pudding, promiseth us assurance, success, and victory, if those Chitterlings should chance to set upon us. You take itrightly, said Pantagruel, and it pleaseth me to see you foreseeand prognosticate our victory by the name of our colonels .This way of foretelling by names is not new; it was inold times celebrated, and religiously observed by the Pythagoreans. Several great princes and emperors have formerly made use of it. Octavianus Augustus, second emperor ofthe Romans, meeting on a day a country fellow named Eutychus,—that is, fortunate, -driving an ass named Niconthat is in Greek, victorious, -moved by the signification ofthe ass's and ass-driver's names, remained assured of allprosperity and victory.The Emperor Vespasian, being once all alone at prayers. inthe temple of Serapis, at the sight and unexpected coming of304 [BOCK IV. RABELAIS' WORKS.a certain servant of his, named Basilides, —that is , royal, —whom he had left sick a great way behind, took hopes andassurance of obtaining the empire of the Romans. Regilian was chosen emperor, by the soldiers , for no other reason,but the signification of his name. See the Cratylus of thedivine Plato. (By my thirst I will read him, said Rhizotomus; I hear you so often quote him. ) See how the Pythagoreans, by reason of the names and numbers, conclude thatPatroclus was to fall by the hand of Hector; Hector byAchilles; Achilles by Paris; Paris by Philoctetes . I amquite lost in my understanding, when I reflect upon the admirable invention of Pythagoras, who by the number, eithereven or odd, of the syllables of every name, ' would tell youof what side a man was lame, hunch- backed, blind, gouty,troubled with the palsy, pleurisy, or any other distemper incident to human kind; allotting even numbers to the left,and odd ones to the right side of the body.Indeed, said Epistemon, I saw this way of syllabising triedat Xaintes, at a general procession , in the presence of thatgood, virtuous, learned , and just president, Brian Vallée,'Lord of Douhait. When there went by a man or womanthat was either lame, blind of one eye, or hump- backed , hehad an account brought him of his or her name; and ifthe syllables of the name were of an odd number, immediately, without seeing the persons, he declared them to be deformed, blind, lame, or crooked of the right side; and ofthe left, if they were even in number: and such indeed we ever found them.By this syllabical invention , said Pantagruel, the learnedhave affirmed, that Achilles kneeling, was wounded by thearrow of Paris in the right heel; for his name is of oddsyllables; (here we ought to observe that the ancients usedto kneel the right foot:) and that Venus was also woundedbefore Troy in the left hand; for her name in Greek isAopodirn, of four syllables; Vulcan lamed of his left foot forthe same reason; Philip, King of Macedon, and Hannibal,blind of the right eye; not to speak of sciaticas, brokenbellies, and hemicranias, which may be distinguished by thisPythagorean reason.1 Read every person's proper name, d'ung chascun nom propre.Nom propre is one's surname; nome de batéme one's Christian name,says Boyer. 2 It was he who saved Scaliger from the stake whenaccused ofhaving feasted in Lent. It is not unlikely Rabelais lay undera similar obligation to him.CHAP. XXXVII. ]PANTAGRUEL. 305But returning to names: do but consider how Alexanderthe Great, son of King Philip, of whom we spoke just now,compassed his undertaking, merely by the interpretation ofaname. He had besieged the strong city of Tyre, and forseveral weeks battered it with all his power: but all in vain.His engines and attempts were still baffled by the Tyrians,which made him finally resolve to raise the seige, to his greatgrief; foreseeing the great stain which such a shameful retreat would be to his reputation . In this anxiety and agitation of mind he fell asleep, and dreamed that a satry wascome into his tent, capering, skipping, and tripping it up anddown, with his goatish hoofs, and that he strove to lay holdon him. But the satyr still slipt from him, till at last, having penned him up into a corner, he took him. With this heawoke, and telling his dream to the philosophers and sagesof his court, they let him know that it was a promise of victory from the gods, and that he should soon be master ofTyre; the word satyros, divided in two, being sa Tyros, andsignifying Tyre is thine; and in truth , at the next onset, hetook the town by storm, and, by a complete victory, reducedthat stubborn people to subjection.On the other hand, see how, by the signification of oneword, Pompey fell into despair. Being overcome by Cæsar at the battle of Pharsalia, he had no other way left to escapebut by flight; which, attempting by sea, he arrived near the island of Cyprus, and perceived on the shore, near the cityof Paphos, a beautiful and stately palace: now asking thepilot what was the name of it, he told him, that it was called Kakoẞarilia, that is , evil king: which struck such a dreadand terror in him, that he fell into despair, as being assuredof losing shortly his life; insomuch that his complaints,sighs, and groans were heard by the mariners and other passengers. And indeed, a while after, a certain strangepeasant, called Achillas, cut off his head.3To all these examples might be added what happened to L. Paulus Emilius, when the senate elected him imperator,that is, chief of the army which they sent against Perses,King of Macedon. That evening returning home to preparefor his expedition , and kissing a little daughter of his called Trasia, she seemed somewhat sad to him. What is the3 Read, kakoẞaoiλevç. See Val. Max. 1. 1 , c. 5. • See Cicero De Divinatione, &c.VOL. II. X306 [BOOK IV. RABELAIS' WORKS.matter, said he, my chicken? Whyis my Trasia" thus sadand melancholy? Daddy, replied the child, Persa is dead.This was the name of a little bitch, which she loved mightily.Hearing this, Paulus took assurance of a victory over Perses.If time would permit us to discourse of the sacred Hebrewwrit, we might find a hundred noted passages, evidentlyshowing how religiously they observed proper names andtheir significations.He had hardly ended this discourse, when the two colonelsarrived with their soldiers, all well armed and resolute.Pantagruel made them a short speech, entreating them tobehave themselves bravely, in case they were attacked; forhe could not yet believe that the Chitterlings were so treacherous but he bad them by no means to give the firstoffence; giving them carnival for the watch- word.CH. XXXVIII.-How Chitterlings are not to be slightedby men.You shake your empty noddles now, jolly topers, and donot believe what I tell you here, any more than if it weresome tale of a tub. Well, well, I cannot help it. Believeit if you will; if you will not, let it alone. For my part, Ivery well know what I say. It was in the Wild Island, inour voyage to the Holy Bottle; I tell you the time andplace; what would you have more? I would have you callto mind the strength of the ancient giants, that undertook tolay the high mountain Pelion, on the top of Ossa, and setamong those the shady Olympus, to dash out the god's brains, unnestle them, and scour their heavenly lodgings.Theirs was no small strength, you may well think, and yetthey were nothing but Chitterlings from the waist downwards, or, at least, serpents, not to tell a lie for the matter.The serpent that tempted Eve, too, was of the Chitterlingkind, and yet it is recorded of him, that he was more subtlethan any beast of the field. Even so are Chitterlings . Nay,to this very hour they hold in some universities, that this5 Rabelais has it Tratia. It should indeed be Tertia, which being abbreviated into Tria, the printers, often none of the best guessers,made it Tratia instead of Tertia. 6 Plutarch, in the life of Paulus Emilius, copied this passage from Cicero; but not being thoroughly versed in the Latin tongue, as he somewhere owns him.self, he made of this bitch, a dog, which he calls Perseus.CHAP. XXXVIII.] PANTAGRUEL. 307same tempter was the Chitterling called Ithyphallus, ' intowhich was transformed bawdy Priapus, arch- seducer of females in paradise, that is , a garden, in Greek. "Pray now tell me, who can tell but that the Swiss, nowso bold and warlike, were formerly Chitterlings? For mypart I would not take my oath to the contrary. The Himantopodes, a nation very famous in Ethiopia, according toPliny's description, are Chitterlings, and nothing else . If all this will not satisfy your worships, or remove your incredulity, I would have you forthwith ( I mean drinking first,that nothing be done rashly) visit Lusignan, Parthenay,Vouant, Mervant, and Ponzauges in Poictou .There youwill find a cloud of witnesses, not of your affidavit men ofthe right stamp, but credible, time out of mind, that willtake their corporal oath, on Rigomés knuckle- bone,³ thatMelusina, their founder, or foundress, which you please ,was woman from the head to the prick -purse, and thencedownwards was a serpentine Chitterling, or if you will haveit otherwise, a Chitterling- dized serpent. She neverthelesshad a genteel and noble gait, imitated to this very day byyour hop-merchants of Britanny, in their paspié and country dances.What do you think was the cause of Erichthonius's beingthe first inventor of coaches, litters, and chariots? Nothingbut because Vulcan had begot him with Chitterlingdizedlegs; which to hide, he chose to ride in a litter, rather thanon horseback; for Chitterlings were not yet in esteem at that time.The Scythian nymph, Ora," was likewise half woman andhalf Chitterling; and yet seemed so beautiful to Jupiter,that nothing could serve him but he must give her a touchof his godship's kindness; and accordingly he had a braveboy by her, called Colaxes; and therefore I would have youleave off shaking your empty noddles at this , as if it were astory, and firmly believe that nothing is truer than thegospel.¹ See H. Cornelius Agrippa, in his treatise De Origine Peccati.2 Read, in paradise, as the Greeks call it, but garden in French.3 Read, right arm . 4 Aux boursavits. See the old romance of Melusina. ⚫ Herodotus, in the beginning of his fourth book, speaksof one Colaxis, son of Jupiter, and immediately after tells a story of aScythian nymph, half woman and halfserpent, who lay with Hercules.Rabelais, writing bymemory, has confounded and altered thesetwo fables.x 2308 RABELAIS' WORKS. [BOOK IVCH. XXXIX. -How Friar John joined with the cooks to fightthe Chitterlings.FRIAR JOHN, seeing these furious Chitterlings thus boldlymarch up, said to Pantagruel, Here will be a rare battle ofhobby-horses, a pretty kind of puppet-show fight, for ought I see. Oh! what mighty honour and wonderful glory willattend our victory! I would have you only be a bare spectator of this fight, and for any thing else, leave me and mymen to deal with them. What men? said Pantagruel.Matter of breviary, replied Friar John. How came Potiphar,who was head cook of Pharoah's kitchens, he that boughtJoseph, and whom the said Joseph might have made acuckold, if he had not been a Joseph; how came he, Isay, to be made general of all the horse in the kingdom ofEgypt? Why was Nabuzardan, King Nebuchadnezzar's headcook, chosen, to the exclusion of all other captains, to besiege and destroy Jerusalem. I hear you, replied Pantagruel. By St. Christopher's whiskers, said Friar John, Idare lay a wager that it was because they had formerly engaged Chitterlings, or men as little valued; whom to rout,conquer, and destroy, cooks are , without comparison, morefit, than cuirassiers and gens d'- armes armed at all points,or all the horse and foot in the world.You put me in mind, said Pantagruel, of what is writtenamongst the facetious and merry sayings of Cicero. Duringthe more than civil wars between Cæsar and Pompey,though he was much courted by the first, he naturally leaned more to the side of the latter. Now one day, hearing thatthe Pompeyians, in a certain rencontre, had lost a greatmany men, he took a fancy to visit their camp. There he perceived little strength, less courage, but much disorder.From that time, foreseeing that things would go ill withthem, as it since happened, he began to banter now one and then another, and be very free of his cutting jests: sosome of Pompey's captains, playing the good fellows, to show their assurance, told him, do you see how many eagleswe have yet? (They were then the device of the Romansin war.) They might be of use to you, replied Cicero, ifyou had to do with magpies.Thus seeing we are to fight Chitterlings , pursuea Pantagruel, you infer thence that it is a culinary war, and have aCHAP. XL. ]PANTAGRUEL. 309mind to join with the cooks. Well, do as you please. I will stay here in the meantime, and wait for the event of the rumpus.Friar John went that very moment among the sutlers, intothe cook's tents, and toldthem in a pleasing manner; I mustsee you crowned with honour and triumph this day, my lads;to your arms are reserved such achievements as never yetwere performed within the memory of man. Odd's belly,do they make nothing of the valiant cooks? let us go fightyonder fornicating Chitterlings! I will be your captain. Butfirst let us drink boys, -come on-let us be of good cheer.Noble captain, returned the kitchen tribe, this was spokenlike yourself; bravely offered: huzza! we are all at yourexcellency's command, and will live and die by you. Live,live, said Friar John, a God's name: but die by no means.That is the Chitterlings' lot; they shall have their bellyfulof it: come on then, let us put ourselves in order; Nabuzardan's the word.CH. XL.-How Friar Johnfitted up the sow; and ofthe valiant cooks that went into it.THEN, by Friar John's order, the engineers and their workmen fitted up the great sow that was in the ship Leathernbottle. It was a wonderful machine, so contrived , that, bymeans of large engines that were round about in rows, it threw forked iron bars, and four square steel - bolts; and inits hold two hundred men at least could easily fight, and besheltered. It was made after the model ofthe sow of Riole ,by the means of which Bergerac was re-taken from the English, in the reign of Charles the Sixth.'Here are the names of the noble and valiant cooks whowent into the sow, as the Greeks did into the Trojan horse.Sour-sauce. Crisp-pig. Carbonadoe.Sweet- meat. Greasy- slouch. Sop-in-pan.Greedy- gut. Fat-gut.Pick-fowl.Liquorice- chops. Bray-mortar. Mustard-pot.Soused- pork.Lick- sauce. Hog's- haslet.Slap- sauce. Hog's-foot. Chopt-phiz.co*ck-broth. Gallimaufrey.Slipslop.Hodge-podge.' Rabelais mistakes. It wasin Charles the Fifth's reign, in the year 1378.two years before that prince's death. Froissart, vol. ii. c. 2, on that year. They sent to Riolle for a huge machine called a sow, which was so contrived as to cast prodigious stones, and could easily shelter a hundred men at arms, in their approaches to attack the town.310 [BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.All these noble cooks, in their coat of arms, did bear, in afield gules, a larding- pin vert, charged with a chevron argent.Lard, hog's-lard.Nibble-lard.Filch-lard .Fat-lard.Pinch-lard.Top-lard.Pick-lardave-lard.Snatch-lard.Gnaw-lard.Scrape-lard.Chew-lard.Gaillardon (by syncope) born near Rambouillet. Theculinary doctor's name was Gaillardlardon, in the samemanner as you use to say idolatrous for idololatrous .Stiff- lard.Dainty- lard.Watch- lard.Sweet-lard.Eat- lard .Snap-lard .Catch-lard.Cut-lard.Mince- lard.Fresh-lard.Rusty-lard.Waste-lard.Ogle- lard.Weigh-lard.Gulch- lard .Eye-lard.Names unknown among the Marranes and Jews.2Ballocky. Monsieur- Ragout. Mustard- sauce.Pick-sallad . Snail-dresser. Claret- sauce.Broil-rasher. Soup-monger. Swill-broth.Cony- skin. Brewis- belly. Thirsty.Dainty- chops. Chine- picker. Kitchen-stuff.Pie-wright. Crack-pipkin. Verjuice.Pudding-pan. Scrape- pot.Salt- gullet.Save-dripping . Porridge- pot.Water-cress. Lick-dish.Suck- gravy.Macaroon.Scrape-turnip .Toss-pot.Skewer-maker.Trivet.Smell- smock; he was afterwards taken from the kitchen,and removed to chamber- practice, for the service of thenoble Cardinal Hunt-venison.³Rot-Roast.Dish- clout.Prick- madam.Pricket.Flesh- smith.Cram-gut.Fox-tail.Fly- flap.Old-Grizzle.Ruff- belly.FEESirloin.Save- suet.Fire-fumbler.Pillico*ck.Long-tool.Prick-pride.Tuzzy- mussy.Jacket-liner.Guzzle- drink.Spit-mutton.Fritter-fryer.2 Who abominate bacon, and all sorts of lardings. 3 In Rabelais, Cardinal le Veneur. John le Veneur-Carrouges, Bishop of Lisieux, made Cardinal at Marseilles by Pope Clement VII. in 1533 He was such a lover of partridge, that he had them kept all the year round at his country house.CHAP. XLI. ] PANTAGRUEL. 311Hog's-gullet.Saffron- sauce.Strutting-tom.Slashed-snout.Smutty-face.Mondam, that first invented madam's sauce, and for thatdiscovery, was thus called in the Scotch- French dialect.Loblolly. GoodmanGoosecap. Snap- gobbet.Slabber- chops.Scum-pot.Gully-guts.Rinse-pot.Drink-spiller.Munch- turnip.Sloven.Swallow-pitcher.Wafer-monger.Scurvy- phiz.Trencher-man.Pudding-bag.Pig- sticker.Robert: he invented Robert's sauce, so good and necessary for roasted conies, ducks, fresh pork, poached eggs, salt fish, and a thousand other such dishes.Cold-eel.Thornback.Gurnard.Grumbling-gut.Alms- scrip .Taste-all.Scrap-merchant.Belly- timberman.Hashee.Frig- palate.Powdering- tub.Frying- pan.Man of dough.Sauce-doctor.Waste-butter.sh*tbreech.Thick-brawn.Tom T-d.Mouldy- crust.Hasty.Red-herring.Cheesecake.Big-snoutLick-finger.Tit-bit.Sauce-box.All fours.Whimwham.Baste-roast.Gaping-Hoyden.Calf's pluck.Leather-breeches.All these noble cooks went into the sow, merry, cheery,hale, brisk, old dogs at mischief, and ready to fight stoutly.Friar John, ever and anon waving his huge scimitar, brought up the rear, and double-locked the doors on the inside.CH. XLI.- How Pantagruel broke the Chitterlings at the knees.THE Chitterlings advanced so near, that Pantagruel perceived that they stretched their arms, and already began tocharge their lances; which caused him to send Gymnast toknow what they meant, and why they thus, without the leastprovocation, came to fall upon their old trusty friends, whohad neither said nor done the least ill thing to them. Gymnast being advanced near their front, bowed very low, and4 Our author ridicules the Scotch pronunciation of the French tongue, which Brantome likewise says, is perfect jargon in the mouth of a Scotchman, whose natural speech is in itself " rurale, barbare, mal- sonnate, and malseante. " See Dam. illust. of Brantome, disc. 3.Before in 1. ii. c. 9. " Saint Treignan foutys vous d'Escouss ou j'ay failly à entendre. "312 RABELAIS [ BOOK IV.' WORKS.said to them, as loud as ever he could: We are friends, weare friends; all, all of us your friends, yours, and at yourcommand; we are for Carnival, your old confederate . Somehave since told me, that he mistook, and said cavernal in- stead of carnival.¹Whatever it was, the word was no sooner out of his mouth,but a huge little squab Sausage, starting out of the frontof their main body, would have griped him by the collar.By the helmet of Mars, said Gymnast, I will swallow thee;but thou shalt only come in in chips and slices; for, big asthou art, thou couldest never come in whole. This spoke,he lugs out his trusty sword, kiss-mine-arse , ( so he calledit, ) with both his fists , and cut the sausage in twain. Blessme, how fat the foul thief was! it puts me in mind of thehuge bull of Berne, that was slain at Marignan, when thedrunken Swiss were so mauled there. Believe me, it hadlittle less than four inches lard on its paunch.The Sausage's job being done, a crowd ofothers flew uponGymnast, and had most scurvily dragged him down, when Pantagruel with his men came up to his relief. Then beganthe martial fray, higgledy piggledy. Maul- chitterling didmaul Chitterlings; Cut-pudding did cut puddings; Pantagruel did break the Chitterlings at the knees; 2 Friar Johnplay'd at least in sight within his sow, viewing and observingall things; when the pattipans, that lay in ambuscade, mostfuriously sallied out upon Pantagruel.Friar John, who lay snug all this while, by that time perceiving the route and hurly-burly, set open the doors of hissow, and sallied out with his merry Greeks, some of themarmed with iron-spits, others with handirons, racks, fireshovels, frying- pans, kettles , gridirons , oven forks , tongs,dripping pans, brooms, iron pots, mortars, pestles , all inbattle array, like so many house-breakers, hallooing and roar1 Gymnast had said , afterthe manner of the Gascons, Gradimars, instead of Mardigras; which provoked the Chitterlings' wrath: for he imagined they did it on purpose to affront their good friend Mardigras,(which here means our Shrove Tuesday, or ratherall the whole Carnival. )2 A proverbial expression for attempting impossibilities; as is that of breaking Chitterlings by mere strength of arm. Amadis, 1. 8, c. 53." The gods have permitted the death of your brother. They have pre- served my father; they are pleased to frustrate your designs, and fa- vour his; and you are for breaking the eel at your knees. " Rabelais's'early commentators will have this chapter to pourtray the Battle of Marignan. His modern editors regard it as a mock recital of thecombats so frequently occurring in the romances ofchivalry.CHAP. XLI.]PANTAGRUEL. 313ing out altogether most frightfully, Nabuzardan, Nabuzardan,Nabuzardan. Thus shouting and hooting, they fought likedragons, and charged through the pattipans and sausages.The Chitterlings perceiving this fresh reinforcement, andthat the others would be too hard for them, betook themselvesto their heels , scampering off with full speed, as if the devil had come for them. Friar John, with an iron crow, knockedthem down as fast as hops: his men too were not sparing on their side. O! what a woful sight it was! the field wasall over strewed with heaps of dead or wounded Chitterlings;and history relates, that had not heaven had a hand in it,the Chitterling tribe had been totally routed out of the world,by the culinary champions. But there happened a wonderful thing, you may believe as little or as much of it as you please.From the north flew towards us a huge, fat, thick, grizzlyswine, with long and large wings, like those of a windmill;its plumes red crimson, like those of a phenicoptere (whichin Languedoc they call flaman; ) its eyes were red, andflaming like a carbuncle; its ears green like a Prasinemerald; its teeth like a topaz; its tail long and black likejet; its feet white, diaphonous, and transparent like adiamond, somewhat broad, and of the splay kind, like thoseof geese, and as Queen Dick's¹ used to be at Thoulouse, inthe days of yore. About its neck it wore a gold collar,round which were some Ionian characters, whereof I couldpick out but two words, ' YE AOHNAN: hog-teaching Minerva.The sky was clear before; but at that monster's appearance, it changed so mightily for the worse, that we were all amazed at it. As soon as the Chitterlings perceived theflying hog, down they all threw their weapons, and fell ontheir knees, lifting up their hands, joined together without speaking one word, in a posture of adoration. Friar Johnand his party kept on mincing, felling, braining, mangling ,3 If, as some imagine, the Chitterlings in this chapter are the Swiss at the battle of Marignan, this phenicoptere may mean the Cardinal of Sion; and the mustard which he laid to their wounds, may be the gold with which he pacified them. 4 La Royne Pedaucque. Pie'd oie:Goose-foot. At Toulouse there is a bridge called Queen Pedauque's bridge. Menage says, that the statue of that queen, with goose feet, is to be seen at Dijon, in the porch of St. Benigne's church, and at Nevers,in the cathedral church there; and asserts, that she was called Pedauque, because of her splay-footedness.314 [BOOK IV RABELAIS' WORKS.and spitting the Chitterlings like mad: but Pantagruelsounded a retreat, and all hostility ceased.The monster having several times hovered backwards andforwards between the two armies, with a tail - shot voidedabove twenty- seven butts of mustard on the ground; thenflew away through the air, crying all the while, Carnival,Carnival, Carnival.ON CHAP. XXXV. AND THE SIX FOLLOWING.-Pantagruel lands in the Wild Island to refresh his men , whom the fish had disordered. He would not come where Shrovetide lived , but goes ashore at the dwelling of the Chitterlings, because he did not love Lent. There they pitched their tents, fixed their kitchen batteries; the cloth is immediately laid,supper brought in, and all eat cheerfully, as is usual after Lent. What happens in that island, and the fight in which the chitterlings, sausages,and pastry-pans, are mauled by Pantagruel and his men, and particu- larly by the friar at the head of the cooks, partly seems a comical alle- gory, which denotes the good cheer at Easter, after the Lent-keepers have mastered that time of mortification. Sausages, chitterlings , & c.,which are preserved with salt, help them to appease hunger, at the same time that they create and heighten thirst.It is obvious that the 37th chapter ridicules the method used by some of the ancients, and to this day, of foretelling things by the names of persons. We find that the Chitterlingonians knowing at last that Pan- tagruel is Shrovetide's foe, and a friend to Carnival, their old confede- rate, pay him their homage, and send, under the conduct of young Niphleseth, seventy-eight thousand royal Chitterlings to Gargantua,who made a present of them to the great King of Paris; but most of them died, and were buried in heaps in a part of Paris, called to this day the street paved with Chitterlings; yet, at the request of the court ladies, young Niphleseth was preserved, honourably used, and since that married to heart's content. We need not understand Hebrew tofind out what our joking author means by that young Chitterling (men- tula) Niphleseth, of whom the charitable, or rather selfish ladies took such mighty care.After all, the description of a misunderstanding between the French,and the Swiss and Germans that had reformed, may be couched under those notions of Chitterlings. In the 35th chapter we find a treaty on foot to reconcile them to Shrovetide: and as the council was then sitting, some concessions were made by the pope's party in case of a like- lihood of an accommodation. Besides, Rabelais mentions, that Shrove- tide (by which may be meant here the Swiss, or Germans of the Roman communion) was threatened with being declared bewrayed (i. e. ex- communicated) in case he made any league or agreement with the Chitterlings since which they were grown wonderfully inveterate and obstinate against one another. He also tells us, that they desired the expulsion of I do not know what stinking villains , murderers and rob- bers, that held the castle of Salloir (which means a powdering-tub) .These might be monks and friars . What's more, in the 37th chapter,Rabelais, enumerating the power and antiquity of Chitterling- likeCHAP. XLII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 315people, says, Who can tell but that the Swiss, now so bold and resolute,were formerly Chitterlings? For my part, I would not take my oathto the contrary. Some of the Swiss are now, and were then, a wildsort of people, as our author calls his Chitterlings, whom he brings inmarching up boldly in battalia. By the queen may be meant the re- public, which word is feminine in Latin and in French. The Chitter- lings sent bythe queen, are the soldiers which Switzerland sent them,as it does still, to the French; many of which died by change of air,for want of mustard (i. e. pay) , and other accidents. And what Xeno- manes said, that Chitterlings were double-hearted and treacherous, suits also very well with their taking side now with the emperor, then withthe French, vice versa, in that age. In the 41st chapter, Gymnast,having lugged out his sword with both his fists, cut a huge wild squab sausage in two. Bless me, says our historian, how fat the foul thiefwas! It puts me in mind ofthe huge bull of Berne, that was slain at Marignan, when the drunken Swiss were so mauled there: believe me,it had little less than four inches lard on its paunch. Bythis greatbull of Berne is meant Pontiner, a famous gigantic fat captain of theSwiss, who being killed at the battle of Marignan, some of the Germans who sided with the French, to show they were fully revenged onthe Swiss, who had been too hard for them in several other engagements, run the points of their pikes and lances in that monstrous officer's fat paunch, as Paulus Jovius observes in the account he gives ofthat battle. I have not leisure to get and peruse some books, whichprobably would enable me to give here the particulars to which thisallegory relates; but I believe that any one, that will examine thisnarrowly, may find it much as I have said; and perhaps somethingmore than the expiration of Lent may also be meant by the killing ofthe great fish by Pantagruel.CH. XLII.-How Pantagruel held a treaty with Niphleseth,Queen ofthe Chitterlings.THE monster being out of sight, and the two armies remaining silent, Pantagruel demanded a parley with the ladyNiphleseth, Queen of the Chitterlings , who was in herchariot, by the standards; and it was easily granted. Thequeen alighted, courteously received Pantagruel, and wasglad to see him. Pantagruel complained to her of this breachof peace but she civilly made her excuse, telling him thata false information had caused all this mischief; her spieshaving brought her word, that Shrovetide their mortal foe,was landed, and spent his time in examining the urine ofphyseters.1 In chap. 38. it is said, that Erichthonius first brought into use coaches and litters to hide the ugliness of his legs; which is taken from Servius, on these verses of the third book of the Georgics."Primus Erichthonius currus et quatuor aususJungere equos, rapidisque rotis insistere victor,"It was with the same viewthat Niphleseth chose to appear in her chariot.316 RABELAIS [ BOOK IV.' WORKS.She, therefore, entreated him to pardon them their offence;telling him that sir- reverence was sooner found in Chitterlingsthan gall; and offering, for herself and all her successors , tohold of him, and his, the whole island and country; to obeyhim in all his commands, be friends to his friends, and foesto his foes; and also to send every year, as an acknowledgment of their homage, a tribute of seventy- eight thousandChitterlings, to serve him at his first course at table, sixmonths in the year; which was punctually performed. Forthe next day she sent the aforesaid quantity of royal Chitterlings to the good Gargantua, under the conduct of young Niphleseth, infanta of the island.The good Gargantua made a present of them to the great King of Paris. But by change of air , and for want of mustard, (the natural balsam and restorer of Chitterlings , ) mostof them died. By the great king's particular grant, theywere buried in heaps in a part of Paris, to this day called, LaRue pavée d'Andouilles; the street paved with Chitterlings.At the request of the ladies at his court, young Niphlesethwas preserved, honourably used, and since that married toher heart's content; and was the mother of many finechildren, for which heaven be praised.Pantagruel civilly thanked the queen, forgave all offences,refused the offer she had made of her country, and gave hera pretty little knife. After that he asked her severalnice questions concerning the apparition of that flying hog.She answered, that it was the idea of Carnival, their tutelarygod in time of war, first founder, and original of all theChitterling race; for which reason he resembled a hog; forChitterlings drew their extraction from hogs.Pantagruel asking for what purpose, and curative indication, he had voided so much mustard on the earth, the queenreplied, that mustard was their sanc-greal, and celestialbalsam, of which, laying but a littie in the wounds ofthe fallen Chitterlings, in a very short time the woundedwere healed, and the dead restored to life. Pantagruel held2 Chitterlings are not eaten above six months in the year at most.3 As they do the savages of America. These knives are called parguois corruptly for pragois, being made at Prague in Bohemia.4 Henry V., King of England, was wont to say, in the same sense ,that war without fire was not worth a rush, any more than sausages without mustard. See J. Juvenal des Ursin's Hist. ch. vi. on the year 1420.CHAP. XLIII. ]PANTAGRUEL. 317no further discourse with the queen, but retired on ship- board. The like did all the boon companions, with theirimplements of destruction, and their huge sow.CH. XLIII.-How Pantagruel went into the island of Ruach.Two days after, we arrived at the island of Ruach; and Iswear to you, by the celestial hen and chickens, that I foundthe way of living of the people so strange and wonderful,that I cannot, for the heart's blood of me, half tell ityou. They live on nothing but wind, eat nothing butwind, and drink nothing but wind. They have no otherhouses but weatherco*cks. They sow no other seeds butthe three sorts of wind-flowers, rue, and herbs that makeone break wind to the purpose: these scour them off charmingly. The common sort of people, to feed themselves,make use of feather, paper, or linen fans, according totheir abilities . As for the rich, ' they live by the means of windmills.When they would have some noble treat, the tables arespread under one or two windmills. There they feastas merry as beggars, and during the meal, their whole talkis commonly of the goodness, excellency, salubrity, andrarity of winds; as you, jolly topers, in your cups, philosophize and argue upon wines. The one praises the south- east,the other the south-west, this the west and by south, andthis the east and by north; another the west, and another the east; and so of the rest. As for lovers and amoroussparks, no gale for them like a smock- gale. For the sickthey use bellows, as we use clysters among us.Oh! (said to me a little diminutive swollen bubble) thatI had now but a bladder-full of that same Languedoc windwhich they call Cierce. The famous physician, Scurron,1 Rabelais introduces into the isle of Winds, divers sorts of persons,and even more than one nation. Bythe common sort of people, who makes use of fans of various kinds, we may understand, literally,the great number of male and female dealers in fans: who not only make fans for Paris, and all France, but also send them abroad to Eng- and and other countries. As for the rich, who feed on windmills, they are the proprietors of such sort of useful country houses (explained in the Trevoux dictionary, under the word usines) which are very fre- quent about Paris, and bring in a considerable revenue to the owners.2 In Italy and South- France they make use of large fans, which are hung to the ceiling, and are waved to and fro by a servant, to cool the rooms, particularly at meals. 3 His name was Schyron; witness the inscription over the gate of the anatomy theatre at Montpellier,818 [BOOK 1V. RABELAIS' WORKS.passing one day by this country, was telling us, that it is sostrong, that it will make nothing of overturning a loadedwaggon. Oh! what good would it not do my œdipodic leg. ♦The biggest are not the best; but, said Panurge, ratherwould I had here a large butt of that same good Languedoc wine, that grows at Mirevaux, Canteperdrix, andFrontignan.I saw a good likely sort of a man there, much resemblingVentrose, tearing and fuming in a grievous fret, with a tallburly groom, and a pimping little page of his , laying themon, like the devil, with a buskin. Not knowing the cause ofhis anger, at first I thought that all this was by the doctor'sadvice, as being a thing very healthy to the master to be ina passion, and to his man to be banged for it. But at lastI heard him taxing his man with stealing from him likea rogue as he was, the better half of a large leathern bagof an excellent southerly wind, which he had carefullylaid up, like a hidden reserve, against the cold weather."They neither exonerate, dung, piss, nor spit in that island;but, to make amends, they belch, fizzle, funk, and give tailshots in abundance. They are troubled with all manner ofdistempers and, indeed, all distempers are engendered, andproceed from ventosities, as Hippocrates demonstrates, lib.De Flatibus. But the most epidemical among them is thewind-cholic. The remedies which they use are large clysters, whereby they void store of windiness. They all die ofdropsies and tympanies; the men farting, and the womenfizzling so that their soul takes her leave at the back-door.Some time after, walking in the island, we met three hairbrained airy fellows, who seemed mightily puffed up, andwent to take their pastime, and view the plovers, who livebuilt by King Henry II. " Curantibus Johanne Schyronio, Antonio Saporta, Gulielmo Rondeletio, et J. Boccatio, 1556." Schyron wascounsellor ofthe king, royal professor, and Chancellor of the University of Montpellier, and died very old, in the aforesaid year 1556, after he had made a figure among the learned from the year 1530.ItLame or gouty leg. 5 Read, against the sultry hot weather,not cold weather. Arriere-saison means autumn, vintage, or harvesttime. In Lower Languedoc they call garbin a certain cool breeze of wind, which freshens up in that country about noon in Autumn.comes very seasonably for the harvesters and vintagers, who, without it,would never be able to endure the excessive heats of that season .Which makes the author say, that he had carefully laid it up comme une viande rare, as a tit-bit. The 23rd novel of the Heptam.CHAP. XLIV.] PANTAGRUEL. 319on the same diet as themselves, and abound in the island, Iobserved that as your true topers, when they travel, carry flasks ,leathern bottles, and small runlets along with them , so eachof them had at his girdle a pretty little pair of bellows. Ifthey happened to want wind, by the help of those pretty bellows they immediately drew some, fresh and cool, by attraction and reciprocal expulsion: for, as you well know,wind essentially defined , is nothing but fluctuating and agi- tated air.Awhile after. we were commanded, in the king's name,not to receive, for three hours, any man or woman of thecountry, on board our ships; some having stolen from hima rousing fart, of the very individual wind which old goodman Æolus, the snorer, gave Ulysses, to conduct his ship,whenever it should happen to be becalmed. Which fartthe king kept religiously, like another sanc-greal, and performed a world ofwonderful cures with it, in many dangerousdiseases, letting loose, and distributing to the patient, onlyas much of it as might frame a virginal fart; which is , ifyou must know, what our sanctimonials , alias nuns, in theirdialect, call ringing backwards."CH. XLIV.-How small rain lays a high wind.PANTAGRUEL commended their government and way ofliving, and said to their hypenemian mayor. If you approve Epicurus's opinion, placing the summum bonum in pleasure, (I mean pleasure that is easy and free from toil, ) Iesteem you happy; for your food being wind, costs youlittle or nothing, since you need but blow. True, sir, returned the mayor, but, alas! nothing is perfect here below:for too often, when we are at table, feeding on some goodblessed wind of God, as on celestial manna, merry as somany friars, down drops on a sudden some small rain, whichlays our wind, and so robs us of it. Thus many a meal islost for want of meat.eron: " You live, then, upon faith and hope, as the plover does uponwind? youare very easy to maintain, and are subsisted at a cheap rate."This is a vulgar error of the plovers living on wind. See Belon, 1. 5, c.18, of his Ornithologia. 7 Rabelais says, " les sanctimoniales appellantung pet sonnet; " i. e. the nuns call a fart, sonnet. Sonnet I take to boa diminutive ofthe son (sound) and means a sort of a small, still, silent sound. It likewise signifies a song, or tune. Nuns are so very chaste,at least in speech, that they scruple to call a fart by its right name; andan escape of that nature is never mentioned by them any otherwise than bythe term sonnet.320 LBOOK IV.BABELAIS' WORKS.Just so, quoth Panurge, Jenin Toss-pot, of Quinquenais,evacuating some wine of his own burning [ urine] on hiswife's posteriors, laid the ill- fumed wind that blowed outof their centre, as out of some magisterial æolipile. Hereis a kind of a whim on that subject, which I made formerly:One evening when Toss- pot had been at his butts,And Joan, his fat spouse, crammed with turnips her guts,Together they pigg'd, nor did drink so besot him,But he did what was done when his daddy begot him.Now, when to recruit, he'd fain have been snoring,Joan's back- door was filthily puffing and roaring:So, for spite he bepiss'd her, and quickly did find,That a small rain lays a very high wind.We are also plagued yearly with a very great calamity,cried the mayor, for a giant, called Widenostrils, who livesin the island of Tohu, comes hither every spring to purge,by the advice of his physicians, and swallows us, like somany pills, a great number of windmills, and of bellowsalso, at which his mouth waters exceedingly.Now this is a sad mortification to us here, who are fain tofast over three or four whole Lents every year for this , besides certain petty Lents, ember weeks, and other orison andstarving tides . And have you no remedy for this? askedPantagruel. By the advice of our Mezarims, replied themayor, about the time that he uses to give us a visit, wegarrison our windmills with good store of co*cks and hens.The first time that the greedy thief swallowed them, theyhad like to have done his business at once: for they crowedand cackled in his maw, and fluttered up and down athwartand along in his stomach, which threw the glutton into alipothymy cardiac passion, and dreadful and dangerous convulsions, as if some serpent, creeping in at his mouth, hadbeen frisking in his stomach.Here is a comparative, as altogether incongruous and impertinent, cried Friar John, interrupting them; for I haveformerly heard, that if a serpent chance to get into a man'sstomach, it will not do him the least hurt, but will immediately get out, if you do but hang the patient by the heels,and lay a pan full of warm milk near his mouth.You weretold this, said Pantagruel, and so were those who gave you this account; but none ever saw or read of such a cure. Onthe contrary, Hippocrates, in his fifth book of Epidem,writes, that such a case happening in his time, the patientpresently died of a spasm and convulsion.CHAP. XLIV. ]PANTAGRUEL. 321Besides the co*cks and hens, said the mayor, continuinghis story, all the foxes in the country whipped into Widenostrils' mouth, posting after the poultry; which made sucha stir with Reynard at their heels, that he grievously fell into fits each minute of an hour.At last, by the advice of a Baden enchanter, ' at the timeof the paroxysm, he used to flay a fox,2 by way of antidoteand counter- poison . Since that he took better advice, andeases himself with taking a clyster made with a decoction ofwheat and barley corns, and of livers of goslings; to thefirst of which the poultry run, and the foxes to the latter.Besides, he swallows some of your badgers or fox- dogs, bythe way of pills and boluses. This is our misfortune.Cease to fear, good people, cried Pantagruel, this huge Widenostrils, this same swallower of Windmills, is no more,I will assure you: he died, being stifled and choked with alump of fresh butter at the mouth of a hot oven, by the ad- vice of his physicians.ON CHAPS. XLIII. AND XLIV. -The island of Ruach, wherepeople live on nothing but wind, according to the sense of the Hebrew word, is the island of Wind, or the Vane island.It is an emblem of the court, where men feed themselves, and are fedby others, with wind, compliments, flattery , promises, and empty vain hopes, more than any where else. The weatherco*cks, which are the only houses in that island, imply the uncertain and variable state of courtiers; first, because the court is still where the prince is: and as the weatherco*ck is always in motion, now to the east, and then pre- sently to the west, yet is still fixed in one place, and only moves round its centre: so the courtier is still at home when at court, yet the courtis sometimes in one place, and sometimes another. Besides, as the warm south sometimes gently blows on a weatherco*ck, and soon the cold north rudely whirls it about; so the courtier's house is either cherished, or roughly blown upon, according to the prince's breath.The wind- flowers, rue, and such carminative herbs, which are the only things sowed there, which scour them off in that island, denote the attendance, craft, and pains, which are the seeds by which we hope to rise and reap favour at court; but when the time of harvestcomes, we find ourselves only rid (by a thorough knowledge of the place, and chiefly by balks and disappointments) of a great deal of wind, vain, empty hopes, that swelled and puffed us up.The common sort of people, who, to feed themselves, make use of feather, paper, cr linen fans, according to their abilities, put me in1 Ung enchanteur badin, not baden.tebank quack, or tumbler.vomiting, does admirably well here in boguing the foxes that were got down to the bottom of his maw.It only means a juggler, or moun- 2 This proverbial expression for speaking of Widenostrils disemVOL. II. Y322 | BOOK IV. RABELAIS' WORKS.mind of a poor fellow, who fed himself a long time with hopes of ob- taining a place worth at least £50 a year, only because he knew Sir J. F's coachman, with whom he spent some £20 or £30 that were his all , in hopes of a recommendation to his master, which his patron even wanted for himself, while he fooled him out of his money. Thus thepoor, as well as the rich, aim at something generally above their reach.The wind-mills, by the means of which the rich live, may be designed to denote the kings and princes of those days: mills with mighty sails,which gave that nourishing wind plentifully, according to the disposi- tions in which they were with respect to the courtiers that continually surrounded them. It also signifies that the latter sometimes get nothing but words or favours, merely honorary, and void of substance and solidity. Some of those royal wind- mills have been used to wheel round, with every wind, as readily as weatherco*cks; turning their backs, in an unaccountable manner, to those on whom they looked most favourably but a moment before.The age during which our doctor flourished has given many instances of this sad truth; as Jacques de Baune, Lord of Semblançay, Admiral Chabot, and the Constable de Bourbon, who having all three possessed King Francis I.'s favour, became the objects and the victims of his hatred. The first, hanged at Montfaucon , (the Tyburn of Paris, ) for acrime of which Louis de Savoy, the king's mother, alone was guilty.The second, condemned without reason, to lose his head on a scaffold,and then declared not guilty; the sense of which usage worked so strongly on his mind, that it effected what the executioner was to have done. And the third, a prince of the blood , and by his great merit high constable of France, (a trust thought too great now-a-days, )first deprived of his government of the Milanese, his master being grown jealous of his glory; then of the profits and exercise of his great office; and, finally, of the vast estate of the house of Bourbon , which was his right of inheritance, as eldest of that branch of the royal family.-M.CH. XLV.-How Pantagruel went ashore in the island of PopeFigland.THE next morning we arrived at the island of Pope-figs;formerly a rich and free people, called the Gaillardets; butnow, alas! miserably poor, and under the yoke of the Papi- men. The occasion of it was this.Ona certain yearly high holiday, the burgomaster, syndics,1 Read Papimanes, as in the original. Itis a word composed ofpapa,pope, and mania, madness, (in Greek) and means such whose love andzeal for the pope is so excessive, that it may be counted madness.Here M. Duchat observes, that Spain is a true papimany country:therefore, adds he, it is not at all unlikely, that by the island of Popefigland, subject to the Papimanes, Rabelais means Navarre, after that about the year 1512, Ferdinand, the Catholic, had seized that kingdom,by virtue of a certain pretended bull, which had put it under an inter- dict, for adhering, as was pretended, to the council, convened at Pisa,against Pope Julius II.CHAP. XLV. ] PANTAGRUEL. 323and topping rabbies of the Gaillardets, chanced to go intothe neighbouring island Papimany to see the festival, andpass away the time. Now one of them having espied thepope's picture, (with the sight of which, according to alaudable custom, the people were blessed on high-offeringholidays,) made mouths at it, and cried, a fig for it! as asign of manifest contempt and derision. To be revenged ofthis affront, the Papimen, some days after, without givingthe others the least warning, took arms, and surprised destroyed, and ruined the whole island of the Gaillardets;putting the men to the sword, and sparing none but thewomen and children; and those too only on condition to dowhat the inhabitants of Milan were condemned to , by theEmperor Frederic Barbarossa.These had rebelled against him in his absence, and ignominiously turned the empress out of the city, mounting hera horseback on a mule called Thacor, ' with her breech foremost towards the old jaded mule's head, and her face turnedtowards the crupper. Now Frederick being returned, mastered them, and caused so careful a search to be made, thathe found out and got the famous mule Thacor. Then thehangman, by his order, clapped a fig into the mule's jimcrack, in the presence of the enslaved cits that were broughtinto the middle of the great market-place, and proclaimed,in the emperor's name, with trumpets, that whosoever ofthem would save his own life, should publicly pull the figout with his teeth, and after that , put it in again in the veryindividual cranny whence he had drawn it, without using hishands, and that whoever refused to do this, should presentlyswing for it, and die in his shoes. Some sturdy fools , standing upon their punctillio, chose honourably to be hanged,rather than submit to so shameful and abominable a disgrace;and others, less nice in point of ceremony, took heart ofgrace, and even resolved to have at the fig, and a fig for it,rather than make a worse figure with a hempen collar, anddie in the air, at so short warning: accordingly when theyhad neatly picked out the fig with their teeth, from old3 This infamous punishment is still inflicted in Germany, on pro- fessed prostitutes. 3A scab or pile in the fundament, Cotgrave says; but, according to the Cambridge Dictionary, it means the fundament itself. See under the word anus. The Hebrew word istachor, not thacor.Y 2324 [BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.Thacor's snatch- blatch, they plainly showed it the head'sman, saying, ecco lo fico, behold the fig.By the same ignominy the rest of these poor distressedGaillardets saved their bacon, becoming tributaries and slaves,and the name of Pope-figs was given them, because theysaid, a figfor the pope's image. Since this, the poor wretches never prospered, but every year the devil was at their doors,and they were plagued with hail, storms, famine, and allmanner of woes, as an everlasting punishment for the sin oftheir ancestors and relations. Perceiving the misery andcalamity of that generation, we did not care to go further upinto the country; contenting ourselves with going into a littlechapel near the haven, to take some holy water. It was dilapi- dated and ruined, wanting also a cover-like Saint Peter atRome. When we were in , as we dipped our fingers in thesanctified cistern, we spied in the middle ofthat holy pickle,a fellow muffled up with stoles, all under water, like a diving duck, except the tip of his snout to draw his breath. Abouthim stood three priests , true shavelings, clean shorn, andpolled, who were muttering strange words to the devils outof a conjuring book.Pantagruel was not a little amazed at this, and , inquiringwhat kind of sport these were at, was told, that, for threeyears last past, the plague had so dreadfully raged in theisland, that the better half of it had been utterly depopulated , and the lands lay fallow and unoccupied. Now, themortality being over, this same fellow, who had crept intothe holy tub, having a large piece of ground, chanced to besowing it with white winter wheat, at the very minute of anhour that a kind of a silly sucking devil, who could not yetwrite or read, or hail and thunder, unless it were on parsleyor coleworts, had got leave of his master Lucifer to go intothis island of Pope- figs, where the devils were very familiarwith the men and women, and often went to take their pas- time.This same devil being got thither, directed his discourse tothe husbandman, and asked him what he was doing. The poorman told him, that he was sowing the ground with corn, tohelp him to subsist the next year. Ay, but the ground isnone of thine, Mr. Plough-jobber, cried the devil, but mine;for since the time that you mocked the pope, all this land has been proscribed, adjudged, and abandoned to us. How-CHAP. XLV. ]PANTAGRUEL. 325ever, to sow corn is not my province: therefore I willgive thee leave to sow the field, that is to say, provided we share the profit. I will, replied the farmer. I mean, saidthe devil, that of what the land shall bear, two lots shallbe made, one of what shall grow above ground, the otherof what shall be covered with earth: the right of choosingbelongs to me; for I am a devil of noble and ancient race;thou art a base clown. I therefore chose what shall lieunder ground, take thou what shall be above. When dostthou reckon to reap, hah? About the middle of July, quoththe farmer. Well, said the devil, I'll not fail thee then: inthe meantime, slave as thou oughtest. Work, clown, work:I am going to tempt to the pleasing sin of whoring, the nunsof Dryfart, the sham saints of the cowl, and the gluttonish crew I am more than sure of these . They need but meet,and the job is done: true fire and tinder, touch and take:down falls nun and up gets friar,ON CHAP. XLV. -Bythe island of the Pope-figs , is meant those who followed Luther or Calvin's reformation, and chiefly the Germans and the French. They were called the Gaillardes at first; principally, be- cause they were at first brisk and merry, or gaillard; as when the landsknechts, generally Protestants, plundered Rome in 1527, they led several bishops and cardinals, in their proper accoutrements, through the streets on mules and asses, with their faces turned towards the tail;threw the host, relics, and images of saints about the streets, and forcedthe pope to buy a peace with 400,000 ducats, and remain a prisoner till it was paid, after he had been almost starved in Castel St. Angelo,where he invited the cardinals to a treat of ass's flesh, as if it had beenone of the greatest dainties imaginable. This our author calls faire lafigue, to revile and feague, or say, a fig for the pope; and he has inge- niously brought in the story of the citizens of Milan, who used an empress just as the landsknechts served the cardinals, which also issomewhat like the practice of the inquisition, who serve Protestants so.Now when the Emperor, Charles V., had been too hard for the Pro- testants in Germany, and the Kings Francis I. and Henry II. had per- secuted them in France, they were in a dismal condition, and underthe yoke of the Papimanes, and got the name of Pope-figs, not only because they had reviled the pope, but because they were forced to creep to him, and lay under his lash. The hail, storms, and famine,that plague them continually, mean the persecutions; the hobgoblins and devils that haunt them, are the monks, as the author insinuates at the latter end of chapter 46 .By the country fellow, who runs into the holy-water-stock, and is immersed in that blessed pickle, all but the tip of the snout, for fear ofbeing clawed off by the devil, we must understand the constraint in which the Protestants lived, while to deliver themselves from the persecutions of the popish hob-goblins, they were forced to be plunged326 RABELAIS' WORKS. [BOOK IV.over head and ears in the superstitious worship of the church of Rome;took holy water by handfuls, and hid themselves under stoles, which are the badge of priesthood: that is to say, they professed popery, as they are now forced to do in France; and some even entered into rders, and were priests, monks, bishops, and even cardinals, though they were far from being papists in their hearts.Brisonnet, Bishop of Meaux, was one of these; for having silenced the preaching Franciscans throughout his diocese, and appointed James Fabre, alias La Fevre of Estaple, Girard Ruffi, Michael Arande, and Martial, to preach against the errors of the Church of Rome, he re- canted, through fear, as soon as he was called to an account about it.Ruffi himself did the same, and, from a Lutheran preacher, became aRoman bishop; and so did Martial, who being at first Brisonnet's dis- ciple, was afterwards penitentiary, or head- confessor at Paris. TheBishop of Valence, our Panurge, was one of those dissemblers; and even the great Admiral Chatillon's brother, Odet, the cardinal to whomthis book is dedicated by Rabelais, who himself did like the rest.—M.CH. XLVI. -How a junior devil was fooled by a husbandmanof Pope-Figland.In the middle of July, the devil came to the place aforesaid,with all his crew at his heels, a whole choir of the youngerfry of hell; and having met the farmer, said to him, Well,clod-pate, how hast thou done, since I went? Thou and Imust share the concern. Ay, master devil, quoth the clown,it is but reason we should. Then he and his men began tocut and reap the corn: and, on the other side, the devil'simps fell to work, grubbing up and pulling out the stubbleby the root.The countryman had his corn thrashed, winnowed it, putit into sacks, and went with it to market. The same didthe devil's servants, and sat them down there by the man tosell their straw. ' The countryman sold off his corn at agood rate, and with the money filled an old kind of a demibuskin, which was fastened to his girdle. But the devil asou the devils took: far from taking handsel, they wereflouted and jeered by the country louts:Market being over, quoth the devil to the farmer, Well,clown, thou hast choused me once, it is thy fault; chouseme twice, it will be mine, Nay, good sir devil, replied thefarmer, how can I be said to have choused you, since it was your worship that chose first? The truth is, that, by thistrick, you thought to cheat me, hoping that nothing would1 Read stubble.CHAP. XLVI. ] PANTAGRUEL. 827spring out of the earth for my share, and that you shouldfind whole under ground the corn which I had sowed, andwith it tempt the poor and needy, the close hypocrite, orthe covetous griper; thus making them fall into your snares.But troth, you must even go to school yet: you are no conjurer, for aught I see: for the corn that was sown is deadand rotten, its corruption having caused the generation ofthat which you saw me sell: so you chose the worst, andtherefore are cursed in the gospel. Well, talk no more ofit, quoth the devil: what canst thou sow our field with fornext year? If a man would make the best of it, answered the ploughman, it were fit he sow it with radishes.Now, cried the devil, thou talkest like an honest fellow,bumpkin: well, sow me good store of radishes, I will seeand keep them safe from storms, and will not hail a bit on them . But harkye me, this time I bespeak for my sharewhat shall be above ground; what is under shall be thine.Drudge on, looby, drudge on. I am going to tempt heretics; their souls are dainty victuals , when broiled in rashers,and well powdered. My Lord Lucifer has the griping inthe guts; they will make a dainty warm dish for his honour's maw.When the season of radishes was come, our devil failednot to meet in the field , with a train of rascally underlings,all waiting devils, and finding there the farmer and his men,he began to cut and gather the leaves of the radishes. Afterhim the farmer with his spade dug up the radishes , andclapped them up into pouches. This done, the farmer, andtheir gangs, hied them to market, and there the farmer presently made good money of his radishes: but the poor deviltook nothing; nay, what was worse, he was made a commonlaughing stock by the gaping hoydons. I see thou hastplayed me a scurvy trick, thou villanous fellow, cried theangry devil at last I am fully resolved even to make anend of the business betwixt thee and myself, about theground, and these shall be the terms: we will clapperclaw2 An old proverb, which involves slanderers and devils in one and the same malediction; for as much as the former choosing rather to speak evil than good of their neighbours, are like the devils, who, in the dayof judgment, shall fall on the wicked, and let good men alone.3 Those whomthe devil, in those days tempted to burn the Lutherans,did really believe his devilship's mouth watered at the souls of those supposed strayers from the fold of the church.328 [ BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.each other, and whoever of us two shall first cry, Hold, shallquit his share of the field , which shall wholly belong to theconqueror. I fix the time for this trial of skill, on this dayseven-night: assure thyself that I will claw thee off like adevil. I was going to tempt your fornicators, bailiffs , per- plexers of causes, scriveners, forgers of deeds, two-handedcouncillors, prevaricating solicitors, and other such vermin;but they were so civil as to send me word by an interpreter, that they are all mine already. Besides our masterLucifer is so cloyed with their souls , that he often sendsthem back to the smutty scullions, and slovenly devils of hiskitchen, and they scarce go down with them, unless nowand then, when they are high- seasoned. *Some say there is no breakfast like a student's, no dinnerlike a lawyer's, no afternoon's nunchion like a vinedresser's,no supper like a tradesman's, no second supper like aserving wench's, and none of these meals equal to a frockified hobgoblin's. All this is true enough. Accordingly, atmy Lord Lucifer's first course, hobgoblins, alias imps incowls, are a standing dish. He willingly used to breakfaston students; but, alas , I do not know by what ill luck theyhave of late years joined the Holy Bible to their studies: sothe devil a one we can get down among us; and I verilybelieve that unless the hypocrites of the tribe of Levi helpus in it, taking from the enlightened book-mongers their St.Paul, either by threats, revilings , force, violence, fire, andfa*ggot, we shall not be able to hook in any more of them, to nibble at below. He dines commonly on councillors , mischief-mongers, multipliers of law suits, such as wrest andpervert right and law, and grind and fleece the poor: henever fears to want any of these. But who can endure tobe wedded to a dish?He said, the other day, at a full chapter, that he had agreat mind to eat the soul of one of the fraternity of thecowl, that had forgot to speak for himself, in his sermon;4 It is said, such sort of souls soon corrupt. 5 Reguoubilloner;to steal an after supper: banquet late at nights; as servants frequently do, when their masters and mistresses are in bed.6 " Nil mendicatis sociorum dulcius offis.Il n'est vie que de coquin, no life like a beggar's says the old proverb.7 Here Rabelais smells of the fa*got, says M. Duchat. AFrench way of speaking, significative of the danger one runs of being burned for aheretic.CHAP. XLVI . ] 1 ANTAGRUEL. 329and he promised double pay, and a large pension, to anyone that should bring him such a tit-bit piping hot. Weall went a hunting after such a rarity, but came home withoutthe prey for they all admonish the good women to remembertheir convent. As for afternoon nunchions, he has left themoff, since he was so wofully griped with the cholic; hisfosterers, sutlers , charcoal-men, and boiling cooks having beensadly mauled and peppered off in the northern countries.His high devilship sups very well on tradesmen, usurers,apothecaries, cheats, coiners, and adulterers of wares . Nowand then, when he is on the merry pin, his second supper isof serving wenches; who, after they have, by stealth, soakedtheir faces with their master's good liquor, fill up the vesselwith it at second hand, or with other stinking water.Well, drudge on, boor, drudge on; I am going to temptthe students of Trebisonde, to leave father and mother,forego for ever the established and common rule of living ,disclaim and free themselves from obeying their lawful sove- reign's edicts , live in absolute liberty, proudly despise everyone, laugh at all mankind, and taking the fine jovial little capof poetic licence , 10 become so many pretty hobgoblins. "¹8 This seems to regard the expulsion of the monks out of England,under Henry VIII. and Edward VI.; and also that of the religious out of the two northern kingdoms. Read Trebizonde.The author seems here to derive the name of the imperial city of Tre- bizonde from the Greek Tраna, mensa, a table, for the opportunity of insinuating that none but gormandizers and idle bellies would take up with a cloistered life. 10 Rabelais says, And taking thefine jovial little biggin of poetic innocence. On which M. Duchat ob- serves beguin is the capuche or monachal hood, invented to distinguish from seculars ( or people of the world) such persons as make profes- sions of a benignity and an innocence worthy of the golden age of the poets. In Flanders, they called benings and beningues, (some years after the establishment of the two first orders of religious mendicants) certain men and certain women, who, without making vows,devoting themselves in an especial manner to works of charity and mercy, took, in imitation of the said religious, a sort of hood, as abadge, that should prevent people's looking upon them, to be en- tirely of the secular kind . From those words it is, that theyhave since corruptly been called beguins, and beguines, and at length their hood too was called beguin. Friar James de Guise, in his Chro nicles of Hainault, vol. 3, ch. 133, says, the Countess of Flanders began the benignage, and instituted the first chapellany.Farfadets gentils. Gentlemen hobgoblins, i. e. gentlemen monks.The author ridicules the Benedictines and Bernardins, who assume thetitle of dom (from dominus) as if they were all gentlemen.330 [BOOK IV. RABELAIS' WORKS.ناON CHAP. XLVI. -The stubble and the leaves of the radishes,which are all that falls to the young devil's share, while the countrymanreaps the profit of the corn and fruit he had sowed in his field, showthat the pretended papists only gave the outside and insignificant forms to the Church of Rome, and that their hearts and minds were not inclinable to follow its doctrine. Our author's honest boldness is veryremarkable, both in this chapter and many of the next. He makes theyoung devil say, that at Lucifer's first course, hobgoblins ( alias imps incowls) are a standing dish. He willingly, says the imp, used to breakfast on students; but alas, I do not know by what ill luck they haveof late joined the Holy Bible to their studies; so the devil a one canget down among us; and I verily believe, that unless the cafars (i. e.hypocrites of the tribe of Levi) help us in it, taking from the enlightened bookmongers their St. Paul, either by threats, revilings, force,violence, or fire and fa*ggot, we shall not be able to hook in any more of them to nibble at below.The foresters, suttlers, charcoalmen, and boiling cooks of hell, thatwere mauled and peppered off in the northern countries, are the monks and priests, who were routed there, particularly in England.By the students of Trebisonde, he means those of the popish uni- versities, where, as he says, they are tempted by the devils ( by which he means monks and priests, professors, and their tutors) to leave father and mother, forego for ever the established and common rule ofliving, free themselves from obeying their lawful sovereign's edicts,live in absolute liberty, and taking the fine jovial little cap of poeticlicence, become so many pretty hobgoblins. The cap of licence, means their degrees, or the cowl; and poetic, is only added to blind the thing;so the monks leave father and mother, and disclaim all authority but the pope's. -M.CH. XLVII.- How the Devil was deceived by an old woman ofPope-Figland.THE Country lob trudged home very much concerned andthoughtful, you may swear; insomuch that his good woman,seeing him thus look moping, weened that something had been stolen from him at market: but when she had heardthe cause of his affliction, and seen his budget well linedwith coin, she bade him be of good cheer, assuring him thathe would be never the worse for the scratching bout in question; wishing him only to leave her to manage that business,and not trouble his head about it; for she had already contrived how to bring him off cleverly. Let the worst cometo the worst, said the husbandman, it will be but a scratch;for I'll yield at the first stroke, and quit the field . Quit afart, replied the wife; he shall have none of the field: relyupon me, and be quiet; let me alone to deal with him.You say he is a pimping little devil, that is enough; I willCHAP. XLVII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 331soon make him give up the field, I will warrant you. Indeed, had he been a great devil, it had been somewhat.The day that we landed in the island happened to be that which the devil had fixed for the combat. Now the countryman, having, like a good Catholic, very fairly confessed.himself, and received , ' betimes in the morning, bythe adviceof the vicar, had hid himself, all but the snout, in the holywater pot, in the posture in which we found him; and justas they were telling us this story, news came that the oldwoman had fooled the devil, and gained the field. Youmay not be sorry, perhaps, to hear how this happened.The devil, you must know, came to the poor man's door,and rapping there, cried , So ho! ho the house! ho, clodpate! where art thou? Come out with a vengeance; comeout with a wannion; come out and be damned: now forclawing. Then briskly and resolutely entering the house,and not finding the countryman there, he spied his wife.lying on the ground, piteously weeping and howling. Whatis the matter? asked the devil. Where is he? what doeshe? Oh! that I knew where he is , replied threescore andfive, the wicked rogue, the butcherly dog, the murderer!He has spoiled me; I am undone; I die of what he has done to me. How, cried the devil, what is it? I will ticklehim off for you by and by. Alas, cried the old dissembler,he told me, the butcher, the tyrant, the tearer of devils , toldme, that he had made a match to scratch with you this day,and to try his claws, he did but just touch me with his littlefinger, here betwixt the legs, and has spoiled me for ever.Oh! I am a dead woman; I shall never be myself again:do but see! Nay, and besides, he talked of going to thesmith's, to have his pounces sharpened and pointed. Alas!you are undone, Mr. Devil; good sir, scamper quickly, Iam sure he won't stay; save yourself, I beseech you.While she said this, she uncovered herself up to the chin,after the manner in which the Persian women met theirchildren who fled from the fight,' and plainly showed herwhat do ye call it. The frighten'd devil , seeing the enormoussolution of the continuity in all its dimensions, blessed him1 Avoit communie, i. e. had taken the sacrament. 2 See Plu.tarch. These women when their sons were flying from the enemy,pulled up their clothes, and in scorn bade them come and hide them- selves once more in their mothers' bellies.332 [ BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.self, and cried out, Mahon, Demiourgon, Megæra, Alecto,Persephone; slife, catch me here when he comes! I amgone: sdeath, what a gash! I resign him the field.Having heard the catastrophe of the story, we retired aship-board, not being willing to stay there any longer. Pantagruel gave to the poor's box of the fabric of the church,"eighteen thousand good royals, in commiseration of thepoverty of the people, and the calamity of the place.ON CHAP. XLVII. -By the old woman of Pope- figland , who frightsthe devil, and puts him to flight, the author means that the monks and priests of the Church of Rome were so ignorant, and their tenets so groundless, that the very women could make fools of them even at demonstrative arguments. -M.CH. XLVIII.-How Pantagruel went ashore at the island ofPapimany.HAVING left the desolate island of the Popefigs, we sailed ,for the space of a day, very fairly and merrily, and made theblessed island Papimany. As soon as we had dropt anchor in the road, before we had well moored our ship withground-tackle, four persons, in different garbs, rowed to- wards us in a skiff. One of them was dressed like a monkin his frock, draggle-tailed, and booted: the other like afalconer, with a lure , and a long- winged hawk on his fist:the third like a solicitor, with a large bag, full of informations, subpoenas, breviates , bills, writs, cases, and otherimplements of pettifogging. The fourth looked like one ofyour vine barbers about Ocleans, with a jantee pair of canvass trousers , a dosser, and a pruning knife at his girdle.As soon as the boat had clapped them on board, they all with one voice asked, Have you seen him, good passengers,have you seen him? -Who? asked Pantagruel. You knowwho, answered they. Who is it? asked Friar John. ' Sbloodand ' ounds, I'll thrash him thick and threefold. This hesaid, thinking that they inquired after some robber, murderer, or church-breaker. Oh wonderful, cried the four, donot you foreign people know the one? Sirs, replied Epistemon, we do not understand those terms: but if you willbe pleased to let us know who you mean, we will tell youthe truth of the matter, without any more ado. We mean.A good lesson for princes to be generous and liberal on occasion.Pantagruel went nowhere but he bestowed his favours liberally, and left all the marks of a princely munificence.CHAP. XLVIII. ]PANTAGRUEL. 333said they, He that is. Did you ever see him? He that is,returned Pantagruel, according to our theological doctrine ,is God, who said to Moses, I am that I am.¹ We neversaw him, nor can he be beheld by mortal eyes. We meannothing less than that supreme God, who rules in heaven,replied they; we mean the god on earth. Did you ever seehim? Upon my honour, replied Carpalim, they mean thepope. Ay, ay, answered Panurge: yea verily, gentlemen,I have seen three of them, whose sight has not much bet- tered me. How! cried they, our sacred decretals informus, that there never is more than one living . I mean successively, one after the other, returned Panurge: otherwise I never saw more than one at a time.O thrice and four times happy people! cried they, youare welcome, and more than double welcome! They thenkneeled down before us and would have kissed our feet,but we would not suffer it, telling them that, should thepope come thither in his own person, it is all they could doto him. No, certainly, answered they, for we have alreadyresolved upon the matter. We would kiss his bare arse ,without boggling at it, and eke his two pounders: for hehas a pair of them, the holy father, that he has; we find itso by our fine decretals , otherwise he could not be pope.So that, according to our subtile decretalin philosophy, thisis a necessary consequence: he is pope; therefore, he hasgenitories (genitals) and should genitories no more be found.in the world, the world could no more have a pope.While they were talking thus, Pantagruel inquired of one ofthe coxswain's crew, who those persons were? he answered,that they were the four estates of the realm; and added,that we should be made as welcome as princes, since we hadseen the pope. Panurge having been acquainted with thisby Pantagruel, said to him in his ear, I swear and vow, sir,1 Instead of those words, Rabelais only says, " Et en tel mot se de- claira à Moses, " i. e. and in that word he declared himself to Moses.What word? He that is not, I am that I am. God said not toMoses, I am that I am, but I am he that is. And therefore Rabelaismakes him say so too. Our English Bibles indeed have it, I am that Iam, and so has the Latin, Ego sum qui sum; but the former should be,as I said before, I am he that is, and the later Ego sum qui est. TheSeptuagint translation has it right, ɛyw ɛquí ó ŵv, I amhe that is. Accordingly Rabelais begins this period with He that is; for no being be- sides God truly is.334 RABELAIS WORKS [BOOK 17. .66it is even so; he that has patience may compass any thingOur seeing the pope hath done us no good: now, in thedevil's name, it will do us a great deal. We then wentashore, and the whole country, men, women, and children ,came to meet us as in a solemn procession. Our four es- tates cried out to them with a loud voice, They have seenhim they have seen him! they have seen him!" That proclamation being made, all the mob kneeled before us, lifting uptheir hands towards heaven, and crying, O happy men! Ōmost happy! and this acclamation lasted about a quarter of an hour.Then came the school-master of the place, with all hisushers, and school- boys, whom he magisterially flogged, asthey used to whip children in our country formerly, whensome criminal was hanged, that they might remember it.This displeased Pantagruel, who said to them, Gentlemen,if you do not leave off whipping these poor children, Iam gone. The people were amazed, hearing his stentorianvoice; and I saw a little hump with long fingers , say to thehypodidascal, What! in the name of wonder do all thosethat see the pope grow as tall as yon huge fellow that threatens us! Ah! how I shall think time long till I haveseen him too, that I may grow and look as big. In short,the acclamations were so great, that Homenas ( so theycalled their bishop) hastened thither, on an unbridled mule,with green trappings, attended by his apposts ( as they said)and his supposts, or officers, bearing crosses, banners, standards, canopies, torches, holy water-pots , &c. He too wantedto kiss our feet, (as the good Christian Valfinier did to PopeClement, ) saying, that one of their hypothetes, that is, one of the scavengers, scourers, and commentators of their holydecretals, had written that, in the same manner as the Messiah, so long and so much expected by the Jews, at lastappeared among them; so, on some happy day of God, thepope would come into that island; and that, while they waitedfor that blessed time, if any who had seen him at Rome, orelsewhere, chanced to come among them, they should besure to make much of them, feast them plentifully, and treatthem with a great deal of reverence. However, we civillydesired to be excused.2 This word is a production of that of homme. They use it in Lan- guedoc, when they would say, a great loggerheaded booby, that har neither wit nor breeding.CHAP. XLIX. ]PANTAGRUEL. 335CH. XLIX. How Homenas, Bishop of Papimany, showed usthe Uranopet' decretals.HOMENAS then said to us: It is enjoined us by our holydecretals to visit churches first, and taverns after. Therefore, not to decline that fine institution, let us go to church;we will afterwards go and feast ourselves . Man of God,quoth Friar John, do you go before, we will follow you:you spoke in the matter properly, and like a good Christian;it is long since we saw any such. For my part this rejoices my mind very much, and I verily believe that I shall havethe better stomach after it. Well it is a happy thing tomeet with good men! Being come near the gate of thechurch, we spied a huge thick book, gilt, and covered allover with precious stones, as rubies, emeralds , diamonds,and pearls , more, or at least as valuable as those which Augustus consecrated to Jupiter Capitolinus. This book hungin the air, being fastened with two thick chains of gold tothe zoophore of the porch. We looked on it, and admiredit. As for Pantagruel, he handled it, and dandled it , andturned it as he pleased, for he could reach it without straining; and he protested, that whenever he touched it, he wasseized with a pleasant tickling at his finger's end, new lifeand activity in his arms, and a violent temptation in hismind to beat one or two serjeants, or such officers, providedthey were not of the shaveling kind. Homenas then said tous, The law was formerly given to the Jews by Moses,1 Descending from heaven, or ascending to heaven.grave defines it, A painted carved girdle, or border, about a porch or pillar. But he does not tell us whence it is derived. The Cambridge Dictionary, under the word zophorus, (which certainly is misspelt for zoophorus, ) says, "A frieze or border in pillars, or other works, setoff with the shapes of several things (he should have said living crea- tures, Zoa and other things) graven upon it. " I shall only add, that the Greeks sometimes mean by it the oblique circle of the heavens,called the Zodiac, filled with the representations of animals, &c. Arch- itects call it, as I said before, the frieze, which everybody knows is between the architrave and the cornice. 3 Because by the2 CotDecretals it was forbid, under pain of excommunication, on any account whatever, to strike either clerics or laics that were tonsured. Now beforethe year 1425,there were in France multitudes of serjeants clerical, andothers laical, who had undergone tonsure, and who, under favour of that,committed several grievous offences in the execution of their offices, without being liable to any punishment; and though, in that year, and even in1518, endeavours were used to redress those grievances, both by arrê uu edict, the disorder still continued in some when our author wrotethis336 BOOK IV. RABELAIS' WORKS.written by God himself. At Delphos, before the portal ofApollo's temple, this sentence, гN201 2E AYTON, was foundwritten with a divine hand. And some time after it, EIwas also seen, and as divinely written and transmitted from heaven. Cybele's image was brought out of heaven, into afield called Pessinunt, in Phrygia; so was that of Diana toTauris, if you will believe Euripides; the oriflamb, or holystandard, was transmitted out of heaven to the noble andmost Christian kings of France, to fight against the unbelievers . In the reign of Numa Pompilius, second King ofthe Romans, the famous copper buckler called Ancile, wasseen to descend from heaven. At Acropolis, near Athens,Minerva's statue formerly fell from the imperial heaven.In like manner the sacred decretals, which you see, werewritten with the hand of an angel, " of the cherubim kind.You outlandish people will hardly believe this, I fear. Littleenough of conscience, said Panurge. —And then, continuedHomenas, they were miraculously transmitted to us herefrom the very heaven of heavens; in the same manner asthe river Nile is called Diipetes, by Homer, the father of allphilosophy, (the holy decretals always excepted. ) Now, because you have seen the pope, their evangelist and everlasting protector, we will give you leave to see and kiss themon the inside, if you think meet. But then you must fastthree days before, and canonically confess; nicely and strictlymustering up, and inventorising your sins, great and small,so thick that one single circ*mstance of them may not escapeyou; as our holy decretals, which you see direct. This willtake up some time. Man of God, answered Panurge, wehave seen and descried decrees, and eke decretals enough ofconscience; some on paper, others on parchment, fine andgay like any painted paper lantern, some on vellum, somein manuscript, and others in print: so you need not take4 Plutarch has written a treatise , showing the signification of thismysterious E I; which two letters were also divinely written, and transmitted from heaven, says the Dutch scholiast.5 SeePlutarch. 6 See Pausanias's Attics. 7 Erasmus, inhis Exequia Seraphica. " Christus legem evangelicam promulgavit:Franciscus legem suam, angeli manibus descriptam, tradidit seraphicis fratribus." This tradition could not but be known to Homenas; but,as it would have derogated from the dignity of the decretals, he did notthink himself obliged to take any notice of it, much less to lay any stress upon it. 8 Parchemin lanterné means only trans- parent, as the horn of a lantern.CHAP. XLIX. ] PANTAGRUEL. 337half these pains to show these. We will take the good-willfor the deed, and thank you as much as if we had. Ay,marry, said Homenas, but you never saw these that are angelically written. Those in your country are only transcripts from ours; as we find it written by one of our old decretaline scholiasts. For me, do not spare me; I do notvalue the labour; so I may serve you: do but tell mewhether you will be confessed, and fast only three short littledays of God? As for confessing, answering Panurge, therecan be no great harm in it; but this same fasting, master ofmine, will hardly down with us at this time, for we have sovery much overfasted ourselves at sea, that the spiders havespun their cobwebs over our grinders. Do but look on thisgood Friar John des Entomeures, ( Homenas then courteouslydemy- clipped him about the neck) some moss is growing inhis throat, for want of bestirring and exercising his chaps.He speaks the truth, vouched Friar John; I have so muchfasted that I am almost grown hump- shouldered. Come.then, let us go into the church, said Homenas; and prayforgive us if for the present, we do not sing you a fine high mass. The hour of mid- day is past, and after it our sacred decretals forbid us to sing mass, I mean your high andlawful mass. But I will say a low and dry one, ¹º for you. Ihad rather have one moistened with some good Anjou wine,cried Panurge; fall to, fall to your low mass, and dispatch.Odd's- boddikins, quoth Friar John, it frets me to the guts thatI must have an empty stomach at this time of day. For, had Ieaten a good breakfast, and fed like a monk, if he shouldchance to sing us the Requiem æternam dona eis, Domine, I hadthen brought thither bread and wine for the traits passez, ¹(those that are gone before. ) Well, patience; pull away, andsave tide short and sweet, ¹² I pray you, and this for a cause.It should be, grown quite hump-shouldered , or hump-backed. Tout bossu, in French. This expression is taken from the correspondency there is between a stomach that is empty, and a sack that is so, which cannot stand on end, but falls together of a heap. 10 Alittle mass, or low mass: a mass without communion. " Messa bassa, messasenza communione, " says Oudin. 11 Rabelais plays uponthe word trépasséz (the dead). You must know that, to go to mass for the dead, is, say the Italians, " andar alla messa doppo haver fatta collatione, perche vi si porta pane e vino, " i . e. to go to mass after having taken a repast, because then you carry with you bread and wine, ( in your belly suppose). This is what Friar John merrily alludes to.12 Don't be long about your mass.VOL. II.

Rabelais says,1011"troussez laZ338 [BOOK IV RABELAIS' WORKS.Ca. L.-How Homenas showed us the arch- type, or representation of a pope.MASS being mumbled over, Homenas took a huge bundle ofkeys out of a trunk near the head altar, and put thirty-twoof them into so many key- holes; put back so many springs;then with fourteen more mastered so many padlocks, and atlast opened an iron window strongly barred above the said altar.This being done, in token of great mystery, he covered himselfwith wet sackcloth, and drawing a curtain of crimson satin,showed us an image daubed over, coarsely enough, to mythinking: then he touched it with a pretty long stick, and made usall kiss the part of the stick that had touched the image. Afterthis he said unto us , What think you of this image? It is thelikeness of a pope, answered Pantagruel: I know it by thetriple crown, his furred amice, his rochet, and his slipper.You are in the right, said Homenas; it is the idea of that samegood god on earth, whose coming we devoutly await, andwhom we hope one day to see in this country. O happy,wished for, and much expected day! and happy, most happyyou, whose propitious stars have so favoured you, as to letyou see the living and real face of this good god on earth!bythe single sight of whose picture we obtain full remission ofall the sins which we rememberthat we have committed, as alsoa third part, and eighteen quarantaines of the sins which we haveforgot: and indeed we only see it on high annual holidays .This caused Pantagruel to say, that it was a work likethose which Dædalus used to make, since, though it weredeformed and ill drawn, nevertheless some divine energy, incourt, de paour (peur) que ne se crotte." Tuck it up short, for fear of its daggling. Thus in the play called the Passion of Jesus Christ,with four dramatis personæ, St. John, to the headsman who was come to dispatch him:"Amy, puis que finer me fault,Pour tenir justice et raison,Accorde que face oraison,A dieu, per pensée devote. "GRONGNART, Bourreau." Fay ie donc court, que ne se crotte,Je ne veuil plus attendre a l'huis. ""Friend, since I must suffer death For having been sincere,Grant meto finish my last breath,To God in humble prayer. "GRUMBLESBY, the Headsman."Then make it short,for fear ofdaggling;Icannot stand much longer haggling."This is the style of the penitential canons. 2 Wrong; it should have been translated, A work like that which once, upon a cer- tain occasion, was made by Dædalus. For Dædalus was a most inge- nious artificer , and this work here alluded to was as clumsily made as possibly he could make it, and that for a cause, which the reader will see in M. Duchat's note; a pleasant story enough about Juno's jea lousy, but too long to be here inserted.OHAP. L.] PANTAGRUEL. 339point of pardons, lay hid and concealed in it . Thus, saidFriar John, at Sevillé, the rascally beggars being one evening on a solemn holiday at supper in the spital, one braggedof having got six blancs, or two- pence half- penny; anothereight liards, or two- pence; a third, seven caroluses, or sixpence; but an old mumper made his vaunts of having gotthree testons, or five shillings . Ah, but, cried his comrades,thou hast a leg of God; as if, continued Friar John, somedivine virtue could lie hid in a stenching ulcerated rotten shank. Pray, said Pantagruel, when you are for telling ussome such nauseous tale , be so kind as not to forget to provide a bason, Friar John: I'll assure you, I had much adoto forbear bringing up my breakfast.Fie! I wonder a manof your coat is not ashamed to use thus the sacred name ofGod, in speaking of things so filthy and abominable! fie , Isay. If among your monking tribes such an abuse of wordsis allowed, I beseech you leave it there, and do not let itcome out of the cloisters. Physicians, said Epistemon, thusattribute a kind of divinity to some diseases: Nero also extolled mushrooms, and, in a Greek proverb, termed themdivine food, because with them he had poisoned Claudiushis predecessor. But methinks, gentlemen, this same picture is not over-like our late pope's. For I have seen them,not with their pallium, amice, or rochet on, but with helmets on their heads, more like the top of a Persian turban;and while the Christian commonwealth was in peace, theyalone were most furiously and cruelly making war. Thismust have been then, returned Homenas, against the rebellious, heretical Protestants; reprobates, who are diso- bedient to the holiness of this good god on earth. It is notonly lawful for him to do so, but it is enjoined him by thesacred decretals; and if any dare transgress one single iotaagainst their commands, whether they be emperors, kings,dukes, princes, or commonwealths, he is immediately topursue them with fire and sword, strip them of all theirgoods, take their kingdoms from them, proscribe them,3 Both a Hebrew and Greek expression for a rotten ulcerated leg.See Henry Stephen's Dial du Nouv. Lang. Fr. Ital. and Plutarch, c.33, ofthe dialogue about which are the most sensible beasts.Alexander VI. and Julius II. But chiefly the last, who in 1511 ,with a helmet on his head, and cuirass on his back and breast, appeared before Miranda, to hasten the siege of that place, which he thought his generals were slack in carrying on.z 2340 [BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.anathematize them, and destroy not only their bodies, thoseof their children , relations , and others, but damn also theirsouls to the very bottom of the most hot and burning cauldron in heli . Here, in the devil's name, said Panurge, thepeople are no heretics; such as was our Raminagrobis, andas they are in Germany and England . You are Christiansof the best edition, all picked and culled, for ought I see.Ay, marry are we, returned Homenas, and for that reasonwe shall all be saved. Now let us go and bless ourselveswith holy-water, and then to dinner.CH. LI. -Table- talk in praise of the decretals.Now, topers, pray observe that while Homenas was sayinghis dry mass, three collectors, or licensed beggars of the church, each of them with a large bason, went round amongthe people, with a loud voice; Pray remember the blessedmen who have seen his face. As we came out of the temple,they brought their basons brim full of papimany chink toHomenas, who told us that it was plentifully to feast with;and that, of this contribution and voluntary tax, one partshould be laid out in good drinking, another in good eating,and the remainder in both: according to an admirable exposition hidden in a corner of their holy decretals; which wasperformed to a T, and that at a noted tavern not muchunlike that of Will's at Amiens. ' Believe me, we tickled itoff there with copious cramming, and numerous swilling.I made two notable observations at that dinner: the one,that there was not one dish served up, whether of cabrittas ,capons, hogs, (of which latter there is great plenty in Papimany. )2 pigeons, conies, leverets, turkeys, or others, withoutabundance of magistral stuffing: the other, that every course ,and the fruit also , were served up by unmarried females ofthe place, tight lasses , I will assure you, waggish, fair, goodconditioned, and comely, spruce and fit for business. Theywere all clad in fine long white albs, with two girdles; theirhair interwoven with narrow tape and purple riband, stuckwith roses, gilly- flowers, marjoram, daffidown - dillies , thyme,and other sweet flowers.At every cadence, they invited us to drink and bang itabout, dropping us neat and genteel courtesies: nor was the1 It has been already said, in a note on ch . XI . of this book, how it came about there were formerly so many cook's shops at Amiens.2 The sneerers, among the Catholics, call their canons God Almighty's .hors.СНАР. І.М. ]PANTAGRUEL. 341sight of them unwelcome to all the company; and as forFriar John, he leered on them sideways, like a cur that steals a capon. When the first course was taken off, thefemales melodiously sung us an epode in the praise of thesacrosant decretals; and then the second course being servedup, Homenas, joyful and cheery, said to one of the shebutlers, light here, Clerica. Immediately one of the girlsbrought him a tall- boy brim- full of extravagant wine. Hetook fast hold of it , and fetching a deep sigh," said to Pantagruel , My lord, and you my good friends, here's to ye,with all my heart: you are all very welcome. When hehad tipped that off, and given the tall-boy to the prettycreature, he lifted up his voice and said, O most holy decretals, how good is good wine found through your means! Thisis the best jest we have had yet, observed Panurge. But itwould still be a better, said Pantagruel, if they could turnbad wine into good.O seraphic Sextum! continued Homenas, how necessary are you not to the salvation of poor mortals! O cherubicClementine! how perfectly the perfect institution of a true Christian is contained and described in you! O angelicalExtravagantés! how many poor souls that wander up anddown in mortal bodies, through this vale of misery, wouldperish, were it not for you! When, ah! when shall thisspecial gift of grace be bestowed on mankind, as to lay aside all other studies and concerns, to use you, to peruse you, tounderstand you, to know you by heart, to practise you, toincorporate you, to turn you into blood, and incentre youinto the deepest ventricles of their brains, the inmost marrowof their bones, and most intricate labyrinth of their arteries?Then, ah, then! and no sooner than then, nor otherwise3 Rabelais' words are Clerice, esclaire icy. A sensible pun to such as speak French. Light here, clerk. Words properly of a curateordering his young clerk to light him with his lantern, in adininister- ing the sacraments to a sick person. Homenas makes use of it here,to let his servants know they should fill him nothing but bumpers,(lampées in French , ) which likewise alludes to lamp- light.Tythe wine, granted to Homenas's church by some extravaganté,i . e. extraordinary constitution added to the body of the canon law.5 Much cause indeed to sigh, like the fat prior, in Marot, who cried- Qu'on ha de maulx pour servir saincte eglise!66! how much we go through who serve the church!"Not unlike a parson I knew, possessed of one of your fat-goose livings of 4007 a year, stroking his hand over his pot- belly, after dinner, in hiselbow-chair: O my God! said he, very devoutly342 RABELAIS' WORKS. [ BOOK IV.than thus, shall the world be happy! While the old manwas thus running on. Epistemon rose and softly said toPanurge, For want of a close stool, I must even leave youfor a moment or two: this stuff has unbunged the orifice ofmy mustard-barrel: but I'll not tarry long.Then, ah then! continued Homenas, no hail, frost, ice,snow, overflowing, or vis major: then plenty of all earthlygoods here below. Then uninterrupted and eternal peacethrough the universe, an end of all wars, plunderings, drudgeries, robbing, assassinates, unless it be to destroy thesecursed rebels the heretics. Oh, then, rejoicing, cheerfulness, jollity, solace , sports, and delicious pleasures , over theface of the earth . Oh! what great learning, inestimableerudition, and god-like precepts, are knit, linked, rivetted,and mortised in the divine chapters of these eternal decretals!Oh! how wonderfully, if you read but one demy canon,short paragraph, or single observation of these sacrosanctdecretals, how wonderfully, I say, do you not perceive tokindle in your hearts a furnace of divine love , charity towards your neighbour, (provided he be no heretic, ) boldcontempt of all casual and sublunary things, firm content inall your affections, and extatic elevation of soul even to the third heaven.CH. LII. —A continuation of the miracles caused by the decretals.SPOKE like an organ,' quoth Panurge; but for my part, Ibelieve as little of it as I can. For, one day by chance Ihappened to read a chapter of them at Poictiers, at the mostdecretali potent Scotch doctor's , and old Nick turn me intobumfodder, if this did not make me so hide-bound and costive, that for four or five days I hardly scumbered onepoor butt of sir- reverence; and that, too, was full as dryand hard, I protest, as Catullus tells us were those of hisneighbour Furius:"Nec toto decies cacas in anno,Atque id durius est fabà, et lapills:Quod tu si manibus teras, fricesque,Non unquam digitum inquinare posses."1 Voicy, dist Panurge, qui dict d'orgues. Orgues meaning organs,Panurge does as much as say to Homenas, You have heard others talktous, and upon that footing you affirm it; and so you do just like the organs, which yield a delightful sound, when well managed; but for mv part. I will not believe you without good vouchers.CHAP. LII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 343Oh, ho, cried Homenas, by our lady, it may be you werethen in a state of mortal sin, my friend. Well turned, criedPanurge, this was a new strain egad.One day, said Friar John, at Sevillé I had applied to myposteriors, by way of hind-towel, a leaf of an old Clementinæ, which our rent- gatherer, John Guimard, had thrownout into the green of our cloister; now the devil broil melike a black pudding, if I was not so abominably plaguedwith chaps, chawns, and piles at the fundament, that theorifice of my poor nockandroe was in a most woful picklefor I do not know how long. By our lady, cried Homenas,it was a plain punishment of God, for the sin that you hadcommitted in bewraying that sacred book, which you oughtrather to have kissed and adored; I say with an adorationof latria, or of hyperdulia at least: the Panormitan ³ nevertold a lie in the matter.3Saith Ponocrates: At Montpelier, John Choüart havingbought of the monks of St. Olary a delicate set of decretals,written on fine large parchment of Lamballe, to beat goldbetween the leaves, not so much as a piece that was beatenin them came to good, but all were dilacerated and spoiled .Mark this, cried Homenas; it was a divine punishment andvengeance.At Mans, said Eudemon, Francis Cornu, apothecary, had turned an old set of Extravagantés into waste paper: may Inever stir, if whatever was lapped up in them was not immediately corrupted, rotten, and spoiled; incense, pepper,cloves, cinnamon, saffron, wax, cassia , rhubarb, tamarinds,all drugs and spices , were lost without exception. Mark,mark, quoth Homenas, an effect of divine justice! Thiscomes of putting the sacred Scriptures to such profane uses.At Paris, said Carpalim, Snip Groignet the tailor hadturned an old Clementinæ into patterns and measures, andall the clothes that were cut on them were utterly spoiledand lost; gowns, hoods, cloaks, cassocks, jerkins , jackets,waistcoats, capes, doublets, petticoats, corps de robes, farthingales, and so forth. Snip, thinking to cut a hood, wouldInian, in the original; i. e. by St. John; a childish oath, says Cotgrave. 3 Nicolas de Tudeschi, a Sicilian , Archbishop of Palermo, in 1425. His Commentary on the Clementine was printed in 8vo, at Paris, 1516. See Draudius' Bibliotheque. 4 A townof Bretagne, famous for the manufactory of parchment.344 [BOOK IV.RABELAIS WORKS.cut you out a codpiece; instead of a cassock, he wouldmake you a high- crowned hat; for a waistcoat, he wouldshape you out a rochet; on the pattern of a doublet, Lewould make you a thing like a frying- pan; then his journeymen having stitched it up, did jag it and pink it at thebottom, and so it looked like a pan to fry chesnuts. Insteadof a cape, he made a buskin; for a farthingal, he shaped amontero cap; and thinking to make a cloak, he would cutout a pair of your big out- strouting Swiss breeches, withpanes like the outside of a tabour. Insomuch that Snip wascondemned to make good the stuffs to all his customers; andto this day poor cabbage's hair grows through his hood, andhis arse through his pocket- holes. Mark, an effect ofheavenly wrath and vengeance! cried Homenas.At Cahusac, said Gymnast, a match being made by thelords of Estissac and Viscount Lausun to shoot at a mark,Perotou had taken to pieces a set of decretals , and set oneof the leaves for the white to shoot at: now I sell , nay Igive and bequeath for ever and aye, the mould of my doubletto fifteen hundred hampers full of black devils, if ever anyarcher in the country (though they are singular marksmer.in Guienne) could hit the white. Not the least bit of theholy scribble was contaminated or touched: nay, and Sansornin the elder, who held stakes, swore to us, figues dioures,hard figs, (his greatest oath, ) that he had openly, visibly,and manifestly seen the bolt of Carquelin moving right tothe round circle in the middle of the white; and that juston the point, when it was going to hit and enter, it had gone aside above seven foot and four inches wide of it towardsthe bakehouse.Miracle! cried Homenas, miracle! miracle! Clerica, comewench, light, light here. Here's to you all , gentlemen; IVow you seem to me very sound Christians . While he saidthis, the maidens began to snicker at his elbow, grinning,giggling, and twittering among themselves. Friar Johnbegan to paw, neigh, and whinny at the snout's end, as oneready to leap, or at least to play the ass, and get up andride tantivy to the devil, like a beggar on horseback. "5 Add, printed on canonge paper. A beautiful large paper, called by Vives, " Charta grandis, augustana, sive imperialis . " 6 It is in theoriginal "monter dessus, comme Herbault sus paovres gens." Which has two meanings; one is, fall upon them, as your gentlemen's dogs fall upon beggars at the gates; the other is, ride them, worry them, and harass them, as some lords of manors do their poor tenants.CHAP. LII. ]PANTAGRUEL. 345Methinks, said Pantagruel, a man might have been moreout of danger near the white of which Gymnast spoke, thanwas formerly Diogenes near another. How is that? askedHomenas; what was it? Was he one of our decretalists?Rarely fallen in again egad, said Epistemon, returning fromstool; I see he will hook his decretals in, though by thehead and shoulders .Diogenes, said Pantagruel, one day, for pastime, went tosee some archers that shot at butts, one of whom was soanskilful, that, when it was his turn to shoot, all the bystanders went aside, lest he should mistake them for themark. Diogenes had seen him shoot extremely wide of it:so when the other was taking aim a second time, and thepeople removed at a great distance to the right and left ofthe white, he placed himself close by the mark; holdingthat place to be the safest, and that so bad an archer wouldcertainly rather hit any other.One of the Lord d'Estissac's pages at last found out thecharm, pursued Gymnast, and by his advice Peroton put inanother white made up of some papers of Pouillac's lawsuit, and then every one shot cleverly.At Landerousse, said Rhizotomus, at John Delif's wedding were very great doings, as it was then the custom ofthe country. After supper, several farces, interludes, andcomical scenes were acted: they had also several morrisdancers with bells and tabours; and divers sorts of masksand mummers were let in. My school- fellows and I, tograce the festival to the best of our power, ( for, fine whiteand purple liveries had been given to all of us in the morning) contrived a merry mask with store of co*ckle- shells ,shells of snails , periwinkles, and such other. Then for wantof cuckoo pintle, or priest- pintle, lousebur, clote, and paper,we made ourselves false faces with the leaves of an oldSextum, that had been thrown by, and lay there for any onethat would take it up: cutting out holes for the eyes, nose,and mouth. Now, did you ever hear the like since youwere born? when we had played our little boyish antictricks, and came to take off our sham faces, we appearedmore hideous and ugly than the little devils that acted thePassion" at Douay: for our faces were utterly spoiled atthe places which had been touched by those leaves: one 7 Read Doué. One is in France, the other in Flanders.66346 [ BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.had there the small- pox; another, God's token, or theplague-spot; a third, the crincku*ms; a fourth, the measles;a fifth , botches , pushes, and carbuncles; in short, he cameoff the least hurt, who only lost his teeth by the bargain.Miracle! bawled out Homenas, miracle!Hold, hold, cried Rhizotomus, it is not yet time to clap.My sister Kate, and my sister Ren, had put the crepines oftheir hoods, their ruffles, snuffekins, and neck-ruffs newwashed, starched, and ironed, into that very book of decretals; for, you must know, it was covered with thickboards, and had strong clasps. Nowby the virtue of God—Hold, interrupted Homenas, what God do you mean? Thereis but one, answered Rhizotomus. In heaven, I grant, replied Homenas; but we have another here on earth, do yousee. Ay, marry have we, said Rhizotomus; but on my soulI protest I had quite forgot it. Well then, by the virtue ofgod the pope, their pinners, neck- ruffs , bibs, coifs, andother linen, turned as black as a charcoal-man's sack. Miracle! cried Homenas. Here, Clerica, light me here; andpr'ythee, girl, observe these rare stories . How comes it topass then, asked Friar John, that people say,Ever since decrees had tails,8And gens d'armes lugged heavy mails,'It should be ever since decrees had wings. On which M. Duchat has this long, but not tedious, note. The decretals, says he, which are of so great weight and authority with the canonists, were not only addedto the body of the ancient decrees, as wings, ailes, to the main pile of abuilding, but they are likewise the wings of the decrees in another sense; inasmuch as, by the means and help of these wings, the popes,whom the ancient canons kept pretty low, have soared to their present height, and have assumed the power they now exercise over the Latin church. Pendre des ailes, or, as they speak in Languedoc, pendre ales,to take wing, is to forget one's self so far as to lose sight. of the lowness of one's true condition; as some years ago was the case of a certain arrogant fop not far from Montpelier, according to the following tale,made upon occasion of his taking too much upon him- A certain upstart citizen of late,Would cut a figure, and would needs look great:A knot of country gentlemen were met;And, like a row of onions, all were set,And he amidst them. -Supper being served,To this and that and the other man he carved.Ducks, levrets , partridge, turkey- pout he cuts,And on their plates what part he pleases pnts;In, dealing out their pittances , the elfTook special care not to forget himself.CHAP. LIII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 347Since each monk would have a horse,All went here from bad to worse.I understand you, answered Homenas: this is one of thequirks and little satires of the newfangled heretics.10CH. LIII.-How by the virtue of the decretals, gold is subtilely drawn out of France to Rome.I WOULD, said Epistemon, it had cost me a pint of the besttripe that ever can enter into gut, so we had but comparedwith the original the dreadful chapters, Execrabilis, De multa,Si plures. De annatis per totum. Nisi essent. Cum ad monas- terium. Quod delectio. Mandatum; and certain others , thatdraw every year out of France to Rome, four hundred thousand ducats and more.Do you make nothing of this? asked Homenas. Though ,methinks, after all , it is but little, if we consider that France,the most Christian, is the only nurse the see of Rome has.However, find me in the whole world a book, whether ofphilosophy, physic, law, mathematics, or other humanlearning, nay, even, by my God, of the Holy Scripture itself,will draw as much money thence? None, none, pshaw,tush, blurt, pish; none can.¹ You may look till your eyesdrop out of your head, nay, till doomsday in the afternoon,before you can find another of that energy; I will pass my word for that.Well-stored his plate was with the choicest things;But, above all, a pile of partridge wings.One, that loved partridge wings as well as cit,Whips from his plate the best-" Sir, is it fit, 'Said he to monsieur carver, " is it right,"You should have all the wings, in our despite,You, who already take too high a flight?"Beza, 1. 4, of his Ecclesiastical History, says, this is an allusion to the proverb muli mariani: which see explained in Sartorius. ButBeza's reasoning thereupon is so confused, and his application so inexact and incoherent, that there is no making head or tail of what he says.It is more likely that what made the gens d'arms carrying port- mantles,or mails, so odious to the people, was, that, after they had submitted to carry that luggage, nothing escaped them wherever they quartered or marched, but they would pouch up a thousand things they took a fancy to at people's houses, or in the fields. 10 Homenas is mistaken. Nothing was more common than that proverb, or had been so for a long time. 1 Nargues, nargues, in the original. Aterm of contempt. We say a fig for it. So here Homenas' nargues,i. e., a fig for other books; or nazardes, a rap ofthe nose for such as say there is any book to compare with the decretals.348 RABELAIS' WORKS. [BOOK IV.Yet these devilish heretics refuse to learn and knɔw it.Burn them, tear them, nip them with hot pincers, drownthem, hang them, spit them at the bunghole, pelt them ,paut them, bruise them, beat them, cripple them, dismemberthem, cut them, gut them, bowel them, paunch them , thrashthem, slash them, gash them, chop them, slice them, slitthem, carve them, saw them, bethwack them, pare them,hack them, hew them, mince them, flea them, boil them,"broil them, roast them, toast them, bake them , fry them,crucify them, crush them, squeeze them, grind them, batterthem, burst them, quarter them, unlimb them, behump them,bethump them, belump them, belabour them, pepper them,spitchco*ck them, and carbonade them on gridirons, these wickedheretics! decretalifuges , decretalicides, worse than homicides ,worse than patricides , decretalictiones of the devil of hell.As for you other good people, I must earnestly prayand beseech you to believe no other thing, to think on , say,undertake, or do no other thing, than what's contained inour sacred decretals, and their corollaries , this fine Sextum,these fine Clementinæ, these fine Extravagantés. O deificbooks! So shall you enjoy glory, honour, exaltation,wealth, dignities, and preferments in this world; be revered,and dreaded by all, preferred, elected, and chosen, above all men.For, there is not under the cope of heaven a condition ofmen, out of which you will find persons fitter to do andhandle all things, than those who by divine prescience, eternal predestination, have applied themselves to the study ofthe holy decretals.Would you choose a worthy emperor, a good captain , afit general in time of war, one that can well foresee all inconveniences, avoid all dangers, briskly and bravely bringhis men on to a breach or attack, still be on sure grounds,always overcome without loss of his men, and know how tomake a good use of his victory? Take me a decretist. —No,no, I mean a decretalist. Ho, the foul blunder, whispered Epistemon."2 Punishments then in fashion. Mat. Corderius, ch. 49, n. 28, of his De Corr. Serm. Emendatione: They are going to execute him,i. e., to hang or burn, or behead, or quarter, or boil him. " Ad ca- pitale supplicium perductus est. ' 3 Ole gros rat! Othe huge rat! A Poitevine expression, to rally one that makes a slip with his tongue, speaks one word for another, as Homenas does here.In ch. xxvii. , of lib. 5. Oles gros rats à la table, O the bouncing tableCHAP. LIII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 349Would you, in time of peace, find a man capable ofwisely governing the state of a commonwealth, of a king- dum, of an empire, of a monarchy; sufficient to maintainthe clergy, nobility, senate, and commons in wealth, friend- ship, unity, obedience, virtue, and honesty? Take a de- cretalist.Would you find a man, who, by his exemplary life , eloquence, and pious admonitions, may in a short time, withouteffusion of human blood, conquer the Holy land, and bringover to the holy church the misbelieving Turks, Jews, Tartars, Muscovites, Mamelukes, and Sarrabonites? Take me a decretalist.What makes, in many countries, the people rebellious and depraved, pages saucy and mischievous, students sottish andduncical? Nothing but that their governors, and tutors were not decretalists.But what, on your conscience, was it, do you think, thatestablished, confirmed, and authorised those fine religiousorders, with whom you see the Christian world every whereadorned, graced, and illustrated , as the firmament is with itsglorious stars? The holy decretals.What was it that founded, underpropped, and fixed, andnow maintains, nourishes, and feeds the devout monks, andfriars in convents, monasteries, and abbeys; so that did theynot daily and mightily pray without ceasing, the world wouldbe in evident danger of returning to its primitive chaos?The sacred decretals .What makes and daily increases the famous and celebrated patrimony of St. Peter in plenty of all temporal, corporeal, and spiritual blessings? The holy decretals .What made the holy apostolic see and pope of Rome, inall times, and at this present, so dreadful in the universe,that all kings, emperors, potentates, and lords , willing, nilling, must depend upon him, hold of him, be crowned, confirmed, and authorised by him, come thither to strike sail ,buckle, and fall down before his holy slipper, whose pictureyou have seen? The mighty decretals of God.I will discover you a great secret. The universities ofrats, means the fat monks (rats signified shavelings as well as rats)who eat up mankind. There Friar John means that they are never more like real rats well fed, than at table, when they lay about thememptying the plates.350 RABELAIS' WORKS [BOOK IV.your world have commonly a book, either open or shut, intheir arms and devices: what book do you think it is?Truly, I do not know, answered Pantagruel; I never read. It is the decretals, said Homenas, without which theprivileges of all universities would soon be lost. You mustown, that I have taught you this; ha, ha, ha, ha, ha!Here Homenas began to belch, to fart, to funk, tolaugh, to slaver, and to sweat; and then he gave his hugegreasy four- cornered cap to one of the lasses , who claptit on her pretty head with a great deal of joy, after she hadlovingly bussed it, as a sure token that she should be firstmarried . Vivat, cried Epistemon, fifat, bibat, pipat.*O apocalyptic secret, continued Homenas! light, light,Clerica, light here with double lanterns . Now for the fruit,virgins.I was saying then, that giving yourselves thus wholly tothe study of the holy decretals , you will gain wealth andhonour in this world: I add, that in the next you will infalliblybe saved in the blessed kingdom of heaven, whose keys aregiven to our good god and decretaliarch. O my good god,whom I adore and never saw, by thy special grace open untous, at the point of death at least, this most sacred treasure ofour holy mother church, whose protector, preserver, butler,chief larder, administrator, and disposer thou art; and takecare, I beseech thee, O lord , that the precious works of supererogation, the goodly pardons, do not fail us in time ofneed so that the devils may not find an opportunity togripe our precious souls, and the dreadful jaws of hellmay not swallow us. If we must pass through purgatory,thy will be done. It is in thy power to draw us out of itwhen thou pleasest. Here Homenas began to shed hugehot briny tears, to beat his breast, and kiss his thumbs inthe shape of a cross.▲ Germanis vivere, bibere est, is the saying in France, on occasion ofthis cry of the Germans, which Epistemon pronounces after the Ger- man fashion. See Misson, Lett. 9, of his Travels into Italy.Being a couple of bumpers, (lampées in French) which equivocates to lanterns in sense. 6 Allusion to what is usually done by bigots, whose devotion consists so essentially in kissing the cross, that,in order to have a cross always at hand, they form a cross with theirtwo thumbs, and in that shape are continually lifting them to their mouths. In Languedoc they say of a man that bestirs him vigorously in an affair, and seems to have it at heart, he kisses his thumbs acrossthat it may succeed .CHAP. LIII.] PANTAGRUEL. 351ON CHAP. XLVIII. AND FIVE FOLLOWING. -The island of Papimany,is those whose love and zeal for the pope is so excessive, that it maybe counted madness. The word is made of papa, pope, and mania,madness, from µaívoµai, insanio. Thus in Plutarch, the Andromaneswere women, whose love for men was most blind and furious; thatname being given to those Lacedæmonian women, who used to fightbefore the people with bare thighs, whence they were called Phenomerides. This blind zeal for popery is drawn in most lively colours, byour satirical painter, in all those chapters; and particularly appears bythe discourse of the four estates of the country, the gentleman , thelawyer, the monk, and the clown, who will all give the pope thoseepithets which only belong to God, calling the bishop of Rome, Hethat is, and God on earth. All know that the pope's flatterers havebeen very prodigal of such epithets, principally in Rabelais' time; asto Paul III., who, as Alstedius and others write, was styled Optimus maximus in terris Deus; and the following distich was also made tocompliment a pope, and prove that he was justly called, God on earth."Ense potens gemino, mundi moderaris habenas,Et meritò in terris diceris esse Deus. "The four estates are brought in to show that the pope's missionaries are of all sorts of conditions. Their frantic zeal does not only make them adore the pope, but prostrate themselves at the feet of those who have seen him. Says Panurge to them, when they asked him whether he had been blest with the sight of that God on earth; yea, verily gen.tlemen, I have seen three of them, whose sight has not much bettered me. O thrice and four times happy people! cried the Papimanes,you are welcome, and more than double welcome; and they would have kissed Panurge's feet; saying, they would even kiss the pope's a-, ifever he came among them. As soon as our travellers are landed ,the people throng to see those blessed men, who had seen his holiness's face. Homenas, bishop of the place, hastens to them in pontificalibus,with his train of church-players, bearing crosses, banners, standards,holy water- pots, and canopies, such as the pope and the host usedto beunder, when they are carried in procession. The mob conducts and attends the strangers to the church, where there is not one word men- tioned of God, nor Jesus Christ, or the gospel; but much of the mostholy decretals, or pope's decrees written with the hand of an angei.Our author admirably ridicules the credulity of those bigoted papists.Then Homenas mumbles over a mass; after which, from the church heleads them to the tavern, where he feasts the strangers with the money that was gathered during the mass; yet not till he had showed themthe pope's picture, which Epistemon said was not like the late popes:For, said he, I have seen them, not thus with their pallium , amice, and rochet on, but with helmets on their heads, more like the top of a Persian turban; and, while the christian commonwealth was in peace, they alone were furiously and cruelly making war. Homenas zealously takes their part, and replies, that then it was against those who transgressed against their decretals, and that whether they were emperors, kings, or commonwealths, he was immediately to pursue them with fire andsword, strip them of their kingdoms, anathematize them, and not only332 [ BOOK IV. RABELAIS' WORKS.66destroy their bodies, those of their children and adherents , but also damn their souls to the pit of hell. Nothing can be finer than the feast, and the discourse of Homenas and his guests. Young buxom lasses waiton them, principally Homenas's favourite, whom our author calls Clerica. Friar John, who leered on them sideways, like a cur thatsteals a capon, liked them better than some of the bon christian pears:so does Homenas who is very lavish of that fruit, like Horace's CalaberHæc porcis hodiè comedenda relinques."But he will by no means be persuaded to part with one of the doxies.The most holy and heavenly decretals are celebrated with swingeing bumpers of good wine, just as Belshazzar extolled his gods of gold andsilver . In short, this feast is a triumph, in which our author has described the voluptuous life of those effeminate Papimanes, their super- stitions, which are the foundation of their idleness and luxury, and their impious doctrine, that encourages subjects to kill their lawful sovereign, and massacre all those who will not blindly submit to the pope, and the blind idolatrous worship which he has invented; bymeans whereof, saith our author, gold is subtilly drawn out of France to Rome, above four hundred thousand ducats every year. England was much more fleeced, till it had shaken off the papal yoke; and we must own, that as doctor Rabelais was very well informed of all these abuses, no man ever described them more to the life; and the best protestant writers have not equalled him in this, though they did it ontof interest, and made it their particular business. Neither can I tell,whether Rabelais' boldness be more to be wondered at in publishing such a work while fires were kindled, in every part of France, to burn the Lutherans, than his good fortune in having escaped those flames towhich many were condemned for less every day where he wrote. -M.CH. LIV. —How Homenas gave Pantagruel some bon- christianpears.EPISTEMON, Friar John, and Panurge, seeing this doleful catastrophe, began, under the cover of their napkins, to cry,meeow, meeow, meeow; feigning to wipe their eyes all the whileas if they had wept. The wenches were doubly diligent, andbrought brimmers of Clementine wine to every one, besidesstore of sweetmeats; and thus the feasting was revived.Before we arose from table, Homenas gave us a greatquantity of fair large pears; saying, Here, my good friends,these are singular good pears; you will find none such any1 Clement the Vth, who was of Bordeaux, and under whose namethe Clementines were compiled, had planted in the territory of Pessac,a village within a league of Bordeaux, a vineyard, which still bears the name of that pope. See du Chesne's Antiquities of the Cities , &c. 1. 3,c. 2. But this is not what Rabelais has his eye to here. There is agreat deal more likelihood that he means wine of a certain growth, the tythe whereof had been granted to Homenas' church by some Clemen- tine.CHAP. LIV. ]PANTAGRUEL. 358where else, I dare warrant. Every soil bears not everything, you know; India alone boasts black ebony; the bestincense is produced in Sabæa; the sphragitid earth at Lem.nos: so this island is the only place where such fine pearsgrow. You may, if you please, make nurseries with theirkernels in your country.I like their taste extremely, said Pantagruel. If theywere sliced, and put into a pan on the fire with wine andsugar, I fancy they would be very wholesome meat for thesick, as well as for the healthy. Pray what do you call them?No otherwise than you have heard, replied Homenas. Weare a plain downright sort of people, as God would have it,and call figs, figs; plums, plums; and pears, pears. Truly,said Pantagruel, if I live to go home,-which I hope will bespeedily, God willing, I'll set off and graff some in mygarden in Touraine, by the banks of the Loire, and will callthem bon- Christian or good- Christian pears: for I never sawbetter Christians than are these good papimans. I wouldlike him two to one better yet, said Friar John, would he butgive us two or three cart- loads of yon buxom lasses. Why,what would you do with them? cried Homenas. QuothFriar John, No harm, only bleed the kind-hearted soulsstraight between the two great toes, with certain clever lancets of the right stamp: by which operation good Christianchildren would be inoculated upon them, and the breed bemultiplied in our country, in which there are not many overgood, the more's the pity.Nay verily, replied Homenas, we cannot do this; for youwould make them tread their shoes awry, crack their pipkins, and spoil their shapes: you love mutton, I see, youwill run at sheep; I know you by that same nose and hairof yours, though I never sawyour face before. Alas! alas!how kind you are! And would you indeed damn your precious soul? Our decretals forbid this. Ah, I wish you hadthem at your finger-end. Patience, said Friar John; but,2 Nec verò terræ ferre omnes omnia possunt, says Virgil, 1. 2, of hisGeorgics. And lower;" Sola India nigrumFert ebenum, solis est thurea virga Sabæis. "3 See Pliny, 1. 37, c. 8. 4 Pliny, l. 28, c. 7, says, all pearsare heavy and hard of digestion, especially to unhealthy people; but in the same chapter he excepts baked pears.VOL. II.354 RABELAIS [ BOOK IV. ' WORKS.si tu non vis dare, præsta, quæsumus. Matter of breviary. Asfor that, I defy all the world, and I fear no man that wearsa head and a hood, though he were a chrystallin, I mean adecretalin doctor.Dinner being over, we took our leave of the right reverend Homenas, and of all the good people, humbly givingthanks; and, to make them amends for their kind entertainment, promised them that, at our coming to Rome, we wouldmake our applications so effectually to the pope, that hewould speedily be sure to come to visit them in person.After this we went on board.Pantagruel, by an act of generosity, and as an acknowledgment of the sight of the pope's picture, gave Homenasnine pieces of double frized cloth of gold, to be set before the grates of the window. He also caused the church box,for its repairs and fabric, to be quite filled with double.crowns of gold; and ordered nine hundred and fourteenangels to be delivered to each of the lasses, who had waited at table, to buy them husbands when they could get them.CH. LV.-How Pantagruel, being at sea, heard various un- frozen words.¹WHEN We were at sea, junketting, tippling, discoursing, andtelling stories, Pantagruel rose and stood up to look out:then asked us, Do you hear nothing, gentlemen? MethinkI hear some people talking in the air, yet I can see nobody.Hark! According to his command we listened , and with fullears sucked in the air, as some of you suck oysters, to findif we could hear some sound scattered through the sky? andto lose none of it, like the Emperor Antoninus, some of uslaid their hands hollow next to their ears; but all this wouldnot do, nor could we hear any voice. Yet Pantagruel continued to assure us he heard various voices in the air, some ofmen, and some of women.At last we began to fancy that we also heard something,or at least that our ears tingled; and the more we listened,the plainer we discerned the voices, so as to distinguisharticulate sounds. This mightily frightened us, and notwithout cause; since we could see nothing, yet heard such5 These words are in the style of the oremus, in the breviary and prayer- books. 1 Rabelais has borrowed these from the Courtisanof Balthasar de Castillon, of which a French translation was printed in1539, and from the Apologues of Cælius Calcagninus of Ferrara, pub.lished in 1544.CHAP. LV. }PANTAGRUEL. 355various sounds and voices of men, women, children, horses,&c. , insomuch that Panurge cried out, Cods belly, there isno fooling with the devil; we are all besh*t, let us fly.There is some ambuscade hereabouts. Friar John, art thou here, my love? I pray thee, stay by me, old boy. Hastthou got thy swinging tool? See that it do not stick in thy scabbard; thou never scourest it half as it should be. We areundone. Hark! They are guns, gad judge me: let us fly, Ido not say with hands and feet, as Brutus said at the Battleof Pharsalia; I say, with sails and oars: let us whip itaway: I never find myself to have a bit of courage at sea;in cellars, and elsewhere, I have more than enough. Let usfly and save our bacon. I do not say this for any fear that I have; for I dread nothing but danger, that I do not; Ialways say it, that should not. The free archer of Baigno let said as much. Let us hazard nothing therefore, I say,lest we come off bluely. Tack about, helm a lee , thou sonof a bachelor. Would I were now well in Quinquenois,'though I were never to marry. Haste away, let us make allthe sail we can; they will be too hard for us; we are notable to cope with them; they are ten to our one; I willwarrant you; nay, and they are on their dunghill, while wedo not know the country. They will be the death of us.We will lose no honour by flying: Demosthenes saith ,³ thatthe man that runs away, may fight another day. At least, let us retreat to the leeward. Helm a lee; bring the main tackaboard, hawl the bowlins, hoist the topgallants; we are alldead men; get off, in the devil's name, get off.Pantagruel, hearing the sad outcry which Panurge made,said, Who talks of flying? Let us first see who they are; perhaps they may be friends: I can discover nobody yet, though I can see a hundred miles round me. But let us consider alittle: I have read that a philosopher, named Petron, was ofopinion, that there were several worlds, that touched each otherin an equilateral triangle; in whose centre, he said, was thedwelling of truth: and that the words, ideas, copies, andimages of all things past, and to come, resided there; roundwhich was the age; and that with success of time part ofthem used to fall on mankind , like rheums and mildews .just as the dew fell on Gideon's fleece, till the age was fulfilled ,• Before, in ch. 13, the good wine of that place is mentioned with great praise. 3 See Aulus Gellius, lib. 17, cap. 21 .AA 2856 RABELAIS [BOOK IV. ' WORKS.I also remember, continued he, that Aristotle affirms Homer's words to be flying, moving, and consequently animated. Besides, Antiphanes said , that Plato's philosophywas like words, which, being spoken in some country duringa hard winter are immediately congealed, frozen up, and notheard for what Plato taught young lads, could hardly be understood by them when they were grown old. Now, continued he, we should philosophize and search whether this benot the place were those words are thawed.You would wonder very much, should this be the head andlyre of Orpheus. When the Thracian women had torn himto pieces, they threw his head and lyre into the river Hebrus;down which they floated to the Euxine sea, as far as theisland of Lesbos; the head continually uttering a dolefulsong, as it were, lamenting the death of Orpheus, and thelyre, with the wind's impulse, moving its strings , and harmoniously accompanying the voice. Let us see if we can- not discover them hereabouts.CH. LVI. -How among the frozen words Pantagruel found some odd ones.THE skipper made answer: Be not afraid, my lord, we areon the confines of the Frozen Sea, on which, about the beginning of last winter, happened a great and bloody fightbetween the Arimaspians and the Nephelibates. Then thewords and cries of men and women, the hacking, slashing,and hewing of battleaxes, the shocking, knocking, and jolting of armours and harnesses, the neighing of horses, andall other martial din and noise, froze in the air; and now,the rigour of the winter being over, by the succeedingserenity and warmth ofthe weather, they melt and are heard.Byjingo, quoth Panurge, the man talks somewhat like;I believe him: but could not we see some of them? Ithink I have read, that, on the edge of the mountain onwhich Moses received the Judaic law, the people saw thevoices sensibly.-Here, here, said Pantagruel, here are some that are not yet thawed. He then threw us on thedeck whole handfuls of frozen words, which seemed to uslike your rough sugar plums, of many colours, like those usedin heraldry; some words gules, ( this means also jests and merry sayings , ) some vert, some azure, some black, some or1 Græcé, those who dwell in the snows. An allusion to the battlof Marignan, between the French and the Swiss.CHAP. LVI. ] PANTAGRUEL. 357(this means fair words; ) and when we had somewhatwarmed them between our hands, they melted like snow,and we really heard them, but could not understand them,for it was a barbarous gibberish. One of them, only, that was pretty big, having been warmed between Friar John'shands, gave a sound much like that of chesnuts when theyare thrown into the fire, without being first cut, which made us all start. This was the report of a field piece in its time,cried Friar John.Panurge prayed Pantagruel to give him some more; butPantagruel told him, that to give words was the part of alover. Sell me some then, I pray you, cried Panurge.That is the part of a lawyer, returned Pantagruel. I wouldsooner sell you silence, though at a dearer rate; as Demosthenes formerly sold it by the means of his argentangina,³ orsilver quinsey.However, he threw three or four handfuls of them on the2 Verba dat omnis amans, says Ovid.3 M. Duchat taking no notice ofthis argentangina, any further than by referring to Erasmus's Adages; and the old Dutch scholiast saying only that it was a distemper which Demosthenes was reproached with,when he declined speaking against the Milesian ambassadors' request;(see Aul. Gel. 1. 2, c. 9, ) I thought it might not be disagreeable to quote what Sartorius says upon this phrase, argentanginampatitur. ' Apyvрayxnv Tάoxe , such a one labours under anargentangina. Hyheeft diegelt zucht,say the Hollanders; i . e. , he has (not the mully-grubs but) the money- grubs, as near as I can make the English answer to the Dutch. Gelt,everybody knows is money, and zuct is properly a swelling caused by bad humours. So here, metaphorically, gelt-zucht is an ailment causedby money, which takes a man in the mouth, and hinders him fromspeaking, as was the orator Demosthenes' case, which gave occasion to this proverb. Demosthenes being bought off by the Milesian am.bassadors, who had given him twenty talents, that is, twelve thousand crowns, for only one day's silence, the orator came next day into thesenate-house, his neck muffled about with rollers, and his chin bolsteredup with wool, as if he had a sore throat: but one of the assembly smelt a rat, and cried out, Demosthenes has not got a cold, but gold; as near as I can imitate the Greek pun, non συνάγην sed αργυραγχην. The Greeks have another proverb to the same purpose: Beς ἐπὶ γλώττης:Bos in lingua: he has an ox on his tongue. (Hem is een stuck specks inde mont geworpen, say the Dutch. Somebody has thrown a piece of bacon into his mouth; when a man is bribed to be silent. ) As for the ox on the tongue, the reader must knowthe Athenian coin was stamped with the figure of an ox. Plautus in Persa; hoves bini hic sunt in crumena, he has a pair of oxen in his purse. Such, therefore, as were corrupted into silence, were said to have an ox stamped on their tongue;bovem in lingua habere. He has a bone in his mouth, say the French;il a un os dans la bouche.858 RABELAIS' WORKS. [BOOK IV.deck; among which I perceived some very sharp words, andsome bloody words, which, the pilot said, used sometimes ogo back, and recoil to the place whence they came, but itwas with a slit weasand: we also saw some terrible words,and some others not very pleasant to the eye.When they had been all melted together, we heard astrange noise, hin, hin , hin, hin, his , tick , tock, taack, bredelinbrededack, frr, frr, frr, bou, bou, bou, bou, bou, bou, bou, bou,track, track, trr, trr, trr, trrr, trrrrrr; on, on, on, on, on, on,ououououon, gog, magog, and I do not know what other barbarous words; which, the pilot said, were the noise made bythe charging squadrons, the shock and neighing of horses.Then we heard some large ones go off like drums and fifes ,and others like clarions and trumpets. Believe me we hadvery good sport with them. I would fain have saved somemerry odd words, and have preserved them in oil, as ice andsnow are kept, and between clean straw.. But Pantagruelwould not let me, saying, that it is a folly to hoard up whatwe are never like to want, or have always at hand; odd,quaint, merry, and fat words of gules, never being scarceamong all good and jovial Pantagruelists.Panurge somewhat vexed Friar John, and put him in the pouts; for he took him at his word, while he dreamed ofnothing less. This caused the friar to threaten him withsuch a piece of revenge as was put upon G. Jousseaume,who having taken the merry Patelin at his word, when hehad overbid himself in some cloth, was afterwards fairlytaken by the horns like a bullock, by his jovial chapman,whom he took at his word like a man. Panurge, well knowingthat threatened folks live long, bobbed, and made mouths athim, in token of derision, then cried, would I had here theword of the Holy Bottle, without being thus obliged to gofurther in pilgrimage to her.ON CHAPS. LV. AND LVI. -By the unfrozen or thawed words which,Pantagruel and his company heard at sea in open air, just after they had left the Papimanes, our author ingeniously describes the freedom which our navigators took to speak their true sentiments of the gross ignorance,blind zeal, loose lives, and worse principles ofthose superstitious papists ,as soon as they were out of their reach . For among them the Panta- gruelists did not dare discover their minds; so that their words were ina manner frozen within their mouths, which fear and interest kept shut. But when they were out of danger they could no longer thus con- tain their words, and then every one distinctly heard them; murmuringCHAP. LVII.] PANTAGRUEL. 359words against those bigots, very sharp words, bloody words, terrible words, angry words, occasioned by reflections made on those idolatrouspersecutors; and to those words our jolly company add some words of gules, that is , merry words, jests, pleasant talk, probably about the young wenches so ready to wait on the strangers at table, and on the good bishop a-bed.

These frozen words that thawed, and then were heard , may also mean the books published at that time at Geneva, and elsewhere, againstpopery and the persecution. Those who fled from it to places of safety,with a great deal of freedom, filled their writings with such truths as were not to be spoken among the bigoted Romanists and many of those unfortunate men, having been used very cruelly in their slavery,and having nothing to defend their cause but their pens, while their ad- versaries were armed with fire and sword, their words could not but bevery sharp. The words which Rabelais says were mere gibberish,which they could not understand, may be the books that were dark,ill- written, and without judgment: and the words of gules, or jests,may be pleasant books, such as were some of Marot's epigrams, and other pieces of that nature.CH. LVII. - How Pantagruel went ashore at the dwelling ofGaster, thefirst master of arts in the world.¹THAT day Pantagruel went ashore in an island , which, forsituation and governór, may be said not to have its fellow.When you just come into it , you find it rugged, craggy, andbarren, unpleasant to the eye, painful to the feet, and almostas inaccessible as the mountain ofDauphiné,2 which is somewhat like a toad- stool, and was never climbed, as any canremember, by any but Doyac, who had the charge of KingCharles the Eighth's train of artillery.3This same Doyac, with strange tools and engines, gainedthat mountain's top, and there he found an old ram. It puz1 Alluding to the magister artis, ingeniique largitor venter, of the poet Persius. 2 This mountain is one of the four wonders whichLouis XI. took notice of in Dauphiné. It is within three leagues of Grenoble, going towards Embrun, near the Grande Chartreuse; andbeing shaped like a pyramid reversed, it has got the name of inac- cessible. 3 The continuation of Monstrelet, folio 209,calls him Doyac, and fol. 229, de Doyac; but Seyssel calls him plain Oyac, which seems to suit best with the first condition of that man, who,from a hosier, as he was in Auvergne at Montferrant, the place of his birth, rose to be the chief favourite of Louis XI. See more of him,and of his fate , in Duchat. But this was not the person that formed and executed the bold design of climbing the mountain in question; itwas one Damp Julian, a Lorrainer, a captain of Montelimar, who, by means of engines he had contrived himself, climbed to the top of it, the 26th of June, 1492. We are told this in the Chevalier Bayard's life,written by Symphorian Champier.860 RABELAIS' WORKS [BOOK IV. .zled many awise head to guess how it got thither. Some said that some eagle, or great horn- coot, having carried it thitherwhile it was yet a lambkin, it had got away, and saved itself among the bushes.As for us, having with much toil and sweat overcome thedifficult ways at the entrance, we found the top of themountain so fertile, healthful, and pleasant, that I thoughtI was then in the true garden of Eden, or earthly paradise,about whose situation our good theologues are in suchquandary, and keep such a pother.As for Pantagruel, he said, that here was the seat ofAreté—that is as much as to say, virtue-described by He- siod. This, however, with submission to better judgments.The ruler of this place was one Master Gaster, the first mas- ter of arts in the world. For, if you believe that fire is thegreat master of arts, as Tully writes, you very much wronghim and yourself: alas, Tully never believed this ." On theother side, if you fancy Mercury to be the first inventor ofarts, as our ancient Druids believed of old, you are mightilybeside the mark. The satirist's sentence, that affirms masterGaster to be the master of all arts , is true. Withhim peacefully resided old goody Penia, alias Poverty, the mother ofthe ninety-nine Muses, on whom Porus, the lord of Plenty,formerly begot Love, that noble child, the mediator of heaven and earth, as Plato affirms in Symposio.We were all obliged to pay our homage, and swear allegiance to that mighty sovereign; for he is imperious, severe,blunt, hard, uneasy, inflexible: you cannot make him believe,represent to him, or persuade him anything.He does not hear and, as the Egyptians said that Harpocrates, the god of silence, named Sigalion' in Greek, wasastomé, that is, without a mouth; so Gaster was created without ears, even like the image of Jupiter in Candia.He only speaks by signs: but those signs are more readilyobeyed by every one, than the statutes of senates, or com mands of monarchs: neither will he admit the least let or4 Opinion of Heracl*tus, &c. See Plutarch. 5 Indeed heconfutes this opinion in his De Natura Deorum, 1. 3.Plato's Banquet, and Plutarch in his Discourse of Isis and Osiris.7 Auson, Ep. 25, v. 27."Aut tua Sigalion Ægyptius oscula signet."• Seo Plutarch in the same discourse• SeeCHAP. LVII.] PANTAGRUEL. 361delay in his summons. You say, that when a lion roars, all the beasts at a considerable distance round about, as far ashis roar can be heard, are seized with a shivering. This iswritten, it is true; I have seen it. I assure you, that atmaster Gaster's command, the very heavens tremble, and all the earth shakes: his command is called, Do this or die.Needs must when the devil drives; there's no gainsaying of it.The pilot was telling us how, on a certain time, after themanner of the members that mutinied against the belly, asEsop describes it , the whole kingdom of the Somates,' wentoff into a direct faction against Gaster, resolving to throw off his yoke but they soon found their mistake, and most humbly submitted; for otherwise they had all been famished.What company soever he is in, none dispute with him forprecedence or superiority; he still goes first, though kings,emperors, or even the pope, were there. So he held the firstplace at the council of Basle; though some will tell you thatthe council was tumultuous, by the contention and ambitionofmany for priority.10Every one is busied, and labours to serve him; and, indeed, to make amends for this, he does this good to mankind,as to invent for them all arts, machines, trades, engines, andcrafts: he even instructs brutes in arts which are againsttheir nature, making poets of ravens, jackdaws, chatteringjays, parrots, and starlings, and poetesses of magpies, teaching them to utter human language, speak and sing; and all for the gut. He reclaims and tames eagles, gerfalcons, falcons gentle, sakers, lanners, goshawks, sparrow- hawks, merlins, hagards, passengers, wild rapacious birds; so thatsetting them free in the air, whenever he thinks fit, as highand as long as he pleases, he keeps them suspended, straying, flying, hovering, and courting him above the clouds:then on a sudden he makes them stoop, and come downamain from heaven next to the ground; and all for the gut.Elephants, lions, rhinoceroses, bears, horses, mares, anddogs, he teaches to dance, prance, vault, fight, swim, hidethemselves, fetch and carry what he pleases; and all for thegut.From oua, the body. Now the author makes a kingdom of it,where lives Messer Gaster (a Greek word likewise, signifying th belly, stomach, and paunch. ) 10 The belly will be foremost,especially if it is more than ordinary large and prominent.862 LBOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.Salt and fresh- water fish, whales, and the monsters of themain, he brings them up from the bottom of the deep; wolveshe forces out of the woods, bears out of the rocks, foxes outof their holes, and serpents out of the ground; and all for the gut.In short, he is so unruly, that in his rage he devours allmen and beasts: as was seen among the Vascons, " when Q.Metellus besieged them in the Sertorian wars; among theSaguntines besieged by Hannibal; among the Jews besieged by the Romans, and six hundred more; and all forthe gut. When his regent Penia takes a progress, wherevershe moves, all senates are shut up, all statutes repealed, allorders and proclamations vain; she knows, obeys, and hasno law. All shun her, in every place choosing rather to expose themselves to shipwreck at sea, and venture throughfire, rocks, caves, and precipices, than be seized by that most dreadful tormentor.CH. LVIII. —How, at the court of the Master of Ingenuity,Pantagruel detested the Engastrimythes and the Gastrolaters.Ar the court of that great master of ingenuity, Pantagruelobserved two sorts of troublesome and too officious apparitors , whom he very much detested . The first were calledEngastrimythes; the others, Gastrolaters.The first pretended to be descended of the ancient race ofEurycles; and for this brought the authority ofAristophanes,in his comedy called The Wasps whence of old they were called Euryclians, as Plato³ writes, and Plutarch in his bookof the Cessation of Oracles. In the holy decrees, 26, qu. 3,they are styled Ventriloqui: and the same name is giventhem in Ionian by Hippocrates, in his fifth book of Epid. as,men who speak from the belly. Sophocles calls them Ster- nomantes. These were soothsayers, enchanters, cheats, who11 "Sed qui mordere cadaver Sustinuit Vascones, ut fama est, alimentis talibus usi Produxere animas, "Says Juvenal, Sat. 15. See Florus, 1. 3, c. 22, and Val. Max. 1. 7, c. 6.12 Necessity has no law, as the proverb says.1 Servants, incommodious to Gaster their master, by preventing him .n all his appetites. See Cæl. Rhodig. 1. 9, c. 13, of his Ancient Readings. 2 The name ofan Engastrimuthe in Aristophanes's comedy of the Wasps. 3 In his dialogue entitled the Sophist.CHAP. LVIII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 863guiled the mob, and seemed not to speak and give answersfrom the mouth, but from the belly.Such a one, about the year of our Lord 1513, was JacobaRodogina, an Italian woman of mean extract: from whosebelly, we, as well as an infinite number of others at Ferrara,and elsewhere, have often heard the voice of the evil spiritspeak; low, feeble, and small, indeed; but yet very distinct,articulate, and intelligible, when she was sent for, out of curiosity, by the lords and princes of the Cisalpine Gaul. Toremove all manner of doubt, and be assured that this was nota trick, they used to have her stripped stark naked, andcaused her mouth and nose to be stopped. This evil spiritwould be called Curled- pate, or Cincinnatulo, seeming pleased when any called him by that name; at which, he was alwaysready to answer. Ifany spoke to him of things past or present, he gave pertinent answers, sometimes to the amazement of the hearers: but if of things to come, then the devilwas gravelled, and used to lie as fast as a dog can trot. Nay,sometimes he seemed to own his ignorance; instead of ananswer, letting out a rousing fart, or muttering some wordswith barbarous and uncouth inflexions, and not to be understood.6As for the Gastrolaters, they stuck close to one anotherin knots and gangs. Some of them merry, wanton, and softas so many milksops; others louring, grim, dogged, demure,and crabbed; all idle, mortal foes to business, spending halftheir time in sleeping, and the rest in doing nothing, a rentcharge and dead unnecessary weight on the earth, as Hesiodsaith; afraid, as we judged, of offending or lessening theirpaunch. Others were masked, disguised, and so oddlydressed, that it would have done you good to have seen them.There's a saying, and several ancient sages write, that theskill of nature appears wonderful in the pleasure which she4 Or of the Rouigue, a town of Italy, of which likewise was Cælius Rhodiginus, who, 1, 5, c. 10 , Of his Ancient Readings, had related this story, but without specifying the year. 5 Beyond the Alps inrespect of France, and the contrary with respect to Rome: it is an an- cient part of Gaul, between Mount Cenis and the river Rubicon, near Rimini, comprehending Piedmont, Montferrat, Milan, Mantua, and Ferrara. Dutch scholiast. 6 The same who are afterwardscalled by Rabelais, coquillons or cucullated gentry, are properly the monks, to whom he bore an old grudge. 7 According to theirnatural disposition, and in proportion to their income.Pliny, 1. 9, c. 33.& See364 [BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.seems to have taken in the configuration of sea- shells, so greatis their variety in figures, colours, streaks, and inimitableshapes. I protest the variety we perceived in the dresses ofthe gastrolatrous coquillons was not less. They all ownedGaster for their supreme god, adored him as a god, offeredhim sacrifices as to their omnipotent deity, owned no other god, served, loved, and honoured him above all things.You would have thought that the holy apostle spoke ofthose, when he said, Phil. chap. 3. " Many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, thatthey are enemies of the cross of Christ: whose end is destruction, whose God is their belly. " Pantagruel comparedthem to the cyclops Polyphemus, whom Euripides brings inspeaking thus: I only sacrifice to myself (not to the gods)and to this belly of mine, the greatest of all gods..CH. LIX. —Of the ridiculous statue Manduce; and how, and what the Gastrolaters sacrifice to their ventripotent god.WHILE we fed our eyes with the sight of the phyzzes andactions of these lounging gulli - gutted Gastrolaters, we on asudden heard the sound of a musical instrument called a bell;at which all of them placed themselves in rank and file , asfor some mighty battle, every one according to his office, degree, and seniority.In this order, they moved towards master Gaster, after aplump, young, lusty, gorbellied fellow, who, on a long staff,fairly gilt, carried a wooden statue, grossly carved, and asscurvily daubed over with paint; such a one as Plautus,¹Juvenal, and Pomp. Festus describe it. At Lyons, duringthe Carnival, it is called Maschecroute, or Gnaw- crust; theycall this Manduce.It was a monstrous, ridiculous, hideous figure, fit to frightlittle children: its eyes were bigger than its belly, and itshead larger than all the rest of its body: well mouth- clovenhowever, having a goodly pair of wide, broad jaws, lined withtwo rows of teeth, upper tier and under tier, which, by themagic of a small twine hid in the hollow part of the goldenIn his tragedy of the Cyclops. See Plutarch in Cessation of Oracles 1 Plautus in his comedy of the Cable; Juvenal, Sat. iii, and Pom- pon. Festus, 1. xi. 2 They do not now carry it about aLyons, though they still talk of it there, and frighten their childrenwith threatening to throw them to Masche-croute, to be devoured by him.CHAP. LIX. ]PANTAGRUEL. 365staff, were made to clash, clatter, and rattle dreadfully oneagainst another; as they do at Metz with St. Clement's dragon.3Coming near the Gastrolaters, I saw they were followedby a great number of fat waiters and tenders , laden withbaskets, dossers, hampers, dishes, wallets, pots , and kettles .Then under the conduct of Manduce, and singing I do notknow what dithyrambics, crepalocomes, and epenons, opening their baskets and pots, they offered their god,White hippocras, Fricassees, nine with dry toasts.White bread.Brown bread.Carbonadoes, sixsorts.Monastical brewis.Cold loins of veal,with spice.Brewis.Zinziberine.Gravy soup.Beatille pies.Hotch-pots.Soft bread. Marrow-bones,Household bread. toast, and cabbage.Hashes.sorts.Brawn.Sweet-breads. Capirotades.Eternal drink intermixed. Brisk delicate white wine ledthe van; claret and champaign followed, cool, nay, as coldas the very ice, I say; filled and offered in large silver cups.Then they offered,Chitterlings gar- Neat's tongues.nished with mus- Scotch collops.Hog's haslets.Brawn heads.tard. Powdered venison,Hams.Hung beef.Sausages.Puddings.Carvelats. with turnips.Bolognia sausages. Pickled olives.Chines and peas.All this associated with sempiternal liquor. Then they housed within his muzzle,Legs of mutton with Ribs of pork with Caponets.Olias.shalots. onion sauce. Caviare and toast.Roast capons, Fawns, deer.Lumber pies with basted with their Hares, leverets.own dripping.hot sauce.3 The people call it graulli, either from the German word gæruliche,horrible, terrible, or rather corruptly for gargouille, (which see ex- plained elsewhere.) The image is carried in procession on St. Mark's day, and during the rogation week; but this not being the same figure Rabelais saw, the jaws ofthe graulli have now no motion. Only, on the end of his tongue, which is of iron, is fixed a small white loaf,which, together with as many more as each baker furnishes, beforewhose stall the procession passes, makes up the stipend or salary of the poor man who carries the graulli.366 [BOOK IV.RABELAIS WORKS.Fieldfares.Olives.Thrushes.Young sea-ravens.Geese, goslings.Queests.Widgeons.Mavises.Partridges andyoungpartridges.Plovers.Dwarf-herons.Teals.Duckers.Bitterns.Shovelers.Curlews.Wood-hens.Fat kids.Pigeons, squabs, Cygnets.and squeakers.Herons, and young herons,A reinforcement ofvinegar inter- mixed.Venison pasties.Lark-pies.Dormice-pies.Coots, with leeks.Shoulders ofmuttonSouced hog's feet. Capon- pies.Cabretto pasties.Roe-buck pies.Pigeon pies.Kid pasties.Bacon pies.with capers.Grouse. Hedgehogs.Sirloins of beef. Turtles. Snites.Doe-conies. Then large puffs.Peaco*cks . Thistle-finches.Storks.Woodco*cks.whor*'s farts.Fritters.Snipes. Cakes, sixteen sorts.Ortolans. Crisp wafers.Turkey co*cks, hen Quince tarts.turkeys, and tur- Curds and cream.Whipped cream.Preserved myraboBreasts of veal.Pheasants andpheasant poots.Fried pasty- crust.Forced capons.Parmesan cheese.Red and pale hippocras.Gold-peaches.Artichokes.Dry and wet sweetmeats, seventyeight sorts.Boiled hens, andfat capons mari- nated.Pullets with eggs.Chickens.Rabbits, and sucking rabbits.key poots.Stock-doves, and woodculvers.Pigs, with winesauce.Blackbirds, ousels,and rayles.Moor-hens.Bustards, and bust- ard poots.Fig-peckers.lans.Jellies.Welshbarrapyclids.Macaroons.Tarts, twenty sorts.Lemon-cream, raspberry cream, &c.Comfits, one hundre colours .YoungGuineahens. Cream wafers.Quails, and young Flamingoes.quails.Cream- cheese.Vinegar brought up the rear to wash the mouth, and forfear of the squinsy: also toasts to scour the grinders .CH. LX.-What the Gastrolaters sacrificed to their god on interlarded fish- days.PANTAGRUEL did not like this pack of rascally scoundrels,CHAP. LX. ] PANTAGRUEL. 367with their manifold kitchen sacrifices , and would have beengone, had not Epistemon prevailed with him to stay and seethe end of the farce. He then asked the skipper, what theidle lobco*cks used to sacrifice to their gorbellied god on interlarded fish- days? For his first course, said the skipper,they give him:Caviare.Botargoes.Fresh butter.Pease soup.Spinage.Fresh herrings, full roed.Salads, a hundredvarieties, of cresses, sodden hoptops,cods, cellery,chives, rampions,jew's-ears (a sort of mushroomsthat sprout out ofold elders) asparagus, wood-bine,and a world ofothers.bishop's- Red herrings.Pilchards.Anchovies.Fry of tunny.Cauliflowers. 'Beans.2Salt salmon.Pickled griggs.Oysters inthe shell.Then he must drink, or the devil would gripe him at thethroat this, therefore, they take care to prevent, and nothingis wanting. Which being done, they give him lampreyswith hippocras sauce:Gurnards.Salmon-trouts.Barbels, great andSmelts. Flounders.Rock-fish. Sea-nettles.Gracious lords. Mullets.small. Sword-fish. Gudgeons.Roaches. Skate-fish.co*ckerells. Lamprels.Dabs and sandings.Haddocks.Minnows. Jegs. Carps.Thornbacks, Pickerells .Sleeves.Sturgeons.Sheath-fish .Mackerels.Maids.Plaice.Fried oysters.Golden carps.Burbates.Salmons.Salmon- peels.Dolphins.Barn trouts.Millers's-thumbs.Pikes.Rochets.Sharplings.Tunnies.Silver- eels .Chevins.Bottitoes.Sea-bears.co*ckles.Prawns.Precks.Bret fish.Cray-fish.Pallours.Not mere cauliflowers, but emb' olif, i . e. with oil. See this ex- plained before in ch. 32. 2 It is not plain beans in Rabelais,but saulgrenees de febues, which Cotgrave says is a porridge, or mess of beans, sallad, oil, and some verjuice or vinegar.368Shrimps.Congers.Porpoises.Bases.Shads.RABELAIS' WORKS.Sea breams.Halibuts.Soles.Dog's tongue, or kind fool.Murenes, a sort of Mussels.Darefish.[BOOK IV.Fausens, and grigs.Eelpouts.Tortoises.Serpents, i. e. woodeels.HElampreys.Craylings.Smys.Turbots.Lobsters.Great prawns.Dace.Bleaks.Trout, not above a Tenches.foot long.Salmon.Meagers.Ombres.Fresh cods.Dried melwels.Dorees.Moor-game.Perches.Loaches.Crab- fish.Snails and whelks.Frogs.If, when he had crammed all this down his guttural trapdoor, he did not immediately make the fish swim again in hispaunch, death would pack him off in a trice. Special careis taken to antidote his godship with vine-tree syrup. Thenis sacrificed to him, haberdines, poor-jack, minglemangledmismashed, &c.Eggs fried, beaten, sliced, roasted in Green- fish.buttered, poached, the embers, tossed Sea- batts .hardened, boiled, in the chimney, &c . Cod's sounds.broiled, stewed, Stock - fish. Sea-pikes.Which to concoct and digest the more easily, vinegar ismultiplied . For the latter part of their sacrifices they offer,Rice milk, and Stewed prunes, and Raisins.hasty pudding.baked bullace. Dates.Buttered wheat, and Pistachios, or fistic Chestnuts and walflummery. nuts.Water- gruel, and Figs.milk porridge. Almond-butter.Frumenty and bon- Skirret- root.ny clamber. White-pot.nuts.Filberts.Parsnips.Artichokes.Perpetuity of soaking with the whole.It was none of their fault, I will assure you, if this samegod of theirs was not publicly, preciously, and plentifully served in the sacrifices, better yet than Heliogabalus's idol;nay, more than Bel and the Dragon in Babylon, under King Belshazzar. Yet Gaster had the manners to own that hewas no god, but a poor, vile, wretched creature. And asCHAP. LXI. ]PANTAGRUEL. 369King Antigonus, first of the name, when one Hermodotus,(as poets will flatter, especially princes, ) in some of hisfustian dubbed him a god, and made the sun adopt him forhis son, said to him; My lasanophore (or in plain English,my groom of the close- stool) can give thee the lie; so master Gaster very civilly used to send back his bigoted worshippers to his close- stool , to see, smell, taste, philosophise, andexamine what kind of divinity they could pick out of his sir-reverence.CH. LXI.-How Gaster invented means to get and preserve corn.THOSE gastrolatrous hobgoblins being withdrawn, Pantagruel carefully minded the famous master of arts, Gaster.You know that, by the institution of nature, bread has beenassigned him for provision and food; and that, as an additionto this blessing, he should never want the means to get bread.Accordingly, from the beginning he invented the smith'sart, and husbandry to manure the ground, that it might yieldhim corn; he invented arms, and the art of war, to defendcorn; physic and astronomy, with other parts of mathematics,which might be useful to keep corn a great number of yearsin safety from the injuries of the air, beasts, robbers, andpurloiners: he invented water, wind, and handmills, and athousand other engines to grind corn, and to turn it intomeal; leaven to make the dough ferment, and the use ofsalt to give it a savour; for he knew that nothing bred morediseases than heavy, unleavened, unsavoury bread.He found a way to get fire to bake it; hour- glasses, dials,and clocks to mark the time of its baking; and as somecountries wanted corn, he contrived means to convey it outof one country into another.He had the wit to pimp for asses and mares, animals ofdifferent species, that they might copulate for the generation.of a third, which we call mules, more strong and fit for hardservice than the other two. He invented carts and waggons,to draw him along with greater ease and as seas and rivershindered his progress, he devised boats, gallies, and ships(to the astonishment of the elements) to waft him over tobarbarous, unknown, and far distant nations, thence to bring,or thither to carry corn.See Plutarch in his Apophthegms, and in his treatise of Isis and Osiris.VOL. II. В Б870 [ BOOK IT. RABELAIS' WORKS.Besides, seeing that, when he had tilled the ground, someyears the corn perished in it for want of rain in due season,in others rotted, or was drowned by its excess, sometimesspoiled by hail, shook out by the wind, or beaten down bystorms, and so his stock was destroyed on the ground; weare told that ever since the days of yore, he has found out away to conjure the rain down from heaven only with cuttingcertain grass, common enough in the field , yet known to very few, some of which was then shown us. I took it to be thesame as the plant, one of whose boughs being dipped byJove's priest in the Agrian fountain, ' on the Lycian mountain in Arcadia, in time of drought, raised vapours whichgathered into clouds, and then dissolved into rain, thatkindly moistened the whole country.Our master ofarts was also said to have found a way to keepthe rain up in the air, and make it to fall into the sea; alsoto annihilate the hail , suppress the winds, and remove storms as the Methanensians of Træzene used to do . And as inthe fields thieves and plunderers sometimes stole, and tookby force the corn and bread which others had toiled to get,he invented the art of building towns, forts, and castles, tohoard and secure that staff of life. On the other hand,finding none in the fields, and hearing that it was hoarded upand secured in towns, forts, and castles, and watched withmore care than ever were the golden pippins of the Hesperides, he turned engineer, and found ways to beat, storm,and demolish forts and castles, with machines and warlikethunderbolts, battering-rams, ballistas, and catapults, whoseshapes were shown us, not over- well understood by our engineers, architects, and other disciples of Vitruvius; as masterPhilebert de l'Orme, King Megistus's principal architect, has owned to us.³And seeing that sometimes all these tools of destructionwere baffled by the cunning subtilty or the subtle cunningRead the fountain Agria. See Nicolas Leonicus, 1. 1 , c. 67, Of his Various Histories. In Pausanias's Arcadics, this fountain is called'Ayvw, and Rhodiginus, 1. 13, c . 17, likewise has called it Agnò.2 This is taken from the same work of Nicolas Leonicus, I. 2 , c. 38.See Pausanias's Corinthiacs. 3 Henry II. in whose reign Philibert de l'Orme was architect and intendant of the buildings, as he continued to be under the Kings Francis II. and Charles IX. The different works of this ingenious Lyonnois were printed in folio in 1569 at Paris, by Frederic Moral.CHAP. LXII. | PANTAGRUEL. 371(which you please) of fortifiers, he lately invented cannons,field-pieces, culverins, mortar-pieces, basilisks, murderinginstruments that dart iron, leaden, and brazen balls, some ofthem outweighing huge anvils. This by the means of amost dreadful powder, whose hellish compound and effecthas even amazed nature, and made her own herself out-doneby art; the Oxydracian thunders, hails, and storms, bywhich the people of that name immediately destroyed the.renemies in the field, being but mere popguns to these. For,one of our great guns, when used is more dreadful," moreterrible, more diabolical, and maims, tears, breaks, slays,mows down, and sweeps away more men, and causes a greaterconsternation and destruction, than a hundred thunderbolts.CH. LXII.-How Gaster invented an art to avoid being hurt ortouched by cannon balls.GASTER having secured himself with his corn within strongholds, has sometimes been attacked by enemies; his fortresses, by that thrice three-fold cursed instrument, levelledand destroyed: his dearly beloved corn and bread snatched outof his mouth, and sacked by a tyrannic force; thereforehe then sought means to preserve his walls, bastions, rampiers, and sconces from cannon- shot, and to hinder the bullets from hitting him, stopping them in their flight, or atleast from doing him or the besieged walls any damage. Heshowed us a trial of this, which has been since used byFronton, and is now common among the pastimes and harmless recreations of the Thelemites. I will tell you how hewent to work, and pray for the future be a little more readyto believe what Plutarch affirms to have tried. Suppose aherd of goats were all scampering as if the devil drovethem, do but put a bit of eringo into the mouth of the hindmost nanny, and they will all stop stock still, in the time you can tell three.Thus Gaster, having caused a brass falcon to be charged.with a sufficient quantity of gunpowder, well purged fromall sulphur, and curiously made up with fine camphor; he then had a suitable ball put into the piece, with twenty- four littlepellets like hail- shot, some round, some pearl fashion: then4 See Apollonius's life by Philostratus, 1 , 2, c. 14. 5 Poly- dore Virgil had before expressed himself much after the same manner in his treatise " De Rerum inventoribus."BB 2372 RABELAIS WORKS. [ BOOK IV.taking his aim, and levelling it at a page of his, as if hewould have hit him on the breast; about sixty strides offthe piece, half-way between it and the page in a right line,he hanged on a gibbet by a rope a very large siderite , oriron-like stone, otherwise called herculean, formerly foundon Ida in Phrygia by one Magnes, as Nicander¹ writes, andcommonly called load- stone; then he gave fire to the primeon the piece's touch-hole, which in an instant consuming thepowder, the ball and hail- shot were with incredible violenceand swiftness hurried out of the gun at its muzzle, that theair might penetrate to its chamber, where otherwise wouldhave been a vacuum; which nature abhors so much, that thisuniversal machine, heaven, air, land, and sea would soonerreturn to the primitive chaos, than admit the least void any where. Now the ball and small shot, which threatened thepage with no less than quick destruction , lost their impetuosity, and remained suspended and hovering round the stone:nor did any of them, notwithstanding the fury with whichthey rushed, reach the page.Master Gaster could do more than all this yet, if you willbelieve me: for he invented a way how to cause bullets tofly backwards, and recoil on those that sent them, with asgreat a force, and in the very numerical parallel for whichtheguns were planted. And indeed, why should he have thoughtthis difficult, seeing the herb ethiopis opens all locks whatsoever; and an echinus or remora, a silly weakly fish, inspite of all the winds that blow from the thirty-two pointsof the compass, will in the midst of a hurricane make youthe biggest first-rate remain stock still, as if she were becalmed, or the blustering tribe had blown their last: nay,and with the flesh of that fish, preserved with salt, you mayfish gold³ out of the deepest well that was ever sounded witha plummet; for it will certainly draw up the precious metal.Since, as Democritus affirmed , and Theophrastus believedand experienced, that there was an herb at whose singletouch an iron wedge, though never so far driven into a hugelog of the hardest wood that is, would presently come out;1 See Pliny, 1. 36, c. 16.3 See Pliny, 1. 9, c. 25.2 See Pliny, 1. 24, c 17, &c.Though Democritus was reckonecby Pliny to be a great liar, yet in the point before us, Theophrastus,who is one of Pliny's heroes, gives full credit to Democritus's assertion.See Pliny for all or most of these particulars .CHAP. LXII.] PANTAGRUEL. 873and it is this same herb your hickways, alias woodpeckers,use, when with some mighty axe any one stops up the holeof their nests, which they industriously dig and make in thetrunk of some sturdy tree. Since stags and hinds, whendeeply wounded with darts, arrows, and bolts, if they dobut meet the herb called dittany, which is common in Candia,and eat a little of it, presently the shafts came out, and all iswell again; even as kind Venus cured her beloved by- blowEneas, when he was wounded on the right thigh with anarrow by Juturna, Turnus's sister. Since the very wind oflaurels, fig trees , or sea calves, makes the thunder sheer offinsomuch that it never strikes them. Since at the sight ofa ram, mad elephants recover their former senses. Sincemad bulls coming near wild fig- trees, called caprifici, growtame, and will not budge a foot, as if they had the cramp.Since the venomous rage of vipers is assuaged if you buttouch them with a beechen bough. Since also Euphorion"writes, that in the Isle of Samos, before Juno's temple wasbuilt there, he has seen some beasts called neades, whosevoice made the neighbouring places gape and sink into achasm and abyss. In short, since elders grow of a morepleasing sound, and fitter to make flutes, in such placeswhere the crowing of co*cks is not heard, as the ancientsages have writ, and Theophrastus relates: as if the crowing of a co*ck dulled, flattened, and perverted the wood ofthe elder, as it is said to astonish and stupify with fear thatstrong and resolute animal, a lion. I know that some haveunderstood this of wild elder, that grows so far from townsor villages, that the crowing of co*cks cannot reach near it;and doubtless that sort ought to be preferred to the stenching common elder, that grows about decayed and ruinedplaces; but others have understood this in a higher sense,not literal, but allegorical, according to the method of thePythagoreans: as when it was said that Mercury's statuecould not be made of every sort of wood; to which sentencethey gave this sense; that God is not to be worshipped in avulgar form, but in a chosen and religious manner. In thesame manner by this elder, which grows far from places6 See Elian, l. 17, c 28. 6 Pythagoras used to say, allegorically, that all sorts of wood ought not to be employed indifferentiy mmaking Mercury's statue; which has been explained by Alex. ab Alex.1. 4, c. 12, Of his Genial Days; and by Erasmus, in his Adages.374 [ BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.where co*cks are heard, the ancients meant, that the wise andstudious ought not to give their minds to trivial or vulgarmusic, but to that which is celestial, divine, angelical, moreabstracted, and brought from remoter parts, that is , from aregion where the crowing of co*cks is not heard: for, to denote a solitary and unfrequented place, we say, co*cks are never heard to crow there.ON CHAP. LVII . AND THE FIVE FOLLOWING. -The dwelling ofMasterGaster, whose entrance is rugged, craggy, barren, and unpleasantto the eye, is found at last to be very fertile, healthful, and delightful, when with much toil the difficult ways on its borders have been passed. This Gaster, the first master of arts in the world, is the belly in Greek."Magister artis, ingenîque largitor,Venter" Persius.Yet our author tells us that the muses are the offspring of Penia, that is L. say, poverty. I will not pretend to contradict him; neither will any contradict me, if I say, that at least poverty is the most common reward which their unhappy favourites reap for all their toilsome study. The description of the empire of Gaster is very curious: and the author displays there at once much learning, fancy, and wit. The Gastrola- ters are those whose god is their belly; the Engastrimythes are para- sites, and all those whom their hungry bellies cause to say many thingsagainst their consciences; so that they may be said to speak from the belly the word engastrimythe also means one who by use and practice can speak as it were out of his belly, not moving his lips; and finally,one who has an evil spirit speaking out of his belly.

The Idol Manduce is the figure of gluttony, whose eyes are biggerthan its belly, and its wide jaws armed with dreadful teeth it is an imitation of the Manducus of the ancients.The great number of dishes of all sorts, that are sacrificed to Gaster,show that gluttony reigns among all sorts of people, the poor offering their gross food. as well as the rich their dainties; and that coarse fare will go down with belly-gods, and with all men in general, for want of better. What is offered him on interlarded fish -days, shows that this noble messer Gaster, as he is called in the French, is a true Papimane,and agrees pretty well with the mass, messe in French, which wants but an r ofthe word messer, used in those times for monsieur. -M.CH. LXIII.-How Pantagruel fell asleep near the island ofChaneph, and of the Problems proposed to be solved when he wak'd.THE next day, merrily pursuing our voyage, we came insight of the island of Cheneph, where Pantagruel's shipcould not arrive, the wind chopping about, and then failingus so that we were becalmed, and could hardly get ahead,1 It means hypocrisy, in the Hebrew language. In this island, Ra- belais places a sort of pretended saints, who under a mortified exterior,concealed, according to him, morals full of cynical indiscretions.CHAP. LXIII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 375tacking about from starboard to larboard, and larboard tostarboard, though to our sails we added drabblers.With this accident we were all out of sorts, moping,drooping, metagrabolized, as dull as dun in the mire, in Csol fa ut flat, out of tune, off the hinges, and I -don't-knowhowish, without caring to speak one single syllable to each other.Pantagruel was taking a nap, slumbering and nodding onthe quarter deck, by the cuddy, with an Heliodorus in hishand; for still it was his custom to sleep better by book thanby heart.2Epistemon was conjuring, with his astrolabe, to know whatlatitude we were in.Friar John was got into the cook- room, examining, by the ascendant of the spits, and the horoscope of ragouts andfricassees, what time of day it might then be.Panurge (sweet baby! ) held a stalk of Pantagruelionsalias hemp, next his tongue, and with it made pretty bubble,and bladders.Gymnast was making tooth pickers with lentisk.Ponocrates, dozing, dozed, and dreaming, dreamed; tickledhimself to make himself laugh, and with one finger scratched his noddle where it did not itch.Carpalim, with a nut- shell, and a trencher ofverne, ( that'sa card in Gascony, ) was making a pretty little merry windmill, cutting the card longways into four slips , and fasteningthem with a pin to the convex of the nut, and its concave tothe tarred side of the gunnel of the ship.Eusthenes, bestriding one of the guns, was playing on itwith his fingers, as if it had been a trump- marine.Rhizotomus, with the soft coat of a field tortoise, aliasycleped a mole, was making himself a velvet purse.Xenomanes was patching up an old weather- beaten lantern, with a hawk's jesses.Our pilot (good man! ) was pulling maggots out of the seamen's noses.At last Friar John, returning from the forecastle, perceived that Pantagruel was awake. Then breaking this obstinate silence, he briskly and cheerfully asked him how aman should kill time, and raise good weather, during a calmn at sea?2 He choose rather to sleep over a book than absolutely to do nothing.376 RABELAIS' WORKS. [BOOK IT.Panurge, whose belly thought his throat cut, backed themotion presently, and asked for a pill to purge melancholy.Epistemon also came on, and asked how a man might beready to bepiss himself with laughing, when he has no heartto be merry?Gymnast, arising, demanded a remedy for a dimness ofeyes?Ponocrates, after he had a while rubbed his noddle, andshaken his ears , asked , how one might avoid dog- sleep?Hold, cried Pantagruel, the Peripatetics have wisely made arule, that all problems, questions, and doubts, which areoffered to be solved, ought to be certain, clear, and intel- ligible. What do you mean by dog's- sleep?³ I mean,answered Ponocrates, to sleep fasting in the sun at noon- day,as the dogs do.Rhizotomus, who lay stooping on the pump, raised hisdrowsy head, and lazily yawning, by natural sympathy, setalmost every one in the ship a yawning too: then he askedfor a remedy against oscitations and gapings.Xenomanes, half puzzled, and tired out with new vamping his antiquated lantern, asked, how the hold of the sto- mach might be so well ballasted and freighted from the keel to the main hatch, with stores well stowed, that our human vessels might not heel, or be walt, but well trimmed and stiff?Carpalin, twirling his diminutive windmill, asked howmany motions are to be felt in nature, before a gentlemanmay be said to be hungry?Eusthenes, hearing them talk, came from between decks ,and from the capstern called out to know why a man that isfasting bit by a serpent also fasting, is in greater danger of death, than when man and serpent have eat their breakfasts? Why a man's fasting- spittle is poisonous toserpents and venomous creatures?One single solution may serve for all your problems, gen.tlemen, answered Pantagruel, and one single medicine for allsuch symptoms and accidents. My answer shall be short,not to tire you with a long needless train of pedantic cant.3 In Oudin's Dictionary, Ital. and Fr. to sleep like a dog, is to sleep indifferently at all hours, and in all places. 4 Oscitante uno deinde oscitat et alter. Prov.c. 29, and Pliny, 1. 7 , c. 2.5 See Aristotle, of Animals, l . 9,CHAP. LXIV.] PANTAGRUEL. 877The belly has no ears, nor is it to be filled with fair words:you shall be answered to content by signs and gestures. Asformerly at Rome, Tarquin the proud, its last king, sent ananswer by signs to his son Sextus, who was among the Gabii,at Gabii. ( Saying this, he pulled the string of a little bell,and Friar John hurried away to the cook-room. ) The sonhaving sent his father a messenger, to know how he mightbring the Gabii ( Gabini) under a close subjection; the king,mistrusting the messenger, made him no answer, and onlytook him into his privy garden, and, in his presence, withhis sword, lopped off the heads of the tall poppies that were there. The express returned without any other dispatch:yet having related to the prince what he had seen his fatherdo, he easily understood that by those signs he advised himto cut off the heads of the chief men in the town, the betterto keep under the rest of the people.CH. LXIV.-How Pantagruel gave no answer to the problems.PANTAGRUEL then asked what sort of people dwelt in thatdamned island?¹ They are, answered Xenomanes, all hypocrites, holy mountebanks, tumblers of Ave Marias, spiritualcomedians, sham saints, hermits, all of them poor rogues, who,like the hermit of Lormont between Blaye and Bordeaux ,live wholly on alms given them by passengers.Catch methere if you can, cried Panurge! may the devil's head- cookconjure my bum-gut into a pair of bellows, if ever you findme among them. Hermits, sham saints, living forms of mortification, holy mountebanks, avaunt, in the name of yourfather Satan, get out of my sight: when the devil's a hog,you shall eat bacon. I shall not forget yet awhile ourfat Concilipetes of Chesil. O that Beelzebub and Astarothhad counselled them to hang themselves out of the way, andthey had done it! we had not then suffered so much by devilish storms as we did for having seen them.Hark ye me,dear rogue, Xenomanes, my friend, I prithee are these hermits, hypocrites, and eaves-droppers, maids or married? Is6 L'estomac affamé. A hungry stomach has no ears, said Cato the censor, in one of his speeches to the Roman people. See his life in Plutarch. 1 Isle de chien, in Rabelais. On which M. Duchatsays, Chiene d'Isle, (Bitchington Island, if you will, ) island of people who bark at and bite all the world, as cursed curs do.hydropics, puffed up with a false opinion of their own sanctity.3 Fathers of the Council of Trent. See before, ch. 18.• Add878 RABELAIS' WORKS. [BOOK IVthere anything of the feminine gender among them? Coulda body hypocritically take there a small hypocritical touch?Will they lie backwards, and let out their fore-rooms?There's a fine question to be asked, cried Pantagruel. Yes,yes, answered Xenomanes; you may find there many goodlyhypocritesses, jolly spiritual actresses, kind hermitesses,women that have a plaguy deal of religion: then there's thecopies of them, little hypocritillons, sham sanctitos, and her- metillons. Foh! away with them, cried Friar John; ayoung saint, an old devil! ( Mark this , an old saying, andas true a one as a young whor* an old saint. ) Were therenot such, continued Xenomanes, the isle of Chaneph, forwant of a multiplication of progeny, had long ere this been desert and desolate.Pantagruel sent them by Gymnast, in the pinnace, seventyeight thousand fine pretty little gold half- crowns, * of those that are marked with a lantern. After this he asked, What'so'clock? Past nine, answered Epistemon . It is then thebest time to go to dinner, said Pantagruel: for the sacredline, so celebrated by Aristophanes' in his play called Concionatores, is at hand, never failing when the shadow is decempedal.Formerly, among the Persians, dinner time was at a sethour only for kings: as for all others, their appetite andtheir belly was their clock; when that chimed, they thought it time to go to dinner. So we find in Plautus a certain parasite making a heavy do, and sadly railing at the inventorsof hour- glasses and dials, as being unnecessary things, therebeing no clock more regular than the belly.Diogenes, being asked at what times a man ought to eat,answered, The rich when he is hungry, the poor when he hasanything to eat. Physicians more properly say, that the ca- nonical hours are,To rise at five, to dine at nine,To sup at five, to sleep at nine.Cyrus, being reduced to beggary in the other world, begged Epic- tetus to bestow a penny upon him in charity. I give no pennies, said that philosopher, who was become a great lord in that country; here,sirrah, here's a crown for you. (Rab. 1. 2, c. 30.). The reason of thisproceeding of Epictetus is, that when great men bestow their fa- vours, they ought to have more regard to their own grandeur than to the meanness and indispensable occasions of the necessitous:See Erasmus's Adages, chil. 3, cent. 4, ch. 70.Cynic's life in Diogenes Laertius.• See thisCHAP. I.XIV.] PANTAGRUEL. 379The famous king Petosiris's' magic was different,—Herethe officers for the gut came in, and got ready the tables andcupboards; laid the cloth, whose eight and pleasant smellwere very comfortable; and brought plates , napkins, salts ,tankards, flagons, tall- boys, ewers, tumblers, cups, goblets,basons, and cisterns.Friar John, at the head of the stewards, sewers, yeomenof the pantry, and of the mouth, tasters, carvers, cup-bearers,and cupboard-keepers, brought four stately pasties , so huge,that they put me in mind of the four bastions at Turin,Odsfish, how manfully did they storm them! What havocdid they make with the long train of dishes that came afterthem! How bravely did they stand to their pan-puddings,and paid off their dust! How merrily did they soak their noses!The fruit was not yet brought in, when a fresh gale atwest and by north began to fill the main course, missen- sail,fore-sail, tops, and top- gallants: for which blessing they allsung divers hymns of thanks and praise.IWhen the fruit was on the table, Pantagruel asked; Nowtell me, gentlemen, are your doubts fully resolved or no?gape and yawn no more, answered Rhizotomus. I sleepno longer like a dog, said Ponocrates. I have cleared myeyesight said Gymnast. I have broke my fast, said Eusthenes so that for this whole day I shall be secure from thedanger of my spittleAsps.Amphisbenes.Amerudutes.Abedissimons.Alhatrabans.Aractes.Asterions.Alcharates.Attelabes.Ascalabotes.Hæmorrhoids.Basilisks.FEEAlhartafs. Fitches.Ammobates.Apimaos.7 Juvenal Sat. 6.Arges.Spiders.Starry Lizards.Sucking water- snakes."Egra licet jaceat, capiendo nulla videtur Aptior hora cibo, nisi quam dederit Petosiris. "The pretended magic of Petosiris, as also that ofthe physician Cnidias in Pliny, 1. 29, c. 1, was properly not more than an inordinate fondness for the mathematics, which persuaded those two men that the knowledge of the stars was so extensive, that therein might be discovered whether a sick person had best take a new laid egg or broth. • Agreatpart of these different names of serpents and other venomous creatures,disposed here in alphabetical order, is to be found in Pliny.380 [BOOK IV. RABELAIS' WORKS.Black wag leg- flies . Falvises. Rhagious.Spanish flies. Galeotes. Rhaganes.Catoblepes. Harmenes. Salamanders.Horned snakes. Handons. Slow-worms.Caterpillars.Crocodiles.Icles .Stellions.Jarraries. Scorpenes.Toads.Night-mares.Mad dogs.Colotes.Cychriodes.Ilicines. Scorpions.Pharaoh's mice. Horn-worms.Kesudures. Scalavotins.Sea-hares. Solofuidars.Chalcidic newts. Deaf- asps.Cafezates. Footed serpents. Horse-leeches.Cauhares.Snakes.Cuhersks, twotongued adders.Amphibious serpents.Cenchres.co*ckatrices.Manticores.Molures.Mouse- serpents.Shrew-mice.Miliares.Megalaunes.Spitting-asps.Porphyri.Dipsades. Pareades.Domeses. Phalanges .Dryinades.Dragons.Elopes.Enhydrides.Penphredons.Pine-tree-worms.Rutulæ .Worms.Salt-haters.Rot-serpents.Stink-fish.Stuphes.Sabrins.Blood- sucking flies.Hornfretters.Scolopendres.Tarantulas.Blind worms.Tetragnathias.Teristales .Vipers, &c .ON CHAPS. LXIII . AND LXIV. -Chaneph is hypocrisy in Hebrew;so the island of Chaneph is the island of the hypocrites. Accordingly our author says it was wholly inhabited by sham saints, spiritual come- dians, forms of holiness, tumblers of beads, dissembling mumblers ofave-marias, and so forth; poor sorry rogues, who wholly lived on the alms that were given them by passengers, like the hermit of Lormont,between Blaye and Bourdeaux. Thus he chiefly places the orders of mendicant friars among the hypocrites, because their convents have no revenue but mumping; and so they are obliged to affect a greater de- votion than those religious orders who do not make a vow of poverty,as these do.Our author tells us, that the Pantagruelian fleet was becalmed when it came in sight of that island, and was forced to tack from Iarboard tostarboard, and from starboard to larboard; yet could not get a-head,though they had added drabblers to their sails. By this he insinuates,that this inferior crew of hypocrites did put a stop to the progress of the reformation, and the discovery of truth in general; as when he him- self was misused by some of them in the convent of Cordeliers at Fontenay-la-Comte, merely because he studied Greek. These beggarlyCHAP. LXV. ] PANTAGRUEL. 381tribes had not the power to raise a storm, like the nine sail of fathers who were going to the Council of Chesil; they could do little more than hinder the advancement of those who searched after truth. Thus wefind, not only that the fleet could not proceed, but that every ship's company in a manner fell asleep, dozed, and were out of sorts, and offthe hinges. At last this is remedied by sending to those poor hypo- crites seventy- eight thousand little half-crowns, and by eating anddrinking which perhaps may mean, that provided those poor hungry curs have meat and drink, or money to get food, which is all they beg,they cease to bark, and will suffer you to go on without any further impediment. This has been, and is still observable in France, and other parts, among some of those begging friars; whereas your Jesuits,Dominicans, Austins, Bernardins, Celestins, Theatins, and others, suchas were in the nine sail, are not to be bribed or pacified so easily.One of these, whose poetry and criticisms are deservedly esteemed among us, has reflected on our author's admirable satire too severely for a man of his sense, though not for one of his order; I mean FatherRapin: but who could expect less from a Jesuit, and a Jesuit too,whose sodality is satirized in this work? Yet, after all, that able critic durst not but own that it is a most ingenious satire.¹ Panurge asks whether there be not something of the feminine genderamong them, and whether they would not take a small hypocritical touch by the bye? To which answer is made by Xenomanes, that were there not some pretty, kind- hearted hypocritesses, hermitesses,and spiritual actresses, who beget a race of young hypocritillons and sham sanctitoes, the island of Chaneph had long since been without inhabitants.This is true in more than one sense; for did not hypocrites beget others, some parts of the world would be very thin of people: then those sham sanctitoes and hermitillons, whom our author means, arechiefly the young bastardly monastic fry, the only fruit many nuns bear, by the means of the father confessor's kind applications: for such ofthose by- blows as escape abortion, or an untimely death, are reared up for a while as the pious father's or sister's poor relations; and then caged with father or mother to sing matins and vespers, and increase the larger tribe of hypocrites world without end.-M.CH. LXV.—How Pantagruel passed the time with his servants.In what hierarchy of such venomous creatures do you placePanurge's future spouse? asked Friar John. Artthou speakng ill of women, cried Panurge, thou mangy scoundrel, thousorry, noddy-peaked shaveling monk? By the cenomanic.paunch and gixie, said Epistemon, Euripides has written,and makes Andromache say it, that by industry, and the helpof the gods, men had found remedies against all poisonouscreatures; but none was yet found against a bad wife,This flaunting Euripides, cried Panurge, was gabbling1 Rapin's "Reflect, ou Poetry. "382 BABELAIS' WORKS. BOOK IV.against women every foot, and therefore was devoured bydogs, as a judgment from above; as Aristophanes observes.-Let us go on. Let him speak that is next. I can leaknow like any stone- horse, said then Epistemon. I am, saidXenomanes, full as an egg and round as a hoop; my ship'shold can hold no more, and will now make shift to bear asteady sail. Said Carpalim, a truce with thirst, a truce withhunger; they are strong, but wine and meat are stronger. Iam no more in the dumps, cried Panurge; my heart is apound lighter. I am in the right cue now, as brisk as a bodylouse, and as merry as a beggar. For my part, I know whatI do when I drink; and it is a true thing (though it is inyour Euripides) that is said by that jolly toper Silenus ofblessed memory, thatThe man's emphatically mad,Who drinks the best, yet can be sad .We must not fail to return our humble and hearty thanksto the Being, who, with this good bread, this cool deliciouswine, these good meats and rare dainties, removes from ourbodies and minds these pains and perturbations, and at thesame time, fills us with pleasure and with food.But methinks, sir, you did not give an answer to FriarJohn's question; which, as I take it, was how to raise goodweather? Since you ask no more than this easy question,answered Pantagruel, I will strive to give you satisfaction;some other time we will talk of the rest of the problems if you will.Well then, Friar John asked how good weather might be raised. Have we not raised it? Look up and see our fulltop- sails: Hark! how the wind whistles through theshrouds, what a stiff gale it blows; observe the rattling ofthe tacklings, and see the shets, that fasten the mainsail behind; the force of the wind puts them upon thestretch. While we passed our time merrily, the dull weatheralso passed away; and while we raised the glasses to ourmouths, we also raised the wind by a secret sympathy in nature.Thus Atlas and Hercules clubbed to raise and underpropthe falling sky, if you will believe the wise mythologists;The poets feigned that Atlas supported the heavens on his shoulders,but that, in order to ease him, Hercules, who was not to be conquered by labour, one day lent him his back. See Lucian in his dialogue en-CHAP. LXV. ]PANTAGRuel. 389but they raised it some half an inch too high; Atlas, to er.-tertain his guest Hercules more pleasantly, and Hercules to make himself amends for the thirst which sometimes beforehad tormented him in the deserts of Africa. -Your goodfather, said Friar John, interrupting him, takes care to freemany people from such an inconveniency; for I have beentold by many venerable doctors, that his chief butler, Turelupin, saves above eighteen hundred pipes of wine yearly, tomake servants, and all comers and goers, drink before they area-dry. As the camels and dromedaries of a caravan, continued Pantagruel, used to drink for the thirst that is past,for the present, and for that to come; so did Hercules: andbeing thus excessively raised , this gave new motion to thesky, which is that of titubation and trepidation, about whichour crack-brained astrologers make such a pother. —This,said Panurge, makes the saying good,While jolly companions carouse it togetherA fig for the storm, it gives way to good weather. "Nay, continued Pantagruel, some will tell you, that wehave not only shortened the time of the calm, but also muchdisburthened the ship; not like Esop's basket, by easing itof the provisions, but by breaking our fasts; and that a manis more terrestrial and heavy when fasting, than when he haseaten and drank, even as they pretend that he weighs moredead than living . However it is , you will grant they are inthe right, who take their morning's draught, and breakfastbefore a long journey; then say that the horses will perform the better, and that a spur in the head is worth twoin the flank; or, in the same horse dialect,That a cup in the pate Is a mile in the gate.titled Caron, or the Contemplators, and Seneca's tragedy of Hercules Furens. Rabelais, 1. 5, c . 22, speaks of this labour of Atlas and Her- cules. According to him, they made debauch together, which he callshausser le tems, raising the weather, hoisting away the clouds: because by sitting long in tippling, the weather, which was cloudy at their first sitting down to table, is become clear and serene, when they are going to break up. It is in the same sense that 1. 1 , c. 5, it is said, long tip- pling breaks the thunder. 2 Read these two lines thus:While round a fat ham we carouse it together,The storm spends itself, and gives way to fair weather."Le mal temps passe, et retourne le bon,Pendant qu'on trinque autour du gras jambon."In those times, a ham was a principal and a standing dish at all repasta of pleasure. See Tales of Eutrapel, ch. 21.384 [BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.Don't you know that formerly the Amycleans worshipped the noble Bacchus above all other gods, and gave himthe name of Psila, which in the Doric dialect signifieswings: for, as the birds raise themselves by a toweringflight with their wings above the clouds; so , with the help of soaring Bacchus, the powerful juice of the grape, ourspirits are exalted to a pitch above themselves, our bodiesare more sprightly, and their earthly parts become soft andpliant.CH. LXVI. -How, by Pantagruel's order, the Muses were saluted near the Isle of Ganabim.THIS fair wind and as fine talk brought us in the sight of ahigh land, which Pantagruel discovering afar off, showed itXenomanes, and asked him, Do you see yonder to the leeward a high rock, with two tops much like Mount Parnassus in Phocis? I do plainly, answered Xenomanes; it isthe isle of Ganabim. ' Have you a mind to go ashore there?No, returned Pantagruel. You do well indeed, said Xenomanes; for there is nothing worth seeing in the place.The people are all thieves: yet there is the finest fountainn the world, and a very large forest towards the right topof the mountain. Your fleet may take in wood and water there.2He that spoke last, spoke well, quoth Panurge; let usnot by any means be so mad as to go among a parcel ofthieves and sharpers. You may take my word for it, thisplace is just such another as, to my knowledge, formerly were the islands of Sark and Herm, between the smallerand the greater Britain; such as was the Poneropolis ofPhilip in Thrace; islands of thieves, banditti, picaroons,robbers, ruffians, and murderers, worse than raw- head and3 See Pausanias's Laconics. 1 A Hebrew word for a thief,says the Dutch scholiast. Mot Hebreu, qui signifie larron. He should have said larrons, thieves, for ganabim is the plural of ganab, a thief.2 These are two small islands, or rather two whitish rocks, betweenGuernsey and Jersey, anciently dependent on Normandy, but united to England by William the Conqueror. As, in all probability, it was cus tomary in Rabelais' time, for such of his nation as were forced to quit their country for any crime, to retire to those two places; our author for that reason, makes these two small islands a receptacle of thieves and sharpers. 3 See Plutarch, in his Treatise of Curiosity: and Suidas, at the word ▲ɛdiç modɩç , where he quotes to this purpose the his torian Theopompus, in 13 of his Philippics.CHAP. LXVI.]PANTAGRUEL. 385bloody-bones, and full as honest as the senior fellows of thecollege of iniquity, the very outcasts of the county gaolscommon-side. As you love yourself, do not go among them:if you go, you will come off but bluely, if you come off atall. If you will not believe me, at least believe what thegood and wise Xenomanes tells you: for may I never stir ifthey are not worse than the very cannibals: they wouldcertainly eat us alive. Do not go amongthem, I pray you;it were safer to take a journey to hell. Hark, by cod'sbody, I hear them ringing the alarm bell most dreadfully, as the Gascons about Bourdeaux used formerly to do againstthe commissaries and officers for the tax on salt, or my earstingle. Let's sheer off.Believe me, sir, said Friar John, let's rather land; we willrid the world of that vermin, and inn there for nothing.Old Nick go with thee for me, quoth Panurge. This rashhair-brained devil of a friar fears nothing, but ventures andruns on like a mad devil as he is, and cares not a rush whatbecomes of others; as if every one was a monk, like hisfriarship . A pox on grinning honour, say I. Go to, retarned the friar, thou mangy noddy- peak! thou forlorndruggle-headed sneaksby! and may a million of black devils anatomize thy co*ckle brain. The hen-hearted rascalis so cowardly, that he bewrays himself for fear every day.If thou art so afraid , dunghill, do not go, stay here and behanged, or go and hide thy loggerhead under Madam Proserpine's petticoat ."Panurge hearing this, his breech began to make buttons:so he slunk in in an instant, and went to hide his head downin the bread- room among the musty biscuits , and the orts and scraps of broken bread.Pantagruel in the meantime said to the rest, I feel a pressingretraction in my soul, which like a voice admonishes me not to land there. Whenever I have felt such a motion withinme, I have found myself happy in avoiding what it directedme to shun, or in undertaking what it prompted me to do;and never had occasion to repent following its dictates.In the original, Ladreverd; which M. Duchat interprets, A man withou. courage, insensible to the spurrings of honour. The like says Cotgrave: A coward; one that's insensible and cannot, or fearful and will not, feel the wrongs done to him. Cottardie, an old wordfor a petticoat: used here, because it equivocates to couhardie, (the cowardice of Panurge. ) • The Queen of Navarre, in her Me.VOL II. C C386 [BOOK IV. RABELAIS' WORKS.As much, said Epistemon, is related of the dæmon of Socrates, so celebrated among the Academics. Well then, sir,said Friar John, while the ship's crew water, have you amind to have good sport? Panurge is got down somewherein the hold, where he is crept into some corner, and lurkslike a mouse in a cranny: let them give the word for thegunner to fire yon gun over the round- bouse on the poop:this will serve to salute the Muses of this Anti- parnassus:besides, the powder does but decay in it . You are in theright, said Pantagruel: here, give the word for the gunner.The gunner immediately came, and was ordered by Pantagruel to fire that gun, and then charge it with fresh powder;which was soon done. The gunners of the other ships,frigates, galleons, and galleys of the fleet, hearing us fire,gave every one a gun to the island: which made such ahorrid noise , that you would have sworn heaven had beentumbling about our ears.ON CHAP. LXVI. -The island of Ganabim is the island of Thieves,from gannab, a thief in Hebrew. Xenomanes says, that the people of that island are all such, and commends Pantagruel for not going ashore there. Friar John advises Pantagruel to cause a gun to be fired, as it were to salute the Muses of that Anti- parnassus. By this, perhaps, ourauthor may have a mind to reflect on most of the authors of that age,who, as well as some of this, were very great plagiaries. The fair foun- tain on that hill may mean the great number of subjects, which mightemploy their pens more to the purpose than in translating many foolish romances, as the best hands of France did at that time. That spring may also signify the French tongue, which our author commends somuch in the prologue to the fifth book, and inveighs against such sorts of plagiaries, whom he calls brokers and retailers of ancient rhapsodies,and such mouldy trash; botchers of old thread- bare stuff, a hundred and a hundred times clouted up and pieced together; wretched bung- lers, that can do nothing but new-vamp old rusty saws; beggarly scavengers, that rake the muddiest canals of antiquity, &c. By which he would encourage his countrymen to follow his example, study it, and write something that might chiefly spring from their fancies, without being wholly indebted to foreign nations for what they published: yet not disdaining to make improvements from the thoughts of the Greek and Latin authors, as he himself has done, and enrich the moderns with translations of the best works of the ancients.The large forest, that is round the fountain, may mean the wild,dark, entangled, voluminous writings of some of that age. The moun- tain is called Anti- Parnassus, in opposition to that where the true Muses were said to dwell; and is placed in the island of Thieves properly enough, because poets, as well as they, are the children of Penis,or poverty, according to our author. -M.moirs, says much the same of herself, and of Catherine de Medicis,her mother.LXVII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 387CH. LXVII. How Panurge bewrayed himself for fear; andof the huge cat Rodilardus , which he took for a puny devil.PANURGE, like a wild, addle- pated, giddy goat, sallies outof the bread-room in his shirt, with nothing else about him but one of his stockings, half on half off, about his heel,like a rough-footed pigeon; his hair and beard all be- pow- dered with crumbs of bread, in which he had been overhead and ears, and a huge and mighty puss partly wrappedup in his other stocking. In this equipage, his chops movinglike a monkey's who is a louse-hunting, his eyes staring likea dead pig's, his teeth chattering, and his bum quivering,the poor dog fled to Friar John, who was then sitting bythe chain-wales of the starboard side of the ship , and prayedhim heartily to take pity on him, and keep him in the safe.guard of his trusty bilbo; swearing, by his share of Papi- many, that he had seen all hell broke loose.Woe is me, my Jacky, cried he, my dear Johnny, my oldcrony, my brother, my ghostly father! all the devils keepholiday, all the devils keep their feast to- day, man: porkand peas choke me, if ever thou sawest such preparations in thy life for an infernal feast. Dost thou see the smoke ofhell's kitchens? ( This he said , showing him the smoke ofthe gunpowder above the ships . ) Thou never sawest somany damned souls since thou wast born; and so fair, sobewitching they seem, that one would swear they areStygian ambrosia. I thought at first, God forgive me, thatthey had been English souls; and I don't know, but thatthis morning the isle of Horses, near Scotland, was sacked,with all the English who had surprised it, by the lords of Termes and Essay.¹1 This happened about the month of July 1548. Henry II . , King of France, had sent six thousand men to the assistance of the Scots,who, for some years , had been at war with England. The Englishhaving by surprise taken from the Scots the isle of Keith, (otherwise called the isle of Horses, ) Andrew de Montalambert Sieur de Dessé,who commanded the body of French auxiliaries, so rightly took his measures for re- entering the island , that, making a descent on it not above three weeks after the English had possessed themselves of it, he made himself master of the island , after an engagement wherein theEnglish lost 400 men, and all their baggage. See Thuanus. 1. 5, in the yea: 1548. It was the souls of these English, which Panurge thought he perceived in hell, though he had only a glimpse of them, his fear hindering him from seeing them perfectly and they appeared to him tant douillettes, tant blondelettes, tant delicates, so soft, so fair, so nice

C C 2388 [BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.Friar John, at the approach of Panurge, was entertainswith a kind of smell that was not like that of gunpowdernor altogether so sweet as musk; which made him turzPanurge about, and then he saw that his shirt was dismallybepawed, and bewrayed with fresh sir -reverence. The retentive faculty of the nerve, which restrains the musclecalled sphincter ( it is the arse-hole, and it please you) wasrelaxated by the violence of the fear which he had been induring his fantastic visions. Add to this , the thunderingnoise of the shooting, which seems more dreadful betweendecks than above. Nor ought you to wonder at such a mishap; for one of the symptoms and accidents of fear is, thatit often opens the wicket of the cupboard wherein second- handmeat is kept for a time. Let us illustrate this noble themewith some examples.99Messer Pantolfe de la Cassina, of Sienna, riding post from.Rome, came to Chamberry, and alighting at honest Vinet's,took one of the pitchforks in the stable; then turning to theinn-keeper, said to him, “ Da Roma in qua, io non son andatodel corpo. Di gratia piglia in mano questa forcha, et fa mi paura. I have not had a stool since I left Rome. I praythee take this pitchfork, and fright me. Vinet took it, andmade several offers, as if he would in good earnest have hitthe signor, but did not: so the Sienese said to him, “ Si tunon fai altramente, tu non fai nulla: pero sforzati di adoperartıpiù guagliardamente. " If thou dost not go another way towork, thou hadst as good do nothing: therefore try to bestirthyself more briskly. With this, Vinet lent him such aswinging stoater with the pitchfork souce between the neckand the collar of his jerkin, that down fell signore on theground arsyversy, with his spindle shanks wide stragglingover his pole. Then mine host sputtering, with a fullmouthed laugh, said to his guest, by Beelzebub's bum gut,much good may it do you, Signore Italiano. Take noticethis is datum Camberiaci, given at Chamberry. It was wellthe Sienese had untrussed his points , and let down hisdrawers for this physic worked with him as soon as hetook it; and as copious was the evacuation, as that of nineand tender, that one would have taken them for Stygian ambrosia, as he tells Friar John: and indeed the English are naturally fairer,and more tender than any other nation of the North.Macrobius, 1. 7, c. 11, of his Saturnalia.CHAP. LXVII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 3893 buffaloes and fourteen missificating arch -lubbers. Whichoperation being over, the mannerly Sienese courteously gavemine host a whole bushel of thanks, saying to him, “ Io tiringratio, bel messere; cosi facendo tu m ai esparmiata la spezad'un servitiale." I thank thee , good landlord; by this thouhast even saved me the expense of a clyster .I will give you another example of Edward V. , king ofEngland. Master Francis Villon, being banished France,fled to him, and got so far into his favour, as to be privy toall his household affairs. One day the king, being on his close stool, showed Villon the arms of France, and said tohim , Dost thou see what respect I have for thy FrenchKings? I have none of their arms any where but in this backside, near my close stool . Odd's life , said the buffoon,how wise, prudent, and careful of your health, your high- ness is! How carefully your learned doctor, Thomas Linacer,5looks after you! He saw that, now you grow old, you are inclined to be somewhat costive , and every day were fain tohave an apothecary; I mean, a suppository or clyster thrustinto your royal nockandroe; so he has, much to the pur- pose, induced you to place here the arms of France; for thevery sight of them puts you into such a dreadful fright, that you immediately let fly, as much as would come from eighteen squattering bonasi of Paonia. And if they were painted3 Archiprebstres de Hostie, says Rabelais, arch- priests of Hostia. The buffalo, or buffle, is a kind of wild ox, common in Italy, and probably more so at Ostia than in any other parts of that country. Which, belike,gave occasion to Rabela. always an enemy to ecclesiastics , to couple to- gether the buffalos and arch-priests of Ostia, as supposed to be greater eaters than your ordinary oxen and piain priests. Before, in 1. 1 ,c. 21, the author uses a proverb importing that arch-deacons ' noses run more copiously than simple deacons. 4 Francis Corbueil, surnamed Villon, had committed several villanies, for which,in 1461 , he was condemned by the chatelet to be hanged. But theParliament having changed the punishment of death into that of banish- ment, Villon, who at first retired to St. Maixant in Poitou, went from thence into England, being then but thirty years old as he sayshimself, in the beginning of his (larger) will and testament.5 He died in 1524, aged three-score and four; and if we may believe Konigius in his Bibliotheca, he was physician only to Henry VII. and Henry VIII. Besides, Edward V. began his reign but in 1483, full eighteen years after Villon's banishment. Thus, as it is not at all likely that this banishment lasted so long, so it is more than probable, thatwhat is here said by Rabelais concerning Edward V. and the poet Vil- lon, is a mere fable from one end to the other. 6 ΒονασοςCambridge Dictionary, quoting Pliny, 8, 15 Awild beast like a bull,390 [ BOOK IV.RABELAIS WORKS.in other parts of your house,' by jingo, you would presentlyconskite yourself wherever you saw them. Nay, had youbut here a picture of the great oriflamb of France, odasbodikins, your tripes and bowels would be in no smalldanger of dropping out at the orifice of your posteriors.But henh, henh, atque iterum henh.A silly co*ckney am I not,As ever did from Paris come?And with a rope and sliding knot My neck shall know what weighs my bum.A co*ckney of short reach, I say, shallow of judgment, andjudging shallowly, to wonder, that you should cause yourpoints to be untrussed in your chamber before you come intothis closet. By our lady, at first I thought your close stoolhad stood behind the hangings of your bed; otherwise itseemed very odd to me you should untruss so far from theplace of evacuation. But now I find I was a gull, a wittal,a woodco*ck, a mere ninny, a dolt- head, a noddy, a changeling, a calf- lolly, a doddipole. You do wisely, by the mass,you do wisely; for had you not been ready to clap yourhind face on the mustard-pot as soon as you came withinsight of these arms, mark ye me, cop's body, the bottom ofyour breeches had supplied the office of a close stool.Friar John, stopping the handle of his face with his lefhand, did, with the fore-finger of the right , point out Panurge's shirt to Pantagruel, who, seeing him in this pickle,scared, appalled, shivering, raving, staring, bewrayed, andtorn with the claws of the famous cat Rodilardus, could notchoose but laugh, and said to him, Prythee what wouldst thou do with this cat? With this cat, quoth Panurge, thedevil scratch me, if I did not think it had been a young softchinned devil, which, with this same stocking instead ofmitten, I had snatched up in the great hutch of hell, asonly hath the mane of a horse: when he is hunted, he saves himself by his ordure, which he throws out in that abundance, and is so noisome,that the hunters are fain to leave the pursuit. The remarks, said to be made by Rabelais himself on the fourth book, say, that when the bo- nassus finds himself pressed by the dogs, he squirts his dung at them almost five paces off; and that it is so hot, it fetches off not only the hair, but the very skin. 7 The original says, painted in your bed-chamber, in your guard-room, in your hall, in your chapel, in your galleries, or in any other parts of your house. 8 Latinfor bacon- gnawer. Rodere and lardum. The inventor of this name was Eliseus Calentius, one of Paul Jovius's eminent men.CHAP. LXVII.]PANTAGRUEL. 391thievishly as any sizar of Montague college could have done.The devil take Tybert: I feel it has all bepinked my poorhide, and drawn on it to the life I do not know how manylobsters' whiskers . With this he threw his boar- cat down.Go, go, said Pantagruel, be bathed and cleaned, calm your fears, put on a clean shift, and then your clothes . What!do you think I am afraid, cried Panurge? Not I , I protest!by the testicl*s of Hercules, I am more hearty, bold, andstout, though I say it that should not, than if I had swallowed as many flies as are put into plum- cakes, and other paste at Paris, from Midsummer to Christmas.10 But whatis this? hah! oh, ho! how the devil came I by this? Doyou call this what the cat left in the malt, filth , dirt, dung,dejection, focal matter, excrement, stercoration , " sir- reverence, ordure, 12 second- hand meats, fumets, stronts, scybal, ¹³or spyrathe? 14 'Tis Hibernian saffron , 15 I protest. Hah,hah, hah! it is Irish saffron, by Shaint Pautrick, and so much for this time. Selah. Let us drink.1613ON CHAP. LXVII.-Panurge's fear, increased by the noise of the guns, makes him run mad for a while, and lay hold of the huge cat Rodilardus, by which he was scratched . He saith, he took it to be ayoung soft-chinned devil, and thought he had snatched it up in the great hutch of hell, as thievishly as any sizar of Montague college could have done. Rodilardus stands for Croquelardon, lick- sauce, a parasi- tical smell-feast . This passage, doubtless, refers to some of Montluc's adventures, hardly to be discovered in our age; yet known in that during which he lived, Panurge's cowardice and impudence suit pretty well with that Bishop of Valence's character; as appears by what Isaid of his daring to preach before Queen Catherine of Medicis with ahat and cloak on, like a Geneva divine, and then not having the cou- rage to go on, but leaving off in the midst of his sermon (though the queen abetted him, and her presence secured him) as soon as the constabie of Montmorency spoke two words against his way of preaching.The fly is a symbol of temerity, inasmuch as that insect falls upon Anything, to the hazard of its life. Thence the proverb. 10 Readall -saints day, or All -hallows tide: tousaints, in the original.11 Laisse in the original. Lesses, i . e., wolf's or wild boar's dung.12 Repaire in French: i. e. , crotels, or hare's dung. 13 Scybal.The Dutch scholiast says, is un estron endurcy, a hard t- d. M. Du- chat says nothing of it. 14 It means the dung of sheep or goats.Enúρaloç, caprarum stercus. 15 Hibernian partly equivocates 16 Sela, is as much as to say, most certainly.It is certainly saffron. The new editions have it cela; but Rabelais writ it sela, a Hebrew word denoting a serious and vehement affirma- tion. Here it alludes to the sela which concludes several lessons of thechoir, after which every one betakes himself to drinking.to bren a t- d.392 [ BOOK IV.RABELAIS' WORKS.Here Rabelais takes an opportunity to bring in a story, which, aswell as some other things of as odious a nature, I would have omitted,did not many learned men despise a maimed or imperfect book, as much as some selfish women hate a male in those circ*mstances. Thatstory is what is said of Edward V. King of England, and Francis Vil lon, the witty rogue of whom I have already spoken. But, with ourauthor's good leave, this story is as false as it is filthy and improbable;though we should suppose there is a mistake in the printing (as thereare thousands even in the best editions of this work I have seen yet. )For none can imagine that Rabelais was so little versed in history, asnot to know that Edward V. died a child, and can neither have beencostive in his old age, nor familiar with Villon; who, according toPasquier, must have been hanged before the reign of that unfortunateprince, and, perhaps, before his birth . And should any say that Rabe- lais means Edward the Fourth; I answer, that he neither died old,nor could be drolled upon at that rate, by a buffooning inmate; since,though he was not one of the wisest heads, yet he was one of the bravestwarriors of his time, having fought nine pitched battles, generally orfoot, and at last gloriously overcome all his enemies: so that the wittyjester would hardly have offered to have told him, that the sight of Lewis the Eleventh's oriflame, or royal standard, would have scared him into a looseness. The verses which Rabelais makes Villon speak,are mentioned as his by Pasquier, somewhat otherwise than in thischapter:"Je suis François, dont ce me poise,Né de Paris, prez de Pontoise;Où d'une corde d'une toise,Saura mon col, que mon cul poise. " -M.END OF BOOK THE FOURTH.BOOK V.TREATING OF THE HEROIC DEEDS AND SAYINGSOF THE GOOD PANTAGRUEL.THE AUTHOR'S PROLOGUE.INDEFATIGABLE topers, and you thrice precious martyrs of thesmock, give me leave to put a serious question to your worships,while you are idly striking your codpieces, and I myself not muchbetter employed: Pray, why is it that people say that men are notsuch sots now-a-days as they were in the days of yore? Sot is anold word, that signifies a dunce, dullard, jolthead, gull, wittal, ornoddy, one without guts in his brains, whose co*ckloft is unfurnished, and, in short, a fool. Now would I know, whether youwould have us understand by this same saying, as indeed you logically may, that formerly men were fools, and in this generationare grown wise? How many and what dispositions made themfools? How many and what dispositions were wanting to makethem wise? Why were they fools? How should they be wise?Pray, how came you to know that men were formerly fools? Howdid you find that they are now wise? Whothe devil made them fools? Who in God's name made them wise? Who do youthink are most, those that loved mankind foolish, or those thatlove it wise? How long has it been wise? How long otherwise?Whence proceeded the foregoing folly? Whence the followingwisdom? Why did the old folly end now, and no later? Whydid the modern wisdom begin now, and no sooner?What werewe the worse for the former folly? What the better for the succeeding wisdom? How should the ancient folly be come to nothing. How should this same new wisdom be started up and established?Now answer me, and please you: I dare not adjure you in stronger terms, reverend sirs, lest I make your pious fatherly wor- ships in the least uneasy. Come, pluck up a good heart; speak the truth and shame the devil, that enemy to paradise, that enemyto truth be cheery, my lads; and if you are for me, take me offthree or five bumpers of the best, while I make a halt at the firstpart of the sermon; then answer my question. If you are notfor me, avaunt! avoid Satan! For I swear by my great-grandnother's placket, ' that if you do not help me to solve that puzThe original is mon grand hurluburlu. And lower, in ch . 15 , Friar John says, Saint Hurluburlu . The ehrlich wahrlich of the Germans,i. e. upon my honour, in good truth, may have been Rabelais' occa- sion to forge this burlesque oath out of the corruption of those German words, as he before had framed St. Picaud from the German bi Gott.394 RAPELAIS' WORKS. [ BOOK V.zug problem, I will, nay, I already do repent having proposed it:for still I must remain nettled and gravelled, and a devil a bit Iknow how to get off. Well, what say you? In faith, I begin tosmell you out. You are not yet disposed to give me an answer:nor I neither, by these whiskers. Yet to give some light into thebusiness, I will even tell you what had been anciently foretold inthe matter, by a venerable doctor, who being moved by the spiritin a prophetic vein, wrote a book yeleped the Prelatical Bagpipe.What do you think the old fornicator saith? Hearken, you old noddies, hearken now or never.The jubilee's year, when all, like fools were shorn,Is about thirty [ trente ] supernumerary.O want of veneration! fools they seem'd,But, persevering, with long breves, at last No more they shall be gaping greedy fools.For they shall shell the shrub's delicious fruit,Whose flow'r they in the spring so much had fear'd.Now you have it, what do you make of it? The seer is ancient,the style laconic, the sentences dark, like those of Scotus, thoughthey treat of matters dark enough in themselves. The best commentators on that good father take the jubilee after the thirtieth,to be the years that are included in this present age till 1550,[ there being but one jubilee every fifty years . ] Men shall no longer be thought fools next green pease season.The fools, whose number, as Solomon certifies, is infinite, shallgo to pot like a parcel of mad bedlamites as they are; and allmanner of folly shall have an end, that being also numberless, according to Avicenna, manic infinitæ sunt species. Folly having been driven back and hidden towards the centre, during the rigour of the winter, it is now to be seen on the surface, and buds outlike the trees. This is as plain as a nose in a man's face: youknow it by experience; you see it. And it was formerly foundout by that great good man Hippocrates, Aphorism. Vera etenim moniæ, &c. This world therefore wisifying itself, shall no longerdread the flower and blossoms of every coming spring, that is, asyou may piously believe, bumper in hand, and tears in eyes, in the woful time of Lent, which used to keep them company.Whole cartloads of books, that seemed florid, flourishing andflowery, gay and gaudy as so many butterflies; but in the mainwere tiresome, dull, soporiferous, irksome, mischievous, crabbed,knotty, puzzling, and dark as those of whining Heracl*tus, as unintelligible as the numbers of Pythagoras, that king of the bean,according to 1. 2, sat. 6, Horace: those books, I say, have seenAlluding to the proverb:" Quand les feves sont en fleur, les fous sont en vigueur.Beans in flower, madness ( or folly) , in power.BOOK V.]THE AUTHOR'S PROLOGUE, 395their best days, and shall soon come to nothing, being delivered tothe executing worms, and merciless petty chandlers: such wastheir destiny, and to this they were predestinated.In their stead beans in cod are started up; that is , these merryand fructifying Pantagruelian books, so much sought now- a- days,in expectation of the following jubilee's period: to the study of which writings all people have given their minds, and accord- ingly have gained the name of wise.Now, I think, I have fairly solved and resolved your problem:then reform, and be the better for it. Hem once or twice, likehearts of oak; stand to your pan-puddings, and take me off your bumpers, nine go- downs, and huzza! since we are like to have agood vintage, and misers hang themselves . Oh! they will cost me an estate in hempen collars if fair weather hold. For I hereby promise to furnish them with twice as much as will do their busi- ness, on free cost, as often as they will take the pains to dance at a rope's end, providently to save charges, to the no small disap- pointment of the finisher of the law.3Now my friends, that you may put in for a share of this new wisdom, and shake off the antiquated folly this very moment,scratch me out of your scrolls, and quite discard the symbol oftheold philosopher with the golden thigh , by which he has forbiddenyou to eat beans for you may take it for a truth, granted amongall professors in the science of good eating, that he enjoined you not to taste of them, only with the same kind intent with the freshwater physician, Amer, late Lord of Camelotiere, kinsman to thelawyer of that name, who forbad his patients the wing of thepartridge, the rump of the chicken, and the neck of the pigeon,saying, Ala mala, cropium dubium, collum bonum, pelle remotá.For the dunsical dog- leech was so selfish as to reserve them for hisown dainty chops, and allowed his poor patients little more thanthe bare bones to pick, lest they should over - load their squeamish stomachs.To the heathen philosopher succeeded a pack of Capucions,monks, who forbid us the use of beans, that is, Pantagruelian books.They seem to follow the example of Philoxenus and Gnatho, oneof whom was a Sicilian, of fulsome memory, the ancient masterbuilders of their monastic cram- gut voluptuousness, who, whensome dainty bit was served up at a feast, filthily used to spit on it,that none but their nasty selves might have the stomach to eat ofit, though their liquorish chops watered never so much after it.So those hideous, snotty, pthisicky, eves dropping , musty, -3 See the old story in the Serées of J. Bouchet. An usurer had bought a cord to hang himself with, if the harvest failed . It proved abundant, on which he hung himself, that the price of the cord might not be thrown away.396 RABELAIS WORKS. BOOK V.moving forms of mortification, both in public and private, cursethose dainty books, and like toads spit their venom upon them.Now though we have in our mother-tongue several excellentworks in verse and prose, and, heaven be praised, but little left of the trash and trumpery stuff of those dunsical mumblers of AveMaries, and the barbarous foregoing Gothic age; I have made boldto choose to chirrup and warble my plain ditty, or, as they say, to whistle like a goose among the swans, rather than be thought deaf among so many pretty poets and eloquent orators. And thus I amprouder of acting the clown, or any other under part, among themany ingenious actors in this noble play, than of herding amongthose mutes, who, like so many shadows and cyphers, only serve to fill up the house, and make up a number; gaping and yawning atthe flies, and pricking up their lugs, like so many Arcadian asses,at the striking up of the music; thus silently giving to understand,that their fopships are tickled in the right place.Having taken this resolution, I thought it would not be amiss to move my Diogenical tub, that you might not accuse me of living without example. I see a swarm of our modern poets and orators,your Colinets, Marots, Herouets, Saint Gelias, Salels, Masuels, andmany more; who, having commenced masters in Apollo's academy on Mount Parnassus, and drunk brimmers at the Cabalian fountain,among the nine merry Muses, have raised our vulgar tongue, andmade it a noble and everlasting structure. Their works are all Pa- rian marble, alabaster, porphyry, and royal cement: they treat of nothing but heroic deeds, mighty things, grave and difficult matters;and this in a crimson, alamode, rhetorical style . Their writings are all divine nectar, rich, racy, sparkling, delicate, and luscious wine. Nor does our sex wholly engross this honour; ladies havehad their share of the glory: one of them, of the royal blood of France, whom it were a profanation but to name here, surprises the age at once by the transcendent and inventive genius in her writings, and the admirable graces of her style. Imitate those great examples, if you can; for my part, I cannot. Every one,See Duchat's account of these authors at large in loc. AnthonyHerouet, says Duchat, was a Parisian, an excellent poet, and was raised to the episcopal see at Digne, in Provence . Joachim du Bellay had long before said of this deserving author," Seu canis heroas, seu condis Epwrika, verum Nomen eroeti fata dedere tibi. ”5 Margaret of Valois, Queen of Navarre, sister to Francis the First:born at the castle of Engouleme, 10th April 1492 , and died in that of Audos, in Bearne, the 21st December, 1549. See the eulogium ofthis princess in Brantome, and in 1. 3, Of the Additions to Castle- nau's Memoirs. Ofall her writings, whether in prose or verse, nothingdid more honour to her pen than her Heptameron, which, after several editions in the old French, vas some years ago published in the modern.BOOK V. ]THE AUTHOR'S PROLOGUE. 397you know, cannot go to Corinth. When Solomon built the temple,all could not give gold by handfuls; each offered a shekel of gold .Since, then, it is not in my power to improve our architecture as much as they, I am even resolved to do like Renault of Montauban: 6I will wait on the masons, set on the pot for the masons, cook forthe stone-cutters; and since it was not my good luck to be cut out for one of them, I will live and die the admirer of their divinewritings.

9As for you, little envious prigs, snarling bastards, puny Zoiluses,you will soon have railed your last go hang yourselves, andchoose you out some well- spread oak, under whose shade you mayswing in state, to the admiration of the gaping mob; you shall never want rope enough. While I here solemnly protest before my Helicon, in the presence of my nine mistresses the Muses, that if Ilive yet the age of a dog, eked out with that of three crows, soundwind and limbs, like the old Hebrew captain Moses, Xenophilus "the musician, and Demonax 10 the philosopher; by arguments noways impertinent, and reasons not to be disputed, I will prove, inthe teeth of a parcel of brokers and retailers of ancient rhapsodies,and such mouldy trash, that our vulgar tongue is not so mean, silly,inept, poor, barren, and contemptible, as they pretend. Nor ought I to be afraid of I know not what botchers of old thread- bare stuff.a hundred and a hundred times clouted up, and pieced together;wretched bunglers, that can do nothing but Lew-vamp old rusty saws; beggarly scavengers, that rake even the muddiest canals ofantiquity for scraps and bits of Latin, as insignificant as they areoften uncertain. Beseeching our grandees of Witland, that, aswhen formerly Apollo had distributed all the treasures of his poeticalexchequer to his favourites, little hulch-backed Esop got forhimself the office of apologue-monger: in the same manner, sinceI do not aspire higher, they would not deny me that of puny rhy- parographer, or riff- raff follower of Pyreicus.11In the last chapter of the romance of Aymon's four sons, we find Renaud, as the first act of penance for his past life, carrying hods of mortar for the building St. Peter's church at Cologne.10 He7 As did Zoilus, that implacable enemy to Homer's reputation.Pendentem volo Zoilum videre, says Martial. 8 According to Hesiod, as reported by Pliny, 1. 7, c. 48, the crow or raven lives nine times the age of a man. 9 Pliny, 1. 7, c. 70,says, after Aristoxenus, that the musician Xenophilus, lived 105 years. See Lucian in his discourse on long livers.lived near 100 years, without ailing anything in body or mind. See Lucian's discourse entitled Demonax. 11 Ryparographer, Gr.оvπaρoç, sordidus. Pyreicus the painter is so surnamed by Pliny, be- cause he confined himself only to drawing ridiculous and grotesque pictures; in which he however excelled in his time, as Rabelais did in his;who byhis romance, for all it seems at first sight so impertinent tomany people, hath acquired him the title of a refined wit, a good poet,and one of the best French writers that has ever appeared.398 RABELAIS WORKS. [ BOOK T.I dare swear they will grant me this: for they are all so kind, sogood- natured , and so generous, that they will never boggle at sosmall a request. Therefore both dry and hungry souls, pot andtrenchermen, fully enjoying those books, perusing, quoting themm their merry conventicles, and observing the great mysteries ofwhich they treat, shall gain a singular profit and fame: as in thelike case was done by Alexander the Great, with the books of primephilosophy composed by Aristotle.O rare! belly on belly! what swillers, what twisters will there be!Then be sure all you that take care not to die of the pip, be sure,I say, you take my advice, and stock yourselves with good store of such books, as soon as you meet with them at the booksellers; and do not only shell those beans, but even swallow them down like anopiate cordial, and let them be in you; I say, let them be within you; then you shall find, my beloved, wnat good they do to all clever shellers of beans.Here is a good handsome basketful of them, which I here lay before your worships; they were gathered in the very individualgarden whence the former came. So I beseech you, reverend sirs,with as much respect as was ever paid by dedicating author, to accept of the gift, in hopes of somewhat better against next visit theswallows give us.ON THE AUTHOR'S PROLOGUE. -The author begins this Prologue witha question , Why people say, that men are not such fools now- a- days,as they were in the days of yore? He answers it himself, by prophecy out of an imaginary book, which he calls the Prelatical Bagpipe.Let us see if we can unriddle it."The year ofjubilee" was in 1525, under Pope Clement VII. Then all Europe suffered themselves to be shorn or fleeced by the pardon- pedlars, the sellers of the court of Rome's indulgences, and other trum- pery ware. " Is supernumerary about [ or above] thirty [ or trente ] .'This means, that time is past, and such years of jubilee are needless,out of fashion, and cried down after the year 1530, ( or, perhaps, theCouncil of Trent; ) by reason of the change made by the restoration of learning, and the reformers: so that people were no longer to be fleeced by the sellers of pardons. And, indeed , about the year 1530, King Francis I. invited the learned to come to Paris, and having procuredseveral men well versed in various studies, fixed them in the university of Paris. Belleforest and Lambinus say, that in 1531 , he establishedtwelve professors for Latin , Greek, Hebrew, mathematics, philosophy,divinity, oratory, physic, &c. But Du Tillet, who at large relates whatthat prince did, and designed, for the advancement of learning, says this was 1530. And Genebrard, who was afterwards one of those professors, writes, anno 1530, Guillielmo Budæo et Joanne Bellaïo hortantibus, regios linguarum professores instituit. In Clemente VIII. Now,those learned men, to whom Petavius gives the epithets of litterati et pii, purged the age of its foolishness, and very much forwarded the affairs of the reformation: so that in 1530, or at least at the time of theitting of the Council of Trent, the reign of ignorance may be said to have come to an end.CHAP. I. ] PANTAGRUEL. 399" O want of veneration! fools they seemed. " That is, those who had been foolish enough to suffer themselves to be sheared and fleecedthus, appeared such as they were, when ignorance had been expelled;I mean, bigoted fools; neither did the veneration which uses to be paid to the church, hinder the wiser sort from laughing at them, or at least from pitying their silliness.66' But, persevering, with long breves, at last no more they shall be gaping greedy fools." Those long breves should be the sacred books;which may be called so in opposition to the Roman breviary, in which their contents are as maimed, imperfect, and abbreviated, as the vain imaginations of superstition are spun out there to a tedious length: at least, they mean the books written by the learned, many of which are long. So the people who appeared foolish being no more blinded by aridiculous superstition, will no more gape after it , nor be greedy of it;being filled with sound knowledge."For they shall shell the shrub's delicious fruit, whose flower they in the spring so much had feared." That is, they shall shell beans in cod; which is as if he had said , truth that lay concealed, and before was known but by a few, will be revealed to the world; and as muchas at first it was hated, despised, and feared, at its first appearance, so much the sweeter and more delicious will its fruit prove, when the world shall have had a taste of it.By these beans in cod we may also partly understand our author's work. The beans are the mystery; the cod is the emblem and out- ward dress which is good for nothing but to wrap up what is within it; neither ought we to feed upon it, but solely on what it contains.So we might fix the period of ignorance, and the beginning of the new æra, or restoration of learning, at the year 1550, at which time it began to bear good fruit, and this fifth book was written, though it was not published till after our author's death, perhaps because it spoke tooplain. This makes him foretell the speedy oblivion of whole cart-loads of books, that were dull, dark, and mischievous, though they seemedflorid, flourishing, and flowery, gay and gaudy as so many papillons [ butterflies ]; by which he seems to play upon the word papa, as in Papimany, and in the sixth chapter of the Pantagruelian Prognosti- cation , where the King of the Papillons, or butterflies , undoubtedly means the pope.-M.CHAPTER I.How Pantagruel arrived at the Ringing Island, and of the noise that we heard.PURSUING our voyage, we sailed three days , without dis- covering any thing; on the fourth, we made land. Ourpilot told us that it was the ringing Island, ' and indeed we heard a kind of a confused and often repeated noise, that1 He that made the key to Rabelais asserts that England is meantby the Ringing Island; but he is mistaken, since, besides several other reasons, that island had already withdrawn itself from the Pope's authority, under Edward VI. when this book was written.400 RABELAIS' WORKS.seemed to us, at a great distance, not unlike the sound ofgreat, middle- sized , and little bells , rung all at once, as it iscustomary at Paris, Tours, Gergeau, Nantes, and elsewhere,on high holidays; and the nearer we came to the land, the louder we heard that jangling.Some of us doubted that it was the Dodonian kettle, orthe portico called Heptaphone, in Olympia, or the eternalhumming of the Colossus raised on Memnon's tomb, inThebes of Egypt, or the horrid din that used formerly to beheard about a tomb at Lipara, one of the Æolian² Islands .But this did not square with chorography.I do not know, said Pantagruel, but that some swarms ofbees hereabouts may be taking a ramble in the air, and sothe neighbourhood make this dingle dangle with pans, kettles, and basons, the corybantine cymbals of Cybele, grandmother of the gods, to call them back. Let us hearken.When we were nearer, among the everlasting ringing ofthese indefatigable bells, we heard the singing, as wethought, of some men. For this reason, before we offeredto land on the Ringing Island, Pantagruel was of opinionthat we should go in the pinnace to a small rock, near whichwe discovered an hermitage, and a little garden. Therewe found a diminutive old hermit, whose name was Braguibus, born at Glenay. He gave us a full account of allthe jangling, and regaled us after a strange sort of fashion:four live-long days did he make us fast, assuring us that weshould not be admitted into the Ringing Island otherwise,because it was then one of the four fasting , or ember weeks.As I love my belly, quoth Panurge, I by no means understand this riddle: methinks , this should rather be one of thefour windy weeks; for while we fast we are only puffed upwith wind. Pray now, good father hermit, have not youhere some other pastime besides fasting? Methinks it issomewhat of the leanest: we might well enough be without> many palace holidays, and those fasting times of yours.In my Donatus, quoth Friar John, I could find yet but threetimes or tenses , the preterit, the present, and the future, andtherefore I make a donative of the fourth (i . e. the fast ofthe quatre-tems ) to be kept by my footman. That time ortense, said Epistemon, is aorist, derived from the preterimperfect tense of the Greeks, admitted in variable and unSee Pliny 3 In Poitou. for all these particulars.CHAP. I.]PANTAGRUEL. 401certain times. Patience per force is a remedy for a maddog. Saith the hermit, it is as I told you, fatal to go against this: whoever does it is a rank heretic, and wants nothingbut fire and fa*ggot, that is certain . To deal plainly withyou, my dear pater, cried Panurge, being at sea, I muchmore fear being wet than being warm, and being drownedthan being burned.Well, however, let us fast in God's name; yet I havefasted so long, that it has quite undermined my flesh , and Ifear that at last the bastions of this bodily fort of mine will fall to ruin. Besides, I am much more afraid of vexing youin this same trade of fasting; for the devil a bit I understandany thing in it, and it becomes me very scurvily," as severalpeople have told me, and I am apt to believe them. Formy part I do not much mind fasting: for alas! it is as easyas pissing a bed, and a trade of which any body may set up;there needs no tools. I am much more inclined not to fastfor the future: for to do so, there is some stock required,and some tools are set to work. No matter, since you are sostedfast, and would have us fast, let us fast as fast as we can,and then breakfast in the name of famine. Now we arecome to these esurial idle days . I vow I had quite put them out of my head long ago. If we must fast, said Pantagruel, I see no other remedy but to get rid of it as soon aswe can, as we would out of a bad way. I will in that spaceoftime somewhat look over my papers, and examine whether the marine study be as good as ours at land. ForPlato, to describe a silly, raw, ignorant fellow, compareshim to those that are bred on shipboard, as we would doone bred up in a barrel, who never saw any thing but throughthe bung-hole.To tell you the short and the long ofthe matter, our fastingwas most hideous and terrible; for, the first day we fasted atfisticuffs, the second at cudgels , the third at sharps and thefourth at blood and wounds: such was the order of the fairies.'The proverb in the original is, patience, say the lepers. Alluding to the herb patience (lapathum) which those afflicted with the leprosy seek after with great eagerness, to relieve them.5 Ridiculus æque nullus est, quam quando esurit. Plaut. in Sticho,act 2, scene 1. The meaning of all this is, that one or twodays fasting may not do a man much harm, but three or four daya may prejudice his health, nay, be as much as his life is worth.7Whohad ordained the fatal ( as said before) fast of the ember- weeks.VOL II. D D402 RABELAIS' WORKS. LBOOK V.ON CHAP. I.-The Ringing Island can mean nothing but the clergy of the Church of Rome, whose mysteries are all performed at the sound of large, middle- sized little, and very little bells. They are rung amatins, mass, noon, vespers, sermons, and the salutation to the virgin every day, on the eves or vigils of holydays, at processions and at stations; and, whenever the priest lifts up the wafer-god, a little bell is rung, that the people may fall down and adore that piece of dough,which, they must believe, made heaven and earth, though it were made that very morning by the baker, and some of the same stamp be shown in every parish. Besides, when the priest carries the viaticum, a dimi- nutive bell always tingles before him. Thus bells are often rungwherever there is a monastery, church, chapel, or hermitage, to awaken the people's devotion , summon them together, dismiss them, and make them come again. Add to this, that as whatever is said ofthe Ringing Island in the following chapters, cannot well be adapted to any thing but the popish ecclesiastics, so those who pretended to explain these books, only by printing at the end of some French editions twenty or thirty names, which, without the least reason, they call a key, either never read them , or had a design to impose on the reader more thanour author; else they would never have said, that the Ringing Island is England. I own there is much ringing there, and the English are famous for making that a recreation; but this book was written during King Edward the Sixth's reign, at which time the Reformation had prevailed here; and though our author mentions the Knights of the Garter in the fifth chapter, while he speaks of the knight-hawks ofthe Ringing Island, it does not follow he meant England, since he only places the Knights of Malta among the Roman ecclesiastics; which was judiciously done, because they make a vow never to marry, read the breviary, and have livings like abbots. Even that passage proves that the Ringing Island is not England: since Adituus makes one of his island's knight-hawks look wistfully on the Pantagruelian strangers,to see whether he might not find among their company a stately gaudykind of large, huge, dreadful birds of prey, so untoward, that they could never be brought to the lure, nor to perch on the glove, ( which may mean, that other knights claimed a pre- eminence over those of Malta.)Edituus adds, I am told there are such in your world, who weargoodly garters below the knee, with an inscription about them which condemns him who shall think ill of it (qui mal ypense) to be bewrayed and conskited. So it is plain there were none such in the Ringing Island. Then in the sixth chapter Edituus says, that all the good things which they have in this island come from every part of the otherworld, except some of the northern regions; particularly from Touraine,our author's native country; and that the income of the duke of that country could not afford him to eat his belly full of beans and bacon,because his predecessors had been more than liberal to the birds ofthe Ringing island, that they might there munch it, twist it, cram it, gorge it, craw it, riot it, junket it, and tickle it off; stuffing their pudding with dainty food, &c.The hermit, whom the Pantagruelists met, assured them they should not be admitted into the Ringing Island, unless they fasted four days,because it was then one of the four fasting or ember-weeks. As theCHAP. I.]PANTAGRUEL. 403island is the popish clergy, none enter into it, that is, into orders, with out fasting, and a great deal of formality; and it was judiciously that Rabelais made his travellers be admitted there at one of the times pre.scribed for the admittance of laics into the body of the clergy. Yet heshows, that those fasts (though commendable in their institution) were much abused; and many, like Panurge, are pretty apt to say, Since you are so steadfast, and have us fast, let us fast, as fast as we can, andthen break fast. Thus only putting a constraint on themselves a while (or seeming to put it) to indulge them in gluttony after it.-M.CH. II. -How the Ringing Island had been inhabited by theSiticines, who were become birds.HAVING fasted as aforesaid, the hermit gave us a letterfrom one whom he called Albian Camar, ¹ master Edituus ofthe Ringing Island: but Panurge greeting him, called him Master Antitus. He was a little queer old fellow, baldpated, with a snout whereat you might easily have lighted acard match, and a phiz as red as a cardinal's cap. He madeus all very welcome, upon the hermit's recommendation,hearing that we had fasted, as I have told you.When we had well stuffed our puddings, he gave us anaccount of what was remarkable in the island, affirming thatit had been first inhabited by the Siticines; but that, accord.ing to the course of nature, as all things , you know, are sub- ject to change, they were become birds.There I had a full account of all that Atteius Capito ,Pollux, Marcellus, A. Gellius, Athenæus, Suidas, Ammonius,and others had writ of the Siticines; and then we thoughtwe might as easily believe the transmutations of Nectymene,Progné, Itys, Alcyone, Antigone, Tereus, and other birds.Nor did we think it more reasonable to doubt of the transmogrification of the Macrobian children into swans, or thatof the men of Pallene in Thrace into birds, as soon as they had bathed themselves in the Tritonic lake. After thisthe devil a word could we get out of him but of birds andcages.2The cages were spacious, costly, magnificent, and of anadmirable architecture . The birds were large, fine, andThis must have been some Jacobin, or at least some ecclesiatics with a black cassock under a white surplice. Albian, from albus,white; and the priests of Baal were called in Hebrew cemarim, only because of their wearing black gowns. See the Second of Kings, ch.xxiii, verse 5. See Stuckius De Gentilium Sacris. 2 Pliny, 14, ch. 13, places Pallene in Macedonia.DD 2404 [BOOK V. RABELAIS' WORKS.neat accordingly; looking as like the men in my country, asone pea does like another: for they eat and drank like men,muted like men, digested like men, but stunk like devils;slept, billed, and trod their females like men, but somewhatoftener: in short, had you seen and examined them from topto toe, you would have laid your head to a turnip that theyhad been mere men. However, they were nothing less, asMaster Edituus told us; assuring us, at the same time, thatthey were neither secular nor laic: and the truth is, the diversity of their feathers and plumes did not a little puzzle us.Some of them were all over as white as swans, others asblack as crows, many as grey as owls, others black andwhite like magpies, some all red like red- birds, and otherspurple and white like some pigeons. He called the malesclerg-hawks, monk-hawks, priest- hawks, abbot- hawks, bishhawks, cardin- hawks, and one pope-hawk, who is a speciesby himself. He called the females clerg-kites, nun- kites,priest-kites, abbess- kites, bis-kites, cardin-kites, and pope- kites.However, said he, as hornets and drones will get amongthe bees, and there do nothing but buzz, eat, and spoil everything; so, for these last three hundred years, a vast swarmof bigottelloes flocked, I do not know how, among thesegoodly birds every fifth full moon, and have bemuted, bewrayed, and conskited the whole island. They are so hardfavoured and monstrous, that none can abide them. Fortheir wry necks make a figure like a crooked billet; theirpaws are hairy, like those of rough- footed pigeons; theirclaws and pounces, belly and breech, like those of the stymphalid harpies . Nor is it possible to root them out: for ifyou get rid of one, straight four and twenty new ones flythither.There had been need of another monster-hunter, such aswas Hercules; for Friar John had like to have run distracted about it, so much he was nettled and puzzled in thematter. As for the good Pantagruel, he was even served aswas Messer Priapus, contemplating the sacrifices of Ceres,for want of skin.53 Dangerous hypocrites; with Jacob's voice, but the hands of Esau.See Diodorus Siculus. 5 The gods having been invited by their good mother to a feast, repaired to it one and all, even the nymphs and satyrs, not excepting Silenus himself. Their godships,after spending part of the night in drinking pretty liberally, some fell asleep, others went to dancing and other little sports. Priapus run-CHAP. 11. ] PANTAGRUEL. 405ON CHAP. II.-When Pantagruel and his attendants have fasted after a strange sort of a fashion, they are kindly received by Albiam Camar, master Edituus, or Sacristan of the Ringing Island. Camar in Hebrew signifies an idolatrous priest; and St. Jerome has made itaruspex and adituus in Latin. We may observe, by that beginning,what esteem our author had for the Ringing Island , with its sacrifices and mysteries.Edituus acquaints our strangers with the metamorphosis of the siti cines and sicinnists into birds. The siticines and sicinnists were thosethat used to sing mournfully on the dead, and at funerals, among the ancients. Siticines appellantur qui apud sitos canere soliti essent, hoc est, vita functos et sepultos. A. Gellius , lib . 2, cap. 20. Consequently,the clergy ofthe church of Rome, who chiefly subsist by obits, trentals,and masses, for the repose of the souls of the dead, may well be called by those names.We are told that the siticines were become birds; those birds arethose ecclesiastics, who raise themselves by contemplation and holiness of life , (if you will believe them , ) soaring above the things of this earth,on which we poor grovelling laics crawl. Edituus would make Panta- gruel sensible of this, when he tells him that those birds, which looked like men, eat and drank, slept and billed like men, were nothing less than men, being neither secular nor laics.Their spacious, costly, magnificent cages, admirable in their archi- tecture, are their churches; which appears the plainer by reason of the bells which our author says were above them.The variety of the feathers and plumes of those birds denotes the dif- ferent orders and clothings of the popish clergy, which distinguish them from each other: the Benedictines are white, the Austins black, the Franciscans grey, the Bernardins black and white, the Bishops purple,the Cardinals red; some knights and commanders are white and blue;and there are nuns dressed like most of those professing the same orders.It is observable that they are all made birds of prey, clerghawks,monkhawks, priesthawks, abbothawks, bishawks, cardinhawks, and popehawks; and clergkites, nunkites, abbeskites, &c.The wry-necked bigottelloes , who had flocked thither during the last three hundred years, are the orders of Franciscan and Dominican friars.Our author, who had been a Cordelier, i . e. a Franciscan, and misusedby the fraternity in the convent, was well acquainted with their merit,ning afterthe nymphs, spied Vesta asleep. Whether or no he knewher.or took her for somebody else, he resolved not to miss the opportunity.As ill-luck would have it, the moment he was going to work, Silenus ass fell a-braying, and awaked Vesta, who getting up in a sad fright,and the celestial gentry running in, upon the noise she made, poor Priapus was discovered; nor could he with the skirt of his robe,had it been four times as large, conceal the condition he was in. It is an idle frivolous story. Ovid, in the sixth of his Fasti, tells it agree ably, as he does every thing else, and Lactantius after him, 1. 1 , of his Divine Institutions, n. 21. I have added a little to the thing, the better to explain our author's text, who has darkened the fact exceedingly, by having Ceres instead of Cybele, and skin instead of covering or lappet.406 RABELAIS WORKS. [BOOK V.and speaks experimentally; which makes him wish for another Her- cuies to root them out.-M.CH. III. -How there is but one Popehawk in the Ringing Island.We then asked Master Ædituus why there was but one 'popehawk among such venerable birds, multiplied in alltheir species? He answered, that such was the first institution and fatal destiny of the stars: that the clerg- hawksbegot the priest-hawks and monk- hawks, without carnalcopulation, as some bees are born of a young bull: thepriest-hawks begat the bis -hawks, the bis-hawks the statelycardin-hawks, and the stately cardin- hawks, if they live longenough, at last come to be pope -hawk.Of this last kind, there never is more than one at a time;as in a bee-hive there is but one king, and in the world but one sun.When the pope- hawk dies, another rises in his stead outof the whole brood of cardin-hawks; that is, as you mustunderstand it all along, without carnal copulation 2 So thatthere is in that species an individual unity, with a perpetuity of succession , neither more or less than in the Arabianphoenix.It is true, that about two thousand seven hundred andsixty moons ago, ³ two pope- hawks were seen upon the faceof the earth but then you never saw in your lives such awoful rout and hurly- burly as was all over this island. Forall these same birds did so peck, clapperclaw, and maul oneanother all that time, that there was the devil and all to do,and the island was in a fair way of being left without inhabitants. Some stood up for this pope-hawk, some for theother. Some, struck with a dumbness, were as mute as somany fishes; the devil a note was to be got out of them;part of the merry bells here were as silent as if they had losttheir tongues, I mean their clappers.3 At1 See 4th book of Virgil's Georgics. 2 Gens æterna in quanemo nascitur, said Pliny formerly, 1. 5, c. 17, of certain hermitscalled Essenes, dwelling in the deserts of Palestine.twelve moons a year, ( Rabelais, as he insinuates in the preface of thisbook, composing it about the year 1550, ) the 2760 moons he speaks of, i . e. 230 years, point out the year 1380, the times of the greatschism, which was caused on one hand by Urban VI. sitting at Rome,and on the other hand, the vretended Clement VII. sitting at Avignon.CHAP. III .] PANTAGBUEL. 407During these troublesome times, they called to their assistance the emperors, kings, dukes, earls, barons, and commonwealths of the world that live on the other side thewater; nor was this schism and sedition at an end, till oneof them died, and the plurality was reduced to a unity,*We then asked, what moved those birds to be thus continually chaunting and singing? He answered, that it was thebells that hung on the top of their cages. Then he said tous, Will you have me make these monkhawks, whom you seebardocuculated with a bag, such as you use to strain Hippocras wine through, sing like any wood - larks? Pray do,said we. He then gave half a dozen pulls to a little rope,which caused a diminutive bell to give so many tingtangs;and presently a parcel of monkhawks ran to him, as if thedevil had drove them, and fell a singing like mad.Pray, master, cried Panurge, if I also rang this bell, couldI make those other birds yonder, with redherring- colouredfeathers, sing? Aye, marry would you, returned Ædituus .With this Panurge hanged himself (by the hands, I mean)at the bell- rope's end , and no sooner made it speak, but those smcked birds hied them thither, and began to lift up theirvoices, and make a sort of untowardly hoarse noise, which Igrudge to call singing. Edituus indeed told us, that theyfed on nothing but fish, like the herons and cormorants ofthe world, and that they were a fifth kind of cucullati newlystamped.He added, that he had been told by Robert Valbringue,who lately passed that way in his return from Africa , that asixth kind was to fly hither out of hand, which he calledcapushawks, more grum, vinegar-faced , brain- sick, froward,and loathsome, than any kind whatsoever in the whole island .Africa, said Pantagruel, still uses to produce some new andmonstrous thing.ON CHAP. III.—The popehawk, who, like the phoenix, is a species alone, is undoubtedly the pope. Wehave there a true account of whatAt the council of Constance, when Cardinal Otho, of the family of Colonna, was made pope by the name of Martin V. 5 The Benedictines, or rather Bernardines, whose cowl looks like the bardocucullus (or hood) of the ancient inhabitants of Saintonge,Langres, and some other Gauls. See Fauchet Ant. Gaul . 1. 1 , ch. 5.6 The minims, instituted by Francis de Paul, about the middle of the 15th century, long after the establishment of the four orders of inendicants.408 [ BOOK VRABELAIS' WORKS.happened some 1760 moons, that is about 140 years, before our authorwrote; only to blind this, or perhaps by some mistake in the printing,it is made 2760 moons: I mean the schism of Avignon, which lasted forty years. Three popes were seen then at the same time. Bennet the Ninth, Gregory the Twelfth, and Alexander the Fifth. This schismended at the Council of Constance, which began in 1414, and ended in 1419.-M.CH.IV.-How the birds ofthe Ringing island were all passengers.SINCE you have told us, said Pantagruel, how the popehawkis begot by the cardinhawks, the cardinhawks by the bishhawks, and the bishhawks by the priesthawks, and thepriesthawks by the clerghawks, I would gladly know whenceyou have these same clerghawks. They are all passengers,or travelling birds, returned Ædituus, and come hither fromthe other world; ¹ part out of a vast country, called Want- o'-bread, the rest out of another towards the west, which theystyle Too-many-of-' em. From these two countries flockhither, every year, whole legions of these clerghawks, leaving their fathers, mothers, friends , and relations.This happens when there are too many children , whethermale or female, in some good family of the latter country;somuch that the house would come to nothing, if the paternal estate were shared among them all; (as reason requires, nature directs, and God commands. ) For this causeparents used to rid themselves of that inconveniency, by packing off the younger fry, and forcing them to seek theirfortune in this isle Bossart, ( or humpy island) . I supposehe means L'isle Bouchart, near Chinon, cried Panurge. No,replied the other, I mean Bossart ( crooked) for there is notone in ten among them, but is either crooked, crippled, blinking, limping, ill -favoured, deformed, or an unprofitable load to the earth.It was quite otherwise among the heathens, said Pantagruel, when they used to receive a maiden among the num- ber of vestals: for Leo Antistius affirms, that it was absolutely forbidden to admit a virgin into that order, if she hadany vice in her soul, or defect in her body, though it werebut the smallest spot on any part ofit . I can hardly believe,continued Edituus, that their dams on the other side thewater go nine months with them; for they cannot endurethem nine years, nay, scarce seven, sometimes in the house;1 Monks are said to be civilly dead to this world.CHAP. IV. ] PANTAGRUEL. 409but byputting only a shirt over the other clothes ofthe youngurchins, and lopping off I do not well know howmany hairsfrom their crowns, mumbling certain apostrophised and expiatory words, they visibly, openly, and plainly, by a Pythagorical metempsychosis, without the least hurt, transmogrify them into such birds as you now see; much after thefashion of the Egyptian heathens, who used to constituteisiacs , by shaving them, and making them put on certainlinostoles, or surplices. However, I do not know my goodfriends, but that these she-things, whether clergkites, monkites, and abbesskites, instead of singing pleasant motets andcharisteres , such as used to be sung to Oromasis by Zoroaster's institution, may be bellowing out such catarates andscythropys, (cursed lamentable, and wretched imprecations, )as were usually offered to the Arimanian demon; being thusin continual devotion for their kind friends and relations,that transformed them into birds , whether when they weremaids, or thornbacks, in their prime, or at their last prayers .But the greatest numbers of our birds came out of Wanto' -bread, which, though a barren country, where the daysare of a most tedious lingering length, overstocks this wholeisland with the lower class of birds. For hither fly theasapheis³ that inhabit that land, either when they are indanger of passing their time scurvily for want of belly-timber, being unable, or what is more likely, unwilling to takeheart of grace, and follow some honest lawful calling, or tooproud-hearted and lazy to go to service in some sober family.The same is done by our frantic inamoradoes, who, whencrossed in their wild desires , grow stark staring mad, andchoose this life suggested to them by their despair' [ too cowardly to make them swing, like their brother Iphis of doleful memory. ] There is another sort, that is , your gaol birds,2 Mr. Motteux is vastly mistaken here to say, in continual devotion for their friends. Rabelais means just the contrary: "font continuelledevotions de leurs parens et amis, " i . e. they (the cloistered people) are continually devoting or cursing their friends, who put them there.What says Merlin Coccaie? " Est monachæ, quando moritur, mala- dire parentes." 3 It means obscure, little known. Such arethe Utopians, Amaurotes, &c. 4 The words between thecrotchets [ ] are not in Duchat. He only quotes, at the word despair,these verses of Jovian Pontanus taking leave of his mistress Fannia:Ah valeant veneres, valeant mala gaudia amoris!Casta placent, luxos desidiose vale!66Jam mihi Francisci tunicam chordamque parate,Jam teneant nudos linea vincla pedes.410 [BOOK V. RABELAIS' WORKS.who, having done some rogue's trick, or other heinousvillany, and being sought up and down to be trussed up, and made to ride the two or three- legged mare that groans forthem, warily scour off, and come here to save their bacon;because all these sorts of birds are here provided for, andgrowin an instant as fat as hogs, though they came as lean asrakes; for having the benefit of the clergy, they are as safe as thieves in a mill within this sanctuary.But, asked Pantagruel, do these birds never return to theworld where they were hatched? Some do, answered Edituus; formerly some few, but very late and very unwillingly;however, since some certain eclipses, by the virtue of thecelestial constellations , a great crowd of them fled back tothe world. Nor do we fret or vex ourselves a jot about it:for those that stay, wisely sing, the fewer the better cheer;and all those that fly away first, cast off their feathers here among these nettles and briars. "Accordingly we found some thrown by there; and as welooked up and down, we chanced to light on what somepeople will hardly thank us for having discovered; andthereby hangs a tale.ON CHAP. IV. -Edituus owns that all the birds ofthe Ringing Island are passengers. There is a sort of hawks distinguished by that name.He adds, that none of them were bred in that piace, but all came fromthe other world; that is, out of the laity, who are styled worthy men with respect to the clergy, who assume that of divine. One of thecountries out ofwhich they come is called Want- o' -bread, and the other,Too-many-of-' em. The first shows, that many will take to any thing rather than starve; the other, that the avarice of unnatural parentsmakes them compel their children, often the most defective in body or mind, to be monks, friars, priests, &c.Those birds who returned to the world are the monks and clergymen,who, like Luther, Calvin, and others, left their monastical or ecclesias- tical habits; or, like Rabelais, left their monasteries. The feathers found among the nettles, means his frock and cowl, which he cast off,and in general those of other monks who apostatize-so their desertion is called by the church of Rome. What the company chanced to light upon there, as they looked up and down, for the discovery of which some people will hardly thank them, may imply this work, which exposes all the mysteries of monachism. -M.CH. V. Ofthe dumb knighthawks of the Ringing island.THESE words were scarce out of his mouth, when some fiveand-twenty or thirty birds flew towards us: they were of aHow many monks at that time did not cast away their habit.CHAP. V.] PANTAGRUEL. 411hue and feather like which we had not seen any thing in thewhole island. Their plumes were as changeable as the skinof the chameleon, and the flower of tripolion, or teucrion. 'They had all under the left wing a mark, like two diametersdividing a circle into equal parts, or, if you had rather haveit so, like a perpendicular line falling on a right line . Themarks which each of them bore, were much of the sameshape, but of different colours; for some were white , othersgreen, some red, others purple, and some blue.Who arethose, asked Panurge, and how do you call them? Theyare mongrels, quoth Edituus.We call them knighthawks, and have a great number ofrich commanderies³ (fat livings) in your world. Good, yourworship, said I , make them give us a song, and it please you,that we may know how they sing. They scorn your words,cried Edituus, they are none of your singing birds; but, tomake amends, they feed as much as the best two of themall. Pray, where are their hens? where are their females?said I. They have none, answered Edituus. How comesit to pass, then, asked Panurge, that they are thus bescabbed,bescurfed, all embroidered over the phiz with carbuncles,pushes, and pock-royals, some of which undermine thehandles of their faces. This same fashionable and illustrious disease , quoth Ædituus, is common among that kind ofbirds, because they are pretty apt to be tossed on the salt deep.He then acquainted us with the occasion of their coming.This next to us, said he, looks so wistfully upon you, to seewhether he may not find among your company a statelygaudy kind of huge dreadful birds of prey, which yet are sountoward, that they never could be brought to the lure, norto perch on the glove. They tell us that there are such inyour world, and that some of them have goodly garters below the knee, with an inscription about them, which condemns him (qui mal y pense) who shall think ill of it , to bebewrayed and conskited. Others are said to wear the devilin a string before their paunches; and others a ram's skin. 'Pliny, 1. 21 , ch. 7 , speaking of the polium, which some, says he,call teuthrion, among other wonderful things which he relates of this herb, affirms the flower of it to be white in the morning, red at noon,and blueish in the evening.wore a green cross .gourmanderies.5 Order of St. Michael.52 The knights of St. Lazere, who 3 Rabelais banteringly calls them the Of the great falc ner the pope.6 Order of the Golden Fleece.412 [BOOK V. RABELAIS' WORKS.All that is true enough, good master Edituus, quothPanurge; but we have not the honour to be acquaintedwith their knightships.Come on, cried Ædituus in a merry mood, we have hadchat enough of conscience! let's even go drink.——And eat,quoth Panurge. Eat, replied Ædituus, and drink bravely,old boy; twist like plough jobbers, and swill like tinkers;pull away and save tide , for nothing is so dear and precious as time, therefore , we will be sure to put it to a good use.He would fain have carried us first to bathe in the bagnios ofthe cardinhawks, which are goodly delicious places , and haveus licked over with precious ointments by the alyptes, aliasrubbers, as soon as we should come out of the bath. ButPantagruel told him, that he could drink but too muchwithout that. He then led us into a spacious delicate refectory, or fratrie- room, and told us: Braguibus, the hermit,made you fast four days together; now contrariwise, I willmake you eat and drink of the best four days' through stitch,before you budge from this place. But hark- ye-me, criedPanurge, may not we take a nap in the meantime? Af, ay,answered Ædituus, that is as you shall think good; for hethat sleeps, drinks. Good Lord! how we lived! what good bub! what dainty cheer! O what an honest cod was thissame Edituus.ON CHAP. V. -The dumb knighthawks of the Ringing Island, arethe knights of Malta; the marks which they bear under their left wing,is the cross of their order, which these knights wear on their heart , ofdifferent colours, according to the provinces to which they belong.They are said to be dumb, because they do not say mass, nor officiateas priests and monks; and are only obliged to read every day, or repeat some parts of their breviary. They have no females, says Edituus,.because there are none of their order; yet they make themselvesamends with others out of every order: so that what is said of thepock-royals that embroider their heads, and undermine the handle oftheir faces, is true of many of them who are not always concerned inholy wars. They are all gentlemen, not shut up within monasteries;and though they sing not, feed, that is, spend and devour as much asthe best two that do. Some of the livings or commanderies bring themin great sums yearly and as they make a vow never to marry, it is notstrange they should meet with such wounds, when they engage some other infidels than the Turks.7 The author seems here to have an eye to what is practised even now in the Trinity Hospital at Rome. Such pilgrims as come thitherfrom any place in Italy, are lodged and fed for three days; but the Ultramentanes 3re entertained a day longer.CHAP. VI. ]PANTAGRUEL. 413I have already spoken en passant of the knights of the garter, of whom our author made mention in the same manner. The knights whowear before their plumes le trophée d'un calumniateur, that is, the devil in a string before their paunches, are the knights of the order of St. Michael, pictured with the devil at his feet . It was the most honour- able order in France in our author's time; for that of the Holy Ghost was instituted since, by Henry III. Those who wear a ram's skin , are the knights of the order of the golden fleece . -M.CH. VI. -How the birds are crammed in the Ringing island.PANTAGRUEL looked I do not know howish, and seemed notvery well pleased with the four days' junketing which Edituus enjoined us. Edituus, who soon found it out, said tohim, You know sir, that seven days before winter, and sevendays after,' there is no storm at sea: for then the elementsare still , out of respect for the halcyons, or king- fishers,birds sacred to Thetis, which then lay their eggs and hatchtheir young near the shore. Now here the sea makes itselfamends for this long calm; and whenever any foreignerscome hither it grows boisterous and stormy for four days together. We can give no other reason for it, but that it is apiece of its civility, that those who come among us may staywhether they will or no, and be copiously feasted all thewhile with the incomes of the ringing. Therefore pray donot think your time lost; for, willing, nilling, you will beforced to stay; unless you are resolved to encounter Juno,Neptune, Doris, Eolus, and his fluster-busters; and, in short,all the pack of ill -natured left- handed godlings and vejoves.Do but resolve to be cheery, and fall to briskly.After we had pretty well staid our stomachs with sometight snatches, Friar John said to Ædituus, For ought I see,you have none but a parcel of birds and cages in this islandof yours, and the devil- a-bit of one of them all that sets hishand to the plough, or tills the land, whose fat he devours:their whole business is to be frolic, to chirp it, to whistleit, to warble it: tossing it, and roaring it merrily night andday: pray then, if I may be so bold, whence comes thisplenty and overflowing of all dainty bits and good things,which we see among you? From all the other world, returned Edituus, if you except some part of the northernregions, who of late years have stirred up the jakes. Mum:1 See Pliny, 1. 10, ch. 12, and Plutarch, in the treatise where he examines who is wisest.Dictionary.2 Movere camerinam. See Cambridge414 [BOOK!RABELAIS' WORKS.they may chance ere long to rue the day they did so; theircows shall have porridge, and their dogs oats; there will bework made among them, that there will: come, a fig for it,let us drink.- -But pray what countrymen are you? Tourain is our country, answered Panurge. Cod so, criedEdituus, you were not then hatched of an ill bird, I willsay that for you, since the blessed Tourain is your mother:for from thence there comes hither every year such a vaststore of good things, that we were told by some folks oftheplace, that happened to touch at this island, that your Dukeof Tourain's income will not afford him to eat his belly fullof beans and bacon, ( a good dish spoiled between Moses andPythagoras, ) because his predecessors have been more thanliberal to these most holy birds of ours , that we might heremunch it, twist it, cram it, gorge it, craw it, riot it , junketit, and tickle it off; stuffing our puddings with dainty pheasants, partridges , pullets with eggs, fat capons of Loudunois,and all sorts of venison and wild fowl. Come, box it about,tope on my friends: pray do you see yon jolly birds that areperched together, how fat, how plump, and in good casethey look, with the income that Tourain yields us! And infaith they sing rarely for their good founders, that is thetruth on it. You never saw any Arcadian birds mumblemore fairly than they do over a dish, when they see thesetwo gilt batons,³ or when I ring for them those great bellsthat you see above their cages. Drink on, sirs , whip itaway: verily, friends, it is very fine drinking to- day, and soit is every day of the week; then drink on, toss it about,here is to you with all my soul; you are most heartily welcome never spare it, I pray you; fear not we should everwant good bub, and belly timber; for, look here, thoughthe sky were of brass, and the earth of iron, we should notwant wherewithal to stuff the gut, though they were to continue so seven or eight years longer than the famine inEgypt. Let us then, with brotherly love and charity, re- fresh ourselves here with the creature.Woons man, cried Panurge, what a rare time you have ofit in this world! Pshaw, returned Ædituus, this is nothingto what we shall have in the other: the Elysian fields willbe the least that can fall to our lot. Come, in the meantime let us drink here; come, here is to thee, old fuddlecap.3 Feste à bastons. A solemn festival.CHAP. VII.]PANTAGRUEL. 415Your first siticines, said I, were superlatively wise, in devising thus a means for you to compass whatever all mennaturally covet so much; and so few, or, to speak moreproperly, none can enjoy together: I mean, a paradise in this life , and another in the next. Sure you were bornwrapt in your mother's smickets! O happy creatures! Omore than men! Would I had the luck to fare like you!ON CHAP. VI. -The author describes how the birds of the Ringing Island are crammed, and how, though not one of them sets his hand tothe plough, or tills the land, whose fat he devours, they wallow inplenty, and do nothing but chirp it, whistle it , and warble it merrily night and day. All this chapter is a cutting satire, in which Rabelais ingeniously exposes the foolish bigotry of the great vulgar and the small,who have undone, and still ruin themselves daily, to maintain thoselazy, hypocritical birds of prey, in idle ease, and luxurious pleasure;though the ravenous tribe have nothing to give in return, but insignifi- cant siticin prayers, and a doubtful hereafter for a certain now.-M.CH. VII. -How Panurge related to Master Edituus the fableof the horse and the ass.WHEN we had crammed and crammed again, Ædituus tookus into a chamber that was well furnished, hung with tapestry, and finely gilt. Thither he caused to be broughtstore of mirobolans, cashou, green ginger preserved withplenty of hippocras, and delicious wine. With those antidotes, that were like a sweet Lethe, he invited us to forgetthe hardships of our voyage; and at the same time he sentplenty of provisions on board our ship that rid in the harbour. After this , we then jogged to bed for that night; butthe devil a bit poor pilgarlic could sleep one wink: the everlasting jingle jangle of the bells kept me awake whether Iwould or no.About midnight Edituus came to wake us, that we mightdrink. He himself showed us the way, saying; You menof the other world say that ignorance is the mother of allevil, and so far you are right; yet for all that, you do nottake the least care to get rid of it, but still plod on, and livein it, with it, ad by it; for which a plaguy deal of mischief lights Jou every day, and you are right enoughserved: you are perpetually ailing somewhat, making amoan and never right. It is what I was ruminating uponjust now. And, indeed, ignorance keeps you here fastenedin bed. just as that bully-rock Mars was detained by Val-416 [BOOK. V. RABELAIS' WORKS.can's art for all the while you do not mind that, you oughtto spare some of your rest, and be as lavish as you can of the goods of this famous island. Come, come, you shouldhave eaten three breakfasts already and take this from mefor a certain truth, That if you would consume the mouthammunition of this island, you must rise betimes; eat them,they multiply; spare them, they diminish.

For example: mow a field in due season, and the grasswill grow thicker and better; do not mow it, and in a short time it will be floored with moss. Let us drink, and drinkagain, my friends: come let us all carouse it. The leanest¹of our birds are now singing to us all; we will drink tothem , if you please . Let us take off one, two, three, nine²bumpers. Non zelus , sed charitas.At the break of day, he waked us again to take a dish of monastical brewess." From that time we made but onemeal, that only lasted the whole day: so that I cannot welltell how I may call it, whether dinner, supper, nunchion, orafter- supper; only to get a stomach, we took a turn or twoin the island, to see and hear the blessed singing birds.At night Panurge said to Edituus, Give me leave, sweetsit , to tell you a merry story of something that happenedsome three and twenty moons ago, in the country of Chas- telleraud.One day in April, a certain gentleman's groom, Rogerbyname, was walking his master's horses in some fallowground:there it was his good fortune to find a pretty shepherdess,feeding her bleating sheep and harmless lambkins, on thebrow of a neignoouring mouniam , in the shade of an adjacent grove near her, some frisking kids tripped it over agreen carpet of nature's own spreading; and to complete the1 The mendicant friars, who sing their matins at midnight.2 Referring to the number of the Graces and Muses. Aut ter bi- bendum aut novies: a proverb of the ancients, who, in point of drink- ing, were nothing to compare with this Edituus, who here unites all the lessons of the different sorts of claustral matins.3 Soupe de prime. So called from its being eaten at the hour of prime, which is the first of the canonical hours; Rabelais boasts much of these soups, and always calls them fat soupes de prime, because it is the first boiling, and very top of the porridge pot. The others,called by him greyhound soups, 1. 3, c. 4, are less strong and succulent,by having more water poured in. 4 April is an amorous month.And the country of Chastelleraud abounds with these Arcadian night.ingales (Asses).CHAP. VII. ] 417 PANTAGRUEL.landscape, there stood an ass. Roger, who was a wag, had &dish of chat with her, and after some ifs , ands, and buts, hemsand heighs on her side, got her in the mind to get upbehind him, to go and see his stable, and there take a bitby the bye in a civil way. While they were holding aparley, the horse, directing his discourse to the ass , ( for allbrute beasts spoke that year in divers places, ) whisperedthese words in his ear: Poor ass, how I pity thee! thouslavest like any hack, I read it on thy crupper: thou dostwell, however, since God has created thee to serve mankind;thou art a very honest ass: but not to be better rubbeddown, curricombed, traped, and fed, than thou art, seemsto me indeed to be too hard a lot. Alas! thou art all roughcoated, in ill plight; jaded, foundered, crest-fallen , anddrooping, like a mooting duck, and feedest here on nothingbut coarse grass, or briars and thistles: therefore do butpace it along with me, and thou shalt see how we noblesteeds, made by nature for war, are treated. Come, thouwilt lose nothing by coming; I will get thee a taste of my fare. In troth, sir, I can but love you and thank you, returnedthe ass; I will wait on you, good Mr. Steed. Methinks,gaffer ass, you might as well have Sir Grandpaw Steed. O!cry mercy, good Sir Grandpaw, returned the ass; we countryclowns are somewhat gross , and apt to knock words out ofjoint. However, if it please you, I will come after yourworship at some distance, lest for taking this run, my side should chance to be firked and curried with a vengeance, asit is but too often, the more is my sorrow.The shepherdess being got behind Roger, the ass followed,fully resolved to bait like a prince with Roger's steed; butwhen they got to the stable, the groom, who spied the graveanimal, ordered one of his underlings to welcome him with apitchfork, and curricomb him with a cudgel. The ass, whoheard this, recommended himself mentally to the god Neptune, and was packing off, thinking, and syllogising within himself thus: Had not I been an ass, I had not come hereamong great lords, when I must needs be sensible that I was65 It is lanterne in Rabelais, and means, thy whole body is transparent as a lantern, and the skin of thy sides depilated, i . e. as free from hair as the smoothest parchment. 6 The ass saw thepitchfork held up to him. In this danger he addresses his prayer toNeptune, whose trident is a kind of fork.VOL. II.E E118 LBOCA Y. RABELAIS' WORKS.only made for the use of the small vulgar. Esop had givenme a fair warning of this in one of his fables. Well, I muste'en scamper, or take what follows. With this he fell atrotting, and wincing, and yerking, and calcitrating, alias,kicking, and farting, and funking, and curvetting, and bounding, and springing, and galloping full drive, as if the devilhad come for him in propriá personá.The shepherdess, who saw her ass scour off, told Rogerthat it was her cattle , and desired he might be kindly used,or else she would not stir her foot over the threshold . FriendRoger no sooner knew this, but he ordered him to be fetchedin, and that my master's horses should rather chop straw fora week together, than my mistress's beast should want hisbelly- full of corn.The most difficult point was to get him back; for in vainthe youngsters complimented and coaxed him to come. Idare not, said the ass, I am bashful. And the more theystrove by fair means to bring him with them, the more thestubborn thing was untoward, and flew out at heels; insomuch that they might have been there to this hour, hadnot his mistress advised them to toss oats in a sieve, or in ablanket, and call him; which was done, and made him wheelabout, and say, Oats by mackins! oats shall go to pot. Adveniat , oats will do, there is evidence in the case: but noneof the rubbing down, none of the firking. Thus melodiouslysinging ( for, as you know, that Arcadian bird's note is veryharmonious) he came to the young gentleman of the horse,alias, black garb, who brought him to the stable.When he was there, they placed him next to the greathorse, his friend, rubbed him down, curricombed him, laidclean straw under him up to the chin, and there he lay atrack and manger; the first stuffed with sweet hay, the latterwith oats which when the horse's valet- de-chambre sifted,he clapped down his lugs, to tell them by signs that hecould eat it but too well without sifting, and that he did notdeserve so great an honour.When they had well fed, quoth the horse to the ass:7 It is in the original, I must even scamper as quick as a bundle of asparagus is in boiling: a proverbial expression often used by theEmperor Augustus. See it both in Latin and Greek among the adagia in most school books. The pun is upon the word avoine,oats, and adveniat, let ' em come.CHAP. VII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 419Well, poor ass, how is it with thee now? How dost thoulike this fare? Thou wert so nice at first, a body had muchado to get thee hither. By the fig, answered the ass, which,one of our ancestors eating, Philemon died laughing, this isall sheer ambrosia, good Sir Grandpaw; but what wouldyou have an ass say? Methinks all this is yet but halfcheer. Do not your worships here now and then use totake a leap? What leaping dost thou mean? asked thehorse, the devil leap thee; dost thou take me for an ass?In troth, Sir Grandpaw, quoth the ass, I am somewhat ablockhead, you know, and cannot, for the heart's blood of me,learnso fast the court wayof speaking of you gentlemen horses;I mean, don't you stallionize it sometimes here among yourmettled fillies? Tush, whispered the horse, speak lower;for, by Bucephalus, if the grooms but hear thee, they willmaul and belam thee thrice and threefold; so that thou wilthave but little stomach to a leaping bout. Cod so, man, wedare not so much as grow stiff at the tip of the lowermostsnout, though it were but to leak or so, for fear of beingjirked and paid out of our lechery . As for any thing else,we are as happy as our master, and perhaps more. By thispacksaddle, my old acquaintance, quoth the ass , I have donewith you; a fart for thy litter and hay, and a fart for thyoats; give me the thistles of our fields, since there we leapwhen we list eat less, and leap more, I say: it is meat,drink, and cloth to us. Ah! friend Grandpaw, it would dothy heart good to see us at a fair, when we hold our provincial chapter! Oh! how we leap it, while our mistresses areselling their goslings and other poultry! With this theyparted. Dixi: I have done.Panurge then held his peace. Pantagruel would have hadhim to have gone on to the end of the chapter: but Ædituussaid, A word to the wise is enough; I can pick out themeaning of that fable, and know who is that ass, and whothe horse; but you are a bashful youth, I perceive. Well,know that there is nothing for you here; scatter no words.Yet, returned Panurge, I saw but even now a pretty kind ofa cooing abbess-kite as white as a dove, and her I had ratherride than lead. May I never stir if she is not a dainty bit,and very well worth a sin or two. Heaven forgive me! Imeant no more harm in it than you; may the harm I mean!in it befal me presently.EE 2420 [BOOK V. RABELAIS' WORKS.ON CHAP. VII. -It is observable, that about midnight, which is thetime that many monks are to rise to go to prayers, Edituus wakes hisguests, that they might drink; telling them they should have eaten three breakfasts already, and that if they would consume the mouthammunition of that country, they must rise betimes: Eat them, sayshe, they multiply; spare them, they diminish. The lean birds, whoare singing to them while they are to drink, are the novices and sorry monklings, who chant at church matins or vespers, while the great onessnore or tope.Panurge, who likes all this well enough, is yet for something else,and would mix the sports of love with those of Bacchus; and consi- dering, that those ecclesiastics enjoy the latter at their ease, yet they dare not taste of the first without danger, he brings in the fable of theass, who slighted the delicious food of the high-mettled prancers, be- cause they were not allowed to be familiar with the mares. Our author ingeniously makes Panurge, who was for copulating in a lawful way,relate this to the priest; by which he would insinuate, that it were much better for them to have a liberty to marry.-—M.CH. VIII. -How with much ado we got a sight of the Pope- hawk.OURjunketing and banqueting held on at the same rate thethird day, as the two former. Pantagruel then earnestlydesired to see the pope- hawk: but Edituus told him it wasnot such an easy matter to get a sight of him. How, askedPantagruel, has he Plato's helmet¹ on his crown, Gyges's ringon his pounces, or a chameleon on his breast, to make himinvisible when he pleases? No, sir, returned Ædituus; buthe is naturally of pretty difficult access: however, I will seeand take care that you may see him, if possible. With thishe left us piddling: then within a quarter of an hour cameback, and told us the pope- hawk is now to be seen: so heled us, without the least noise, directly to the cage whereinhe sat, drooping with his feathers staring about him, attendedby a brace of little cardin-hawks, and six lusty fusty bishhawks.Panurge stared at him like a dead pig, examining exactlyhis figure, size, and motions. Then with a loud voice hesaid, A curse light on the hatcher of the ill bird; on myword this is a filthy whoophooper. Hush, speak softly, saidEdituus; by G- he has a pair of ears, as formerly Michaelde Matiscome remarked. What then, returned Panurge, so1 Plato, 1. x . of his Republic, uses indeed this proverb. But it should be Pluto's helmet. See Erasmus's Adages, at the words oregalea.CHAP. VIII .]PANTAGRUEL. 421hath a whoopcat. Whist, said Edituus, if he but hear youspeak such another blasphemous word, you had as good bedamned; do you see that bason2 yonder in his cage? Outof it shall sally thunderbolts and lightnings, storms, bulls,and the devil and all , that will sink you down to Peg Trantum's, an hundred fathom under ground. It were better todrink and be merry, quoth Friar John.Panurge was still feeding his eyes with the sight of the pope-hawk and his attendants, when somewhere under hiscage he perceived a madgehowlet. With this he cried out,By the devil's maker, master, there is roguery in the case;they put tricks upon travellers here more than any where else, and would make us believe that a t ―d is a sugar loaf.What damned cozening, gulling, and cony- catching have wehere! Do you see this madgehowlet? By Minerva, we are all besh*t. Odsoons, said Edituus, speak softly, I tell you:it is no madgehowlet, no she-thing on my honest word;but a male, and a noble bird.May we not hear the pope-hawk sing, asked Pantagruel?I dare not promise that, returned Edituus; for he only singsand eats at his own hours. So do not I , quoth Panurge;poor pilgarlic is fain to make every body's time his own:come, then, let us go drink if you will. Now this is something like a tansy, said Edituus, you begin to talk somewhat like; still speak in that fashion, and I will secure youfrom being thought a heretic. Come on, I am of your mind.As we went back to have the other fuddling bout, wespied an old green- headed bish- hawk, " who sat moping withhis mate and three jolly bittern attendants, all snoring under an arbour. Near the old cuff stood a buxom abbess-kite,that sung like any linnet; and we were so mightily tickledwith her singing, that I vow and swear we could have wishedall our members but one turned into ears , to have had moreof the melody. Quoth Panurge, this pretty cherubim ofcherubims is here breaking her head with chaunting to thishuge, fat, ugly face, who lies grunting all the while like a2 A bell which is rung when any one is excommunicated.3 On the most solemn days in the year. 4 That is, speak ofdrinking and guttling as much as you will, and practise both to the full, in a country where there is the inquisition; but speak not aword of religion , or the pope's authority. Their arms are surmounted with a green hat, as a token of their being in hopes to be one day made cardinals.422 BOOK V. RABELAIS WORKS.hog as he is. I will make him change his note presently in the devil's name. With this he rang a bell that hung overthe bish- hawk's head; but though he rang and rang again,the devil a bit bish-hawk would hear; the louder the sound,the louder his snoring. There was no making him sing.By G-, quoth Panurge, you old buzzard, if you will notsing by fair means, you shall by foul. Having said this, hetook up one of St. Stephen's loaves , alias a stone, and was going to hit him with it about the middle. But Edituuscried to him, Hold, hold, honest friend! strike , wound,poison, kill, and murder all the kings and princes in theworld, by treachery or how thou wilt, and as soon as thouwouldest, unnestle the angels from their co*ckloft; pope hawkwill pardon thee all this: but never be so mad as to meddlewith these sacred birds, as much as thou lovest the profit,welfare, and life not only of thyself, and thy friends andrelations alive or dead, but also of those that may be bornhereafter to the thousandth generation; for so long thouwouldest entail misery upon them. Do but look upon thatbason. Catso, let us rather drink, then, quoth Panurge.He that spoke last, spoke well, Mr. Antitus, quoth FriarJohn while we are looking on these devilish birds, we donothing but blaspheme; and while we are taking a cup, wedo nothing but praise God. Come on, then, let us go drink;how well that word sounds!drank, as you must under- We made him a present of The third day (after we hadstand) Ædituus dismissed us.'a pretty little Pergois knife, which he took more kindlythan Artaxerxes did the cup of cold water that was givenhim by a clown. He most courteously thanked us, and sentall sorts of provisions aboard our ships, wished us a pros6 Claud de Seissel . fol . 111 , of his Translation of that part of Dio- dorus Siculus, which touches upon Alexander's successors, relates of the Pithecusæ, three towns so called in Upper Libya, that the in- habitants of those three towns held parrots in the highest veneration,accounting them gods and punishing with death any that were so in- human and sacrilegious as to kill one of those creatures. But poorSeissel was miserably mistaken , doubtless by following the old Latin translator, who took IIi0ŋkot for Virraкot; this last, indeed, signifying parrots or jays; but not the first, which means an ape or monkey. Thus Pithecusæ signifies ape- town, or monkey-town, not parrot-town, orjay-town. Now, Rabelais, it is probable, had read this passage of Diodorus Siculus in Seissel's translation, and was so misled."The custom is to treat and entertain pilgrims, in the hospitals of Italy, for three days, but no longer; they must then depart.CHAP. VIII.]PANTAGRUEL. 423perous voyage, andmade us promise andback by his territories.success in our undertakings, andswear by Jupiter of stone to comeFinally he said to us, Friends, praynote, that there are many more stones in the world thanmen; take care you do not forget it.9ON CHAP. VIII.-With much ado our travellers get a sight of the pope-hawk (it is Pope Julius III . ) who sat drooping with his feathers staring about him, attended by a brace of little cardinhawks, and six lusty fusty bishawks. Panurge seeing him, cries, A curse light on the hatcher of the ill bird! on my word this is a filthy whoophooper. Awhoophooper, or a hooper, upupa, no , is a bird whose cop or tuft of feathers on its head is not altogether unlike the papal tiara, adorned with a triple crown: the whole delight of that filthy fowl is to nestle in man's ordure; which admirably denotes the inclinations of many of the holy fathers, and particularly of Julius III. , as I will immediately show.The madgehowlet which was perceived under the popehawk's cage,implies either a pope of the female kind, as Pope Joan (if there ever was any such) , or rather a donzella, or concubine: unless some critic will offer to say, that this madgehowlet, which Edituus swears is no she-thing, but a male and a noble bird , certainly was the Cardinal Innocent, with whom Pope Julius III. had been passionately in love while he was Legate at Bologna, and to whom, as a reward for his kind services, he had bestowed a cardinal's cap, when he was advanced to the papal chair. Since that, this noble cardinal was so very intimate with that pope, that Pasquin could not forbear to say, he believed nothing of all this, and that Innocent was not handsome enough to be Jupiter's Ganymede.The brace of little cardinhawks seem to mean either some such youngsparks, or rather some of that pope's bastards, or at least his prede- cessor's. Paul III. made two of his bastard daughter's sons cardinals;and Rabelais, in his fifteenth letter to the Bishop of Maillezais, calls them the little cardinals de santa fiore. That pope himself, who had kept a Roman lady, Della Casa Rufina, and had a bastard son by another, had a sister once kept by Pope Alexander VI. , who had her drawn like the Virgin Mary. She was married afterwards to a gentle- man, who having notice that the pope lay with her in his absence, on his return stabbed her: so to make her brother amends, Alexander made him a cardinal while he was yet very young, and afterwards he was chosen pope. Rabelais seems maliciously to pun upon one of those diminutive cardinals in his letters, calling him a cardinacule.The old green -headed bishawk, snoring with his mate and three jolly bittern attendants under an arbour, so that he could not be waked by thebuxom abbesskite, that sung by them like any linnet, is John della Casa,Archbishop of Benevento, and Legate of the Holy See at Venice. He was famous for poetry, and wrote a poem in praise of sodomy, which6 The pope; inasmuch as by his thunder he makes himself be feared by the present Romans, as much as Jupiter Lapis was by the old ones. 9 Men's stones: here we have a priest advanc- ing, that it is to be less than men to endure for so long a time toge.ther the tyranny and vices of the monks and clergy.424 RABELAIS' WORKS. BOOK V.be called opera divina; and said in it, that he knew no other love. His indifference for the fair is happily expressed by his snoring near the pretty abbesskite, that so kindly invites him with her syren's voice;which yet proves too weak an allurement, and cannot wake him into anatural love.-M.CH. IX. -How we arrived at the Island of Tools.HAVING Well ballasted the holds of our human vessels, weweighed anchor, hoised up sail, stowed the boats , set theland, and stood for the offing with a fair loom gale, and formore haste unparalleled the mizen- yard, and launched itand the sail over the lee-quarter, and fitted gyves to keep itsteady, and boomed it out: so in three days we made the Island of Tools, that is altogether uninhabited. We sawthere a great number of trees which bore mattocks, pickaxes, crows, weeding- hooks, scythes, sickles, spades, trowels,hatchets, hedging - bills , saws, adzes, bills, axes, shears, pincers, bolts, piercers, augers, and wimbles.Others bore dags, daggers, poniards, ' bayonets, squarebladed tucks, stilettoes, poinadoes, skenes, penknives, puncheons, bodkins, swords, rapiers, back- swords, cutlasses,scymetars, hangers, falchions, glaives , raillons, whittles, andwhinyards.Whoeverwould have any of these, needed but to shake thetree, and immediately they dropped down as thick as hops,like so many ripe plums; nay, what is more, they fell on akind of grass called scabbard, and sheathed themselves in itcleverly. But when they came down, there was need oftaking care lest they happened to touch the head, feet, orother parts of the body. For they fell with the point downwards, and in they stuck, or slit the continuum of somemember, or lopped it off like a twig; either of which generally was enough to have killed a man, though he were ahundred years old, and worth as many thousand spankers,spur-royals, and rose- nobles.Under some other trees, whose names I cannot justly tellyou, I saw some certain sorts of weeds that grew and sproutedlike pikes, lances, javelins, javelots, darts, dartlets, halberts,boar- spears, eel- spears , partizans, tridents, prongs, troutstaves,1 Sangdedez, in the original: a short sword, which at Venice, where the nobles wear it, is called in the Venetian language (or rather dialect) cinque dea, by way of joke, as if it was but the length of five fingers.CHAP. IX. ]PANTAGRUEL. 425spears, nalfpikes, and hunting staffs. As they sprouted upand chanced to touch the tree , straight they met with their heads, points, and blades, each suitable to its kind, madeready for them by the trees over them, as soon as every in- dividual weed was grown up, fit for its steel: even like thechildren's coats, that are made for them as soon as they wearthem, and you wean them of their swaddling clothes. Nordo you mutter, I pray you, at what Plato, Anaxagoras, andDemocritus have said: od's fish! they were none of yourlower-form gimcracks, were they?Those trees seemed to us terrestrial animals, in no wise sodifferent from brute beasts as not to have skin, fat, flesh ,veins, arteries , ligaments, nerves, cartilages, kernals, bones,marrow, humours, matrices, brains , and articulations; forthey certainly have some, since Theophrastus will have itso: but in this point they differed from other animals, thattheir heads, that is , the part of their trunks next to the root,are downwards; their hair, that is their roots, in the earth;and their feet, that is their branches, upside down: as if aman should stand on his head with outstretched legs . Andas you, battered sinners , on whom Venus has bestowedsomething to remember her, feel the approach of rains,winds, cold, and every change of weather, at your ischiaticlegs, and your omoplates, by means of the perpetual alma- nack which she has fixed there: so these trees have noticegiven them, by certain sensations which they have at theirroots, stocks, gums, paps, or marrow, of the growth of thestaffs under them; and accordingly they prepare suitablepoints and blades for them beforehand. Yet as all things,except God, are sometimes subject to error, nature itself notfree from it, when it produceth monstrous things; likewiseI observed something amiss in these trees . For a halfpike ,that grew up high enough to reach the branches of one ofthese instrumentiferous trees, happened no sooner to touchthem, but instead of being joined to an iron head, it impaleda stub broom at the fundament. Well, no matter, it willserve to sweep the chimney. Thus a partizan met with apair of garden shears, Come, all is good for something, itwill serve to nip off little twigs, and destroy caterpillars .The staff of a halbert got the blade of a scythe, which madeit look like a hermaphrodite. Happy- be-lucky, it is all acase, it will serve for some mower. Oh, it is a great bless-426 [ BOOK V. RABELAIS' WORKS.ing to put our trust in the Lord! As we went back to ourships, I spied behind I do not know what bush, I do not know what folks, doing I do not know what business, in I donot know what posture, scouring I do not know what tools,in I do not know what manner, and I do not know whatplace.ON CHAP. IX. -The Island of Tools treats of things which are notmuch less odious than the cages of the popehawk and bishawk. There is a catch in the prologue to the fourth book, which is in a manner akey to this chapter: It is that which follows: -:-" Since tools without their hafts are useless lumber,And hatchets without helves are of that number;That one may go in the other and may match it,I'll be the helve, and thou shalt be the hatchet."This chapter requires a larger comment; but its subject being none of the most modest, it is better to leave that to be done by those who love to dive to the bottom of such matters. -M.CH. X.-How Pantagruel arrived at the Island of Sharping(or gaming)."WE left the Island of Tools to pursue our voyage, and thenext day stood in for the Island of Sharping, the true imageof Fontainbleau: for the land is so very lean , that the bones,that is, the rocks, shoot through its skin . Besides, it issandy, barren, unhealthy, and unpleasant. Our pilot showedus there two little square rocks, which had eight equal pomtsin the shape of a cube. They were so white, that I might have mistaken them for alabaster or snow, had he not assured us they were made of bone.He told us that twenty- one chance devils very much fearedin our country, dwelt there in six different stories, and thatthe biggest twins or braces of them were called sixes, and thesmallest amb's- ace; the rest cinques, quatres, treys, andduces. When they were conjured up, otherwise coupled,they were called either sice cinque, sice quatre, sice trey.sice duce, and sice ace; or cinque quatre, cinque trey, andso forth. I made there a shrewd observation: would youknow what it is, gamesters? It is, that there are very fewof you in the world, but what call upon and invoke the devils. For the dice are no sooner thrown on the board, andthe greedy gazing sparks have hardly said , Two sixes, Frank;1 A description of the inconveniences and vexations that attend gaming.CHAP. X.] PANTAGRUEL. 427If amb's-ace,Quarter duce,And so on to thebut Six devils damn it! cry as many of them.then, Abrace of devils broil me, will they say.Tom, The duce take it, cries another.end of the chapter. Nay, they do not forget sometimes tocall the black cloven- footed gentlemen by their christiannames and surnames: and what is stranger yet, they usethem as the greatest cronies , and make them so often theexecutors of their wills; not only giving themselves , but every body, and every thing, to the devil, that there is nodoubt but he takes care to seize, soon or late , what is so zealously bequeathed him. Indeed, it is true, Lucifer does notalways immediately appear by his lawful attornies; but alas!it is not for want of good- will: he is really to be excusedfor his delay; for what the devil would you have a devil do?He and his blackguards are then at some other places, according to the priority of the persons that call on them:therefore, pray let none be so venturesome as to think, that the devils are deaf and blind.He then told us that more wrecks had happened aboutthose square rocks, and a greater loss of body and goods,than about all the Syrtes, Scyllas and Charibdes , Sirens, Strophades, and gulfs in the universe. I had not much ado tobelieve it, remembering that formerly, among the wise Egyptians, Neptune was described in hieroglyphics for the firstcube, Apollo by an ace, Diana by a duce, Minerva by seven,³and so forth.He also told us that there was a phial of Sanc- Greal, amost divine thing, and known to a few. Panurge did sosweeten up the syndics of the place, that they blessed us witha sight of it: but it was with three times more potherand ado, with more formalities and antic-tricks, than theyshow the pandects of Justinian at Florence, or the holy2 See Plutarch in his treatise of Isis and Osiris. 3 SeeMacrobius on Scipio's dream, 1. 1 , ch. 6.4 The same as sangreal, i. e. royal blood, a pretended relic of Christ's blood preserved by Joseph of Arimathea, when he washed our Saviour's body before he embalmed it. The Saint Graal, another relic, is the precious dish inwhich the paschal lamb was served up which our Saviour eat with his disciples the eve of his death. Graal is properly a bowl or mazer of potter's clay. 5 Menage, and before him Politian, ob- serve they never show this manuscript but by torchlight. There isnot such a pother made about it now, because of its being printed since 1553, in a most beautiful and grand manner.428 RABELAIS' WORKS [BOOK 7..Veronica at Rome. I never saw such a sight of flambeaux,torches, and hagios, and sanctified tapers, in my whole life.After all, that which was shown us was only the ill -facedcountenance of a roasted coney.All that we saw there worth speaking of, was a good faceset upon an ill game, and the shells of the two eggs formerly laid up and hatched by Leda, out of which came Castor andPollux, fair Helen's brothers. These same syndics sold usa piece of them for a song, I mean, for a morsel of bread.Before we went, we bought a parcel of hats and caps of the manufacture of the place; which, I fear, will turn to no very good account: nor are those who shall take them off ourhands, more likely to commend their wearing.ON CHAP. X.-After the venereal games, in the Island of Tocls, we have those of chance in the Sharping Island. It is said to be lean,sandy, barren, and unpleasant: because, in the main, seldom anything is to be got by games of hazard honestly. What is got at one time is generally lost at another, and goes as easily as it comes: for most game- sters, often prodigal of what they have got, seldom consider, that should their profits at the year's end balance their losses, they still will be found to have lost their time, and squandered away part of what should have made the scales even between profit and loss; and so, though they have won much, they are poorer many times than they would have been had they not played at all. It is obvious that the two little white square rocks, with eight equal points in the shape of a cube, are the dice; the six different stories are their six different sides and numbers, that ascendfrom 1 , 2, 3, 4 , 5 , to 6. Of which twenty-one points Rabelais makesso manydevils, because they tempt and bewitch men so much; though,as he observes, the land is barren and unpleasant; for, after all, gaming is a tedious repetition of the same thing, and a continual gazing upon the dice or cards, without any pleasing discourse; not to speak of the fear and agony of gamesters; their toil when they pass whole nights at play, and break their rest and not their fast; their despair and curses when they have lost; the mean actions by which they debase them- selves to borrow or pawn; and the quarrels, and their sad consequences,among the greatest friends, on the account of play. So that Panta gruel's pilot was in the right, when he told him that more wrecks hadhappened about those square rocks, than about all the others in the universe.After the games of hazard, comes another, that is as deceitful at least:6 A Greek wood . it means holy. Here it means superstitious cere- monies . It comes from the hagios ho theos of Good - Friday: words which are then pronounced at the lifting up the cross, with that air of admiration and astonishment which strikes a religious awe into the be holders. 7 He alludes to the promise of a cardinal's hat, a pro- mise often paid very dear for and never performed.sharping, tricking island.TheCHAP. XI. ]PANTAGRUEL. 429I mean the trick of relics. The author places them in the Island of Sharping, because the church of Rome sharps the superstitious laity out of great sums of money by the doubtful remains of as doubtful saints,much more than by the real relics of the true. Accordingly our tra- vellers, with a world of pother and ado, formalities, and antic tricks,were blessed at last with a sight of a phial of sanc-greal; that is, as I have observed on the forty- third chapter of the fourth book, what they im- pudently pretend to be our Saviour's blood; but, after all, it was only the scurvy face of a roasted coney. Mr. Emiliane, in his book ofthefrauds ofthe Romish priests, tells us, that such a kind of relic is in Italy to this day. That pretended blood is shown with great ceremonies, and store of flambeaux, torches, and sanctified tapers, &c. Our authorsays, that they saw nothing worth speaking of in that island, but a good face set upon an ill game; which suits well with the carriage of those who show such sham relics: accordingly, he says, they also saw theshells of the two eggs, formerly laid and hatched by Leda; which in- deed are most worthy of being placed among such relics.The hats and caps of the manufactory of the place, (chapeaux de cassade) may be mentioned to banter some prelates, who had a mind to be cardinals, and perhaps were fooled out of the money which they gave to the pope's favourites to that intent. Avoir des cassades is a burlesqueexpression; such as, when we say, to be gulled , or swallow a gudgeon.Yet, as Rabelais says that some of the company bought a piece of Leda's egg-shells for a morsel of bread; and then immediately adds, that they bought those hats and caps, which, he feared would turn to no very good account; he may either mean that they were cheated there, or bought some sham Agnus Dei's, and such holy trumpery. Whatever i be, we find that in the next chapter they went through the wicket;and, for offering to sell them again, were clapped into lob's pound, by order of Gripe-men- all, Arch-duke of the Furred Law- cats.CH. XI. -How we passed through the wicket, inhabited byGripe- men-all, Arch- duke of the Furred Law- cats.FROM thence Condemnation was passed by us. It is anotherdamned barren island, whereat none for the world cared totouch. Then we went through the wicket: but Pantagruelhad no mind to bear us company; and it was well he didnot, for we were nabbed there, and clapped into lob's poundby order of Gripe-men-all, Arch-duke of the Furred Law- cats,because one of our company would have put upon a serjeantsome hats ofthe Sharping Island.The Furred Law- cats are most terrible and dreadful monsters, that devour little children, and trample' over marbleThe new editions of Rabelais have indeed passent sur, &c ., but the true reading is paissent. They feed, they guttle, in a room paved with marble; such as is , and always was, that called la grande chambre,belonging to the courts of judicature at Paris; where the lawyers play as good a knife as any inns of court gentlemen here with us.430 [BUNK V. RABELAIS WORKS.stones. Pray tell me, noble topers, do they not deserve to have their snouts slit? The hair of their hides does not lieoutwards; and every mother's son of them for his devicewears a gaping pouch, but not all in the same manner: forsome wear it tied to their neck scarf- wise, others upon thebreech, some on the paunch, others on the side, and all for acause, with reason and mystery. They have claws so verystrong, long, and sharp , that nothing can get from them whatis once fast between their clutches. Sometimes they covertheir heads with mortar- like caps , at other times with mortified caparisons.As we entered their den, said a common mumper, to whomwe had given half a teston, Worshipful culprits , God sendyou a good deliverance. Examine well, said he, the countenance of these stout props and pillars of this catch- coin lawand iniquity; and pray observe, that if you still live but sixolympiads, and the age of two dogs³ more, you will see these Furred Law- cats lords of all Europe, and in peaceful possession of all the estates and dominions belonging to it: unless , by divine providence, what is got over the devil's back,is spent under his belly; or the goods which they unjustly get, perish with their prodigal heirs. Take this from anhonest beggar.Among them reigns the sixth essence; by the means ofwhich they gripe all, devour all, conskite all , burn all, drawall, hang all, quarter all, behead all, murder all, imprison all,waste all, and ruin all, without the least notice of right orwrong for among them vice is called virtue; wickedness,piety; treason, loyalty; robbery, justice. Plunder is theirmotto, and when acted by them, is approved by all men, except the heretics and all this they do, because they dare;their authority is sovereign and irrefragable. For a sign ofthe truth of what I tell you, you will find, that there the mangers are above the racks. Remember hereafter, that afool told you this; and if ever plague, famine, war, fire , earthquakes, inundations, or other judgments befal the world, donot attribute them to the aspects and conjunctions of the malevolent planets, to the abuses of the court of Romania, or2 He puns upon the word mortier; a sort of cap (with brims turned up) worn in France by the lord chancellor, and presidents of sovereign courts on high days. 3 Twenty years, more or less.At that time the parliament caused them to be burnt.CHAP. XI.]PANTAGRUEL. 431the tyranny of secular kings and princes: to the impostures ofthe false zealots of the cowl, heretical bigots, false prophets,and broachers of sects; to the villany of griping usurers,clippers, and coiners; nor to the ignorance, impudence, andimprudence of physicians, surgeons, and apothecaries: norto the lewdness of adultresses, and destroyers of by- blows;but charge them all, wholly and solely to the inexpressible,incredible , and inestimable wickedness and ruin, which is con-

• inually hatched, brewed, and practised in the den or shop of those Furred Law- cats. Yet it is no more known in the

world than the cabala ofthe Jews; the more is the pity; and,therefore, it is not detested, chastised, and punished , as it isfit it should be. But should all their villany be once displayed in its true colours, and exposed to the people; therenever was, is , nor will be any spokesman so sweet- mouthed,whose fine colloguing tongue could save them; nor any lawso rigorous and draconic, that could punish them as they deserve: nor yet any magistrate so powerful, as to hinder theirbeing burnt alive in their coney- burrows without mercy. Eventheir own furred kittlings , friends , and relations would abo- minate them .For this reason , as Hannibal was solemnly sworn by hisfather Amilcar to pursue the Romans with the utmost hatred,as long as ever he lived: so , my late father has enjoined meto remain here without, till God Almighty's thunder reduce them there within to ashes, like other presumptuous Titans,prophane wretches, and opposers of God: since mankind isso inured to their oppressions, that they either do not remember, foresee, or have a sense of the woes and miseries whichthey have caused; or if they have, either will not, dare not,or cannot root them out.How, said Panurge, say you so? Catch me there andhang me! Damme, let us march off! This noble beggarhas scared me worse than thunder in autumn. Upon this wewere filing off; but alas! we found ourselves trapped: the door was double locked and barricadoed. Some messengersof ill news told us, it was full as easy to get in there as intohell, and no less hard to get out. Ay, there indeed lay thedifficulty, for there is no getting loose without a pass and discharge in due course from the bench. This for no otherreason than because folks go easier out of a church than ontof a spunging house," and because they could not have our" It is in the original , because folks go easier out of a market than out432 [BOOK V. RABELAIS' WORKS.company when they would. The worst of it was when wegot throughthe wicket: for we were carried, to get out our passor discharge, before a more dreadful monster than ever wasread of in the legends of knight errantry. They called himGripe-men-all . I cannot tell what to compare it to , betterthan to a chimera, a Sphynx, a Cerberus; or to the imageofOsiris, as the Egyptians represented him, with three heads,one of a roaring lion, the other of a fawning cur, and the lastof a howling, prowling wolf, twisted about with a dragonbiting his tail, surrounded with fiery rays. His hands werefull of gore, his talons like those of the harpies, his snoutlike a hawk's bill , his fangs or tusks like those of an overgrown brindled wild boar; his eyes were flaming, like thejaws of hell, all covered with mortars interlaced with pestles,and nothing of his arms was to be seen, but his clutches.His hutch, and that of the warren- cats his collaterals, was along, spick- and- span new rack, a-top of which (as themumper told us) some large, stately mangers were fixed inthe reverse. Over the chief seat was the picture of an oldwoman, holding the case or scabbard of a sickle in her right hand, a pair of scales in her left, with spectacles on her nose:the cups or scales of the balance were a pair of velvetpouches: the one full of bullion , which overpoised the other,empty and long, hoisted higher than the middle of the beam.I am of opinion it was the true effigies of Justice Gripe- menall; far different from the institution of the ancient Thebans,of a fair; a French proverb, the ground whereof is, that your pedlarsand petty chapmen are forced to pay ready money in a fair, whereasin a market they may and often do go upon tick. In this place, by the word fair (foire) the author means the courts of judicature, forum,and what he intends by it is this: that different from what is practisedat the chatelet (or ordinary sessions-house) here the fees of parliament(i . e. supreme judges) are deposited before hand, lest the countrypeople should make up matters before the decree is taken out.6 The original has it because we were pie poudreux, or dusty- footed, i . e. foreign dealers; who in fairs have their particular juris- diction, which holds no longer than the fair. Such were Pantagruel and his people, in the furred cat's opinion; and they were resolved not to part with such pigeons without plucking. 7 See Macrob.Saturn. 1. 1 , c. 20. 8 Here we find the mangers above the rack, and indeed it could not possibly be otherwise; for the forms or benches on which the furred cats sat are the rack, and the mangers were the furred cats themselves, or rather resided in them; the word mangerie, from the French verb manger (to eat) signifying both a mau ger and extortion. ⁹ The picture of i.stice. ·CHAP. XI. ] PANTAGRUEL. 438who set up the statues of their dicasts¹0 without hands, inmarble, silver, or gold, according to their merit, even after their death.When we made our personal appearance before him, asort of I do not know what men, all clothed with I do notknow what bags and pouches, with long scrolls in theirclutches , made us sit down upon a cricket: [ such as criminals sit on when tried in France. ] Quoth Panurge to them,Good my lords, I am very well as I am; I would as lievestand, if it please you. Besides, this same stool is somewhat of the lowest for a man that has new breeches and ashort doublet. " Sit you down, said Gripe-men-all again, andlook that you do not make the court bid you twice. Now,continued he, the earth shall immediately open its jaws, andswallow you up to quick damnation, if you do not answer asyou should.ON CHAP. XI. -Pantagruel prudently passed by Condemnation with his fleet; but some of his companions, more unfortunate or less wise,were stopped at the wicket, and obliged to take their trial. That wicket is the Inquisition in general; and, in particular, the court established in 1548, at Paris, against the Lutherans: for we find that the Furred Law-cats (which mean the judges, presidents à mortier, i . e. en parle- ment) have mortar-like caps and furred gowns. A common mumper gives an admirable account of the place. He speaks of it as a hellish court, where, without the least regard to right or wrong, they imprison,behead, hang, and burn those who fall into their clutches; where vicepasses for virtue, wickedness for piety, treason for loyalty, and robbery for justice: yet whatever is acted by them, is approved by all men ex- cept the heretics; and he charges on its members all the woes that in- fest the world. One would almost think that Rabelais meant some ofthe nobility in the Netherlands by this noble gueux, noble beggar; for so he styles him, after he had called him gueux de l'hostiere, ostiarias mendicus, a common mumper: which he probably did to hide his thought, or turn that of the reader from the subject, at the same time that he speaks to him about it; a method which he has followed almostthroughout this work. It is known that the protestant nobility, and others in the Netherlands, got the name of gueux, i. e. , beggars, it issaid for opposing themselves to the setting up the Inquisition; and though some trace the original of that nickname no higher than the time of Margaret of Parma's government, others pretend it was given them long before, by the Spaniards, on that account. If this be not meant of those noble assertors of their liberties in the Netherlands, as10 Judges. See Plutarch in his Isis and Osiris. 11 New breechesare generally not very supple, which, together with a short doublet,might make the judges laugh at the expense of a poor wretch sitting upon a stool so low as a cricket.VOL. II.334 RABELAIS' WORKS. [BOOK Y.being written some years before that name of gueur was universally spread, it must yet be owned, that it refers to the persecuting courts of judicature in those times, chiefly to the Inquisition, or at least to the tournelle; that is, that part of the Courts of Parliament in France thattries criminals; for in France men have not the privilege of being tried by their juries, or their peers, which Englishmen enjoy. Gripe- men-all is the head of the Inquisition, or perhaps the president of that Court which used the Protestants so severely in France in 1548. The picture over the chief seat is that of injustice.CH. XII. -How Gripe-men-allpropounded a riddle to us.WHEN We were sate , Gripe-men-all, in the middle of hisfurred cats, called to us in a hoarse dreadful voice, Well.come on, give me presently-an answer. Well, come on,muttered Panurge between his teeth, give , give me presentlya comforting dram. Hearken to the court, continued Gripemen-all.AN ENIGMA.Ayoung tight thing, as fair as may be,Without a dad conceived a baby;And brought him forth without the pother In labour made by teeming niother.Yet the cursed brat feared not to gripe her,But gnawed, for haste, her sides like viper.Then the black upstart boldly sallies,And walks and flies o'er hills and vallies.Many fantastic sons of wisdom,Amazed, foresaw their own in his doom;And thought, like an old Grecian noddy,A human spirit moved his body.Give, give me out ofhand-an answer to this riddle, quothGripe-men-all. Give, give me-leave to tell you, good, good,my lord, answered Panurge, that if I had but a sphynx athome,' as Verres, one of your precursors had, I might thensolve your enigma presently: but verily, good my lord, I wasnot there; and, as I hope to be saved, am as innocent in thematter as the child unborn. Foh, give me a better answer,cried Gripe-men-all; or, by gold, this shall not serve yourturn: I will not be paid in such coin: if you have nothingbetter to offer, I will let your rascalship know, that it hadbeen better for you to have fallen into Lucifer's own clutches,1 Alluding to the fable of the sphynx, inasmuch as that fable gaveTully an occasion to say a very good thing by way of repartee to the orator Hortensius, to whom Verres had made a present of a large aud rich figure of that monster, to engage him to undertake his defence against Tully. See Plutarch's Apophthegms.CHAP. XII.]PANTAGRUEL. 435than into ours. Dost thou see them here, sirrah? hah? anddost thou prate here of thy being innocent, as if thoucouldest be delivered from our racks and tortures for beingso! Give me-Patience! thou widgeon. Our laws arelike cobwebs your silly little flies are stopped, caught, anddestroyed therein; but your stronger ones break them, andforce and carry them which way they please . Likewise, donot think we are so mad as to set up your nets to snap upyour great robbers and tyrants: no, they are somewhat toohard for us, there is no meddling with them; for they would make no more of us than we make of the little ones: butyou paltry, silly, innocent wretches, must make us amends:and, bygold, we will innocentise your fopship with a wannion,you never were so innocentised in your days; the devil shallsing mass among ye.³Friar John, hearing him run on at that mad rate, had nolonger the power to remain silent, but cried to him, Heigh- dey!Pr'ythee, Mr. Devil in a coif, wouldest thou have a mantell thee more than he knows? Has not the fellow told youhe does not know a word of the business? His name isTwyford. A plague rot you, will not truth serve your turns?Why, hownow, Mr. Prate- apace, cried Gripe-men-all, takinghim short, marry come up, who made you so saucy as to2 Allusion to a custom which Cotgrave says the Papists have in France on Childermas or Innocents' Day, to jerk, or slap with the palm of the hand, the backsides of all such young persons as they can find in bed, or others, whose breach they may otherwise easily come at; nor is that whipping always the ne plus ultra of this merry custom, adds M. Duchat, (who does not confine it to the papists alone, as Cotgrave does. ) Marot, in his epigram on Innocents ' Day:Knew I but where my charmer meant to layHer pretty person, on the approaching day Of Innocents, O how exceeding earlyWould I go visit her I love so dearly!Yes, gentle conqueror of my heart, I'd flyWith wings of love-not at your feet to sigh,But to touch, handle, feel thy velvet skin:And should some spoilt- sport chance to enter in To interrupt our bliss, why let it be,I would make show of Innocensing thee?Who could disprove so plausible a plea?3 M. Duchat says, that Grippeminaud (Gripe-men-all) by way of opposition to what is customary at mass, where nobody is forced to act the part of a responder, (i . e make responses) here calls by the name of the devil's mass, the interrogatory which one that is accused is obliged to answer to, whether he is willing or no.436 RABELAIS' WORKS. BOOK Vopen your lips before vou were spoken to? Give me→Patience! By gold! this is the first time, since I havereigned, that any one has had the impudence to speak before he was bidden. How came this mad fellow to breakloose? (Villain, thou liest, said Friar John, without stirring his lips. ) Sirrah, sirrah, continued Gripe-men-all, Idoubt thou wilt have business enough on thy hands, when itcomes to thy turn to answer. (Damme, thou liest, saidFriar John, silently. ) Dost thou think, continued my lord,thou art in the wilderness of your foolish university, wrangling and bawling among the idle, wandering searchers andhunters after truth? By gold, we have here other fish tofry; we go another gat's- way to work, that we do. By gold,people here must give categorical answers to what they doknow. By gold, they must confess they have done thosethings which they have not nor ought to have done . Bygold, they must protest that they know what they neverknew in their lives; and, after all, patience, per force, mustbe their only remedy, as well as a mad dog's. Here sillygeese are plucked, yet cackle not. Sirrah, give me,—anaccount, whether you had a letter of attorney, or whetheryou were feed or no, that you offered to bawl in anotherman's cause? I see you had no authority to speak, andI may chance to have you wed to something you will notlike. Oh, you devils , cried Friar John, proto- devils, pantodevils, you would wed a monk, would you? Ho hu! ho hu!A heretic! a heretic! I will give thee out for a rank heretic.CH. XIII.-How Panurge solved Gripe-men- all's riddle.GRIPE-MEN- ALL, as if he had not heard what Friar Johnsaid, directed his discourse to Panurge, saying to him, Well.what have you to say for yourself. Mr. Rogue- enough, hah?Give, give me out of hand-an answer. Say? quoth Panurge, why, what would you have me say? I say, that weare damnably besh*t, since you give no heed at all to theequity of the plea, and the devil sings among you let thisserve for all , I beseech you, and let us go out about ourbusiness; I am no longer able to hold out, as gad shalljudge me.Go to, go to, cried Gripe- men-all; when did you ever hear that for these three hundred years last past, any bodyver got out of this weal without leaving something of his ehind him? No, no, get out of the trap if you can with-CHAP. X111.]PANTAGRUEL. 437out will losing leather, life , or at least some hair,and youhave done more than ever was done yet. For why, thiswould bring the wisdom of the court into question , as if wehad took you up for nothing, and dealt wrongfully by you.Well, by hook or by crook, we must have something out of you. Look ye, it is a folly to make a rout for a fart and ado;one word is as good as twenty; I have no more to say tothee, but that as thou likest thy former entertainment, thouwilt tell me more of the next; for it will go ten times worsewith thee, unless, by gold, you give me—a solution to theriddle I propounded. Give, give-it, without any more ado.By gold, quoth Panurge, it is a black mite or weevil,which is born of a white bean, and sallies out at the holewhich he makes, gnawing it: the mite, being turned into akind offly , sometimes walks and sometimes flies , over hills anddales. Now, Pythagoras, the Greek sage, and his sect, besides many others, wondering at its birth in such a place,(which makes some argue for equivocal generation, ) thoughtthat, by a metempsychosis, the body of that insect was thelodging of a human soul. Now, were you men here, afteryour welcome death, according to his opinion, your soulswould most certainly enter into the body of mites or weevils;for, as in your present state of life, you are good for nothingin the world, but to gnaw, bite, eat, and devour all things;so in the next you will even gnaw and devour your mother'svery sides, as the vipers do. Now, by gold, I think I havefairly solved and resolved your riddle.May my bauble be turned into a nut- cracker, quoth FriarJohn, if I could not almost find in my heart to wish thatwhat comes out at my bung-hole were beans, that these evilweevils might feed as they deserve.Panurge then, without any more ado, threw a large leathernpurse, stuffed with gold crowns (escus au soleil) among them .The furred law- cats no sooner heard the jingling of thechink, but they all began to bestir their claws, like a parcelof fiddlers running a division: and then fell to it, squimble,squamble, catch that catch can. They all said aloud, Theseare the fees, these are the gloves; now, this is somewhatlike a tansy. Oh! it was a pretty trial, a sweet trial, a daintytrial. On my word, they did not starve the cause: these arenone of your snivelling forma pauperis's; no, they are nobleclients, gentlemen every inch of them. By gold, it is gold,quoth Panurge, good old gold, I'll assure you.138 (BOOK V. RABELAIS' WORKS.Saith Gripe-men-all, The court, upon a full hearing, (ofthe gold, quoth Panurge, ) and weighty reasons given, findsthe prisoners not guilty, and accordingly orders them to bedischarged out of custody, paying their fees. Now, gentlemen, proceed, go forwards, said he to us: we have not somuch of the devil in us as we have of his hue; though weare stout, we are merciful.As we came out at the wicket, we were conducted to the portbya detachment of certain highland griffins, who advised us,before we came to our ships, not to offer to leave the placeuntil we had made the usual presents, first to the LadyGripe-men-all, then to all the furred law- puss*s; otherwisewe must return to the place from whence we came. Well, well,said Friar John, we will fumble in our fobs, examine everyone of us his concern, and even give the women their due;we will never boggle nor stick out on that account; as wetickled the men in the palm, we will tickle the women in theright place. Pray, gentlemen, added they, do not forget toleave somewhat behind you for us poor devils to drink yourhealths. Olawd! never fear, answered Friar John, I do notremember that I ever went any where yet, where the poordevils are not remembered and encouragedCH. XIV. -How the furred law- cats live on corruption.FRIAR JOHN had hardly said these words ere he perceivedseventy-eight gallies and frigates just arriving at the port.So he hied him thither to learn some news; and as he askedwhat goods they had on board, he soon found that theirwhole cargo was venison, hares, capons, turkeys, pigs, swine,bacon, kids, calves, hens, ducks, teals, geese, and other poul- try and wildfowl.He also spied among these some pieces of velvet, satin,and damask. This made him ask the new- comers, Whither,and to whom, they were going to carry those dainty goods?They answered, that they were for Gripe-men-all and the furred law-cats .Pray, asked he, what is the true name of all these thingsin your country language? Corruption, they replied . Ifthey live on corruption, said the Friar, they will perish withtheir generation. May the devil be damned, I have it now:their fathers devoured the good gentlemen, who, accordingto their state of life, used to go much a hunting and hawk-CHAP. XIV.]PANTAGRUEL. 439ing, to be the better inured to toil in time of war; for hunting is an image of a martial life; and Xenophon was muchin the right of it, when he affirmed that hunting had yielded agreat number of excellent warriors, as well as the Trojan horse.For my part, I am no scholar, I have it but by hearsay, yetI believe it. Now, the souls of those brave fellows, according to Gripe-men- all's riddle, after their decease, enter intowild boars, stags , roebucks, herons, and such other creatures, which they loved, and in quest of which they wentwhile they were men; and these furred law- cats , havingfirst destroyed and devoured their castles, lands, demesnes,possessions, rents, and revenues, are still seeking to have their blood and soul in another life. What an honest fellowwas that same mumper, who had forewarned us of all thesethings, and bid us take notice of the mangers above the racks!But, said Panurge to the new- comers, how do you comeby all this venison? Methinks the great king has issuedout a proclamation, strictly inhibiting the destroying of stags,does, wild boars, roebucks, or other royal game, on pain ofdeath. All this is true enough, answered one for the rest,but the great king is so good and gracious, you must know,and these furred law- cats so cursed and cruel, so mad, andthirsting after Christian blood, that we have less cause tofear in trespassing against that mighty sovereign's commands,than reason to hope to live, if we do not continually stop the mouths of these furred law- cats with such bribes and corruption. Besides, added he, to-morrow Gripe- men- all marriesa furred law-puss of his to a high and mighty double- furredlaw-tybert. Formerly we used to call them chop-hay; but,alas! they are not such clean creatures now as to eat any,or chew the cud. We callthem chop-hares, chop - partridges,chop- woodco*cks, chop- pheasants, chop- pullets , chop-venison,chop- conies, chop-pigs, for they scorn to feed on coarser meat. A td for their chops, cried Friar John, next yearwe will have them called chop- dung, chop- stront, chop-filth.Would you take my advice, added he to the company.What is it? answered we. Let us do two things, returnedhe. First, let us secure all this venison and wild fowl, -Imean paying well for them; for my part, I am but too muchtired already with our salt meat, it heats my flanks, so horribly. In the next place, let us go back to the wicket, and440 [BOOK7.RABELAIS WORKS.destroy all these devilish furred law- cats. For my part,quoth Panurge, I know better things: catch me there, and hang me; no, I am somewhat more inclined to be fearfulthan bold; I love to sleep in a whole skin.CH. XV. -How Friar John talks of rooting out the furred law-cats.VIRTUE of the frock, quoth Friar John, what kind of voyagewe are making? A sh*tten one, on my word: the devil ofanything we do, but fizzling, farting, funking, squattering.dozing, raving, and doing nothing. Odd's belly, it is not inmy nature to lie idle; I mortally hate it: unless I am doing some heroic feat every foot, I cannot sleep one wink at nights.Damn it, did you then take me along with you for yourchaplain, to sing mass and shrive you? By Maunday Thurs- day, the first of ye all that comes to me on such an accountshall be fitted; for the only penance I will enjoin shall be,that he immediately throw himself headlong over- board into the sea, like a base cow-hearted son of ten fathers. This in deduction of the pains of purgatory.What made Hercules such a famous fellow, do you think?Nothing, but that while he travelled, he still made it hisbusiness to rid the world of tyrannies, errors, dangers, anddrudgeries; he still put to death all robbers, all monsters,all venomous serpents, and hurtful creatures. Why then dowe not follow his example, doing as he did in the countriesthrough which we pass? He destroyed the Stymphalides,the Lernæan hydra, Cacus, Antheus, the centaurs, and whatnot; I am no clericus, those that are such tell me so.In imitation of that noble by- blow, let us destroy and rootout these wicked furred law- cats, that are a kind of ravenousdevils; thus we shall remove all manner of tyranny out of the land. Mahomet's tutor, swallow me body and soul,tripes and guts, if I would stay to ask your help or advice in the matter, were I but as strong as he was. Come, he thatwould be thought a gentleman, let him storm a town; well,then, shall we go? I dare swear we will do their businessfor them with a wet finger; they will bear it, never fear:since they could swallow down more foul language that camefrom us, than ten sows and their babies could swill hogwash.Damn them , they do not value all the ill words or dishonourin the world at a rush, so they but get the coin into theirCHAP. XV. ] PANTAGRUEL. 441purses, though they were to have it in a sh*tten clout . Come,we may chance to kill them all, as Hercules would have done,had they lived in his time. We only want to be set to work by another Eurystheus, and nothing else for the present, un- less it be what I heartily wish them, that Jupiter may givethem a short visit, only some two or three hours long, andwalk among their lordships in the same equipage¹ that attended him when he came last to his Miss Semele, jolly Bac- chus's mother.It is a very great mercy, quoth Panurge, that you havegot out of their clutches: for my part, I have no stomachto go there again; I am hardly come to myself yet, so scaredand appalled I was; my hair still stands up on end when Ithink on it; and most damnably troubled I was there, for three very weighty reasons. First, because I was troubled.Secondly, because I was troubled. Thirdly and lastly, be- cause I was troubled . Hearken to me a little on the rightside, Friar John, my left cod, since thou wilt not hear at theother; whenever the maggot bites thee, to take a trip down to hell, and visit the tribunal of Minos , acus, Rhadamanthus, and Dis, do but tell me, and I will be sure to bearthee company, and never leave thee, as long as my name is Panurge, but will wade over Acheron, Styx, and Cocytus,drink whole bumpers of Lethe's water, -though I mortallyhate that element, and even pay thy passage to that bawling,cross-grained ferryman, Charon. But as for the damnedwicket, if thou art so weary of thy life as to go thither again,thou mayest even look for somebody else to bear thee company, for I will not move one step that way: even rest sa- tisfied with this positive answer. By my good will, I willnot stir a foot to go thither as long as I live, any more thanCalpe will come over to Abyla. Was Ulysses so mad as togo back into the cyclop's cave to fetch his sword? No, marry was he not. Now, I have left nothing behind me at thewicket through forgetfulness; why then should I think of going thither?Well, quoth Friar John, as good sit still as rise up andfall; what cannot be cured must be endured. But, pr'ythee,let us hear one another speak in turn. Come, wert thou1 Armed with thunder and lightning. 2 Calpe is a moun.tain in Spain, that faces another, called Abyla, in Mauritania, both said to have been severed by Hercules.442 RABELAIS' WORKS. [ BOOK V.not a wise doctor to fling away a whole purse of goldon those mangy scoundrels Ha? A squinzy choke thee,we were too rich, were we? Had it not been enough tohave thrown the hell-hounds a few cropt pieces of white cash?How could I help it, returned Panurge? Did you notsee how Gripe-men-all held his gaping velvet pouch, andevery moment roared and bellowed, By gold, give me out ofhand; by gold, give, give , give me presently? Now, thoughtI to myself, we shall never come off scot- free; I will evenstop their mouths with gold, that the wicket may be opened,and we may get out; the sooner the better. And I judgedthat lousy silver would not do the business; for, do you see,velvet pouches do not use to gape for little paltry clippedsilver and small cash; no, they are made for gold, my friendJohn, that they are, my dainty cod. Ah! when thou hastbeen larded, basted, and roasted, as I was, thou wilt hardly talk at this rate, I doubt. But now what is to be done?—We are enjoined by them to go forwards.The scabby slabberdegullions still waited for us at theport, expecting to be greased in the fist as well as theirmasters. Now, when they perceived that we were ready toout to sea, they came to Friar John, and begged that wewould not forget to gratify the apparitors before we went off,according to the assessment for the fees at our discharge.Hell and damnation, cried Friar John, are ye here still , yebloodhounds, ye citing, scribbling imps of Satan? Rot you,am I not vexed enough already, but you must have theimpudence to come and plague me, ye scurvy fly- catchersyou? By cob's-body, I will gratify your ruffianships as youdeserve; I will apparatorize you presently, with a wannion,that I will. With this he lugged out his slashing cutlass,and, in a mighty heat, came out of the ship, to cut the cozening varlets into steaks, but they scampered away and got outof sight in a trice.However, there was somewhat more to do, for some ofour sailors, having got leave of Pantagruel to go ashore,while we were had before Gripe- men-all, had been at atavern near the haven, to make much of themselves, androar it, as seamen will do when they come into some port.Now I do not know whether they had paid their reckoning tothe full or no, but, however it was, an old fat hostess, meet-CHAP. XV. ] PANTAGRUEL. 443ing Friar John on the quay, was making a woeful complaintbefore a serjeant, son- in- law to one of the furred law- cats, anda brace of bums, his assistants.The Friar, who did not much care to be tired with theirimpertinent prating said to them, Harkee me, ye lubberlygnat- snappers, do ye presume to say, that our seamen arenot honest men? I will maintain they are , ye doterrels , and will prove it to your brazen faces, by justice: I mean thistrusty piece of cold iron by my side. With this he lugged it out and flourished with it . The forlorn lobco*cks soon showedhim their backs , betaking themselves to their heels; but theold fusty landlady kept her ground, swearing like any butterwhor*, that the tarpaulins were very honest cods, but thatthey only forgot to pay for the bed on which they had lainafter dinner, and she asked fivepence French money, for thesaid bed. May I never sup, said the Friar, if it be not dogcheap; they are sorry guests, and unkind customers, thatthey are; they do not know when they have a pennyworth,and will not always meet with such bargains; come, Imyself will pay you the money, but I would willingly see it first.The hostess immediately took him home with her, andshowed him the bed, and having praised it for its goodqualifications , said, that she thought, as times went, she was not out of the way in asking fivepence for it. Friar Johnthen gave her the fivepence; and she no sooner turned herback, but he presently began to rip up the ticking of thefeather-bed and bolster, and threw all the feathers out at thewindow. In the mean time the old hag came down, androared out for help, crying out murder, to set all the neighbourhood in an uproar. Yet she also fell to gathering thefeathers that flew up and down in the air, being scattered bythe wind . Friar John let her bawl on, and, without anyfurther ado, marched off with the blanket, quilt, and boththe sheets, which he brought aboard undiscovered, for theair was darkened with the feathers, as it uses sometimes tobe with snow. He gave them away to the sailors , then saidto Pantagruel, that beds were much cheaper at that placethan in Chinnonois, though we have there the famous geeseof Pautilé; for the old beldam had asked him but fivepencefor a bed, which, in Chinnonois, had been worth abouttwelve francs. "As soon as Friar John and the rest of the444 RABELAIS' WORKS. [BOOK Vcompany were embarked, Pantagruel set sail. But therearose a south- east wind, which blew so vehemently they losttheir way, and in a manner going back to the country of thefurred law- cats, they entered into a huge gulf, where thesea ran so high and terrible, that the ship- boy on the top ofthe mast cried out, he again saw the habitation of Gripemen-all; upon which Panurge, frightened almost out of hiswits, roared out, Dear master, in spite of the wind andwaves, change your course, and turn the ship's head about:O my friend, let us come no more into that cursed country,where I left my purse. So the wind carried them near anisland, where, however, they did not dare at first to land,but entered about a mile off."ON CHAP. XII., &c. -Panurge being brought to the bar, Gripe-men- all propounds to him a riddle, and tells him, that the earth shall imme diately open its jaws, and swallow him to quick damnation, if he do notsolve it. This is exactly the practice of the Inquisition: the party that is accused is obliged to guess his crime, and the name of his accusers;and if he guesses amiss, he is certainly undone; but if he has the wit or good fortune to discover them, he generally comes off better; and around fine, with St. Benet's cap, save him from being burned.Panurge vainly insists on his innocence; for Gripe-men-all re- plies, That if he hath nothing better to offer, he will let him know,that it had been better for him to have fallen into Lucifer's clutches;that their laws are like cobwebs, in which little flies are caught and destroyed, but which are too weak to stop great ones. This may have been spoke on the account of Pantagruel, who would not pass through the wicket, that is to say, who would not submit to the Inquisition.Gripe-men-all says, When did you hear that for these three hundredyears last past, any body ever got out of this weal without leaving something of his behind him? This is true enough, if spoken of theInquisition; and about three hundred years before Rabelais wrote, aCourt of Inquisition was set up at Thoulouse, against the Albigenses,by Lewis the Ninth, called the saint.CH. XVI. - How Pantagruel came to the Island of the Apedepts, or Ignoramuses, with long claws and crooked paws, andofterrible adventures and monsters there.As soon as we had cast anchor, and had moored the ship,the pinnace was put over the ship's side, and manned by the co*ckswain's crew. When the good Pantagruel had prayedpublicly, and given thanks to the Lord, that had delivered1 ' Anaidεvro , uneducated. The gentlemen of one branch of theexchequer, (chambre des comptes) are called Apedefts, by the author,because, as he says lower, there was no occasion to be graduated (any great scholars) to exercise those offices.CHAP. XVI ]PANTAGRUEL. 445him from so great a danger, he stepped into the pinnacewith his whole company, to go on shore, which was no waysdifficult to do, for, as the sea was calm, and the winds laid,they soon got to the cliffs . When they were set on shore,Epistemon, who was admiring the situation of the place,and the strange shape of the rocks, discovered some of thenatives. The first he met had on a short purple gown, adoublet cut in panes, like a Spanish leather jerkin, halfsleeves of satin, and the upper part of them leather, a coiflike a black pot tipped with tin. He was a good likely sortof a body, and his name, as we heard afterwards, wasDouble- fee . Epistemon asked him, How they called thosestrange craggy rocks and deep valleys? Hetold them it wasa colony, brought out of Attorneyland, and called Process;and that if we forded the river somewhat further beyondthe rocks, we should come into the island of the Apedefts.By the sacred memory of the decretals, said Friar John, tellus, I pray you, what you honest men here live on? Couldnot a man take a chirping bottle with you, to taste yourwine? I can see nothing among you but parchment, inkhorns, and pens. We live on nothing else, returned Doublefee; and all who live in this place must come through myhands. How, quoth Panurge, are you a shaver, then? Loyou fleece them? Ay, ay, their purse, answered Doublefee, nothing else . By the foot of Pharaoh, cried Panurge,the devil a sous will you get of me. However, sweet sir, beso kind as to show an honest man the way to those Apedefts,or ignorant people, for I come from the land of the learned,where I did not learn over much.Still talking on, they got to the island of the Apedefts, forthey were soon got over the ford . Pantagruel was not alittle taken up with admiring the structure and habitation ofthe people of the place. For they live in a swinging wine .press, fifty steps up to it. You must know there are someof all sorts, little, great, private, middle- sized , and so forth.You go through a large peristyle, alias a long entry setabout with pillars , in which you see, in a kind of landscape,the ruins of almost the whole world; besides so many gibbets for great robbers, so many gallows and racks , that it is? Potences de grands larrons. The author distinguishes between gal- lows and gibbets: these last he calls potences; to hang the potentes, thegreat robbers upon. It is a good pun enough upon the word potence,2446 [BOOK V. RABELAIS' WORKS.enough to fright you out of your seven senses. Double-feeperceiving that Pantagruel was taken up with contemplatingthose things, Let us go further, sir , said he to him , all this isnothing yet. Nothing, quotha, cried Friar John; by thesoul of my overheated codpiece, friend Panurge and I hereshake and quiver for mere hunger. I had rather be drinking,than staring on these ruins . Pray come along, sir , said Double-fee. He then led us into a little wine- press, thatlay backwards in a blind corner, and was called Pithies inthe language of the country. You need not ask whetherMaster John and Panurge made much of their sweet selvesthere; it is enough that I tell you there was no want of Bolonia sausages, turkey-pouts, capons, bustards, malmseywine, and all other sorts of good belly- timber, very welldressed.A pimping son of ten fathers, who, for want of a better,did the office of a butler, seeing that Friar John had cast asheep's eye at a choice bottle that stood near a cupboard byitself, at some distance from the rest of the bottellic magazine, like a jack-in -an- office, said to Pantagruel, Sir, I perceive that one of your men here is making love to this bottle:he ogles it, and would fain caress it; but I beg that noneoffer to meddle with it; for it is reserved for their worships.How, cried Panurge, there are some grandees here then Isee It is vintage time with you, I perceive. .Then Double- fee led up to a private stair- case, and showedus into a room, whence, without being seen, out at a loophole, we could see their worships in the great wine- press,where none could be admitted without their leave. Theirworships, as he called them, were about a score of fusty,crack-ropes and gallow- clappers, or rather more, all postedbefore a bar, and staring at each other like so many deadpigs their paws or hands were as long as a crane's leg, andtheir claws or nails four and twenty inches long at least; foryou must know, they are enjoined never to pare off the leastchip of them, so that they grow as crooked as a Welch hook,or a hedging-bill. "the common word for a gallows, derived, I suppose, from poteau, apost, though Rabelais ludicrously derives it a potentibus.4 Milan sausages in the original. 5 It should be round a greatgreen-covered table (not a bar); bureau, nor barreau: Rabelais, in hismerry way, spells bureau, bourreau, which signifies the common hang- man, alluding to what he called them just before, crack- ropes, &c.In the original, rivereau, a boat-hook; not a hedging-bill It isCHAP. XVI.]PANTAGRUEL. 4.17We saw a swinging bunch of grapes, that are gathered andsqueezed in that country, brought in by them. As soon asit was laid down, they clapped it into the press, and therewas not a bit of it out of which each of them did not squeezesome oil of gold. Insomuch that the poor grape was triedwith a witness, and brought off so drained and picked, andso dry, that there was not the least moisture, juice, or substance left in it; for they had pressed out its very qu ntessence.Double fee told us, they had not often such huge bunches;but, let the worst come to the worst, they were sure never to be without others in their press. But hark you me, master ofmine, asked Panurge, have they not some of different growth?Ay marry have they, quoth Double- fee. Do you see herethis little bunch, to which they are going to give the other wrench? It is of tythe- growth, you must know; theycrushed, wrung, squeezed, and strained out the very heart'sblood of it but the other day: but it did not bleed freely:the oil came hard, and smelt of the priest's chest; so thatthey found there was not much good to be got out of it. Whythen, said Pantagruel, do they put it again into the press?Only, answered Double- fee, for fear there should still lurksome juice among the husks and hullings, in the mother ofthe grape. The devil be damned, cried Friar John, do youcall these same folks illiterate lobco*cks, and dunsical doddipoles? May I be broiled like a red herring, if I do not think they are wise enough to skin a flint, and draw oil out of abrick wall. So they are, said Double- fee; for they sometimes put castles, parks, and forests into the press, and outof them all extract aurum potabile. You mean portabile, Isuppose, cried Epistemon, such as may be borne. I mean asI said, replied Double-fee, potabile, such as may be drunk;for it makes them drink many a good bottle more than otherwise they should.But I cannot better satisfy you as to the growth of the vinetree syrup that is here squeezed out of grapes, than in desiring you to look yonder in that back-yard, where you willsee above a thousand different growths that lie waiting to becalled rivereau, from its being used by the water-men on the river (Loire.) It is a pole, Cotgrave says, with a fork of iron at the end,wherewith watermen set forward their boats when they do not row.7 Musty, because a priest keeps things as long as ever he can, andgives away as little as possible.448 [ BOOK Y. RABELAIS' WORKS.squeezed every moment. Here are some of the public andsome of the private growth; some of the fortifications , loans,gifts, and gratuities, escheats, forfeitures, fines, and recoveries, penal statutes, crown lands, and demesne, privy purse,post-offices, offerings, lordships of manors, and a world ofother growths, for which we want names. Pray, quothEpistemon, tell me of what growth is that great one, with allthose little grapelings about it . Oh, oh! returned Doublefee, that plump one is of the treasury, the very best growthin the whole country. Whenever any one of that growthis squeezed, there is not one of their worships but gets juice enough of it to soak his nose six months together. Whentheir worships were up, Pantagruel desired Double-fee totake us into that great wine- press, which he readily did.soon as we were in , Epistemon, who understood all sorts of tongues, began to show us many devices on the press, whichwas large and fine , and made of the woods of the cross-at least Double-fee told us so. On each part of it were namesof every thing in the language of the country. The spindleof the press was called receipt; the trough, costs and da- mages; the hole for the vice - pin, state; the side- boards,money paid into the office: the great beam, respite of homage;the branches, radietur; the side - beams, recuperetur; the fats, ¹0ignoramus; the two-handled basket, the rolls; the treadingplace, acquittance; the dossers, validation; the panniers,authentic decrees; the pailes, potentials; the funnels, quietus est.As10By the Queen of the Chitterlings," quoth Panurge, all thehieroglyphics of Egypt are mine a- to this jargon. Why!here are a parcel of words full as analogous as chalk and cheese, or a cat and a cart wheel! But why, pr'ythee, dearDouble-fee, do they call these worshipful dons of yours igno8 The effects of such as had been hanged. Crux signifying a gallows as well as a cross. 9 In the chamber of accounts this is a termfor annulling any gift the king should make of an excessive sum, with- out just cause, or having been first examined into by the chamber.See Bodin. Repub. et Juv. des Ursins, hist. Cha. VI . on the year 1389.10 So M. Motteux wittily translates it; for he professes he knew not what the original plusvaleur meant. Nor indeed can I find out by anybooks, what it should mean. Cotgrave translates it: An overvalue, surplusage, &c. , but the true term here is surcharge, a law term like re cuperetur, &c. 11 The idol Niphleseth, by whose name the author calls the Queen of Chitterlings, was herself an hieroglyphic.CHAP. XVI. ] PANTAGRUEL. 449rant fellows? Only, said Double- fee, because they neitherare, nor ought to be, clerks, and all must be ignorant as to what they transact here; nor is there to be any other reasongiven, but, The court hath said it; The court will have it so;The court has decreed it. Cop's body, quoth Pantagruel,they might full as well have called them necessity; for ne- cessity has no law.From thence, as he was leading us to see a thousand littlepuny presses, we spied another paltry bar, about which satfour or five ignorant waspish churls, of so testy, fuming atemper, like an ass with squibs and crackers tied to its tail,and so ready to take pepper in the nose for yea and nay, thata dog would not have lived with them. They were hard atit with the lees and dregs of the grapes, which they gripedover and over again, might and main, with their clenched fists. They were called contractors, in the language of thecountry. These are the ugliest, misshapen, grim-lookingscrubs, said Friar John, that ever were beheld, with or without spectacles. Then we passed by an infinite number oflittle pimping wine-presses, all full of vintage-mongers, whowere picking, examining, and raking the grapes with someinstruments, called bills of charge.Finally, we came into a hall down stairs, where we saw anovergrown cursed mangy cur, with a pair of heads, a wolf'sbelly, and claws like the devil of hell. The son of a bitchwas fed with costs, for he lived on a multiplicity of fineamonds and amerciaments, by order of their worships, to each of whom the monster was worth more than the bestfarm in the land. In their tongue of ignorance they calledhim Twofold. His dam lay by him, and her hair and shapewas like her whelps, only she had four heads, two male andtwo female, and her name was Fourfold. She was certainlythe most cursed and dangerous creature of the place , excepther grandam, which we saw, and had been kept locked up ina dungeon, time out of mind, and her name was Refusing- of- fees.Fiiar John, who had always twenty yards of gut readyempty, to swallow a gallimaufry of lawyers, began to besomewhat out of humour, and desired Pantagruel to remember he had not dined, and bring Double- fee along with him.12 Aquibble upon the word amende, (a mulct or fine in French) and almonds to eat.VOL. II. G &450 [BOOK V. RABELAIS WORKS.So away we went, and as we marched out at the back-gate,whom should we meet but an old piece of mortality in chains.He was half ignorant and half learned, like an hermaphroditeof Satan.13 The fellow was all caparisoned with spectacles,"as a tortoise is with shells, and lived on nothing but a sort offood which, in their gibberish , was called appeals. Pantagruel asked Double-fee of what breed was that prothonotary,and what name they gave him? Double-fee told us that timeout of mind, he had been kept there in chains , 15 to the greatgrief of their worships, who starved him, and his name was Review. By the pope's sanctified two- pounders, cried FriarJohn, I do not much wonder at the meagre cheer which thisold chuff finds among their worships. Do but look a littleon the weather-beaten scratch- toby, friend Panurge; by thesacred tip of my cowl, I will lay five pounds to a hazel-nut,the foul thief has the very looks of Gripe-men-all. Thesesame fellows here, ignorant as they be, are as sharp andknowing as other folks. But were it my case, I wouldsend him packing with a squib in his breech, like a rogue as he is. By my oriental barnacles, 16 quoth Panurge, honestFriar, thou art in the right, for if we but examine that treacherous Review's ill - favoured phiz, we find that the filthysnudge is yet more mischievous and ignorant than these ignorant wretches here, since they (honest dunces ) grapple andglean with as little harm and pother as they can, without anylong fiddle-cum- farts or tantalizing in the case; nor do theydally and demur in your suit, but, in two or three words,whip-stitch, in a trice, they finish the vintage of the close,bating you all these damned tedious interlocutories , examinations, and appointments, which fret to the heart's blood your furred law- cats .ON CHAP. XVI. -The island of the Apedefts is a satire on somecourts of Judicature, whose members squeeze out the blood and sub13 In matter of law-suits a very devil; in other things a very dunce in name and nature. 14 The functions of his office consistedentirely in revising the process.15 It should be, to his greatgrief by their worships, who had taken from him great part of the fines,which he claimed as his dues, to subsist on. 16 Oriental spectacles: lunettes in French for a pair of spectacles. The Turks, whoare orientals to us, have the moon (lune) for the symbol of their empire.Rabelais quibbles on the words lune and lunettes, moon and spectacles;a pun not capable of being preserved in English, perhaps not worthy of it. [Barnicles is a corruption of binocles, from binoculi, double eyes.]CHAP. XVII . ]PANTAGRUEL. 451stance not only ofthe wrangling part of the world, but of those peaceable persons whom some litigious adversaries compel to fall into their clutches.The little wine-press, called pithies in the language of the country, thatlay backwards in a blind corner, signifies the beuvettes, drinking places, which are generally in the very buildings where are the courts of judicature in France, whither the lawyers go to refresh themselvesat the expense of the clients. That word comes from the Greek wii,drink. The ancients had also a festival sacred to Bacchus, which wascalled Soyia, which comes from i9oç, a wine hogshead. It usedto be celebrated at the time of the year when tuns and hogsheads used to be new hooped and fitted up, and, while it lasted, all comers andgoers drank wine gratis, just as they do in France on St. Martin's eve.The Athenians kept that festival in the month which they call Anthesteron, which is our month of November, as Gaza proves it, Lib. deMensibus Atheniensium. By which it appears, that the custom usedon St. Martin's day in France, on which the parliaments as well as others make merry, succeeded to the pithagia of the ancients.All this chapter may be easily understood , by those who are acquainted with the customs of France; and, as it may be applicable also to other countries, it cannot seem very dark to others. -M.CH. XVII.-How we went Forwards, and how Panurge had like to have been killed.WE put to sea that very moment, steering our course forwards, and gave Pantagruel a full account of our adventures,which so deeply struck him with compassion, that he wrotesome elegies on that subject, to divert himself during thevoyage. When we were safe in the port we took some refreshment, and took in fresh water and wood. The peopleof the place, who had the countenance of jolly fellows , and boon companions, were all of them forward folks , bloatedand puffed up with fat; and we saw some who slashed andpinked their skins, to open a passage to the fat, that it mightswell out at the slits and gashes which they made; neithermore nor less than the sh*t-breech fellows in our countrybepink and cut open their breeches, that the taffety on the inside may stand out and be puffed up. They said, thatwhat they did was not out of pride or ostentation, but be- cause otherwise their skins would not hold them withoutmuch pain. Having thus slashed their skin, they used togrow much bigger, like the young trees, on whose barks thegardeners make incisions, that they may grow the better.Near the haven there was a tavern, which forwards seemedvery fine and stately. We repaired thither, and found itfilled with people of the forward nation, of all ages, sexes,and conditions; so that we thought some notable feast or GG 2452 RABELAIS' WORKS. BOOK V.other was getting ready, but we were told that all that throngwere invited to the bursting of mine host, which caused all his friends and relations to hasten thither.We did not understand that jargon, and, therefore, thoughtin that country, by that bursting they meant some merrymeeting or other, as we do in ours by betrothing, wedding,groaning, christening, churching (of women) , shearing (ofsheep), reaping ( of corn, or harvest-home) , and many otherjunketing bouts that end in ing. But we soon heard that there was no such matter in hand.The master of the house, you must know, had been a goodfellow in his time, loved heartily to wind up his bottom, tobang the pitcher, and lick his dish: he used to be a very fairswallower of gravy soup, a notable accountant in matter ofhours , ' and his whole life was one continual dinner, like minehost at Rouillac [ in Perigord ] . But now, having farted outmuch fat for ten years together, according to the custom ofthe country, he was drawing towards the bursting hour; for neither the inner thin caul wherewith the entrails are covered,nor his skin that had been jagged and mangled so many years,were able to hold and enclose his guts any longer, or hinderthem from forcing their way out. Pray, quoth Panurge, isthere no remedy, no help for the poor man, good people?Why do you not swaddle him round with good tight girths,or secure his natural tub with a strong sorb- apple- tree hoop?Nay, why do not you iron-bind him, if needs be? Thiswould keep the man from flying out and bursting. Theword was not yet out of his mouth, when we heard somethinggive a loud report, as if a huge sturdy oak had been split in two. Then some ofthe neighbours told us, that the burstingwas over, and that the clap or crack, which we heard, was thelast fart, and so there was an end of mine host.This made me call to mind a saying of the venerable abbo'of Castilliers , the very same who never cared to humph his chambermaids, but when he was in pontificalibus.³ That1 So they call in Poitou any great talker, who, when he has no more tales to tell, will count the hours, when the clock strikes, and that aloud,though others hear the clock as well as he. But in this place it also means a smell-feast, a gormandizing hanger- on , a guttling spunger, who that he may not slip the critical minute when people use to dine, counts the hours, nay, the quarters of every clock that strikes, and that with the utmost exactness. 2 See for this Vigneul-Maurville, in his Miscellanies, vol. 3, p. 247. Rotterdam edition. 3 Gravity might have some share in this proud prelate's scrupulousness; but that whichCHAP. XVIII.]PANTAGRUEL. 453pious person, being much dunned, teased, and importunedbyhis relations to resign his abbey in his old age, said andprofessed, That he would not strip till he was ready to go to bed, and that the last fart which his reverend paternity wasto utter, should be the fart of an abbot.ON CHAP. XVII. -The Forward Nation is easily known to be thoseboon companions, who, as the author says, love heartily to wind up their bottom, bang the pitcher, and lick the ditch; men who have been fair swallowers of gravy soup, notable accountants in matter of hours,whose whole lives are one continual dinner, and who at last die of too much fat, of diseases got by eating or drinking to excess . This alsoreflects upon those who prodigally spend their estates, and at last crack their credits, and are forced to abscond , and thus may, in a manner, be said to be dead. This chapter, which now ends with the pleasant story of the abbot of Castilliers, who never used to be familiar with his maidsbut when he was dressed in pontificalibus, is imperfect; or there is amistake in the account of its contents, which promise a relation of the danger which Panurge was in, though not one word of it is mentioned in the whole book.-M.CH. XVIII. -How our ships were stranded, and we were relievedby some people that were subject to Queen Whims (qui tenoient de la Quinte).WE weighed and set sail with a merry westerly gale, whenabout seven leagues off ( twenty- two miles) , some gusts orscuds of wind suddenly arose, and the wind veering andshifting from point to point, was, as they say, like an oldwoman's breech, at no certainty; so we first got our starboard tacks aboard, and hauled off our lee- sheets. Then thegusts increased, and by fits blowed all at once from severalquarters, yet we neither settled nor braided up close our sails,but only let fly the sheets, not to go against the master ofthe ship's direction; and thus having let go amain, lest weshould spend our topsails, or the ship's quick- side should liein the water, and she be overset, we lay by and run adrift;doubtless contributed most to it was, that if in any of these lewd ac- tions be should be caught in a short habit, the secular judge might pro- ceed against him. Ant. Rubenstadius to M. Ort. Gratius, part 1, of the Epistolæ Obsc. Viror. "Qualem te invenio, talem te judico Et quando presbyter reperitur in aliquo indecenti opere, et non est vestitus sicut sacerdos esse debet, sed habitu seculari tunc judex secu- laris potest eum habere et tractare pro homine seculari, et afficere eum pœna corporali, non obstantibus privilegiis clericorum ." N.B.- Rabelais assigns none but chamber-maids to the abbot, because, as is ob- served by Verville, in chap. 10 of his Moyen de Parvenir, servantmaids is the appellative of such as serve plain honest laymen wants chambermaids live with priests or canons, to minister to all theirdisa454 [ BOOK V. RABELAIS ' WORKS.that is , in a landloper's phrase, we temporised it . For heassured us that, as these gusts and whirlwinds would not dous much good, so they could not do us much harm, consider.ing their easiness and pleasant strife, as also the clearness of the sky and calmness of the current. So that we were to observe the philosopher's rule, bear and forbear; that is , trim,or go according to the time.However, these whirlwinds and gusts lasted so long, thatwe persuaded the master to let us go and lie at trie with ourmain course: that is , to haul the tack aboard, the sheetclose aft, the bowline set up, and the helm tied close aboard;so, after a stormy gale of wind, we broke through the whirlwind. But it was like falling into Scylla to avoid Charybdis, (out of the frying- pan into the fire) . For we had notsailed a league, ere our ships were stranded upon some sands, such as are the flats of St. Maixant.All our company seemed mightily disturbed, except FriarJohn, who was not a jot daunted, and with sweet sugar- plumwords. comforted now one and then another, giving themhopes of speedy assistance from above, and telling them thathe had seen Castor at the main- yard arm. Oh! that I werebut now ashore, cried Panurge, that is all I wish for myselfat present, and that you, who like the sea so well, had eachman of you two hundred thousand crowns; I would fairlylet you set up shop on these sands,' and would get a fat calfdressed, and a hundred of fa*ggots cooled for you against youcome ashore. I freely consent never to mount a wife, soyou but set me ashore, and mount me on a horse, that Imay go home: no matter for a servant, I will be contentedto serve myself; I am never better treated than when I amwithout a man. Faith old Plautus was in the right of itwhen he said, the more servants the more crosses; for suchthey are, even supposing they could want what they all have1 Rabelais' words will by no means bear this construction; "Je vous mettrois ung veau en meuë, et refraicherois ung cent de fa*gots pour votre retour." On which M. Duchat observes that though Pan- urge seems to say, I would prepare a fat calf for you, it was not by any means his intention so to do; for as people do not use to put up calves to fat in a hen- coop (meuë, ) any more than they cool or throw water on fa*ggots they would have burn easily; so, instead of engag- ing himself here to any thing, he only laughs at those who, together with himself, had too easily committed their persons to the dangers of the sea.CHAP. XVIII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 455but too much of, a tongue, that most busy, dangerous, andpernicious member of servants accordingly, it was for their sakes alone that the racks and tortures for confessionwere invented, though some foreign civilians in our timehave drawn alogical and unreasonable consequences from it.That very moment we spied a sail that made towards us.When it was close by us, we soon knew what was the ladingof the ship, and who was aboard of her. She was full freightedwith drums: I was acquainted with many of the passengersthat came in her, who were most of them of good families;among the rest Harry Cotiral the chemist, an old toast, whohad got a swinging ass's touch-tripe (penis) fastened to hiswaist, as the good women's beads are to their girdle. In his left hand he held an old overgrown greasy foul cap, suchas your scald- pated fellows wear, and in the right a hugecabbage-stump.As soon as he saw me he was overjoyed, and bawled out to me, What cheer, ho? How dost like me now? Beholdthe true Algamana ( this , he said , showing me the ass's ticklegizzard. ) This doctor's cap is my true elixo; and this (continued he, shaking the cabbage stump in his fist ) is lunariamajor; ³ I have it, old boy, I have it; we will blow the coalwhen thou art come back. But pray, father, said I , whencecome you? Whither go you? What is your lading? Haveyou smelt the sea? To these four questions he answered,From Queen Whims; for Touraine; alchymy; to the very bottom . *" Lingua mali pars pessima servi, " says Juvenal , Sat. 9.3 Because the leaves of it are like those of the sea- cabbage, which bears a great reputation, and is in mighty vogue with the alchymists.This pleasant answer to four questions at a time, is like that of the famous Dante, as we meet with it in Domenichi's Facetiæ, and other old Italian books; "The famous poet, Dante Alighieri, returning home one day out of the country, was overtook by three gen- tlemen of Florence, his acquaintance; who knowing how ready he was in his answers, they all three resolved, by way of proof, to make three successive attacks upon him in the following manner. Thefirst said to him, Good- day, Master Dante; the second, Whence come you, Master Dante? the third, Are the waters deep, Master Dante?To all of which, without once stopping his horse, or making the least pause, he answered thus: Good- day, and good year; From the fair;To the very bottom . " Not unlike this is a story of Henry IV. of France, who being overtaken upon the road by a clergyman that was posting to court; the king, putting his head out of his coach,asked the man in his hasty way, Whence come ye? Whither go ye?456 [BOOK T. RABELAIS' WORKS.Whom have you got on board? said I. Said he, Astrologers, fortune-tellers, alchymists, rhymers, poets, painters,projectors, mathematicians, watchmakers, sing- songs, musicianers, and the devil and all of others that are subject toQueen Whims. They have very fair legible patents to showfor it, as any body may see. Panurge had no sooner heardthis, but he was upon the high- rope, and began to rail atthem like mad. What the devil do you mean, cried he, tosit idly here, like a pack of loitering sneaksbies, and see usstranded, while you may help us, and tow us off into thecurrent! A plague on your whims; you can make all thingswhatsoever, they say, so much as good weather and littlechildren; yet will not make haste to fasten some hawsersand cables, and get us off. I was just coming to set youafloat, quoth Harry Cotiral: by Trismegistus, I will clear you in a trice. With this he caused 7,532,810 huge drumsto be unheaded on one side , and set that open side so that itfaced the end of the streamers and pendants; and havingfastened them to good tacklings, and our ship's head to thestern of theirs, with cables fastened to the bits abaft themanger in the ship's loof, they towed us off ground at onepull, so easily and pleasantly, that you would have wonderedat it, had you been there. For the dub- o-dub rattling ofthe drums, with the soft noise of the gravel, which murmuring disputed us our way, and the merry cheers and huzzasof the sailors, made an harmony almost as good as that ofthe heavenly bodies, when they roll and are whirled roundtheir spheres, which rattling of the celestial wheels Platosaid he heard some nights in his sleep.We scorned to be behind-hand with them in civility, andgratefully gave them store of our sausages and chitterlings,with which we filled their drums; and we were just a-hoisting two-and- sixty hogsheads of wine out of the hold, whentwo huge whirlpools (physeteres) with great fury made towards their ship; spouting more water than is in the riverVienne (Vigenne) , from Chinon to Saumur: to make short,all their drums, all their sails, their concerns, and themWhat want ye? The clergymen, without any ceremony or hesitation,made answer: From Blois; To Paris; A benefice. With which theking was so weli pleased, he instantly granted his request.5 Laquinte. This means a fantastic humour: maggots or a foolish giddiness of brain; and also a fifth, or the proportion of five in music, &c.CHAP . XVIII.]PANTAGRUEL. 457selves , were soused, and their very hose were watered bythecollar.Panurge was so overjoyed , seeing this, and laughed so heartily, that he was forced to hold his sides, and it set himinto a fit of the cholic for two hours and more. I had amind, quoth he, to make the dogs drink, and those honestwhirlpools , egad, have saved me that labour and that cost.There's sauce for them; apiorov μév vdwp. Water is good,saith a poet; let them Pindarise upon it: they never caredfor fresh water, but to wash their hands or their glasses.This good salt water will stand them in good stead , for want of sal ammoniac and nitre in Geber's kitchen."We could not hold any further discourse with them; forthe former whirlwind hindered our ship from feeling thehelm. The pilot advised us henceforwards to let her runadrift, and follow the stream, not busying ourselves withanything, but making much of our carcasses. For our onlyway to arrive safe at the Queendom of Whims, was to trustto the whirlwind, and be led by the current.ON CHAP. XVIII.-To attain to the knowledge of truth, it is neces- sary to take a survey of everything: so our travellers, steering theircourse to its oracle, sail towards the Queendom of Whims; by which,in general, may be understood all sorts of strange whimsical notions,and Alchymy in particular. Accordingly, as they come near that country, that is , imitate the fantastic wavering people that fill their heads with all the strange ima- ginations which we call whimsies, some sudden gusts or scuds of wind arise, and the wind shifting from point to point is at no certainty. They tack about, the gusts increase, and by fits blow at once from several quarters. This very well represents an unfixed mind, that unmetho- dically applies itself to many things at once; then leaves them to think on others , which soon resign the working brain to a crowd of succeedingraw and undigested notions. The master of the ship orders the sheets to be let fly, for fear of over- setting the ship, and is for running adrift, or temporizing, as the author calls it; those gusts not being dangerous. This may mean, that it is not always proper to oppose altogether the inclinations of some men, even while it leads them to studies and attempts that seem insignifi cant; since time soon weans them of their darling foilies; and thus they know the better how to distinguish between the useful and theunprofitable. After all, this may refer to some of those doubtful points, about which the learned were as idly busy in that age, as now-a-days many are about them and others; placing religion more in notions than in actions, and neglecting the practice to talk of the theory. Such questions are6 An ancient Arabian alchymist, whose works are extant.468 RABELAIS' WORKS. [BOOKY.those of free will, predestination, justification , &c. , by which the people reap as little benefit as the teachers gain glory, when they display their learned ignorance about them. Pantagruel's ship that is stranded, or run aground, endeavouring to weather- coil and break through the whirl- wind, after it has been tossed by it, is an image of those, who thinking to ease their fluctuating minds, at last venture on some new notion,which at first seems plausible to some; but they are soon gravelled,and do not know how to get off. The empty drums, which were on board the ship that came from Queen Whims, which towed the Pantagruelists off ground, put me in mind of the help which school -divinity affords in such doubts: an empty noise, mere wind , and that is all;Just as harmonious as the sound made by the gravel, and the seamen's cheers. Even that fantastic relief proves real to some, who are whim- sically drawn by it, and by that means are in a fair way to proceed,and, being led by the current, like our travellers, arrive at the Queen- dom of Whims. -M.CH. XIX.-How we arrived at the queendom of Whims), orkingdom of Quintessence, called Entelechy.WE did as he directed us for about twelve hours, and onthe third day the sky seemed to us somewhat clearer, andwe happily arrived at the port of Mateotechny, not far distant from the palace of Quintessence.We met full butt on the quay a great number of guards.and other military men that garrisoned the arsenal; andwe were somewhat frighted at first, because they madeus all lay down our arms, and, in a haughty manner, asked us whence we came?Cousin, quoth Panurge to him that asked the question, weare of Touraine, and come from France, being ambitious ofpaying our respects to the Lady Quintessence, and visit thisfamous realm of Entelechy.What do you say? cried they do you call it Entelechy, orEndelechy Truly, truly, sweet cousins, quoth Panurge,we are a silly sort of grout- headed lobco*cks, and it please you; be so kind as to forgive us if we chance to knock wordsout of joint: as for anything else, we are downright honestfellows, and true hearts.We have not asked you this question without a cause.said they for a great number of others, who have passedthis way from your country of Touraine, seemed as mere1 There is no pains more foolishly employed about any one thing than in the search of the philosopher's stone; but there are likewise other vain sciences, and the author means to say, that such as confinethemselves thereto are arrived at the port of Mateotechny. Murais,vanus, Tixvn, ars.CHAP. XIX. ] PANTAGRUEL. 459joltheaded doddipoles as ever were scored over the coxcomb,yet spoke as correct as other folks. But there has been herefrom other countries a pack of I know not what overweening self- conceited prigs, as moody as so many mules, andas stout as any Scotch lairds , and nothing would serve these,forsooth, but they must wilfully wrangle and stand out againstus at their coming; and much they got by it after all. Troth ,we even fitted them, and clawed them off with a vengeance,for all they looked so big and so grum.Pray tell me, does your time lie so heavy upon you in yourworld, that you do not know how to bestow it better thanin thus impudently talking , disputing, and writing of oursovereign lady? There was much need that your Tully,2the consul, should go and leave the care of his commonwealth to busy himself idly about her; and after him, yourDiogenes Laertius, the biographer, and your TheodorusGaza, the philosopher, and your Argiropilus, the emperor,and your Bessario, the cardinal, and your Politian, thepedant, and your Budæus," the judge, and your Lascaris ,the ambassador, and the devil and all of those you call lovers of wisdom; whose number, it seems, was notthought great enough already, but likely your Scaliger, "2 In 1. 1. of the Tusculan questions.Aristotle.3 In his Life ofIn ch. 1 , of his Miscellanies.5 In1. 1 of his treatise, De Asse. 6 This seems to supposethat Rabelais, who, some will have it, died in 1553, had seen somework of Scaliger, where that philosopher treats of the entelechy.Now, it is on the one side reckoned for certain, that Scaliger neverspoke of the entelechy but in his exercitations against Cardan, where,after he had defined the understanding, and explained the operations of the soul according to their system, who admit of Aristotle's en- telechy, " Hæc quidem," says he, " risui sunt, atque contemptui novisLucianis, atque Diagoris culinariis; sed non neglecta sunt à maximo philosopho Bigotio; qui quidem pené solus hoc summum jus hodie tuetur in recondita philosophia." But if, as is well known, this book of Scaliger was not published before the year 1557, how could Rabelais have seen it, who died four years before? Perhaps Scaliger hav- ing many years before imparted to Bigot his private sentiments on theentelechy, he might have communicated it to Rabelais on the same footing, as hereafter in ch. 34 of this fifth Book, we see the same Bigot had delivered his thoughts on the woman who, in the Apoca- lypse, is represented as having the moon under her feet . Another and greater difficulty, in my mind, is that this passage of the exercitationsaims personally at Rabelais by the words, " novis Lucianis, atque Diagoris culinaris, " on account of the raillery which Rabelais had sed against Scaliger in this very place. See Duchat further uponthis subject in his preface and notes on this chapter.460 [ BOOK ▼.RABELAIS' WORKS.Bigot, Chambrier, Francis Fleury,' and I cannot tell howmany such other junior sneaking fly- blows, must take upon them to increase it.A squincy gripe the cods-headed changelings at the swallow, and eke at the cover-weesel; we shall make them-Butthe deuce take them; (they flatter the devil here, andsmoothify his name, quoth Panurge, between their teeth; )you do not come here, continued the captain, to uphold them in their folly, you have no commission from them to this effect; well then, we will talk no more of it.Aristotle, that first of men, and peerless pattern of all philosophy, was our sovereign lady's godfather; and wisely andproperly gave her the name of Entelechy. Her true name then is Entelechy, and may he be in tail besh*t, and entail ash*t-a-bed faculty, and nothing else on his family, who darescall her by any other name: for whoever he is, he does herwrong, and is a very impudent person. You are heartily welcome, gentlemen. With this they colled and clipt us about the neck, which was no small comfort to us, I will assure you.Panurge then whispered me, Fellow- traveller, quoth he,hast thou not been somewhat afraid this bout? A little,said I. To tell you the truth of it, quoth he, never werethe Ephraimites in a greater fear and quandary, when theGileadites killed and drowned them for saying sibbolethinstead of shibboleth; and among friends, let me tell you,that perhaps there is not a man in the whole country ofBeauce, but might easily have stopt my bunghole with acart-load of hay.The captain afterwards took us to the queen's palace,leading us silently with great formality. Pantagruel wouldhave said something to him; but the other, not being ableto come up to his height, wished for a ladder, or a very long pair of stilts; then said , Patience, if it were our sovereignlady's will, we would be as tall as you; well, we shall, when she pleases.In the first galleries, we saw great numbers of sick per7 William Bigot, of whom Scaliger speaks in the preceding article.8 Joachim Camerarius, in ch. 10. of his Obs. on the First Book of the Tusculan questions. 9 In his Apology against the Calum 10 See the book of Judges, ch. niators of the Latin Tongue.xii. ver. 6.CHAP. XX. ]PANTAGRUEL. 461sons, differently placed according to their maladies. Theleprous were apart; those that were poisoned on one side;those that had got the plague, alias the pox, " in the firstrank, accordingly.ON CHAP. XIX. -That place, which is also called Entelechy, andits ruler Queen-whims, or Quintessence, is alchymy, the pretended phi- losophical stone; as also quacks, and those beggarly projectors, who,if you will believe them, can make you rich, and promise mountains of gold, whereas they sometimes want brass to buy bread: and more gene- rally, this refers to all addle-headed students and contrivers. All knowhow infatuated many of the chemists are with the lapis, aurum potabile, and a thousand medicines, at whose very sight, they will tell you,diseases disappear. The leprosy, the plague, poisons, though never so corrosive, the venereal disease, the gout, palsies; in short, all obstinate and dangerous evils are cured by them in an unaccountable manner, if you will believe them. Now Rabelais, who, as Thuanus says, was amost learned and ' experienced physician, gives us freely to understand that all those pretenders are so many cheats, who sometimes deceive themselves, but generally others. For this reason, the first port of that island, whereat he makes his fleet touch , is Mateotechny, MaratorεXvía;that is the study of foolish unprofitable arts; yet he makes those who profess them give their country the name of Entelechy, from ' Evreλe- xeía, actus et perfectio; as it is rendered in Aristotle's second bockDe Anima. Tully, Tuscul. Lib. 1 , would have it to signify a perpetual motion. Now, as several learned men in former ages have almost as largely descanted upon the word, as some in this have lost time about the thing, Rabelais reflects upon them for it in this chapter; and at the same time those grammarians, who dispute so hotly about words and neglect things, may be aimed at, as deserving to be placed among those who apply themselves to unprofitable studies.- M.CH. XX.-How the Quintessence cured the sick with a song.THE captain showed us the queen, attended with her ladiesand gentlemen in the second gallery.She looked young,though she was at least eighteen hundred years old; ¹ andwas handsome, slender, and as fine as a queen, that is as handscould make her. He then said to us. It is not yet a fittime to speak to the queen; be you but mindful of herdoings in the meanwhile.You have kings in your world that fantastically pretend to' cure some certain diseases; as for example, scrofula or wensswelled throats, nick-named the king's evil, and quartaragues, only with a touch: now our queen cures all manneof diseases without so much as touching the sick, but barely11 It is on their account principally that the chemical medicines ar in vogue. 1 With respect to the time when Aristotle flourishedwho was the first coiner of the word entelechy.462 [ BOOK V. RABELAIS WORKS.with a song, according to the nature of the distemper. Hethen showed us a set of organs, and said, that when it wastouched by her, those miraculous cures were performed. Theorgan was indeed the strangest that ever eyes beheld: forthe pipes were of cassia fistula in the cod; the top and cornice of guiacum; the bellows of rhubarb; the pedas of tur- bith, and the clavier or keys of scammony.While we were examining this wonderful new make of anorgan, the leprous were brought in by her abstractors, spodizators, masticators, pregustics, tabachins, chachanins, neemanins, rabrebans, nercins, rozuins, nebidins, tearins, segamions, perarons, chasinins, sarins, soteins , aboth, enilins ,archasdarpenins, mebins, chabourins, and other officers, forwhom I want names; so she played them I do not knowwhat sort of a tune, or song, and they were all immediately cured.Then those who were poisoned were had in , and she hadno sooner given them a song, but they began to find a use for their legs, and up they got. Then came on the deaf, theblind, and the dumb, and they too were restored to their lostfaculties and senses with the same remedy; which did sostrangely amaze us ( and not without reason, I think, ) thatdown we fell on our faces, remaining prostrate, like menravished in ecstasy, and were not able to utter one wordthrough the excess of our admiration, till she came, andhaving touched Pantagruel with a fine fragrant nosegay ofred roses, which she held in her hand, thus made us recoverour senses and get up. Then she made us the followingspeech in Byssin words, such as Parisatis desired should bespoken to her son Cyrus, or at least of crimson alamode.The probity that scintillizes in the superfices of your persons, informs my ratiocinating faculty, in a most stupendousmanner, of the radiant virtues, latent within the preciouscaskets and ventricles of your minds.2 For, contemplatingthe mellifluous suavity of your thrice discreet reverences, itis impossible not to be persuaded with facility, that neitheryour affections nor your intellects are vitiated with any defect, or privation of liberal and exalted sciences: far fromit, all must judge that in you are lodged a cornucopia, and2 M. Duchat makes the original run thus; The probity that scintil- lizes in the circumference of your words, informs my ratiocinatingfaculty of the virtue latent in the centre of your minds.CHAP. XX. ]PANTAGRUEL. 453encyclopedia, an unmeasurable profundity of knowledge inthe most peregrine and sublime disciplines, so frequentlythe admiration, and so rarely the concomitants of the imperite vulgar. This gently compels me, who in precedingtimes indefatigably kept myprivate affections absolutely subjugated, to condescend to make my application to you in thetrivial phrase of the plebeian world; and assure you, that youare well, more than most heartily welcome.I have no hand at making of speeches, quoth Panurge to meprivately pr'ythee, man, make answer to her for us, if thou canst. This would not work with me, however, neither didPantagruel return a word: so that Queen Whims, or QueenQuintessence (which you please ) perceiving that we stood asmute as fishes , said: Your taciturnity speaks you not onlydisciples of Pythagoras, from whom the venerable antiquityof my progenitors, in successive propagation was emaned,and derives its original; but also discovers, that through therevolution of many retrograde moons, you have in Egyptpressed the extremities of your fingers, with the hard tenantsof your mouths, and scalptized your heads with frequent applications of your unguicules. In the school of Pythagoras,taciturnity was the symbol of abstracted and superlativeknowledge; and the silence of the Egyptians was agnizedas an expressive manner of divine adoration: this causedthe pontiffs of Hierapolis to sacrifice to the great deity insilence, impercussively, without any vociferous or obstreperous sound. My design is not to enter into a privation ofgratitude towards you; but by a vivacious formality, thoughmatter were too abstract itself from me, excentricate to youmy cogitations.4Having spoken this , she only said to her officers, Tabachins,A panacea; and strait they desired us not to take it amiss,It is in the original, with one finger; a sign of effeminacy and indolence, with which Pompey was formerly reproached , as Seneca,Plutarch, and others have observed. 4 I know not what this word means. The Italians, indeed, call a pander for boys, or a co*ck- bawdin the crupper- mongering way, tabbachino. So this queen here may in a contemptuous way call her servants, like some persons of quality now-a-days, -Here, Bougres, &c. 5 Cotgrave says it is acall to meat (à pan) like à manger. It is likewise an herb called in English all -heal, for it cures all distempers (credat quicunque vult)Pliny and Dioscorides speak of this wonderful vegetable, which Erasmus in his Encomium Moriæ, says must grow, if any where, inthe Fortunate Islands, which produce every thing at a wish.464 [BOOKY,RABELAIS' WORKS.if the queen did not invite us to dine with her; for she nevereat anything at dinner but some categories, jecabots , emnins,dimions, abstractions , harborins, chelemins, second intentions,carradoths, antitheses, metempsychoses, transcendent prolepsies , and such other light food.Then they took us into a little closet, lined through withalarums, where we were treated God knows how. It is saidthat Jupiter writes whatever is transacted in the world, onthe dipthera or skin of the Amalthæan goat that suckledhim in Crete, which pelt served him instead of a shieldagainst the Titans, whence he was nicknamed Ægiochos. 'Nowas I hate to drink water, brother topers, I protest it wouldbe impossible to make eighteen goat- skins hold the description of all the good meat they brought before us; thoughitwere written in characters as small as those in which werepenned Homer's Iliads, which Tully tells us he saw enclosed in a nutshell .For my part, had I one hundred mouths, as many tongues,a voice of iron, a heart of oak, and lungs of leather, togetherwith the mellifluous abundance of Plato; yet I never couldgive you a full account of a third part of a second of the whole.Pantagruel was telling me, that he believed the queen hadgiven the symbolic word used among her subjects, to denotasovereign good cheer, when she said to her tabachins, Apanacea; just as Lucullus used to say, In Apollo, when nedesigned to give his friends a singular treat; though sometimes they took him at unawares, as, among the rest, Cicero and Hortensius sometimes used to do.ON CHAP. XX. -Rabelais ridicules here those empirics whose chieftalent is impudence and lies, while they pretend to the cure of incurable diseases; and also those who seek an universal remedy, Rosicrucians,disciples of Trismegistus, Raimond Lullius, Arnold of Villeneuve, and such as are said to have understood the great work, or arcanum philo- sophicum, and if you will believe them-the only true sons of wisdom.This makes him say, that Queen Whims cured all manner of diseases with a song, full as effectually as some kings rid men of the evil , that takes its name from their dignity: by which he meant, that all those pre- tended cures are just as solid as a song, and are nothing but vain talk.The queen's affected pedantic speech mimics the way of talk of some of our demi-virtuosos, who cannot think any one speaks well, unless he express himself with far- fetched metaphors, long tropes, uncommon words, per ambages, tedious circumlocutions, and such fulsome stuff.It should bethe goat Amalthea. 7 From ai capra, et ixu , habeo.CHAP. XXI. ] PANTAGRUEL. 465Accordingly we find that Panurge could not tell how to answer her in.the same cant; neither did Pantagruel return a word. However, they dined never the worse after it, while the queen fed on nothing but categories, abstractions, second intentions, metempsychoses, transcen- dant prolepsies, expressions, deceptions , dreams, &c. in Greek and Hebrew.-M.CH. XXI.-How the Queen passed her time after dinner.WHEN We had dined , a chachanin led us into the queen'shall, and there we saw how, after dinner, with the ladies andprinces of her court, she used to sift, searse, boult, range, and pass away time with a fine large white and blue silk sieve.We also perceived how they revived ancient sports, diverting themselves together at1. Cordax.¹ 5. Persica.2. Emmelia. 6. Phrygia.3. Sicinnia.4. Jambics.7. Thracia.9. Molossia. 12. Terminalia10. Cernopho- 13. Floralia.rum. 14. Pyrrhice.8. Calabrisme. 11. Monogas. 15. Nicatism ."And a thousand other dances .Afterwards she gave orders that they should show usthe apartments and curiosities in her palace; accordingly wesaw there such new, strange, and wonderful things, that Iam still ravished in admiration every time I think on it.However, nothing surprised us more than what was done by the gentlemen of her household, abstractors , parazons, nebidins, spodizators, and others, who freely, and without the leastdissembling, told us, that the queen their mistress did allimpossible things, and cured men of incurable diseases; andthey, her officers , used to do the rest.I saw there a young parazon cure many of the new consumption, I mean the pox, though they were never sopeppered: had it been the rankest Roan ague,3 (Anglicé, the11. Asort of country dance. 2. A still tragic dance. 3. Dancing and singing used at funerals. 4. Cutting sarcasms and lampoons. 5.The Persian dance. 6. Tunes, whose measure inspired men with akind of divine fury. 7. The Thracian movement. 8. Smutty verses.9. A measure to which the Mollossi of Epirus danced a certain mor- rice. 10. A dance with bowls or pots in their hands. 11. A songwhere one sings alone. 12. Sports at the holidays of the god ofbounds. 13. Dancing naked at Flora's holidays. 14. The Trojan- dance in armour. Le Duchat differs a little in the order of these2 Athenæus, lib. xiv. cap. 7, makes mention of all these dances of the ancients even nicatism, which Sir T. U. and all the new editions have omitted. 3 It should be Rouen, notRoan; they are two different towns in France, at a vast distance from VOL. II .names.H H466 LBOOK V. RABELAIS WORKS.Covent-garden gout, ) it was all one with him; touching onlytheir dentiform vertebræ thrice with a piece ofa wooden shoe,he made them as wholesome as so many sucking pigs.Another did thoroughly cure folks of dropsies, tympanies,ascites, and hyposarcides, striking them on the belly ninetimes with a Tenedian hatchet, without any solution of the continuum .Another cured all manner of fevers and agues on the spot,only with hanging a fox tail on the left side of the patient'sgirdle.One removed the tooth-ache only with washing thrice theroot of the aching tooth with elder- vinegar, and letting itdry half-an- hour in the sun.Another the gout, whether hot or cold, natural or accidental,by barely making the gouty person shut his mouth, and open his eyes.I saw another ease nine gentlemen of St. Francis's distemper, in a very short space of time, having clapped a ropeabout their necks , at the end of which hung a box with tenthousand gold crowns in it.One with a wonderful engine, threw the houses out at thewindows, by which means they were purged of all pestilen- tial air.Another cured all the three kinds of hectics, the tabid ,atrophes, and emaciated, without bathing, without Tabianmilk, dropax, alias depilatory, or other such medicaments;only turning the consumptive for three months into monks:and he assured me that if they did not grow fat and plump in amonastic way of living, they never would be fattened in thisworld, either by nature, or by art.I saw another surrounded with a crowd of two sorts ofwomen. Some were young, quaint, clever, neat, pretty, juicy,tight, brisk, buxom, proper, kind-hearted, and as right as myeach other. Why the pox is denominated from Rouen, is either be- cause it first appeared there, or because such as have it in a violent degree are enrouez, made hoarse by it. 4 It is the tenediabipennis (a twy- bill, or two-edged axe of Tenedos: see Cambridge Dict. ) It was as M. Duchat observes, a symbol of extreme severity.This axe or bipennis gave rise to the French word besaguë, from bisa- cuta, because of its double edge. 5 To drive away the flieswhich pestered the patient. 6 No shorter nor better way to curethe tooth-ache, than to pull out the tooth that causes it.7 A consumption in the pocket, or want of money: for those of St. Francis's order must carry none about them.CHAP. XXI. ]PANTAGRUEL. 467leg, to any man's thinking. The rest were old, weatherbeaten, over- ridden, toothless, blear- eyed, tough, wrinkled,shrivelled , tawny, mouldy, phthysicky, decrepit hags, beldams, and walking carcasses. We were told that this officewas to cast anew those she- pieces of antiquity, and makethem such as the pretty creatures whom we saw, who hadbeen made young again that day, recovering at once thebeauty, shape, size, and disposition, which they enjoyed atsixteen; except their heels, that were now much shorterthan in their former youth.This made them yet more apt to fall backwards, whenever any man happened to touch them, than they had beenbefore. As for their counterparts, the old mother- scratchlobies, they most devoutly waited for the blessed hour, whenthe batch that was in the oven was to be drawn, that theymight have their turns, and in a mighty haste they were pulling and hauling the man like mad, telling him, that it is themost grievous and intolerable thing in nature for the tail to beon fire, and the head to scare away those who should quench it.The officer had his hands full, never wanting patients;neither did his place bring him in little, you may swear.Pantagruel asked him whether he could also make old menyoung again? He said he could not. But the wayto makethem new men, was to get them to cohabit with a new- castfemale for thus they caught that fifth kind of crinckams,which some call pellade, in Greek, opiaois, that makes themcast off their old hair and skin, just as the serpents do; andthus their youth is renewed like the Arabian phoenix's. Thisis the true fountain of youth, for there the old and decrepitbecome young, active, and lusty.Just so, as Euripides tells us, Iolaus was transmogrified;and thus Phaon, for whom kind-hearted Sappho run wild,grew young again for Venus's use: so Tithon by Aurora'smeans; so Eson by Medæa, and Jason also, who, if youwill believe Pherecides and Simonides, was new-vamped anddy'd by that witch: and so were the nurses ofjolly Bacchus,and their husbands, as Eschylus relates .ON CHAP. XXI. -Our travellers see the queen, and some of her subjects, who sift, searse, bolt, range, and pass away time, and revise ancient sports. This reflects on those who wholly apply themselves to the study of the customs of the ancients, while many times they are ignorant in those of the moderns; a sort of book- worms, some ofwhich.HH 2468 [ BOOK V. RABELAIS' WORKS.conversing with none but the dead , are hardly qualified for the com- pany of the living. Our author, who seldom forgets the monks, says,that one of the queen's officers cured the consumptive by turning them into monks, by which means they grew fat and plump. What he says of the nine gentlemen who were rid of their poverty, having a rope put about their necks, at the end of which hung a box with ten thousand crowns in it, may refer to some in those times who either had, or fanciedthey were to have, the collar of the order of St. Michael, or some other,bestowed on them with a pension. —M.CH. XXII. -How Queen Whim's officers were employed: andhow the said lady retained us among her abstractors.I THEN saw a great number of the queen's officers, whomade black-a-moors white, as fast as hops, just rubbing their bellies with the bottom of a pannier.Others, with three couples of foxes in one yoke, ploughed a sandy shore, and did not lose their seed.Others washed burnt tiles, and made them lose their colour.Others extracted water out of pumice- stones; brayingthem a good while in a mortar, and changed their substance.Others sheared asses, and thus got long fleece wool.Others gathered off of thorns grapes, and figs off of thistles.Others stroked he-goats by the dugs, and saved their milkin a sieve; and much they got by it.Others washed asses' heads, without losing their soap.Others taught cows to dance, and did not lose their fiddling.Others pitched nets to catch the wind, and took co*ck lobsters in them.I saw a spodizator, who very artificially got farts out of adead ass, and sold them for five pence an ell.Another did putrify beetles. O the dainty food!Poor Panurge fairly cast up his accounts, and gave up hishalf penny [ i . e. vomited] , seeing an archasdarpenin, wholaid a huge plenty of chamberlye to putrify in horse-dung,mis-mashed with abundance of christian sir -reverence. Pugh,fie upon him, nasty dog! However, he told us, that withthis sacred distillation he watered kings and princes, andmade their sweet lives a fathom or two the longer." Others built churches to jump over the steeples.¹Others set carts before the horses," and began to flay eels1 This, and the other article with turned commas, are not in Rabelais, who says here, Others broke ( andouilles) chitterlings against their knees.CHAP. XXII . ] PANTAGRUEL. 469at the tail; neither did the eels cry before they were hurt,like those of Melun .Others out of nothing made great things, and made greatthings return to nothing.Others cut fire into steaks, with a knife , and drew waterwith a fish net." Others made chalk of cheese, " and honey of a dog's t-d.We saw a knot of others , about a baker's dozen in numDer, tippling under an arbour. They toped out of jollybottomless cups, four sorts of cool, sparkling, pure, delicious ,vine- tree syrup, which went down like mother's milk; andhealths and bumpers flew about like lightning . We weretold, that these true philosophers were fairly multiplying thestars by drinking till the seven were fourteen, as brawny Hercules did with Atlas.Others made a virtue of necessity, and the best of a badmarket, which seemed to me a very good piece of work.Others made alchymy with their teeth, and clapping theirhind retort to the recipient, made scurvy faces, and thensqueezed.Others, in a large grass plat, exactly measured how far thefleas could go at a hop, a step, and a jump; and told us,that this was exceedingly useful for the ruling of kingdoms,the conduct of armies, and the administration of commonwealths; and that Socrates, who first got philosophy out ofheaven, and from idle and trifling, made it profitable and ofmoment, used to spend half his philosophizing time in measuring the leaps of fleas , as Aristophanes, the quintessential,affirms.I saw two gibroins by themselves, keeping watch on thetop of a tower, and we were told, they guarded the moon from the wolves.In a blind corner, I met four more very hot at it, andready to go to loggerheads. I asked what was the cause ofhe stir and ado, the mighty coil and pother they made?And I heard that for four or five livelong days, those overwiseroisters had been at it ding dong, disputing on three high,more than metaphysical propositions, promising themselvesmountains of gold by solving them; the first was concerninga he-ass's shadow: the second, of the smoke of a lantern;2 The original says, Lanterns of bladders, and brass shovels of clouds.470 [ BOOK V. RABELAIS' WORKS.and the third, of goat's hair, whether it were wool or no?We heard that they did not think it a bit strange, that twocontradictions in mode, form, figure , and time, should be true.Though I will warrant the sophists of Paris had rather be unchristened than own so much.While we were admiring all those men's wonderful doings,the evening star already twinkling; the queen (God blessher) appeared attended with her court, and again amazed and dazzled us. She perceived it, and said to us:What occasions the aberrations of human cogitationsthrough the perplexing labyrinths and abysses of admiration,is not the source of the effects, which sagacious mortalsvisibly experience to be the consequential result of naturalcauses it is the novelty of the experiment which makesimpressions on their conceptive, cogitative faculties; that donot previse the facility of the operation adequately, with asubact and sedate intellection , associated with diligent andcongruous study. Consequently let all manner of perturbation abdicate the ventricles of your brains, if any one hasinvaded them while they were contemplating what is transacted by my domestic ministers. Be spectators and auditorsof every particular phenomenon, and every individual proposition, within the extent of my mansion; satiate yourselveswith all that can fall here under the consideration of yourvisual or ascultating powers, and thus emancipate yourselvesfrom the servitude of crassous ignorance. And that you maybe induced to apprehend how sincerely I desire this in consideration of the studious cupidity that so demonstrativelyemicates at your external organs, from this present particleof time, I retain you as my abstractors: Geber, my principal talachin, shall register and initiate you at your departing.We humblythanked her queenship, without saying a word,accepting of the noble office she conferred on us.ON CHAP. XXII.-This chapter ridicules those who attempt impos- sibilities: accordingly, our author says they made black-a-moors white,rubbing their bellies with the bottom of a pannier; ploughed a sandy shore with three couples of foxes in one yoke, and did not lose their seed: which undertakings have given occasion to several proverbs among the ancients, to denote labour in vain, as Æthiopem dealbare;arenas arare; laterem lavare; pumice aridius; ex asino lanam;" and others, which our author has purposely mentioned. Some mathematicians, dilecticians, naturalists , and metaphysicians, are ingeniously satirized in this chapter.--M.66CHAP. XXIII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 471CH. XXIII.-How the queen was served at dinner, and of herway ofeating.QUEEN WHIMS, after this, said to her gentlemen: Theorifice of the ventricle; that ordinary embassador for thealimentation of all members, whether superior or inferior,importunes us to restore, by the apposition of idoneous sustenance, what was dissipated by the internal calidity's actionon the radical humidity. Therefore spodizators, gesinins,memains, and parazons, be not culpable of dilatory protractions in the apposition of every re-roborating species, butrather let them pullulate and superabound on the tables. Asfor you, noblissim prægustators, and my gentilissim masticators, your frequently experimented industry, internectedwith perdiligent sedulity, and sedulous perdiligence, continually adjuvates you to perficiate all things in so expeditious amanner, that there is a necessity of exciting in you a cupidityto consummate them. Therefore I can only suggest to youstill to operate, as you are assuefacted indefatigably to ope- rate.Having made this fine speech, she retired for a while withpart of her women, and we were told, that it was to bathe,as the ancients did more commonly than we use now- adays to wash our hands before we eat. The tables weresoon placed, the cloth spread, and then the queen sat down.She eat nothing but celestial ambrosia, and drank nothing but divine nectar. As for the lords and ladies that werethere, they as well as we, fared on as rare, costly, and daintydishes, as ever Apicius wot or dreamed of in his life.When we were as round as hoops, and as full as eggs,with stuffing the gut, an olla podrida' was set before us, to force hunger to come to terms with us, in case it had notgranted us a truce; and such a huge vast thing it was, that thegolden platter which Pythius Althius gave King Darius, would hardly have covered it. The olla consisted of several sortsof pottages, salads, fricasees, saugrenees, cabirotadoes, roastand boiled meat, carbonadoes, swinging pieces of powderedbeef, good old hams, dainty deifical somates, cakes, tarts, aworld of curds after the moorish way, fresh cheese, jellies,and fruit of all sorts. All this seemed to me good anddainty however the sight of it made me sigh; for alas, Icould not taste a bit of it; so full I had filled my puddingsSome call it an olio. Rabelais pot-pourry.472 RABELAIS' WORKS. [BOOK T.

before, and a bellyful is a bellyful you know. Yet I musttell you what I saw, that seemed to me odd enough of conscience it was some pasties in paste; and what shouldthose pasties in paste be, do you think, but pasties in pots?At the bottom I perceived store of dice, cards, tarots, luettes,chess-men and chequers, besides full bowls of gold crowns,for those who have a mind to have a game or two, and trytheir chance. Under this I sawa jolly company of mules instately trappings, with velvet foot- cloths, and a troop of ambling nags, some for men and some for women; besides I donot know how many litters all lined with velvet, and some coaches of Ferrara make: all this for those who had a mindto take the air.This did not seem strange to me: but if anything did, itwas certainly the queen's way of eating; and truly it was verynew, and very odd: for she chewed nothing the good lady;not but that she had good sound teeth, and her meat requiredto be masticated; but such was her highness's custom. Whenher prægustators had tasted the meat, her masticators tookit and chewed it most nobly: for their dainty chops and gullets were lined through with crimson satin, with little welts,and gold purls, and their teeth were of delicate white ivory.Thus, when they had chewed the meat ready for her highness's maw, they poured it down her throat through a funnel of fine gold, and so on to her craw. For that reason, theytold us, she never visited a close stool but by proxy.ON CHAP. XXIII. -Queen Whims' or Quintessence's supper is notmore substantial than her dinner for she eats nothing but ambrosia;drinks nothing but nectar; and the lords and ladies that were therefared on such dishes as Apicius dreamed of. All this is dream andpoetical food, and consequentlyof easy digestion . An olla or hodgepodge follows, which may represent a mixture of confused notionsjumbled together. The cards, dice, chequers, and bowls full of gold,(for those who would play, ) the mules in stately trappings, velvet litters and coaches, are the vain hopes of those who are subject to whims,and dream of finding the philosopher's stone.The queen tastes and chews nothing: her prægustators and masti- cators (her tasters and chewers) do that for her; and she never visits aclose stool but by proxy. This signifies, that those who employ those cheats, who pretend to make gold, swallow every thing that comes from them without examining the sense of it, or chewing the cud upon the matter: all goes down glibly with them, so greedy they are of pos2 Great cards on which many different things are figured.3 Pieces of ivory to play withal.CHAP. XXIV. ] FANTAGRUEL. 473sessing such a mighty secret. But the alchymists, whom they trust,bestir their grinders lustily, in the mean time, and do not feed alto- gether on smoke, as do their patrons, who are here said never to go tostool but by proxy, because they are only fed with words and promises:all vanishes in smoke. The word spodizater signifies one who fairly gets soot from brass, by trying and melting it down.-M.CH. XXIV.-How there was a ball in the manner of a tournament, at which Queen Whims was present.AFTER supper there was a ball in the form of a tilt or atournament, not only worth seeing, but also never to be forgotten. First, the floor of the hall was covered with a largepiece of velveted white and yellow chequered tapestry, eachchequer exactly square, and three full spans in breadth.Then thirty-two young persons came into the hall; sixteen of them arrayed in cloth of gold; and of these , eight were young nymphs, such as the ancients described Diana'sattendants: the other eight were a king, a queen, two wardens of the castle, two knights, and two archers. Those ofthe other band were clad in cloth of silver.They posted themselves on the tapestry in the followingmanner the kings on the last line of the fourth square; sothat the golden king was on a white square, and the silveredking on a yellow square, and each queen by her king; thegolden queen on a yellow square, and the silvered queen ona white one and on each side stood the archers to guidetheir kings and queens; by the archers the knights, and thewardens by them. In the next row before them stood theeight nymphs; and between the two bands of nymphs fourrows of squares stood empty.Each band had its musicians, eight on each side, dressedin its livery; the one with orange- coloured damask, theother with white; and all played on different instrumentsmost melodiously and harmoniously, still varying in time.and measure as the figure of the dance required . Thisseemed to me an admirable thing, considering the numerousdiversity of steps, back- steps, bounds, rebounds, jerks, paces,leaps, skips, turns, coupés, hops, leadings, risings , meetings,flights, ambuscadoes, moves, and removes.I was also at a loss, when I strove to comprehend how thedancers could so suddenly know what every different notemeant for they no sooner heard this or that sound, but theyplaced themselves in the place which was denoted by the474 [BOOK V. RABELAIS' WORKS.music, though their motions were all different. For thenymphs that stood in the first file, as if they designed tobegin the fight, marched straight forwards to their enemiesfrom square to square, unless it were the first step, at whichthey were free to move over the two steps at once. Theyalone never fall back, ( which is not very natural to othernymphs) and if any of them is so lucky as to advance to theopposite king's row, she is immediately crowned queen ofher king, and after that, moves with the same state, and inthe same manner as the queen; but till that happens, theynever strike their enemies but forwards, and obliquely in adiagonal line. However, they make it not their chief busiLess to take their foes; for if they did, they would leavetheir queen exposed to the adverse parties, who then might take her.The kings move and take their enemies on all sides squareways, and only step from a white square into a yellow one,and vice versa, except at their first step the rank should wantother officers than the wardens; for then they can set themin their place, and retire by him.The queens take a greater liberty than any of the rest;for they move backwards and forwards all manner of ways,in a straight line, as far as they please , provided the place benot filled with one of their own party, and diagonally also,keeping to the colour on which they stand.The archers move backwards or forwards, far and near,never changing the colour on which they stand. The knights move, and take in alineal manner, stepping over one square,though a friend or foe stand upon it, posting themselves onthe second square to the right or left, from one colour toanother, which is very unwelcome to the adverse party, andought to be carefully observed, for they take at unawares.The wardens move, and take to the right or left, before orbehind them, like the kings, and can advance as far as theyfind places empty; which liberty the kings take not.The law which both sides observe, is, at the end of thefight, to besiege and enclose the king of either party, so that he may not be able to move; and being reduced to thatextremity, the battle is over, and he loses the day.Now, to avoid this, there is none of either sex of eachparty, but is willing to sacrifice his or her life, and theybegin to take one another on all sides in time, as soon as theCHAP. XXV. ] PANTAGRUEL. 475

music strikes up. When any one takes a prisoner, he makes

his honours, and striking him gently in the hand, puts himout of the field and combat, and encamps where he stood.If one of the kings chance to stand where he might betaken, it is not lawful for any of his adversaries that had discovered him, to lay hold on him: far from it, they are strictlyenjoined humbly to pay him their respects , and give himnotice, saying, God preserve you , sir! that his officers mayrelieve and cover him, or he may remove, if unhappily hecould not be relieved. However, he is not to be taken, butgreeted with a Good- morrow, the others bending the knee:and thus the tournament uses to end.CH. XXV. -How the thirty- two persons at the ball fought.THE two companies having taken their stations, the musicstruck up, and, with a martial sound, which had somethingof horrid in it, like a point of war, roused and alarmed bothparties, who now began to shiver, and then soon were warmedwith warlike rage; and having got in readiness to fightdesperately, impatient of delay, stood waiting for the charge.Then the music of the silvered band ceased playing, andthe instruments of the golden side alone were heard, whichdenoted that the golden party attacked. Accordingly, a newmovement was played for the onset, and we saw the nymph,who stood before the queen, turn to the left towards hcrking, as it were to ask leave to fight: and thus saluting hercompany at the same time, she moved two squares forwards,and saluted the adverse party.Now the music of the golden brigade ceased playing, andtheir antagonists began again. I ought to have told youthat the nymph, who began by saluting her company, hadby that formality also given them to understand that theywere to fall on. She was saluted by them, in the samemanner, with a full turn to the left, except the queen, whowent aside towards her king to the right; and the samemanner of salutation was observed on both sides during thewhole ball.The silvered nymph that stood before her queen likewisemoved, as soon as the music of her party sounded a charge:her salutations, and those of her side, were to the right, andher queen's to the left. She moved in the second squareforwards, and saluted her antagonists, facing the first golden476 RABELAIS' WORKS. [ BOOKnymph so that there was not any distance between them,and you would have thought they two had been going toight; but they only strike sideways.Their comrades, whether silvered or golden, followedthem in an intercalary figure, and seemed to skirmish awhile, till the golden nymph, who had first entered the lists,striking a silvered nymph in the hand on the right, put herout of the field, and set herself in her place. But soonthemusic playing a new measure, she was struck by a silveredarcher, who after that was obliged himself to retire. Asilvered knight then sallied out, and the golden queen postedherself before her king.Then the silvered king, dreading the golden queen's fury,removed to the right, to the place where his warden stood,which seemed to him strong and well guarded.The two knights on the left, whether golden or silvered.marched up, and on either side, took up many nymphs, whecould not retreat; principally the golden knight, who madethis his whole business; but the silvered knight had greaterdesigns, dissembling all along, and even sometimes not taking a nymph when he could have done it, still moving on talhe was come up to the main body of the enemies, in such amanner, that he saluted their king with a God save you, sir!The whole golden brigade quaked for fear and anger, thosewords giving notice of their king's danger; not but thattheycould soon relieve him, but because their king being thussaluted, they were to lose their warden on the right wing,without any hopes of a recovery. Then the golden king retired to the left, and the silver knight took the golden warden.which was a mighty loss to that party. However, they resolved to be revenged, and surrounded the knight that hemight not escape. He tried to get off, behaving himself witha great deal of gallantry, and his friends did what they couldto save him; but at last he fell into the golden queen's hands,and was carried off.Her forces, not yet satisfied , having lost one of her bestmen, with more fury than conduct, moved about, and didmuch mischief among their enemies. The silvered partywarily dissembled, watching their opportunity to be evenwith them, and presented one of their nymphs to the goldenqueen , having laid an ambuscado; so that the nymph being taken, a golden archer had like to have seized the silveredOHAF. XXV. ]PANTAGRUEL. 477queen. Then the golden knight undertakes to take the silvered king and queen, and says, Good-morrow. Then thesilvered archer salutes them, and was taken by a goldennymph, and she herself by a silvered one.The fight was obstinate and sharp. The wardens left theirposts, and advanced to relieve their friends . The battle was doubtful, and victory hovered over both armies. Now thesilvered host charge and break through their enemy's ranks,as far as the golden king's tent, and now they are beatenback the golden queen distinguishes herself from the restby her mighty achievements, still more than by her garb anddignity; for at once she takes an archer, and going side- ways, seizes a silvered warden. Which thing the silvered queen perceiving, she came forwards, and rushing onwith equal bravery, takes the last golden warden, and somenymphs. The two queens fought a long while hand to hand;now striving to take each other by surprise, then to savethemselves, and sometimes to guard their kings. Finally ,the golden queen took the silvered queen; but presentlyafter she herself was taken by the silvered archer.Then the silvered king had only three nymphs, an archer,and a warden left, and the golden only three nymphs andthe right knight, which made them fight more slowly and warily than before. The two kings seemed to mourn for theloss of their loving queens, and only studied and endeavouredto get new ones out of all their nymphs, to be raised to thatdignity, and thus be married to them. This made them excite those brave nymphs to strive to reach the farthest rank,where stood the king of the contrary party, promising themcertainly to have them crowned if they could do this. The golden nymphs were beforehand with the others, and out oftheir number was created a queen, who was dressed in royal robes, and had a crown set on her head. You need notdoubt the silvered nymphs made also what haste they couldto be queens one of them was within a step of the coronation place; but there the golden knight lay ready to inter- cept her, so that she could go no further.The new golden queen, resolved to show herself valiant,and worthy of her advancement to the crown, achieved great feats of arms. But, in the mean time, the silvered knighttakes the golden warden who guarded the camp: and thusthere was a new silvered queen, who, like the other, strove to478 RABELAIS WORKS [BOOKY. .excel in heroic deeds at the beginning of her reign. Thusthe fight grew hotter than before. Athousand stratagems.charges, rallyings, retreats, and attacks , were tried on bothsides; till at last the silvered queen, having by stealth advanced as far as the golden king's tent, cried , God save you,sir! Now none but his new queen could relieve him: so shebravely came and exposed herself to the utmost extremity todeliver him out of it. Then the silvered warden, with hisqueen, reduced the golden king to such a stress, that, to savehimself, he was forced to lose his queen: but the goldenking took him at last . However, the rest of the golden partywere soon taken; and that king being left alone, the silveredparty made him a low bow, crying, Good- morrow, sir! whichdenoted that the silvered king had got the day.This being heard, the music of both parties loudly proclaimed the victory. And thus the first battle ended to theunspeakable joy of all the spectators .After this the two brigades took their former stations, andbegan to tilt a second time, much as they had done before.only the music played somewhat faster than at the first battle,and the motions were altogether different. I saw the goldenqueen sally out one of the first, with an archer and a knight,as it were angry at the former defeat, and she had like tohave fallen upon the silvered king in his tent among hisofficers; but having been baulked in her attempt, she skirmished briskly, and overthrew so many silvered nymphs andofficers, that it was a most amazing sight. You would havesworn she had been another Penthesilea; for she behavedherself with as much bravery as that Amazonian queen didat Troy.But this havoc did not last long; for the silvered party,exasperated by their loss , resolved to perish, or stop her pro- gress; and having posted an archer in ambuscado, on a distant angle, together with a knight- errant, her highness feli into their hands, and was carried out of the field . The restwere soon routed after the taking of their queen, who, without doubt, from that time resolved to be more wary, and keep near her king, without venturing so far amidst her enemies, unless with more force to defend her. Thus the silverbrigade once more got the victory.This did not dishearten or deject the golden party: farfrom it, they soon appeared again in the field to face theirCHAP. XXV.1 PANTAGRUEL. 479enem.es; and being posted as before, both the armies seemed more resolute and cheerful than ever. Nowthe martial concert began, and the music was above a hemiole the quicker,according to the warlike Phrygian mode, such as was in- vented by Marsyas.Then our combatants began to wheel about, and charge with such a swiftness, that in an instant they made four moves,besides the usual salutations . So that they were continuallyin action, flying, hovering, jumping, vaulting, curvetting,with petauristical turns and motions, and often intermingled.Seeing them then turn about on one foot after they hadmade their honours, we compared them to your tops or gigs,such as boys use to whip about; making them turn roundso swiftly, that they sleep, as they call it, and motion cannotbe perceived, but resembles rest, its contrary: so that if youmake a point or mark on some part of one of those gigs, itwill be perceived not as a point, but a continual line in a mostdivine manner, as Cusanus has wisely observed.While they were thus warmly engaged, we heard continually the claps and episemapsies, which those of the two bands.reiterated at the taking of their enemies; and this , joined tothe variety of their motions and music, would have forcedsmiles out of the most severe Cato, the never-laughing Crassus, the Athenian man-hater, Timon: nay, even whiningHeracl*tus, though he abhorred laughing, the action that is most peculiar to man. For who could have forborn? seeingthose young warriors, with their nymphs and queens, sobriskly and gracefully advance, retire, jump, leap, skip , spring,fly, vault, caper, move to the right, to the left, every way stillin time, so swiftly, and yet so dexterously, that they nevertouched one another but methodically.As the number of the combatants lessened, the pleasure of the spectators increased; for the stratagems and motions ofthe remaining forces were more singular. I shall only add,that this pleasing entertainment charmed us to such a degree,that our minds were ravished with admiration and delight;and the martial harmony moved our souls so powerfully,that we easily believed what is said of Ismenias's having ex- cited Alexander to rise from table and run to his arms, withsuch a warlike melody. At last the golden king remainedmaster ofthe field: and while we were minding those dancers,Queen Whims vanished, so that we saw her no more fromthat day to this.480 RABELAIS' WORKS. [ BOOK V.Then Geber's nichelots conducted us, and we were setdown among her abstractors, as her queenship had commanded. After that we returned to the port of Mateotechny,and thence straight aboard our ships: for the wind was fair,and had we not hoisted out of hand, we could hardly havegot off in three quarters of a moon in the wane.ON CHAPS. XXIV. AND XXV. —The ball in the manner of a tournament, which was performed before the queen, is a most lively and ingenious description of the game of chess. The floor of the hall, whichis covered with a large piece of velveted white and yellow chequered tapestry, means the chequer board. The thirty-two young persons,one-half drest in cloth of gold, and the other in cloth of silver, are thethirty-two chess men; kings, queens, bishops, knights, rooks, and pawns. They play three games; the two first are won by the silvered king, and the last by his adversary.Our author, who cannot be too much admired for his art in raising satirical reflections of great moment, most naturally, out of trifles where they are least expected, in the midst of this admirable allegory, seems to have reflected upon his King Francis' rashness, which made himtobe taken prisoner at the battle of Pavia; for, speaking of the golden queen, who, in this latruncularian war ( if I may use the expression skirmished too boldly, and was taken, he says, the rest were soon routed after the taking of their queen; who, without doubt, from that time resolved to be more wary, and not to venture so far amidst her enemies, unless with more forces to defend her.He also brought in very pleasantly Cardinal Cusa's boyish observa- tion , in his simile on a top or gig; and so he has done almost all over this work.He is not less artful in bringing off his Pantagruelists, that they may no longer be hindered by whims from arriving at the Oracle of Truthfor he says, that while they minded this pleasing entertainment, andwere charmed with the melody that played to the dancers, Queen Whims vanished; and they strait went on board their ships, the wind being fair for had they not set sail immediately, they could hardly have got off in three quarters of a moon in the wain. That is to say,by the means of music, ingenious games, dancing, and other innocent recreations, many ease their minds of perplexing thoughts, and leavethose crabbed, whimsical, unprofitable studies, which wholly possessed them before; for those idle busy fancies vanish, like the evil spirit of Saul, at the harmonious sound of instruments: but should not themind, after this, be immediately applied to some solid inquiries thatmay engross all its faculties, it would be in danger of being taken up again with unnecessary and uncertain businesses.It is observable that Rabelais has made these chapters very clear,and almost sufficient to teach a man to play at chess; that his satiricaallegories throughout the work, which are darker , might be thought of no greater moment than this ball and tournament. -MCHAP. XXVI. ] PANTAGRuel. 481CH. XXVI. -How we came to the Island of Odes, where the ways go up and down.WE sailed before the wind, between a pair of courses, andin two days made the island of Odes, at which place we saw a very strange thing. The ways there are animals; so trueis Aristotle's saying, that all self- moving things are animals.Nowthe ways walk there. Ergo, they are then animals.Some ofthem are strange unknown ways, like those of theplanets! others are highways, crossways, and bye-ways. Iperceived that the travellers and inhabitants of that country asked-Whither does this way go? Whither does that way? Some answered, between Midy and Fevrolles , to theparish church, to the city, to the river, and so forth. Beingthus in their right way, they used to reach their journey's end without any farther trouble, just like those who go by water from Lyons to Avignon or Arles.goNow, as you know that nothing is perfect here below, weheard there was a sort of people whom they called highwaymen, way-beaters, and makers of inroads in roads; and thatthe poor ways were sadly afraid of them, and shunned themas you do robbers. For these used to waylay them, aspeople lay trains for wolves, and set gins for woodco*cks. Isaw one who was taken up with a lord chief justice's warrant, for having unjustly, and in spite of Pallas , taken theschoolway, which is the longest. Another boasted that hehad fairly taken the shortest, and that doing so, he firstcompassed his design. Thus, Carpalim, meeting once Epistemon looking upon a wall with his fiddle-diddle, or liveurinal, in his hand, to make a little maid's water, cried, thathe did not wonder now howthe other came to be still thefirst at Pantagruel's levee, since he held his shortest and least used.I found Bourges highway among these. It went withthe deliberation of an abbot, but was made to scamper atthe approach of some waggoners, who threatened to haveit trampled under their horses' feet, and make their waggons run over it, as Tullia's chariot did over her father'sbody.I also espied there the old way between Peronne and St.Quentin, which seemed to me a very good, honest, plain way,as smooth as a carpet, and as good as ever was trod upon by shoe of leather.VOL. II. I I482 [BOOK V. RABELAIS' WORKS.Among the rocks I knew again the good old way to laFerrare, mounted on a huge bear. This at a distance wouldhave put me in mind of St. Jerome's picture , had but thebear been a lion; for the poor way was all mortified, andwore a long hoary beard uncombed and entangled, whichlooked like the picture of winter, or at least like a whitefrosted bush.On that way were store of beads or rosaries, coarsely madeof wild pine-tree; and it seemed kneeling, not standing, norlying flat; but its sides and middle were beaten with hugestones, insomuch that it proved to us at once an object of fear and pity.While we were examining it, a runner, bachelor of theplace, took us aside, and showing us a white smooth way,somewhat filled with straw, said, Henceforth, gentlemen, denot reject the opinion of Thales the Milesian, who said thatwater is the beginning of all things; nor that of Homer,who tells us that all things derive their original from theocean for this same way which you see here had its beginning from water, and is to return whence she came, beforetwo months come to an end; now carts are driven here where boats used to be rowed.Truly, said Pantagruel, you tell us no news; we see fivehundred such changes, and more, every year, in our world.Then reflecting on the different manner of going of thosemoving ways, he told us he believed that Philolaus andAristarchus had philosophized in this island, and that Seleucus, indeed, was of opinion, the earth turns round about itspoles, and not the heavens, whatever we may think to thecontrary: As, when we are on the river Loire, we think thetrees and the shore moves, though this is only an effect of our boat's motion.As we went back to our ships , we saw three waylayers,who, having been taken in ambuscado, were going to bebroken on the wheel; and a huge fornicator was burned witha lingering fire, for beating away and breaking one of itssides we were told it was the way of the banks of the Nilein Egypt.ON CHAP. XXVI -The Island of Odes, where the ways go up anddown, is the subject of this chapter. The author seems partly inclined to droll, by the means of an hypallagical expression, used by the Eng lish as well as by the French; while, speaking of a way or road, weCHAP. XXVII.] PANTAGRUEL. 483ask, whither it goes? instead of asking, to what place men go by that way? He takes thence an opportunity to banter Aristotle's saying,that all self-moving things are animals.By the by, he gives a touch to the schoolmen, when he says, that he saw one taken up with a warrant, for having, in spite of Pallas, (invitâ Minerva, ) taken the school-way, which is the longest. What he says of Bourges highway, which went with the deliberation of an abbot,must be understood of that university, famous for the study of the civil law.He calls it the Island of Odes from ' Odòc, which signifies a way orroad; a conveniency to forward us in a journey, as a waggon, boat, &c.,a way or rule of living; a method; and finally, an ambush on a road by robbers.-M.Cн. XXVII. — How we came to the Island of Sandals; and ofthe order of Semiquaver Friars.THENCE We went to the island of Sandals, whose inhabitantslive on nothing but ling- broth. However, we were very kindlyreceived and entertained by Benius the Third, king of theisland , who, after he had made us drink, took us with himto show us a spick- and- span new monastery, which he hadcontrived for the Semiquaver Friars: so he called the religious men whom he had there. For he said that, on theother side of the water lived friars who styled themselves hersweet ladyship's most humble servants. Item, the goodlyFriar-minors, who are semibreves of bulls; the smokedherring tribe of Minim Friars; then the Crotchet FriarsSo that these diminutives could be no more than Semiquavers. By the statutes, bulls, and patents of QueenWhims, they were all dressed like so many house- burners,except that, as in Anjou your tilers used to quilt their kneeswhen they tile houses, so these holy friars had usually quiltedbellies, and thick quilted paunches were among them inmuch repute. Their cod- pieces were cut slipper- fashion ,and every monk among them wore two-one sewed beforeandanother behind-reporting that some certain dreadful mysteries were duly represented by this duplicity of cod- pieces.They wore shoes as round as basons, in imitation of those who inhabit the sandy sea. Their chins were closed shaved,and their feet iron- shod; and to show they did not valuefortune, Benius made them shave and poll the hind part of their poles, as bare as a bird's arse, from the crown to theshoulder-blades; but they had leave to let their hair growbefore, from the two triangular bones in the upper part of the skull.II 2484 [BOOKY. RABELAIS' WORKS.Thus did they not value fortune a button, and cared nomore for the goods of this world than you or I do for hanging.And to show how much they defied that blind jilt, all of them wore, not in their hands like her, but at their waist, insteadof beads, sharp razors, which they used to new grind twicea-day, and set thrice a-night.Each of them had a round ball on their feet, because Fortune is said to have one under hers.The flap of their cowls hanged forward, and not back.wards, like those of others; thus, none could see their noses,and they laughed without fear both at fortune and the fortunate; neither more nor less than our ladies laugh at barefaced trulls, when they have those mufflers on, which theycall masks, and which were formerly much more properlycalled charity, because they cover a multitude of sins.The hind part of their faces were always uncovered, as areour faces, which made them either go with the belly or the arse foremost, which they pleased. When their hind facewent forwards, you would have sworn this had been theirnatural gait, as well on account of their round shoes as of thedouble cod-piece, and their face behind, which was as bareas the back of my hand, and coarsely daubed over with twoeyes and a mouth, such as you see on some Indian nuts.Now, if they offered to waddle along with their bellies forwards, you would have then thought they were playing atLindman's buff. May I never be hanged if it was not a co- mical sight.Their way of living was thus. About owl- light they charitably began to boot and spur one another; this being done,the least thing they did was to sleep and snore; and thussleeping, they had barnacles on the handles of their faces, orspectacles at most.You may swear we did not a little wonder at this oddfancy but they satisfied us presently, telling us that the dayof judgment is to take mankind napping; therefore, to showthey did not refuse to make their personal appearance, asfortune's darlings used to do, they were always thus bootedand spurred, ready to mount whenever the trumpet should sound.At noon, as soon as the clock struck, they used to awake.You must know that their clock- bell, church- bells, and refectuary-bells, were all made according to the pontial device,CHAP. XXVII. ]PANTAGRUEL. 485that is, quilted with the finest down, and their clappers of fox-tails.Having then make shift to get up at noon, they pulled offtheir boots, and those that wanted to speak with a maid,alias piss, pissed; those that wanted to scumber, scumbered;and those that wanted to sneeze, sneezed. But all, whetherthey would or no, (poor gentlemen! ) were obliged largelyand plentifully to yawn; and this was their first breakfast,(O rigorous statute! ) Methought it was very comical to observe their transactions: for, having laid their boots and spurson a rack, they went into the cloisters; there they curiouslywashed their hands and mouths, then sat them down on along bench, and picked their teeth till the provost gave thesignal, whistling through his fingers; then every he stretchedout his jaws as much as he could, and they gaped andyawned for about half an hour, sometimes more, sometimesless, according as the priorjudged the breakfast to be suitableto the day.After that they went in procession, two banners beingcarried before them, in one of which was the picture of Virtue, and that of Fortune in the other. The last went before, carried by a semiquavering-friar, at whose heels wasanother, with the shadow or image of Virtue in one hand,and an holy-water-sprinkle in the other; I mean of that holymercurial- water, which Ovid describes in his Fasti. And asthe preceding Semiquaver rang a hand- bell, this shaked thesprinkle with his fist. With that, says Pantagruel, Thisorder contradicts the rule which Tully and the academicsprescribed, that Virtue ought to go before, and Fortunefollow. But they told us they did as they ought, seeing theirdesign was to breech, lash, and bethwack Fortune.During the processions, they trilled and quavered mostmelodiously betwixt their teeth , I do not know what antiphonies, or chauntings, by turns; for my part, it was allHebrew- Greek to me, the devil a word I could pick out ofit; at last, pricking up my ears, and intensely listening, Iperceived they only sang with the tip of theirs. Oh, whata rare harmony it was! How well it was tuned to the soundof their bells! You will never find those to jar , that youwill not. Pantagruel made a notable observation upon the processions: For, says he, have you seen and observed thepolicy of these Semiquavers? To make an end of their proces-456 RABELAIS' WORKS. [BOOK Y.sion, they went out at one of their church doors and came in atthe other; they took a deal of care not to come in at the place whereat they went out. On my honour, these are a subtlesort of people, quoth Panurge; they have as much wit asthree folks, two fools and a madman; they are as wise asthe calf that ran nine miles to suck a bull, and when be came there it was a steer. This subtilty and wisdom oftheirs, cried Friar John, is borrowed from the occult philoso phy: may I be gutted like an oyster if I can tell what tomake of it. Then the more it is to be feared, said Pantagruel; for subtilty suspected, subtilty foreseen, subtilty foundout, loses the essence and very name of subtilty, and onlygains that of blockishness. They are not such fools as youtakethem to be; they have more tricks than are good, I doubt.After the procession they went sluggingly into the frayroom , by the way of walk and healthful exercise, and therkneeled under the tables, leaning their breasts on lanterns.While they were in that posture, in came a huge Sandalwith a pitchfork in his hand, who used to baste, rib-roasswaddle, and swinge them well favouredly, as they said, andin truth treated them after a fashion. They began theirmeal as you end yours-with cheese, and ended it with mutard and lettuce, as Martial tells us the ancients did. Afterwards, a platter full of mustard was brought before everyone of them, and thus they made good the proverb-afte meat comes mustard.Their diet was this .On Sundays they stuffed their puddings with puddings,cnitterlings, links, Bologna sausages, forced- meats, liverings,hogs' -haslets, young quails, and teals: you must also always add cheese for the first course, and mustard for the last.On Mondays they were crammed with pease and pork, cumcommento, and interlineary glosses,On Tuesdays they used to twist store of holy-bread, cakes,buns, puffs, lenten loaves, jumbals, and biscuits.On Wednesdays my gentlemen had fine sheep's-headscalves' - heads, and brocks' - heads, of which there is no wantin that country.On Thursdays they guzzled down seven sorts of porridge,not forgetting mustard.On Fridays they munched nothing but services or sortapples; neither were these full ripe, as I guessed by theircomplexion.CHAP. XXVII.]PANTAGRUEL. 487On Saturdays they gnawed bones; not that they were pooror needy, for every mother's son of them had a very good fatbelly-benefice.As for their drink, it was an antifortunal; thus they calledI do not know what sort of a liquor of the place.When they wanted to eat or drink, they turned down theback-points or flaps oftheir cowls forwards, below their chins,and that served them instead of gorgets or slabbering- bibs.When they had well dined, they prayed rarely all in quavers and shakes; and the rest of the day, expecting the dayof judgment, they were taken up with acts of charity, andparticularly On Sundays rubbers at cuffs .On Mondays, lending each other flirts and fillips on thenose.On Tuesdays, clapperclawing one another.On Wednesdays, sniting and fly- flapping.On Thursdays, worming and pumping.On Fridays tickling.On Saturdays jirking and firking one another.Such was their diet when they resided in the convent, andif the prior of the monk-house sent any of them abroad, thenthey were strictly enjoined neither to touch nor eat any man- ner of fish, as long as they were on sea or rivers, and to abstain from all manner of flesh whenever they were at land;that every one might be convinced that, while they enjoyedthe object, they denied themselves the power, and even thedesire, and were no more moved with it than the Marpesianrock.All this was done with proper antiphones, still sung andchaunted by ear, as we have already observed.When the sun went to bed, they fairly booted and spurredeach other as before, and having clapped on their barnacles,even jogged to bed too. At midnight the Sandal came tothem, and up they got, and having well wetted and set theirrazors, and been a processioning, they clapped the tablesover themselves, and like wire- drawers under their work, fell to it as aforesaid.Friar John des Entoumeures, having shrewdly observedthese jolly Semiquaver Friars, and had a full account of theirstatutes, lost all patience, and cried out aloud-Bounce tail,and God have mercy guts; ifevery fool should wear a bauble,488 [BOOK ,RABELAIS' WORKS.fuel would be dear. A plague rot it, we must know howmany farts go to an ounce. Would Priapus were here, ahe used to be at the nocturnal festivals in Crete, that I mightsee him play backwards, and wriggle and shake to the purpose. Ay, ay, this is the world, and that other is the country;may I never piss if this be not an antichthonian land, and ourvery antipodes. In Germany they pull down monasteriesand unfrockify the monks; here they go quite kam, and aclean contrary to others, setting new ones up, against thehair.ON CHAP. XXVII. -The Island of the Sandals is the next phas which our travellers visit. Rabelais calls it l'isle des Esclots. Exis a patten, sandal, or a wooden shoe in some parts of France, parcularly towards Thoulouse: so because it is the dwelling of friars, an many of them wear sandals or clogs; I call it the Island of SandalsYet as the word esclop was formerly used in France for esclave, a siare,I am persuaded that our author gave that name of esclot to this isimichiefly to disguise his intent, which was to tell us that its inhabiausare esclops, slaves: for such all monks become to the will of their suse- riors, by the vow of obedience which they are obliged to make at thadmission into their respective sodalities. All this chapter is a mescutting satire on monachism in general, and seems to reflect particlarly on the Jesuits: but the author has affected to be mystical aalong, in what may be applied to them.The Jesuits may well be called slaves, considering their rules; sm of which are these, exhibited in Exercita spiritualia Ign. Loyola,printed at Antwerp, They must abandon all judgment of their ow be always ready to obey the Church of Rome, and believe that blacks white, and white is black, if she says it: they ought to regard the cur mand of their superior, as that of God himself, and submit to his government, as though they were mere machines, or an old man's staff, to moved at his pleasure."It was upon this account that Pope Paul III. confirmed the establish ment oftheir society, which was not to exceed sixty, in 1540, abom ten years before Rabelais wrote this book. The time of their institu- tion agrees very well with what Rabelais says, that Benius III. showa spick and span- new monastery to our travellers, contrived byhim fa the semiquaver friars. What is added may refer to all monks and friars in general.By the statutes, bulls, and patents of Queen Whims, they were drest like so many house- burners: this reflects first on the pope andhbulls, as being whimsical, for setting up new monasteries against thehair, while many pull them down; and then implies that they bur the houses where they come; wasting the substance of families, and blowing up the fire of division every where.Their quilted paunches show that they love to stuff their hides to the purpose.Their double codvieces, one before and the other behind, show, thưCHAP. XXVII.]PANTAGRUEL. 489many a monk, and particularly a Jesuit, is ad utrumque paratus; àparte post et à parte ante; and may well say, hanc veniam petimusque damusque vicissim. This abominable practice of theirs made the authorssay, that some dreadful mysteries were duly represented by this dupli- city of codpieces; and as he speaks in the plural, they may also imply,that a monk does as much work as two others at the venereal exercise.Their shoes are round; that they may move forward, backward, or sideways, as their interest guides them.Their chins are close shaven; to show there is no holding or fleecing a monk; or, to speak more plainly, nothing to be got by them.Their feet are iron- shod; because there is no driving them out when once they get footing: for they stick close, and firmly keep their hold.They shave the hind parts of their polls, from the crown to the omo- plata, or the muscles of the shoulder- blade; that none may take hold ofthem behind.They wear sharp razors at their waist. This may mean a good sto- mach, or that they cut to the quick whatever lies in their way.They grind them twice a-day, and set them thrice a- night; by the means of their matins, vigils, the office of the day, &c.They have a round ball on their feet. This ball is the world, which they would gladly bring under their subjection: neither is it strange it should be said to be on their feet, in opposition to fortune that has aball under her's . For, it is said by Friar John, at the end of the chap- ter; Ay, ay, this is the world, and the other is the country: may I never piss, if this be not an antichthonian land; and our very antipodes. So that, according to the vulgar acceptation, supposing the earth to be here under our feet, it must be on or above our antipodes .The flaps of their cowls hide their noses; so they laugh without fear both at fortune and the fortunate: that is , within their monasteries,they laugh in their sleeves at those whose good fortune enables them,and whose foolishness inclines them, to help to maintain them in their idleness.The hind parts of their heads are always uncovered; as are our faces,and coarsely daubed over with eyes and a mouth: which denotes the grimaces and antic tricks with which they amuse the silly people, in amanner only showing their backside to them, while, as we have said,they really laugh to one another at the gulled mob's simplicity.When their hind face went forward, you would have sworn this had been their natural gait: that is , by their vow of poverty they grow rich,rule by their vow of obedience, are the lewder for their vow of chastity,and get forward when they seem to lose ground.If they offered to waddle along with their bellies forwards, you would have thought they were then playing at blind-man's-buff: because they are not used to walk fairly, or act like other people, and are to seek when they must leave their crooked ways, and go the right way to work.They are booted and spurred , as it were, to take a journey to heaven;but instead of hastening thither on horseback, they sleep and snore as soon as it is owl- light.They are obliged to yawn, and that is their breakfast. This impliestheir laziness, and perhaps the singing or bawling at matins.They wash their hands and mouths. This may be the taking ofholy water.490 [BOOK V. RABELAIS' WORKS.Then they sit down on a long bench, and pick their teeth, till the provost gives the signal; which heard, they stretch out their jaws awide as they can, and gape and yawn for about half an hour, more aless, according to the day. This may mean their sitting down, while the office of the day is read, and then their singing and quavering.After this, they went in procession, going out at another door than that through which they came into the church whence Pantagruel concludes, that they are not such fools as his attendants take them to be, having more holes than one to creep out at.Cogitato mus pusillus quam sit sapiens bestia,Ætatem qui uni cubili nunquam committit suam;Quia si unum ostium obsideatur, aliud perfugium quærit.PLAUTUS, Must. act. 4.At the procession , the idol of Fortune is carried in state, and the image of Virtue follows it, carried by a semiquaver, who all the whi besprinkles the idol with holy water; which shows that Fortune goes before Virtue among the monks, and that they are lavish of their in- cense to none but the fortunate.After the procession, they went into the fratry-room, and there kneeled under the tables; because it is the heaven where reside theonly gods they adore, placed in the dishes as on so many thrones. Tis way of explaining this dark passage, appears the more justifiable, co- sidering what Pantagruel says, in the 34th chapter, to the illustrious lantern that guided him and his company through an arbour covered over with leaves and branches of vines, and loaded with clusters."Jupiter's priestess, " said he, " would not, like us, have walked under this arbour." " There was a mystical reason, ' answered the mostconspicuous lantern, " that would have hindered her: for had she gone under it, the wine, or the grapes of which it is made, that is the same thing, had been over her head, and then she would have seemed over- topped and mastered by wine; which signifies," &c.??They had each of them a lantern below the breast and stomach on which they leaned . The lantern should be an empty belly: for after their breakfast, which consisted only of yawning, chanting, and que vering, they had not so filled themselves as not to want to stuff the gut.The huge Sandal, who, while they were in that posture, used to come in with a pitchfork in his hand, and treated them after a fashion,is the friar, who always comes in with a book, in which he reads while they are at table.They begin their meal with cheese, and end it with mustard and lettuce. This shows, like most of this chapter, that these semiquavers affect a way of living quite contrary to other men's; and as cheese is esteemed heavy food, and hard to be digested, when much of it is eaten,principally by itself, and before we are filled with other things, whose digestion it might help; so by cheese may be meant the benedicite, agrace before meat, which is as heavy, tedious, and irksome to the glut tonous hungry fraternity, as a long- winded presbyterian grace to ahalf-famished libertine, when dinner is upon the table.The mustard and lettuce, with which they end the meal, is the agi- mus, or grace after meat, almost as unpleasant to the semiquavers, was think it unseasonable, because they are in haste to go about the recreaCHAP. XXVIII. ]PANTAGRUEL. 491tions mentioned in the next chapter. Our author, according to his custom of hiding his touches of the satire in equivocal expressions,may mean, that this ceremony after dinner, moult tarde, multum tardat,is tedious, and les tue, is death to them; thus punning upon moutarde and laitue.After dinner, they pass some time in praising those gods who blest them with so sweet a life, and are taken up the rest of the day withacts of charity; as rubbers at cuffs, sniting and fly- flapping, worming and pumping, tickling, jirking, and firking one another; and such other pious deeds, as are contained in the twenty- eighth chapter.Then at night they boot and spur each other, (by which something very odious seems meant) and clap their barnacles on the handles oftheir faces; which may imply that they are obliged to look about them,for fear of being discovered.At midnight they are called up by one of their brother Sandals, and do as in the day- time.When they are on the sea and rivers, they are enjoined neither to touch nor eat any manner of fish; and to abstain from all manner of flesh when they are at land. That is, monks use to seem kind to those who are near them, and who support them, and only bite the absent:yet even this is not always true; but it is more certain , that as they are dainty, they long for things that are not easily got; as for example,fresh meat at sea, and fresh fish at land, chiefly in such inland places as are very remote from seas or rivers. -M.CH. XXVIII.-How Panurge asked a Semiquaver Friar manyquestions, and was only answered in monosyllables.PANURGE, who had since been wholly taken up with staringat these royal Semiquavers, at last pulled one of them bythe sleeve, who was as lean as a rake,' and asked him, -Hearkee me, Friar Quaver, Semiquaver, Demisemiquavering quaver, where is the punk!The Friar, pointing downwards, answered, There.PAN. Pray, have you many? FRI. Few.PAN. How many scores have you? FRI. One.PAN. How many would you have? FRI. Five.PAN. Where do you hide them? FRI. Here.PAN. I suppose they are not all of one age; but, pray, howis their shape? FRI. Straight.PAN. Their complexion? FRI. Clear.PAN. Their hair? FRI. Fair.PAN. Their eyes? FRI. Black.PAN. Their features? FRI. Good.PAN. Their brows? FRI. Soft.PAN. Their graces? FRI. Ripe.PAN. Their looks? FRI. Free.1 As a dried red-herring devil, in the original.492 RABELAIS WORKS.! BOOK V.PAN. Their feet? FRI. Flat.PAN. Their heels? FRI. Short.PAN. Their lower parts? FRI. Rare.PAN. And their arms? FRI. Long.PAN. What do they wear on their hands?PAN. What sort of rings on their fingers?PAN. What rigging do you keep them in?PAN. What sort of cloth is it? FRI. New.PAN. What colour? FRI. Sky.PAN. What kind of cloth is it?PAN. What caps do they wear?FRI. Fine.FRI. Blue.FRI. Gloves.FRI. Gold.FRI. Cloth.PAN. What is the colour of their stockings? FRI. Red.PAN. What wear they on their feet? FRI. Pumps.PAN. How do they use to be? FRI. Foul.PAN. How do they use to walk? FRI. Fast.PAN. Now let us talk of the kitchen, I mean that of theharlots, and without going hand over head, let us a littleexamine things by particulars. What is in their kitchens?FRI. Fire.PAN. What fuel feeds it? FRI. Wood.PAN. What sort of wood is it? FRI. Dry.PAN. And of what kind of trees? FRI. Yew.PAN. What are the fa*ggots and brushes of? FRI. Holme.PAN. What wood do you burn in your chambers? FRI.Pine.PAN. And of what other trees? FRI. Lime.PAN. Hearkee me; as for the buttocks, I will go yourhalves: pray, how do you feed them? FRI. Well,PAN. First, what do they eat? FRI. Bread.PAN. Of what complexion? FRI. White.PAN. And what else? FRI. Meat.PAN. How do they love it dressed? FRI. Roast.PAN. What sort of porridge? FRI . None.PAN. Are they for pies and tarts? FRI. Much.PAN. Then I am their man. Will fish go down withtnem? FRI. Well.PAN. And what else? FRI. Eggs.PAN. How do they like them? FRI. Boiled.PAN. How must they be done? FRI. Hard.PAN. Is this all they have? FRI. No.PAN. What have they besides, then? FRI. Beef.PAN. And what else? FRI. Pork.CHAP. XXVIII . ]PANTAGRUEL. 493PAN. And what more? FRI. Geese.PAN. What then? FRI. Ducks.PAN. And what besides? FRI. co*cks.PAN. What do they season their meat with? FRI. Salt.PAN. What sauce are they most dainty for? FRI. Must.PAN. What is their last course? FRI. Rice.PAN. And what else? FRI. Milk.PAN. What besides? FRI. Peas.PAN. What sort? FRI. Green.PAN. What do they boil with them? FRI. Pork.PAN. What fruit do they eat? FRI. Good.PAN. HOW? FRI. Raw.PAN. What do they end with? FRI. Nuts.PAN. How do they drink? FRI. Neat.PAN. What liquor? FRI. Wine.PAN. What sort? FRI. White.PAN. In winter? FRI. Strong.PAN. In the spring? FRI. Brisk.PAN. In summer? FRI. Cool.PAN. In autumn? FRI. New.Buttock of a monk! cried Friar John, how plump theseplaguy trulls, these arch Semiquavering strumpets must be!That damned cattle are so high fed that they must needs behigh- mettled, and ready to wince, and give two ups for onego- down, when any one offers to ride them below thecrupper.Pr'ythee, Friar John, quoth Panurge, hold thy prating tongue, stay till I have done.Till what time do the doxies sit up? FRI. Night.PAN. When do they get up? FRI. Late.PAN. May I ride on a horse that was foaled of an acorn,if this be not as honest a cod as ever the ground went upon,and as grave as an old gate-post into the bargain. Would tothe blessed St. Semiquaver, and the blessed worthy virginSt. Semiquavera, he were lord chief president (justice ) ofParis. Odsbodikins, how he would dispatch! With whatexpedition would he bring disputes to an upshot! What anabbreviator and clawer of law- suits, reconciler of differences,examiner and fumbler of bags, peruser of bills , scribbler ofrough drafts, and an engrosser of deeds, would he not make!Well, Friar, spare your breath to cool your porridge: come,let us now talk with deliberation, fairly and softly, as law-494 [BOOKT. RABELAIS' WORKS.yers go to heaven. Let us know how you victual the vene real camp. How is the snatchblatch? FRI. Rough.FRI. Hot.PAN. How is the gate- way? FRI. Free.PAN. And how is it within? FRI. Deep.PAN. I mean, what weather is it there?PAN. What shadows the brooks? FRI. Groves.PAN. Of what is the colour of the twigs? FRI. Red.PAN. And that of the old? FRI. Grey.PAN. How are you when you shake? FRI. Brisk.PAN. How is their motion? FRI. Quick.PAN. Would you have them vault or wriggle more?FRI. Less.PAN. What kind of tools are yours? FRI. Big.PAN. And in their helves? FRI. Round.PAN. Of what colour is the tip? FRI. Red.PAN. When they have been used, how are they? FRI.Shrunk.PAN. How much weighs each bag of tools?Pounds.PAN. How hang your pouches? FRI. Tight.FRI.PAN. How are they when you have done? FRI. Lank.PAN. Now, by the oath you have taken, tell me, when you have a mind to cohabit, how you throw them? FRI.Down.PAN. And what do they say then? FRI. Fie.PAN. However, like maids, they say nay, and take it:and speak the less , but think the more; minding the work in hand: do they not? FRI. True.PAN. Do they get you bairns? FRI. None.PAN. How do you pig together? FRI. Bare.PAN. Remember you are upon your oath, and tell mejustly, and bonâ fide, how many times a day you monk it?FRI. Six.PAN. How many bouts a-nights? FRI. Ten.Cat so, quoth Friar John, the poor fornicating brother isbashful, and sticks at sixteen, as if that were his stint.Right, quoth Panurge, but couldst thou keep pace with him,Friar John, my dainty cod? May the devil's dam suck myteat, if he does not look as if he had got a blow over thenose with a Naples cowl- staff.PAN. Pray, Friar Shakewell, does your whole fraternity quaver and shake at that rate? FRI. All.CHAP. XXVIII. PANTAGRUEL. 495PAN. Who of them is the best co*ck of the game? FRI. I.PAN. Do you never commit dry-bobs or flashes in thepan? FRI. None.PAN. I blush like any black dog , and could be as testy asan old cook, when I think on all this; it passes my understanding. But, pray, when you have been pumped dry oneday, what have you got the next? FRI. More.PAN. By Priapus, they have the Indian herb, of which Theophrastus spoke, or I am much out. But hearkee methou man of brevity, should some impediment, honestly, or otherwise, impair your talents, and cause your benevolence to lessen, how would it fare with you, then? FRI, Ill .PAN. What would the wenches do? FRr. Rail.PAN. What if you skipped, and let them fast a wholeday? FRI. Worse.PAN. What do you give them then? FRI. Thwacks.PAN. What say they to this? FRI. Bawl.PAN. And what else? FRI. Curse.PAN. How do you correct them? FRI. Hard.PAN. What do you get out of them then? FRI. Blood.PAN. How is their complexion then? FRI. Odd.PAN. What do they mend it with? FRI. Paint.PAN. Then, what do they do? FRI. Fawn.PAN. By the oath you have taken, tell me truly, what time of the year do you do it least in? FRI. NOW.2PAN. What season do you do it best in? FRI. March.PAN. How is your performance the rest of the year? FRI.Brisk.Then, quoth Panurge, sneering, Of all , and of all, com- mend me to ball; this is the friar of the world for my money:you have heard how short, concise, and compendious he isin his answers? Nothing is to be got out of him but monosyilables? By jingo, I believe he would make three bitesof a cherry.Damn him, cried Friar John, that is as true as I am hisuncle: the dog yelps at another gat's rate when he is amonghis bitches; there he is polysyllable enough, my life foryours. You talk of making three bites of a cherry! Godsends fools more wit, and us more money; may I be doomedto fast a whole day, if I do not verily believe he would notmake above two bites of a shoulder of mutton, and one2 August496 BOOK V. RABELAIS' WORKS.swoop of a whole pottle of wine; zoons, do but see how lown ofthe mouth the cur looks! He is nothing but skinand bones, he has pissed his tallow.Truly, truly, quoth Epistemon, this rascally monastical vermin all over the world mind nothing but their gut, andare as ravenous as any kites, and then, forsooth, they tell us they have nothing but food and raiment in this world:' sdeath, what more have kings and princes?ON CHAP. XXVIII. -Panurge asks a semiquaver friar many questions concerning the private customs of the monastic tribe, particularlytheir chastity and sobriety: to which the good friar, in more thanlaconic terms, gives serious and most pertinent answers: and thoughnothing but monosyllables can be got from him, he speaks so fully,clearly, and to the purpose, that all the twenty- eighth chapter needsno commentary. By this affected brevity, Rabelais ridicules that of some of the hypocritical monks, when they come among the laity;which makes Friar John say, the dog yelps at another guess rate whenhe is among his bitches; there he is polysyllable enough , my life foryours. -M.CH. XXIX.-How Epistemon disliked the institution ofLent.PRAY did you observe, continued Epistemon, how thisdamned ill- favoured Semiquaver mentioned March as the best month for caterwauling. True, said Pantagruel, yetLent and March always go together, and the first was in- stituted to macerate and bring down our pampered flesh, to weaken and subdue its lusts, and to curb and assuage the venereal rage.By this, said Epistemon, you may guess what kind of apope it was who first enjoined it to be kept, since this filthywooden- shoed Semiquaver owns that his spoon is neveroftener nor deeper in the porringer of lechery than in Lent.Add to this, the evident reasons given by all good andlearned physicians, affirming, that throughout the whole yearno food is eaten, that can prompt mankind to lascivious acts,more than at that time.As for example, beans, peas, phasels, or long- peason,tiches, onions, nuts, oysters, herrings, saltmeats, garum, ( akind of ancohvy) , and salads, wholly made up of venereous herbs and fruits, as,Rocket,Nose-smart,Taragon,Cresses,Parsley,Rampions,Poppy,Celery,Hop-buds,Figs,Rice,Raisins, and others.CHAP. XXIX. ]PANTAGRUEL. 497It would not a little surprise you, said Pantagruel, shoulda man tell you, that the good pope, who first ordered the keeping of Lent, perceiving that at that time of the year thenatural heat (from the centre of the body, whither it wasretired during the winter's cold) diffuses itself, as the sapdoes in trees, through the circumference of the members, didtherefore in a manner prescribe that sort of diet to forward the propagation of mankind. What makes me think so , is ,that by the registers of christenings at Touars, it appears that more children are born in October and November thanin the other ten months of the year, and, reckoning backwards,it will be easily found that they were all made, conceived, andbegotten in Lent.I listen to you with both my ears , quoth Friar John, and that with no small pleasure, I assure you. But I must tellyou, that the vicar of Jambert ascribed this copious prolification of the women, not to that sort of food that we chieflyeat in Lent, but to the little licensed stooping members, yourlittle-booted Lent- preachers, your little draggle-tailed fatherconfessors, who, during all that time of their reign, damnall husbands that run astray, three fathoms and a half belowthe very lowest pit of hell. So the silly cod's-headed brothers of the noose dare not then stumble any more at thetruckle-bed, to the no small discomfort of their maids, andare even forced, poor souls, to take up with their own bodilywives. Dixi, I have done.You may descant on the institution of Lent as muchas you please, cried Epistemon; so many men so manyminds; but certainly all the physicians will be against its being suppressed, though I think that time is at hand: Iknow they will, and have heard them say, were it not forLent, their art would soon fall into contempt, and they wouldget nothing, for hardly anybody would be sick.All distempers are sowed in Lent; it is the true seminaryand native bed of all diseases: nor does it only weaken andputrify bodies, but also makes souls mad and uneasy. Forthen the devils do their best, and drive a subtle trade , andthe tribe of canting dissemblers come out of their holes. Itis then term- time with your cucullated pieces of formality,that have one face to God and the other to the devil; anda wretched clutter they make with their sessions , stations,dardons, syntereses, confessions, whippings, anathemati- VOL. II. K K498 [BOOK V. RABELAIS' WORKS.zations, and much prayer, with as little devotion. How.ever, I will not offer to infer from this that the Arimas.pians are better than we are in that point; yet I speak to the purpose.Well, quoth Panurge to the Semiquaver friar, who happened to be by, dear bumbasting, shaking, trilling, quavering cod, what thinkest thou of this fellow? Is he not a rank heretic? FRI. Much.PAN. Ought he not to be singed? FRI. Well.PAN. As soon as may be? FRI. Right.FRI. Quick.PAN. Should not he be scalded first? FRI . No.PAN. How then, should he be roasted?PAN. Till at last he be? FRI. Dead.PAN. What has he made you? FRI. Mad.PAN. What do you take him to be?PAN. What place is he to go to?PAN. But, first, how would you FRI. Burnt.FRI. Damned.FRI. Hell.have him served here?PAN. Some have been served so? FRI. Store.PAN. That were heretics? FRI. Less.PAN. And the number of those that are to be warmed thushereafter is? FRI. Great.PAN. How many of them do you intend to save? FRLNone.PAN. So you would have them burned? FRI. All.I wonder, said Epistemon to Panurge, what pleasure youcan find in talking thus with this lousy tatterdemallion ofamonk; I vow, did I not know you well, I might be readyto think you had no more wit in your head, than he has inboth his shoulders. Come, come, scatter no words, returnedPanurge, every one as they like, as the woman said wheashe kissed her cow. I wish I might carry him to Gargantua:when I am married he might be my wife's fool. And makeyou one, cried Epistemon. Well said, quoth Friar John:now, poor Panurge, take that along with thee, thou arteven fitted; it is a plain case thou wilt never escape wearingthe bull's feather; thy wife will be as common as the highway, that is certain.ON CHAP. XXIX. -This chapter is full of reflections upon the keeping of Lent, occasioned by the answers of the semiquaver, who concludes in monosyllables that Epistemon ought to be burnt for a rankheretic, because he inveighs against it, and the hypocrisy and tricks of his brother cheats, during that harvest of theirs .- M

• CHAP. XXX.1 PANTAGRUEL. 499

CH. XXX.-How we came to the land of Satin.HAVING pleased ourselves with observing that new order ofsemiquaver friars , we set sail, and in three days our skipper made the finest and most delightful island that ever wasseen; he called it the island of Frize; for all the ways were of frize.In that island is the land of Satin, so celebrated by ourcourt pages. Its trees and herbage never lose their leavesor flowers, and are all damask and flowered velvet. As forthe beasts and birds, they are all of tapestry work. Therewe saw many beasts, birds on trees, of the same colour, bigness, and shape, of those in our country; with this difference, however, that these did eat nothing, and never sung,or bit like ours: and we also saw there many sorts of crea- tures which we never had seen before.Among the rest, several elephants in various postures;twelve of which were the six males and six females thatwere brought to Rome by their governor in the time of Germanicus, Tiberius's nephew: some of them were learnedelephants, some musicians, others philosophers, dancers, andshewers of tricks; and all sat down at table in good order,silently eating and drinking like so many fathers in a fratry- room.With their snouts or proboscises, some two cubits long,they draw up water for their own drinking, and take holdof palm leaves, plums, and all manner of edibles, using themoffensively or defensively, as we do our fists; with themtossing men high into the air in fight, and making themburst with laughing when they come to the ground.They have joints in their legs, whatever some men, whonever saw any but painted, may have written to the contrary. Between their teeth they have two huge horns: thusJuba called them, and Pausanias tells us, they are not teeth,but horns: however, Philostratus will have them to be teeth,and not horns. It is all one to me, provided you will bepleased to own them to be true ivory. These are some threeor four cubits long, and are fixed in the upper jaw-bone, andconsequently not in the lowermost. If you hearken to thosewho will tell you to the contrary , you will find yourself damnably mistaken, for that is a lie with a latchet: though itwere Ælian, that long-bow man, that told you so, never believe him, for he lies as fast as a dog can trot. It was in KK 2500 RABELAIS' WORKS. [ BOOK V.this very island that Pliny, his brother tell-truth, had seensome elephants dance on the rope with bells, and whip overthe tables, presto, be gone, while people were at feasts,without so much as touching the toping topers, or the toperstoping.I saw a rhinoceros there, just such a one as Harry Clerberg had formerly showed me: methought it was not much unlike a certain boar which I had formerly seen at Limoges,except the sharp horn on its snout, that was about a cubitlong; by the means of which that animal dares encounterwith an elephant, that is sometimes killed with its pointthrust into its belly, which is its most tender and defencelesspart.I saw there two and thirty unicorns. They are a cursed sort of creatures, much resembling a fine horse, unless it bethat their heads are like a stag's, their feet like an elephant's,their tails like a wild boar's, and out of each of their foreheads sprouts a sharp black horn, some six or seven feetlong; commonly it dangles down like a turkey- co*ck's comb.When a unicorn has a mind to fight, or put it to any otheruse, what does he do but make it stand, and then it is asstraight as an arrow.I saw one of them, which was attended with a throng ofother wild beasts, purify a fountain with its horn. Withthat Panurge told me, that his prancer, alias his nimble- wimble, was like the unicorn, not altogether in length indeed,but in virtue and propriety: for as the unicorn purified pools and fountains from filth and venom, so that other animalscame and drank securely there afterwards; in the like manner, others might water their nags, and dabble after himwithout fear of shankers, carnosities, gonorrhæas, buboes,crinkams, and such other plagues, caught by those who venture to quench their amorous thirst in a common puddle;for with his nervous horn he removed all the infection thatmight be lurking in some blind cranny of the mephitic sweet- scented hole.Well, quoth Friar John, when you are sped, that is whenyou are married, we will make a trial of this on thy spouse,merely for charity sake, since you are pleased to give us sobereficial an instruction .Aye, aye, returned Panurge, and then immediately I willgive you a pretty gentle aggregative pill of God, made up of1CHAP. XXX. PANTAGRUEL.two and twenty kind stabs with a dagger, after the Cæsarianway. Cat so, cried Friar John, I had rather take off a bumper ofgood cool wine.I saw there the golden fleece , formerly conquered by Jason,and can assure you on the word of an honest man, that those who have said it was not a fleece, but a golden pippin, because µñλov signifies both an apple and a sheep, were utterly mistaken.I saw also a chameleon, such as Aristotle describes it, andlike that which had been formerly shown me by CharlesMaris, a famous physician of the noble city of Lyons on theRhone and the said chameleon lived on air, just as the other did.I sawthree hydars, like those I had formerly seen.are a kind of serpent, with seven different heads.TheyI saw also fourteen phoenixes. I had read in many authorsthat there was but one in the whole world in every century;but, if I may presume to speak my mind, I declare that thosewho said this had never seen any, unless it were in the landof tapestry; though it were vouched by Lactantius Firmianus.I saw the skin of Apuleius's golden ass.I saw three hundred and nine pelicans.Item, six thousand and sixteen Seleucid birds marching inbattalia, and picking up straggling grasshoppers in corn-fields.Item, some cynamologi, argatiles , caprimulgi, thynnunculs,onocrotals, or bitterns, with their wide swallows, stymphalides, harpies, panthers , dorcasses, or bucks, cemades, cynocephalises, satyrs, cartasans, tarands, uri, monopses, pegasi,neades, cepes, marmosets, or monkeys, presteres, bugles,musimons, byturoses, ophyri, screech owls, goblins, fairies,and griffins.I saw Mid-Lent on horseback, with Mid-August and MidMarch holding its stirrups.I saw some mankind wolves, centaurs, tigers, leopards,hyenas, camelopardels, and orixes, or huge wild goats with sharp horns.I saw a remora, a little fish called echineis by the Greeks,and near it a tall ship, that did not get a head an inch, thoughshe was in the offing with top and top-gallants spread beforethe wind. I am somewhat inclined to believe, that it wasthe very numerical ship in which Periander the tyrant happened to be, when it was stopped by such a little fish in spite502 RABELAIS' WORKS. [ BOOK V.of wind and tide. It was in this land of Satin, and in neother, that Mutianus had seen one of them.Friar John told us, that in the days of yore, two sort offishes used to abound in our courts of judicature, and rotted the bodies and tormented the souls of those whe were atlaw, whether noble or of mean descent, high or low, richor poor; the first were your April fish or mackerel, ' [pimps,panders, and bawds; ] the others your beneficial remoras,that is, the eternity of law- suits; the needless lets that keep them undecided.I saw some sphynges, some raphes, some ounces, and somecepphi, whose fore-feet are like hands, and their hind-feet like men's feet.Also some crocutas and some eali as big as sea-horseswith elephants' tails, boars' jaws and tusks, and horns aspliant as an ass's ears.The leucrocutes, most fleet animals, as big as our asses ofMirabelais, have necks, tails , and breasts like a lion's, legslike a stag's , the mouth up to the ears, and but two teeth,one above and one below; they speak with human voices,but when they do, they say nothing.Some people say, that none ever saw an aery, or nest of sakers; if you will believe me, I saw no less than eleven,and I am sure I reckoned right.I saw some left-handed halberts, which were the first that I had ever seen.I saw some manticores, a most strange sort of creatures,which have the body of a lion , red hair, a face and ears likea man's, three rows of teeth which close together, as if youjoined your hands with your fingers between each other;they have a sting in their tails like a scorpion's , and a verymelodious voice.I saw some catablepases, a sort of serpents, whose bodiesare small, but their heads large without any proportion, so that they have much ado to lift them up; and their eyes are so infectious, that whoever sees them dies upon the spot, as if he had seen a basilisk.I saw some beasts with two backs, and those seemed tome the merriest creatures in the world: they were mostnimble at wriggling the buttocks, and more diligent in tailwagging than any water-wagtails, perpetually jogging and shaking their double rumps.1 Maquereaulx in French signifies both mackerel and pimps.CHAP. XXXI. ] PANTAGRUel. 503I saw there some milched craw- fish , creatures that I neverheard of before in my life; these moved in very good order,and it would have done your heart good to have seen them.CH. XXXI.-How in the land of Satin we saw Hearsay, whokept a school of vouching.WE went a little higher up into the country of Tapestry,and saw the Mediterranean Sea open to the right and leftdown to the very bottom; just as the Red Sea very fairlyleft its bed at the Arabian gulf, to make a lane for the Jews,when they left Egypt.There I found Triton winding his silver shell instead of ahorn, and also Glaucus, Proteus, Nereus, and a thousandother godlings and sea monsters.I also saw an infinite number of fish of all kinds, dancing,flying, vaulting, fighting, eating, breathing, billing, shoving,milting, spawning, hunting, fishing, skirmishing, lying inambuscado, making truces, cheapening, bargaining, swearing, and sporting.In a blind corner we saw Aristotle holding a lantern , inthe posture in which the hermit uses to be drawn nearSt. Christopher, watching, prying, thinking, and setting every thing down in writing.Behind him stood a pack of other philosophers, like so manybums by a head bailiff; as Appian, Heliodorus, Athenæus,Porphyrius, Pancrates, Archadian, Numenius, Possidonius,Ovidius, Oppianus, Olypius, Seleucus, Leonides, Agathocles , Theophrastus, Demostratus, Mutianus, Nymphodorus,Alian, and five hundred other such plodding dons, who werefull of business, yet had little to do; like Chrysippus or Aristarchus of Soli , who for eight and fifty years togetherdid nothing in the world but examine the state and concerns of bees.I spied Peter Gillies among these, with an urinal in hishand, narrowly watching the water of those goodly fishes.When we had long beheld every thing in this land of Satin, Pantagruel said , I have sufficiently fed my eyes, but mybelly is empty all this while, and chimes to let me know itis time to go to dinner: let us take care of the body, les:the soul abdicate it; and to this effect, let us taste some ofthese anacampserotes' that hang over our heads. Psnaw,1 An herb, the touching of which is said to reconcile lovers.504 [BOOK V. RABELAIS' WORKS.cried one, they are mere trash, stark naught on my word,they are good for nothing.I then went to pluck some myrobolans off of a piece oftapestry, whereon they hung, but the devil a bit I couldchew or swallow them; and had you had them betwixt yourteeth, you would have sworn they had been thrown silk;there was no manner of savour in them.One might be apt to think Heliogabalus had taken a hintfrom thence, to feast those whom he had caused to fasta long time, promising them a sumptuous, plentiful, and imperial feast after it; for all the treat used to amount to nomore than several sorts of meat in wax, marble, earthenware, painted and figured tablecloths.While we were looking up and down to find some moresubstantial food, we heard a loud various noise, like that ofpaper-mills, or women bucking of linen: so with all speedwe went to the place whence the noise came, where we founda diminutive, monstrous, mis- shapen old fellow, called Hearsay. His mouth was slit up to his ears, and in it were seventongues, each of them cleft into seven parts. However hechattered, tattled , and prated with all the seven at once, ofdifferent matters, and in divers languages.He had as many ears all over his head, and the rest of hisbody, as Argus formerly had eyes; and was as blind as abeetle, and had the palsy in his legs .About him stood an innumerable number of men and women, gaping, listening, and hearing very intensely; among them I observed some who strutted like crows in a gutter,and principally a very handsome bodied man in the face, whoheld then a map of the world, and with little aphorismscompendiously explained every thing to them; so that thosem*n of happy memories grew learned in a trice , and wouldmost fluently talk with you of a world of prodigious things,the hundredth part ofwhich would take up a man's whole lifeto be fully known.Among the rest, they descanted with great prolixity onthe pyramids and hieroglyphics of Egypt, of the Nile, ofBabylon, of the Troglodytes, the Hymantopodes, or crumpfooted nation, the Blemiæ, people that wear their heads inthe middle of their breasts, the Pigmies, the Cannibals, theHyperborei and their mountains, the Egypanes with theirgoat's feet, and the devil and all of others; every individualword of it by hear- say.CHAP. XXXI. ] PANTAGRUEL. 505I am much mistaken if I did not see among them Herodotus, Pliny, Solinus, Borcsus, Philostratus, PomponiusMela, Strabo, and God knows how many other antiquaries .Then Albert, the great Jacobin friar, Peter Tesmoin, aliasWitness, Pope Pius the Second, Volaterranus, Paulus Joviusthe valiant, Jemmy Cartier, Chaton the Armenian, MarcoPolo the Venetian, Ludovico Romano, Pedro Aliares , andforty cartloads of other modern historians, lurking behind apiece of tapestry, where they were at it, ding- dong, privatelyscribbling the Lord knows what, and making rare work ofit, and all by hear- say.Behind another piece of tapestry, (on which Naboth andSusanna's accusers were fairly represented , ) I saw close byHearsay, good store of men of the country of Perce andMaine, notable students, and young enough.I asked what sort of study they applied themselves to?and was told, that from their youth they learned to be evidences, affidavit-men, and vouchers; and were instructed inthe art of swearing; in which they soon became such proficients, that, when they left that country, and went backinto their own, they set up for themselves, and very honestlylived by their trade of evidencing: positively giving theirtestimony of all things whatsoever, to those who feed themmost roundly to do a job of journey- work for them and all this by hearsay.You may think what you will of it, but I can assure you,they gave some of us corners of their cakes, and we merrilyhelped to empty their hogsheads. Then, in a friendly manner, they advised us to be as sparing of truth as possibly wecould, if ever we had a mind to get court preferment.ON CHAPS. XXX. AND XXXI. -The Island of Satin means morethan one thing. First, it signifies such tapestry work as we call arras;in which are represented several histories, fables, and fabulous animalsand vegetables, such as are many of those of which the author speaksin these two chapters. He displays a great knowledge of antiquity in the account he gives us of those matters, and an uncommon wit and judgment in his remarks.This island means chiefly the works of several ancient and modern authors mentioned here, who having often spoken by hearsay, are not to be believed in many things, though their style be as smooth and soft as satin. We may also understand by that land of Satin, the romances of that age, filled with monsters and monstrous tales; and chiefly that of Amadis de Gaul, which was then very much read; the best writers,as I have already said, having chosen to translate that book, to display506 [ BOOK 7.RABELAIS' WORKS.in it all the beauties, copiousness, and graces, which the French tonga could boast of in the reign of Henry II.-M.CH. XXXII.-How we came in sight of Lantern- Land.HAVING been scurvily entertained in the land of Satin, wwent on board, and having set sail, in four days came nearthe coast of Lantern-land . We then saw certain littlehovering fires on the sea.For my part I did not take them to be lanterns, but ratherthought they were fishes, which lolled their flaming tongueson the surface of the sea; or lampyrides, which some calcicindelas or glow- worms, shining there as ripe barley doeso'nights in my country.But the skipper satisfied us that they were the lanterns ofthe watch, or more properly, light-houses, set up in manyplaces round the precinct of the place , to discover the landand for the safe piloting in of some outlandish lanterns,which, like good Franciscan and Jacobin friars, were comingto make their personal appearance at the provincial chapter.However, some of us were somewhat suspicious that thesefires were the forerunners of some storm, but the skipperassured us again they were not.CH. XXXIII. —How we landed at the Port ofthe Lychnobii,and came to Lantern- land.Soon after we arrived at the port of Lantern-land, wherePantagruel discovered, on a high tower, the lantern of Rochelle, that stood us in good stead, for it cast a great light.We also saw the lantern of Pharos, that of Nauplion, andthat of Acropolis , at Athens, sacred to Pallas.Near the port, there is a little hamlet inhabited by theLychnobii, that live by lanterns, as the gulligutted friars inour country live by nuns; they are studious people, and as honest men as ever sh*t in a trumpet. Demosthenes hadformerly lanternised there.We were conducted from that place to the palace by threeobeliscolichnys , ' military guards of the port, with highcrowned hats, whom we acquainted with the cause of ourvoyage, and our design; which was to desire the queen ofthe country to grant us a lantern to light and conduct us,during our voyage to the Oracle of the Bottle.1 A kind of beacons.CHAP. XXXIII.] PANTAGRUEL. 507They promised to assist us in this, and added , that wecould never have come in a better time; for then the lanterns held their provincial chapter.When we came to the royal place we had audience ofher highness the Queen of Lantern- land , being introducedby two lanterns of honour, that of Aristophanes, and that ofCleanthes. Panurge, in a few words, acquainted her withthe causes of our voyage, and she received us with great demonstrations of friendship; desiring us to come to her atsupper-time, that we might more easily make choice of oneto be our guide; which pleased us extremely. We did notfail to observe intensely every thing we could see, -as thegarbs, motions, and deportments of the queen's subjects, -principally the manner after which she was served.The bright queen was dressed in virgin crystal of Tutia,wrought damaskwise, and beset with large diamonds.The lanterns of the royal blood were clad partly withbastard- diamonds, partly with diaphanous stones; the restwith horn, paper, and oiled cloth.The cresset- lights took place according to the antiquity and lustre of their families .An earthen dark- lantern, shaped like a pot, notwithstanding this, took place of some of the first quality; at which Iwondered much, till I was told it was that of Epictetus, forwhich three thousand drachmas had been formerly refused.Martial's polymix² lantern made a very good figure there;I took particular notice of its dress, and more yet of theicosimyx, formerly consecrated by Canopa, the daughter of Tisias.I saw the pensile lantern, formerly taken out of the templeof Apollo Palatinus at Thebes, and afterwards by Alexanderthe Great carried to the town of Cymos.I saw another that distinguished itself from the rest by abushy tuft of crimson silk on its head. I was told it was that of Bartolus, the lantern of the civilians .Two others were very remarkable for glisterpouches that dangled at their waist. We were told, that one was thegreater light, and the other the lesser light of the apothecaries.When it was supper- time, the queen's highness first satA lamp with many wicks, or a branched candlestick with many springs coming out of it, that supply all the branches with oil.G08 [BOOKT. RABELAIS' WORKS.down, and then the rest, according to their rank and dignity,For the first course, they were all served with large Christmas candles, except the queen, who was served with ahugeous, thick, stiff, flaming taper of white wax, somewhatred towards the tip; and the royal family, as also the provincial lantern of Mirebalais , who were served with nutlights; and the provincial of Lower Poitou, with an armed candle.After that, God wot, what a glorious light they gave with their wicks I do not say all, for you must except a parcelof junior lanterns, under the government of a high and mighty one. These did not cast a light like the rest, butseemed to me dimmer than any long- snuff farthing candle,whose tallow has been half melted away in a hot- house.After supper we withdrew to take some rest, and the nexday the queen made us choose one of the most illustriouslanterns to guide us; after which we took our leave.ON CHAPS. XXXII. AND XXXIII.-Lanternland is the land ofLearning, frequented by bachelors of arts, masters ofarts, doctors, and professors in various studies, bishops, &c. Thus in the preceding chapter, Aristotle is seen in a blind corner holding a lantern , watching prying, cudgelling his brain, and setting every thing down, with a pack of philosophasters about him, like so many bums by a head bailif.because he is lantern of the peripatetics. Here we have Bartolus, the lantern of the civilians; Epicurus, one of the lanterns of the stoics.The lantern of Rochelle on a high tower, which stood his fleet in goodstead, casting a great light , seems to be Geoffrey d'Estissac, bishop and lord of Maillezais, one of Rabelais' best patrons, and even for that never to be forgotten. He would not call him the lantern of Maillezas,for this had been too plain and improper, because Maillezais is an inland town; but as Rochelle was then the chief town in that diocese,insomuch that the episcopal see was transferred to that sea- porttown in 1648, he calls himthe lantern of Rochelle, which he places on a high tower, because that prelate was eminent for his quality, as wel as for his virtue and learning.He tells us that the lanterns held their provincial chapter: so this may be thought by some to refer to the Council of Trent. Yet I had rather understand it of some meeting of the clergy in France, or more particularly of the University of Paris; some of whose best membersmay be the lanterns which lighted our travellers, after they had made their application to the queen for one to conduct them to the Oracle of the Bottle, or rather to the knowledge of truth.The Lynchnobians, who inhabit a little hamlet near the port of Lanternland, are booksellers. They live by lanterns, that is, by the learned, as the gully-gutted friars live by nuns; that is, they grow as fat by buying and selling their works, as the hungry friars do bymanaging the concerns of nuns, of which they are so greedy. TheyCHAP. XXXIV.] PANTAGRuel. 509are studious people; that is. they often study how to get a good copy for little or nothing, contrive a taking title, &c. , and are as honest men as ever sh― in a trumpet. I believe this needs no comment. -M.CH. XXXIV.-How we arrived at the Oracle of the Bottle.OUR glorious lantern lighting and directing us to our heart's content, we at last arrived at the desired island, where wasthe Oracle of the Bottle. As soon as friend Panurge landed,he nimbly cut a caper with one leg for joy, and cried toPantagruel, Now we are where we have wished ourselveslong ago. This is the place we have been seeking with suchtoil and labour. He then made a compliment to our lantern, who desired us to be of good cheer, and not be dauntedor dismayed, whatever we might chance to see.To come to the Temple of the Holy Bottle, we were to gothrough a large vineyard, in which were all sorts of vines, asthe Falernian, Malvesian, the Muscadine, those of Taige,Beaune, Mirevaux, Orleans, Picardent, Arbois, Coussi,Anjou, Grave, Corsica, Vierron, Nerac, and others. Thisvineyard was formerly planted by the good Bacchus, with sogreat a blessing, that it yields leaves, flowers , and fruit, allthe year round, like the orange trees , at Serene.Our magnificent lantern ordered every one of us to eatthree grapes, to put some vine- leaves in his shoes, and takea vine- branch in his left hand.At the end of the close we went under an arch built afterthe manner of those of the ancients. The trophies of atoper were curiously carved on it.First, on one side was to be seen a long train of flagons ,leathern bottles, flasks , cans, glass bottles , barrels , nipperkins, pint- pots , quart- pots, pottles, gallons, and old- fashionedsemaises, (swinging wooden pots, such as those out of whichthe Germans fill their glasses:) these hung on a shady arbour.On another side was store of garlic , onions, shallots , hams,botargos, caviar, biscuits, neats' tongues, old cheese, andsuch like comfits, very artificially interwoven, and packedtogether with vine- stocks.On another were a hundred sorts of drinking glasses , cups,Cisterns, ewers, false cups, tumblers, bowls, mazers, mugs,jags, goblets, talboys, and such other bacchic artillery.On the frontispiece of the triumphal arch, under the zphore, was the following couplet:610 [BOOK V. RABELAIS' WORKS.You, who presume to move this way,Get a good lantern lest you stray.We took special care of that, cried Pantagruel, when heread them; for there is not a better or a more divine lantern than ours in all Lantern-land .This arch ended at a fine large round alley, covered overwith the interlaid branches of vines, loaded and adorned withclusters of five hundred different colours, and of as manyvarious shapes, not natural , but due to the skill of agricuture; some were golden , others blueish, tawny, azure, white,black, green, purple , streaked with many colours, long, round,triangular, cod- like, hairy, great-headed, and grassy. Thatpleasant alley ended at three old ivy-trees, verdant, and ail loaden with rings. Our most illustrious lantern directed usto make ourselves high- crowned hats with some of theirleaves, and cover our heads wholly with them, which wasimmediately done.Jupiter's priestess , said Pantagruel, in former days, would not, like us, have walked under this arbour. There was amystical reason, answered our most perspicuous lantern, that would have hindered her. For had she gone under it, the wine, or the grapes of which it is made, that is the samething, had been over her head, and then she would have seemed overtopped and mastered by wine. Which implies, that priests, and all persons who devote themselvesto the contemplation of divine things, ought to keep theirminds sedate and calm, and avoid whatever may disturb anddiscompose their tranquillity; which nothing is more apt to do than drunkenness.You also, continued our lantern, could not come into theHoly Bottle's presence, after you have gone through thisarch, did not that noble priestess Bacbuc first see your shoesfull of vine-leaves; which action is diametrically opposite tothe other, and signifies that you despise wine, and having mastered it, as it were, tread it under foot.I am no scholar, quoth Friar John, for which I amheartily sorry, yet I find, by my breviary, that in the Revelation, awoman was seen with the moon under her feet, which was amost wonderful sight. Now, as Bigot explained it to me,1 Read Torangle; for that is the word used by Rabelais. It signi- fies a glass turned angularly. In the author's time they said tor for tour, torner for tourner.CHAP. XXXIV.]PANTAGRUEL. 511this was to signify, that she was not of the nature of otherwomen; for they have all the moon at their heads, and, consequently, their brains are always troubled with a lunacy:this makes me willing to believe what you said, dear Madam Lantern.ON CHAP. XXXIV. -Being lighted and directed by the lantern- the learned our travellers at last arrive at the island where was theOracle of the Bottle-truth. Their guide desires them not to be daunted whatever they see, because fear disorders the mind, and ren- ders us incapable of discovering truth. They pass through a large vineyard, in which are all sorts of vines, which yield leaves, flowers,and fruits, all the year round. There they eat three grapes, put vine- leaves in their shoes, and take vine- branches in their hands.The variety of vines in this large vineyard, implies the vast field through which the learned range in the search after truth: some matters, like the leaves, are unprofitable; some, like the flowers , pleasant;and others, like the fruit, useful. But they must use even the last moderately-which is implied by the three grapes; and at the first entrance into the regions of truth, be soberly wise. The insignificant leaves must be trod under foot; for this reason they put some in their shoes; and also to show they have mastered the rudiments of learning unless some will say, that the leaves at their feet signify their desire of stepping forward to come to the oracle of truth . Vine-branches ( which may well be supposed to have flowers as well as leaves) are held by them in their left hand, in token of their hopes to reap the fruit of their study. -M.CH. XXXV. How we went under-ground to come to the Templeof the Holy Bottle, and how Chinon is the oldest city in the world.WE went under ground through a plastered vault, on whichwas coarsely painted a dance of women and satyrs, waitingon old Silenus, who was grinning on horseback on his ass.This made me say to Pantagruel, that this entry put me inmind of the painted cellar, ' in the oldest city in the world,where such paintings are to be seen, and in ' as cool a place.Which is the oldest city in the world? asked Pantagruel.1 The ancient Dutch scholiast here has these words, It was Rabelais's house, and in my time belonged to his son: in order to go from this house into the painted cellar, instead of going down stairs,as in other cellars, in this, people went up stairs; it being much higher than the house, and had as many steps as there were days in the year.It is the highest part of the castle of Chinon, which commands thewhole town. The word painted is equivocal, and ought not to bewritten cave peinte, painted cellar, but cave à pinte, the pint cellar,(or pint vault, ) because people went thither for wine, and fetched itawayin certain wine-pots, or pewter vessels, called pintes.513 RABELAIS' WORKS. [BOOKY.It is Chinon, sir, or Cainon in Touraine, said I. I know, returned Pantagruel, where Chinon lies , and the painted cellaralso, having myself drunk there many a glass of cool wire;neither do I doubt but that Chinon is an ancient town-vness its blazon. I own it is said twice or thrice,Chinon,Little town,Great renown,On old stoneLong has stood;There's the Vienne, if you look down;If you look up, there's the wood.But how, continued he, can you make it out that ' tis theoldest city in the world? Where did you find this written?I have found it in the sacred writ, said I , that Cain was thefirst that built a town; we may then, reasonably conjecture,that from his name he gave it that of Cainon. Thus, afterhis example, most other founders of towns have given thetheir names: Athena, that is Minerva in Greek, to Athens:Alexander to Alexandria; Constantine to Constantinople;Pompey to Pompeiopolis in Cilicia; Adrian to Adrianople;Canaan, to the Canaanites; Saba, to the Sabæans; Assur,to the Assyrians; and so Ptolemais, Cæsarea, Tiberias, andHerodium in Judæa got their names.While we were thus talking, there came to us the greatflask whom our lantern called the philosopher, her holinessthe Bottle's governor. He was attended with a troop of thetemple-guards, all French bottles in wicker armour; andseeing us with our javelins wrapped with ivy, with our illustrious lantern, whom he knew, he desired us to come in withall manner of safety, and ordered we should be immediatelyconducted to the Princess Bacbuc, the Bottle's Lady ofHonour, and priestess of all the mysteries; which was done.ON CHAP. XXXV. -They go down under ground through a plastered vault, on which is coarsely painted a dance of women and satyrs, wait- ing on old Silenus, who was grinning on horseback on his ass. This shows, that we must not dwell on the surface or outside of things, butdive to their very centre or bottom, to come at truth. This also may refer to this work. The plastered vault, on which is coarsely daubed a dance of women and satyrs, is in its literal sense, smutty, drunken,lewd, and satirical expressions; and our author is the Silenus, who grins and laughs at every one. He has ingeniously brought in a dis- course about the antiquity of Chinon , his native town; by which he seems at the same time to ridicule the fables that are reported in manytowns about their founders, whom some make as ancient as the patriarch of highest pedigree in Wales.-CHAP. XXXVI.] PANTAGRUEL. 513CH. XXXVI.-How we went down the Tetradic steps, and ofPanurge'sfear.We went down one marble step under ground, where therewas a resting, or, as our workmen call it, a landing- place ,then, turning to the left, we went down two other steps , wherethere was another resting- place; after that we came to threeother steps, turning about, and met a third; and the like atfour steps which we met afterwards. There, quoth Panurge,is it here? How many steps have you told? asked our magnificent lantern. One, two, three, four, answered Pantagruel.How much is that? asked she. Ten, returned he. Multiplythat, said she, according to the same pythagorical tètrad.That is , ten, twenty, thirty, forty, cried Pantagruel. Howmuch is the whole? said she. One hundred, answered Pantagruel. Add, continued she, the first cube -that is eight:at the end of that fatal number you will find the temple gate;and pray, observe, this is the true psychogony of Plato, socelebrated by the academics, yet so little understood; onemoiety of which consists of the unity of the two first num- bers full of two square and two cubic numbers. Wethen went down those numerical stairs , all under ground;and I can assure you, in the first place, that our legs stoodus in good stead; for had it not been for them, we hadrolled just like so many hogsheads into a vault. Secondly,our radiant lantern gave us just so much light as is in St.Patrick's hole in Ireland, or Trophonius ' cavern in Bocotia;which caused Panurge to say to her, after we had got downsome seventy- eight steps: -LetDear madam, with a sorrowful, aching heart, I most humblybeseech your lanternship to lead us back. May I be led tohell, if I be not half dead with fear; my heart is sunk downinto my hose; I am afraid I shall make buttered eggs in my breeches. I freely consent never to marry. You have givenyourself too much trouble on my account; the Lord shall reward you in his great rewarding- place; neither will I be ungrateful when I come out of this cave of Troglodytes.us go back, I pray you. I am very much afraid this is Tænarus, the low way to hell, and methinks I already hear Cerberus bark. Hark! I hear the cur, or my ears tingle; I haveno manner of kindness for the dog, for there never is a greatertooth-ache than when dogs bite us by the shins: and if thisbe only Trophonius's pit, the lemures, hob-thrushes, and goblins will certainly swallow us alive: just as they devoured VOL. II.L L514 [ BOOK TRABELAIS' WORKS.1formerly one of Demetrius's halbardiers, for want ofluncheos of bread. Art thou here, Friar John? Pr'ythee, dear, deacod, stay by me; I am almost dead with fear. Hast thatgot thy bilbo? Alas! poor pilgarlic is defenceless: I am inaked man thou knowest: let us go back. Zoons, fearnothing, cried Friar John, I am by thee, and have theeby the collar; eighteen devils shall not get thee out of myclutches, though I were unarmed. Never did a man yet warweapons who had a good arm with as stout a heart; heavewould sooner send down a shower of them; even as in Prvence, in the fields of la Crau, near Mariannes, there rainedstones (they are there to this day) to help Hercules, whootherwise wanted wherewithal to fight Neptune's two bas tards. But whither are we bound? Are we a-going to thelittle children's limbo? By Pluto, they will bepaw and co- skite us all. Or are we going to hell for orders? By cubsbody, I will hamper, bethwack, and belabour all the devisnow I have some vine-leaves in my shoes. Thou shalt seeme lay about me like mad, old boy. Which way? wherethedevil are they? I fear nothing but their damned horns: bc:cuckoldy Panurge's bull-feather will altogether secure me from them.Lo in a prophetic spirit I already see him, like anotherActæon, horned, horny, hornified. Pr'ythee, quoth Panurge,take heed thyself, dear frater, lest, till monks have leave tomarry, thou weddest something thou dost not like, as somequartan ague; if thou dost, may I never come safe and soundout of this hypogeum, this subterranean cave, if I do nottup and ram that disease merely for the sake of making theea cornuted, corniferous property; otherwise I fancy the quartan ague is but an indifferent bed- fellow. I remember Gripemen-all threatened to wed thee to some such thing; for which thou calledst him heretic.Here our splendid lantern interrupted them, letting usknow this was the place where we were to have a taste ofthecreature,' and be silent; bidding us not despair of having theword of the Bottle before we went back, since we had linedour shoes with vine - leaves.It should be, where we were to observe taciturnity: favere li guis: which in the sacrifices, and other religious ceremonies of the Romans, signified to keep silence: favorare being the same as fatere languis. But this word by the printer's fault, used to be written sare- rare, which occasioned the mistake above.CHAP. XXXVII. ]PANTAGRUEL. 515Come on, then, cried Panurge, let us charge through andthrough all the devils of hell: we can but perish, and that issoon done: however, I thought to have reserved my life forsome mighty I am as battle. Move, move, move forwards;stout as Hercules, my breeches are full of courage: my hearttrembles a little , I own, but that is only an effect of thecoldness and dampness of this vault; it is neither fear norague. Come on, move on, piss, pish, push on. My name isWilliam Dreadnought.ON CHAP. XXXVI.-Our pilgrims, going down the tetradic stairs,find a resting-place after the first step, another resting-place after the third, another after the sixth, and a fourth resting-place after the tenthstep. This implies, that the progress made at first , in the way to truth,is but small; but by degrees a greater is made, the more we get for- ward so that on the second day we go twice as far as we did the first;three times as far on the third; and four times as far on the fourth;till at last we come to our journey's end.-M.CH. XXXVII. —How the temple gates in a wonderful manneropened of themselves.AFTER we were got down the steps, we came to a portal offine jasper, of Doric order, on whose front we read this sentence in the finest gold, EN ' OINQ AAHO EI A: that is , Inwine, truth. The two folding doors of the gate were of Corinthian-like brass, ¹ massy, wrought with little vine- branches,finely embossed and engraven, and were equally joined and closed together in their mortise without any padlock, keychain, or tie whatsoever. Where they joined, there hangedan Indian loadstone as big as an Egyptian bean, set in gold,having two points, hexagonal, in a right line; and on eachside, towards the wall, hung a handful of scordium.2 There our noble lantern desired us not to take it amiss thatshe went no farther with us, leaving us wholly to the conductof the priestess Bacbuc: for she herself was not allowed togo in, for certain causes rather to be concealed than revealedto mortals. However, she advised us to be resolute and secure, and to trust to her for the return. She then pulled theloadstone that hung at the folding of the gates, and threw itSee Pliny, 1. 34, c. 2. Corinthian brass is held to be a mixtureof gold, silver, and brass. 2 Wrong: Rabelais says, une poignée de scordon, " i . e. a handful of garlic; okóodov in Greek; notKópdiov, scordium, which is another herb, " quæ allii odorem resipit, "(says Robinson's Lexicon, ) it has indeed the smell of garlic and no more.66L L 2516 [BOOK T. RABELAIS WORKS.into a silver box fixed for that purpose: which done, from the threshold of each gate she drew a twine of crimson silk,about nine feet long, by which the scordium hung, and hav.ing fastened it to two gold buckles that hung at the sides, she withdrew.Immediately the gates flew open³ without being touched;not with a creaking, or loud harsh noise, like that made byheavy brazen gates; but with a soft pleasing murmur that re- sounded through the arches of the temple.Pantagruel soon knew the cause of it, having discovered &small cylinder or roller that joined the gates over the threshold; and, turning like them towards the wall on a hard wellpolished ophites stone, with rubbing and rolling, caused thatharmonious murmur.I wondered how the gates thus opened of themselves tothe right and left, and after we were all got in, I cast myeye between the gates and the wall, to endeavour to knowhowthis happened; for one would have thought our kind lantern had put between the gates the herb æthiopis, which theysay opens some things that are shut; but I perceived that theparts of the gates that joined on the inside were covered withsteel; and just where the said gates touched when they wereopened, I saw two square Indian loadstones, of a blueishhue, well polished, and half a span broad, mortised in thetemple wall . Now, by the hidden and admirable power ofthe loadstones, the steel plates were put into motion, andconsequently the gates were slowly drawn; however, notalways, but when the said loadstone on the outside was removed, after which the steel was freed from its power, thetwo bunches of scordium being at the same time put at somedistance, because it deadens the magnet,5 and robs it of itsattractive virtue.On the loadstone that was placed on the right side, theThisis in imitation of the description ofApolidon's palace in ch. xi.of b. iv. of Amadis de Gaul. 4 Before, in 1. 4, ch. 62, theloadstone is mentioned as a stone, in ancient times, found in Ida,in the country of Phrygia, as is said by Pliny, 1. 5, ch. 30 and 36.Here Rabelais speaks of the Indian loadstone, whose virtue he believed to be so much the stronger, as in 1. 7, of Ptolomy's Geog. ch.2, he had read, that in the islands called Manioles, such ships, as had iron pins, or nails in them, stopped short on their way, without any possibility of proceeding any farther, because of the loadstone which the adjoining land abounded with. 5 See preface to Pliny's 20th book.CHAP. XXXVIII. ]PANTAGRUEL. 517following iambic verse was curiously engraven in ancient Roman characters:" Duc*nt volentem fata, nolentem trahunt. "6Fate leads the willing, and the unwilling draws.7The following sentence was neatly cut in the loadstonethat was on the left:ALL THINGS TEND TO THEIR END.CH. XXXVIII.—Ofthe Temple's admirable Pavement.WHEN I had read those inscriptions, I admired the beautyof the temple, and particularly the disposition of its pavement, with which no work that is now, or has been underthe cope of heaven, can justly be compared; not that of theTemple of Fortune at Præneste in Sylla's time; or the pavement of the Greeks, called asarotum, ' laid by Sosistratus inPergamus. For this here was wholly in compartments ofprecious stones, all in their natural colours. One of redjasper, most charmingly spotted. Another of ophites . Athird of porphyry. A fourth of lycophthalmy, a stone offour different colours, powdered with sparks of gold, as small as atoms. A fifth of agate, streaked here and there withsmall milk-coloured waves. A sixth of costly chalcedony.*And another of green jasper, with certain red and yellowishveins. And all these were disposed in a diagonal line.At the portico, some small stones were inlaid, and evenlyjoined on the floor, all in their native colours, to embellishthe design of the figures; and they were ordered in such amanner, that you would have thought some vine leaves andbranches had been carelessly strewed on the pavement; forin some places they were thick, and thin in others. Thatinlaying was very wonderful everywhere: here were seen,• This verse is none of Seneca's the tragedian, as Erasmus took it to be in his adages, at the word fato non repugnandum. The thought is in some of the Greek iambics of the stoic Cleanthes, from whence Epic- tetus taking it, and putting it into his manuel, the other Seneca, who fancied it beautiful enough to make fresh use of it, put into Latin iambics Cleanthes's Greek ones, and inserted them in the CVIIth ofhis Epistles. 7 Or drags, which the reader pleases. Some editions have it tirent, others trainent. 1 See Pliny, 1. 36, ch. 35.2 See Pliny, 1. 35 , c 7, &c. Read ophites, not ophir or ophire, as in some editions of Rabelais. 3 See Pliny, 1. 37, ch. xi;4 Cassidoine by corruption. See Salmasius on Solinus. Costly, be- cause the vases made of this stone are very subject to crack or breakSee Pliny, in preface of 33, 1.518 RABELAIS' WORKS. BOOK V.as it were in the shade, some snails crawling on the grapes;there, little lizards running on the branches: on this side,were grapes that seemed yet greenish; on another, some clusters that seemed full ripe, so like the true, that theycould as easily have deceived starlings, and other birds, as those which Zeuxis drew.Nay, we ourselves were deceived; for where the artistseemed to have strewed the vine- branches thickest, wecould not forbear walking with great strides , lest we shouldentangle our feet, just as people go over an unequal stonyplace.I then cast my eyes on the roof and walls of the temple,that were all pargetted with porphyry and mosaic work;which from the left side at the coming in, most admirably represented the battle, in which the good Bacchus overthrewthe Indians; as followeth.CH. XXXIX.-How we saw Bacchus's army drawn up in Bat- talia in Mosaic work.Ar the beginning, divers towns, hamlets, castles, fortresses,and forests were seen in flames; and several mad and loosewomen, who furiously ripped up, and tore live calves, sheep,and lambs, limb from limb, and devoured their flesh . Therewe learned how Bacchus, ' at his coming into India, destroyedall things with fire and sword.Notwithstanding this, he was so despised by the Indians,that they did not think it worth their while to stop his progress; having been certainly informed by their spies, thathis camp was destitute of warriors, and that he had only withhim a crew of drunken females, a low-built, old, effeminate,sottish fellow, continually addled, and as drunk as a wheelbarrow, with a pack of young clownish doddipoles, starknaked, always skipping and frisking up and down, with tailsand horns like those of young kids.For this reason the Indians had resolved to let them gothrough their country without the least opposition , esteeming a victory over such enemies more dishonourable thanglorious.In the mean time, Bacchus marched on, burning everything; for, as you know, fire and thunder are his paternal arms; Jupiter having saluted his mother Semele with hisThis chapter is taken from Lucian's discourse, intituled Bacchus.CHAP. XXXIX. ] PANTAGRUEL. 519thunder; so that his maternal house was ruined by fire.Bacchus also caused a great deal of blood to be spilt; which,when he is roused and angered, principally in war, is asnatural to him, as to make some in time of peace.Thus the plains of the island of Samos, are called Panema,'which signifies all bloody, because Bacchus there overtookthe Amazons, who fled from the country of Ephesus, andthere let them blood, so that they all died of phlebotomy.This may give you a better insight into the meaning of anancient proverb, than Aristotle has done in his problems;viz. , Why, it was formerly said, Neither eat, nor sow any mint in time of war. The reason is, that blows are givenin time of war without any distinction of parts or persons;and if a man that is wounded has that day handled or eatenany mint, it is impossible, or at least very hard, to stanch his blood.After this, Bacchus was seen marching in battalia, ridingin a stately chariot, drawn by six young leopards. He lookedas young as a child, to show that all good topers never growold: he was as red as a cherry, or a cherub, which youplease; and had no more hair on his chin, than there is inthe inside of my hand: his forehead was graced with pointedhorns, above which, he wore a fine crown or garland of vineleaves and grapes, and a mitre of crimson velvet, having alsogilt buskins on.He had not one man with him, that looked like a man; hisguards,andall his forces, consisted whollyofBassarides , Evantes,Euhyades, Edonides, Trietherides , Ogygiæ, Mimallonides , Mænades, Thyades, and Bacchides, frantic, raving, raging, furious ,

• See Plutarch in his questions about Greek affairs, ch. 96.

3 The reason of this proverb is not that mint being cold of itself, as Aristotle supposed, the using it would be bad for those whose trade is to fight. Mint has so little of this quality, that, according to Diosco- rides, Hippocrates, and Ætius, it provokes urine, and causes seed to abound so as to slip away involuntarily by being too thin. The reason of the proverb is, rather because by exciting too much to love, those who have exhausted themselves in the wars of Venus, must of necessity be less in a readiness for those of Bellona. There is, however,one way, and but one, to reconcile Aristotle with Hippocrates and thephysicians, and that is, in Aristotle, to read kararŋkɛt, liquifies, in- stead of karaúxe , debilitates , or cowardizes, to come as near as Ican to Duchat's superannuated word allachir. This is the sentiment of Jerome Mercurialis, 1. 4, c. 8, of his various readings. See Lud.Nonnius, 1. 1 , c. 20. of his De Re Cibaria.620 [BOOKTRABELAIS' WORKS.mad women, begirt with live snakes and serpents, insteadof girdles, their dishevelled hair flowing about their shouders , with garlands of vine - branches instead of foreheadcloths, clad with stag's or goat's- skins, and armed withtorches, javelins, spears, and halberts, whose ends were likepine-apples besides, they had certain small light bucklers,that gave a loud sound if you touched them never so little,and these served them instead of drums; they were jusseventy-nine thousand two hundred and twenty- seven.Silenus, who led the van, was one on whom Bacchus relied very much, having formerly had many proofs of his valour and conduct. He was a diminutive, stooping, palsied,plump, gorbellied, old fellow, with a swinging pair of stifstanding lugs of his own, a sharp Roman nose, large rougheyebrows, mounted on a well- hung ass; in his fist he helda staff to lean upon, and also bravely to fight, whenever hehad occasion to alight; and he was dressed in a woman's yellow gown. His followers were all young, wild, clownishpeople, as hornified as so many kids, and as fell as so manytigers, naked, and perpetually singing and dancing countrydances: they were called tityri and satyrs; and were in alleighty-five thousand, one hundred and thirty- three.Pan, who brought up the rear, was a monstrous sort of athing for his lower parts were like a goat's, his thighs hairy,and his horns bolt upright; a crimson fiery phiz, and a beard that was none ofthe shortest. He was a bold, stout, daring,desperate fellow, very apt to take pepper in the nose for yea and nay.In his left hand he held a pipe, and a crooked stick in hisright. His forces consisted also wholly of satyrs, ægipanes,agripanes, sylvans, fauns, lemures, lares, elves, and hobgoblins; and their number was seventy-eight thousand, one hundred and fourteen. The signal or word common to allthe army, was Evohé.CH. XL.-How the battle, in which the good Bacchus overthrewthe Indians, was represented in Mosaic work.In the next place we saw the representation of the goodBacchus's engagement with the Indians. Silenus, who ledthe van, was sweating, puffing, and blowing, belabouring hisass most grievously; the ass dreadfully opened its wide jaws,drove away the flies that plagued it, winced, flounced, wentCHAP. XL.]PANTAGRUEL. 5213back, and bestirred itself in a most terrible manner, as ifsome damned gad- bee had stung it at the breech.The satyrs, captains, sergeants, and corporals of companies, sounding the orgies ' with cornets, in a furious mannerwent round the army, skipping, capering, bounding, jerking,farting, flying out at heels, kicking and prancing like mad,encouraging their company to fight bravely; and all thedelineated army cried out Evohé!First, the Mænades charged the Indians with dreadfulshouts, and a horrid din of their brazen drums and bucklers:the air rung again all around, as the mosaic work well expressed it. And pray, for the future do not so much admireApelles, Aristides the Theban, and others who drew claps ofthunder, lightnings, winds, words, manners, and spirits.2We then saw the Indian army, who had at last taken thefield, to prevent the devastation of the rest of their country.In the front were the elephants, with castles well garrisonedon their backs. But the army and themselves were put intodisorder; the dreadful cries of the Bacchides having filledthem with consternation, and those huge animals turned tail,and trampled on the men of their party.There you might have seen gaffer Silenus on his ass, putting on as hard as he could, striking athwart and alongst,and laying about him lustily with his staff, after the oldfashion of fencing. His ass was prancing and making afterthe elephants, gaping and martially braying, as it were tosound a charge, as he did when formerly in the bacchanalianfeasts, he waked the nymph Lottis, when Priapus, full ofpriapism, had a mind to priapise , while the pretty creaturewas taking a nap.5There you might have seen Pan frisk it with his goatishshanks about the Mænades, and with his rustic pipe excite them to behave themselves like Mænades.1 The old editions have orties; that of 1600 , as well as the new editions, orgies, which is the name given to the festivals of Bacchus.Now, as this passage is taken out of Lucian, who says, that in the heat of the battle fought by Bacchus against the Indians, a satyr of hisarmy sung an orthie, orthium carmen, I make no question, but that weought to read orthie , öoßoç vóuoc, a sort of poem which Heroditus, lib.1. ch. 24, and Aulus Gellius, 1. 16, c. 19, tell us Arion tuned his harp to,before he was flung into the sea. 2 See Pliny, 1. 35, c. 10.3 See Pliny in the same place.See before, lib . 3, cap. 84 See Ovid's Metam. lib. 9.522 RABELAIS' WORKS. BOOKT.A little further you might have blessed your eyes with thesight of a young satyr who led seventeen kings his prisoners;and a Bacchis, who with her snakes, hauled along no lessthan two and forty captains; a little faun, who carried awhole dozen of standards taken from the enemy; and goodman Bacchus on his chariot, riding to and fro fearless ofdanger, making much of his dear carcase, and cheerfully to- ping to all his merry friends.Finally, we saw the representation of his triumph, whichwas thus. First, his chariot was wholly covered with in,gathered on the mountain Meros: this for its scarcity, whichyou know raises the price of every thing, and principally ofthose leaves in India. In this , Alexander the Great followedhis example at his Indian triumph . The chariot was drawnby elephants joined together, wherein he was imitated byPompey the Great, at Rome, in his African triumph. Initthe good Bacchus was seen drinking out of a mighty umwhich action Marius aped after his victory over the Cimbri,near Aix' in Provence. All his army were crowned withivy; their javelins, bucklers, and drums, were also whollycovered with it; there was not so much as Silenus's ass, butwas betrapped with it.The Indian Kings were fastened with chains of gold closeby the wheels of the chariot; all the company marched inpomp with unspeakable joy, loaded with an infinite numberof trophies, pageants, and spoils, playing and singing merryepiniciums, songs of triumph, and also rural lays and dithy rambs.At the farthest end was a prospect of the land of Egypt;the Nile with its crocodiles, marmosets, ibides,' monkeys,trochilos's , or wrens, ichneumons, or Pharaoh's mice , hippopotami, or sea-horses, and other creatures, its guests and neigh.bours. Bacchus was moving towards that country underthe conduct of a couple of horned beasts, on one of whichIt is Theophrastus' opinion, in lib . 16, cap. 34, of Pliny, thatthroughout India there grows no ivy. Thus, we are to read India, anthis place, conformable to the old editions, not Ida, as the new ones have it. 7 See Pliny, lib. 33, cap. 11. • Songs ofvictory, from the Greek vien, victory.9 A kind of stork, veryblack, hath the legs of a crane, and a long crooked bill . See Herodotuslib. 2, and Pliny, lib. 8, cap. 27. Cicero, lib . 1, De Nat. Deor andPliny, lib. 10, cap. 28, call these storks ibes; but our author chess rather to follow the usual declension of the Latin genitive.CHAP. XLI. ] PANTAGRUEL. 523was written in gold, Apis, and Osiris on the other; becauseno ox or cow had been seen in Egypt till Bacchus came thither.CH. XLI.—How the temple was illuminateed with a wonderfulLamp.BEFORE I proceed to the description of the Bottle, I willgive you that of an admirable lamp, that dispensed so largelight over all the temple, that, though it lay under ground,we could distinguish every object as clearly as above it atnoon day.In the middle of the roof was fixed a ring of massy gold,as thick as my clenched fist. Three chains somewhat less ,most curiously wrought, hung about two feet and a half below it, and in a triangle supported a round plate of fine gold,whose diameter or breadth did not exceed two cubits and half a span. There were four holes in it, in each of whichan empty ball was fastened , hollow within, and open at the top, like a little lamp; its circumference about two hands'breadth each ball was of precious stone; one an amethyst,another an African carbuncle, the third an opal, and a fourthan anthracites; they were full of burning water, five timesdistilled in a serpentine lymbeck, and inconsumptible, likethe oil formerly put into Pallas ' golden lamp' at Acropolis of = Athens by Callimachus. In each of them was a flamingwick, partly of abestine flax, as of old in the temple of Jupiter Ammon, such as those which Cleombrotus, a moststudious philosopher, saw; partly of Carpasian flax, whichwere rather renewed than consumed by the fire.About two feet and a half below that gold plate, the three chains were fastened to three handles, that were fixed to alarge round lamp of most pure crystal, whose diameter wasa cubit and a half, and opened about two hands' breadth onthe top; by which open place a vessel of the same crystal,shaped somewhat like the lower part of a gourd- like lymbeck, or an urinal, was put at the bottom of the great lamp,with such a quantity of the afore- mentioned burning water,the flame of asbestine wick reached the centre of the greatlamp. This made all its spherical body seem to burn andbe in a flame, because the fire was just at the centre andmiddle point, so that it was not more easy to fix the eye on1 See Plutarch of Oracles, and Pausanias' Attics.524 [ BOOK V. RABELAIS' WORKS.it than on the disc of the sun, the matter being wonderfullybright and shining, and the work most transparent and dazzling, by the reflection of the various colours of the preciousstones, whereofthe four small lamps above the main lamp weremade, and their lustre was still variously glittering all overthe temple. Then this wandering light being darted on thepolished marble and agate, with which all the inside of thetemple was pargetted, our eyes were entertained with a sightof all the admirable colours which the rainbow can boast,when the sun darts his fiery rays on some dropping clouds.The design of the lamp was admirable in itself, but, inmy opinion, what added much to the beauty of the whole,was, that round the body of the crystal lamp, there wascarved in cataglyphic work, a lively and pleasant battle ofnaked boys, mounted on little hobby-horses, with littlewhirligig lances and shields, that seemed made of vinebranches with grapes on them; their postures generally were very different, and their childish strife and motionswere so ingeniously expressed, that art equalled nature inevery proportion and action. Neither did this seem engraved, but rather hewed out and embossed in relief, or, atleast, like grotesque, which, by the artist's skill, has theappearance of the roundness of the object it represents; thiswas partly the effect of the various and most charming light,which, flowing out of the lamp, filled the carved places withits glorious rays.CH. XLII.-How the Priestess Bacbuc showed us a fantasticfountain in the temple, and how the fountain- water had thetaste of wine, according to the imagination of those who drankof it.1WHILE we were admiring this incomparable lamp, and thestupendous structure of the temple, the venerable priestessBacbuc, and her attendants, came to us with jolly smilinglooks, and seeing us duly accoutred, without the least difficulty, took us into the middle of the temple, where, justunder the aforesaid lamp, was the fine fantastic fountain.She then ordered some cups, goblets, and talboys of gold,1 Pliny, lib. 2, cap. 103, says, on the credit of Mutianus, that in the isle of Andros, in the temple of Bacchus, there was a fountain which every year, on the fifth of January, never failed having the taste ofwine. Baccius de Thermis, lib . 6, cap. 22, gives abundance of ex amples of such vinous springs.CHAP. XLII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 525silver, and crystal to be brought, and kindly invited us todrink of the liquor that sprung there, which we readily did:for, to say the truth , this fantastic fountain was very inviting,and its materials and workmanship more precious, rare, andadmirable than any thing Plato ever dreamt of in limbo.Its basis or ground-work was of most pure and limpidalabaster, and its height somewhat more than three spans,being a regular heptagon on the outside, with its stylobatesor footsteps, arulets, cymasults or blunt tops, and doric undulations about it. It was exactly round within. On themiddle point of each angle brink stood a pillar orbiculated ,in form of a circle of ivory or alabaster. These were sevenin number, according to the number of the angles.Each pillar's length, from the basis to the architraves , was near seven hands, taking an exact dimension of its diameterthrough the centre of its circumference and inward roundness; and it was so disposed, that, casting our eyes behindone of them, whatever its cube might be, to view its opposite, we found that the pyramidal cone of our visual lightended at the said centre, and there, by the two opposites,formed an equilateral triangle, whose two lines divided thepillar into two equal parts.That which we had a mind to measure, going from oneside to another, two pillars over, at the first third part of the distance between them, was met by their lowermost and fun- damental line, which, in a consult line drawn as far as theuniversal centre, equally divided , gave, in a just partition,the distance of the seven opposite pillars in a right line, beginning at the obtuse angle on the brink, as you know that an angle is always found placed between two others in allangular figures odd in number.This tacitly gives us to understand, that seven semidiameters are in geometrical proportion, compass, and distance ,somewhat less than the circumference of a circle, from thefigure of which they are extracted; that is to say, threewhole parts, with an eighth and a half, a little more, or aseventh and a half, a little less , according to the instructionsgiven us of old by Euclid, Aristotle, Archimedes, and others .2 Fantastic, inasmuch as the liquor which flowed from it, had the taste of whatever sort of wine the drinker fancied he was drinking, orhad a fancy to drink; which last, upon second thoughts, I take to be the true meaning of M. Duchat's words: " avoit en fantaisie de boire,Judicet lector." I suspect it to be a flirt at the scripture.526 RABELAIS' WORKS. [BOOK TThe first pillar, I mean that which faced the temple gate,was of azure, sky- coloured sapphire.The second, of hyacinth, a precious stone, exactly of thecolour of the flower into which Ajax's choleric blood wastransformed; the Greek letters A I being seen on it in manyplaces.The third, an anachite diamond, as bright and glittering alightning.The fourth, a masculine ruby ballais (peach-colouredamethystizing, its flame and lustre ending in violet or purple,like an amethyst.The fifth, an emerald, above five hundred and fifty timesmore precious than that of Serapis³ in the labyrinth of theEgyptians, and more verdant and shining than those thatwere fixed instead of eyes, in the marble lion's head, near King Hermias's tomb.The sixth, of agate, more admirable and various in the distinctions of its veins , clouds , and colours , than that whicsPyrrhus, King of Epirus, so mightily esteemed.The seventh, of syenites, transparent, of the colour of aberyl, and the clear hue of Hymettian honey; and within itthe moon was seen, such as we see her in the sky, silent,'new, and in the wane.These stones were assigned to the seven heavenly planetsby the ancient Chaldeans; and that the meanest capacitiesmight be informed of this, just at the central perpendicularline, on the chapiter of the first pillar, which was of sap- phire, stood the image of Saturn in elutian lead, with hisscythe in his hand, and at his feet a crane of gold, very artfully enamelled, according to the native hue of the saturninefull, bird.On the second, which was of hyacinth, towards the left,Jupiter was seen in jovetian brass, and on his breast an eagle of gold enamelled to the life.Onthe third, was Phoebus in the purest gold, and a whiteco*ck in his right hand.On the fourth, was Mars in Corinthian brass, and a lion athis feet.3 See Pliny, 1. 37, c. 5.new moon not yet shining.elutium, ab aquæ elutione.4 Ibid. , c. 1. 5 ThePliny, l. 34, c. 16, calls this leacCHAP. XLII.]PANTAGRUEL. 527On the fifth, was Venus in copper, the metal of whichAristonidas made Athamas's statue, that expressed in ablushing whiteness his confusion at the sight of his sonLearchus, who died at his feet of a fall.On the sixth, was Mercury in hydrargyre; I would havesaid quicksilver, had it not been fixed , malleable, and un- moveable; that nimble deity had a stork at his feet.On the seventh, was Luna in silver, with a greyhoundat her feet.The size of these statues was somewhat more than a thirdpart of the pillars on which they stood, and they were soadmirably wrought, according to mathematical proportion,that Polycletus's canon' (or rule) could hardly have stoodin competition with them.The basis of the pillars, the chapiters, the architraves,zoophores, and cornices, were Phrygian work of massy gold,purer and finer than any that is found in the rivers Leedenear Montpellier, Ganges in India, Po in Italy, Hebrus inThrace, Tagus in Spain, and Pactolus ' in Lydia.The small arches between the pillars were of the sameprecious stone of which the pillars next to them were.Thus, that arch was of sapphire which ended at the hyacinthpillar, and that was of hyacinth which went towards thediamond, and so on.Above the arches and chapiters of the pillars , on the in- ward front, a cupola was raised to cover the fountain; itwas surrounded by the planetary statues, heptagonal at thebottom, and spherical on the top, and of crystal so pure,transparent, well- polished , whole and uniform in all its parts,without veins, clouds, flaws, or streaks, that Zenocrates 10never saw such a one in his life .Within it were seen the twelve signs of the Zodiac, thetwelve months of the year, with their properties, the twoequinoxes, the ecliptic line , with some of the most remarkable fixed stars about the antartic pole, and elsewhere, so curiously engraven , that I fancied them to be the workmanship of King Necepsus," or Petosiris , the ancient mathematician.On the top of the cupola, just over the centre of the fountain, were three noble long pearls, all of one size, pearSee Pliny, 1. 34, c. 8.Pliny, 1. 33, c. 4.8 The Lez.10 Pliny, 1. 37 , c. 2 .From Ledus.11 Pliny, l. 7, c. 49.528 RABELAIS' WORKS. [BOOK Yfashion, perfectly imitating a tear, and so joined together asto represent a flower- de- lis or lily, each of the flowers seeming above a hand's breadth. A carbuncle jetted out of itscalix or cup, as big as an ostrich's egg, cut seven square,(that number so beloved of nature. ) and so prodigiouslyglorious, that the sight of it had like to have made us blind.for the fiery sun, or the pointed lightning, are not more dazzling and insufferably bright.Now were some judicious appraisers to judge of the valueof this incomparable fountain, and the lamp of which wehave spoke, they would undoubtedly affirm , it exceeds that ofall the treasures and curiosities in Europe, Asia, and Africa put together. For that carbuncle alone would have darkened the pantarbe of Iarchus 12 the Indian magician, with as much ease as the sun outshines and dims the stars with his meridian rays.Now let Cleopatra, that Egyptian queen, boast of her pairof pendants, those two pearls, one of which she caused tobe dissolved in vinegar,13 in the presence of Anthony theTriumvir, her gallant!Or let Pompeia Plautina " be proud of her dress coveredall over with emeralds and pearls curiously intermixed, shewho attracted the eyes of all Rome, and was said to be thegrave-pit and magazine of the conquering robbers of the universe.The fountain had three tubes or channels of right pearl,seated in three equilateral angles already mentioned, extended on the margin, and those channels proceeded in asnail- like line, winding equally on both sides.We looked on them awhile, and had cast our eyes onanother side, when Bacbuc directed us to watch the water;we then heard a most harmonious sound, yet somewhatstopped by starts , far distant, and subterranean, by which means it was still more pleasing than if it had been free,uninterrupted, and near us, so that our minds were as agreeably entertained through our ears with that charming melody,as they were through the windows of our eyes, with thosedelightful objects.12 See Philostratus, 1. 3, c. 14, of Apollonius' life. Heliodorus likewise speaks of this stone. 13 See Pliny, l . 9, c. 35, and Macrobius' Saturnalia, 1. 3, c. 17. 14 Rabelais, who it isprobable wrote from memory, is mistaken here, and had forgot that Pliny, 19, c. 35, calls this lady Lollia Paulina.CHAP. XLII. ]PANTAGRUEL. 529Bacbuc then said, Your philosophers will not allow thatmotion is begot by the power of figures; look here and seethe contrary. By that single snail-like motion, equallydivided as you see, and a five-fold infoliature , moveable atevery inward meeting, such as is the vena cava, where itenters into the right ventricle of the heart; just so is theflowing of this fountain, and by it a harmony ascends ashigh as your world's ocean.She then ordered her attendants to make us drink; and,to tell you the truth of the matter as near as possible, weare not, heaven be praised! of the nature of a drove of calflollies, who (as your sparrows cannot feed unless you bob them on the tail 15 ) must be rib- roasted with tough crab-tree,and firked into a stomach, or, at least, into an humour to eator drink: no, we know better things, and scorn to scorn anyman's civility, who civilly invites us to a drinking bout.Bacbuc asked us then, how we liked our tiff. We answered,that it seemed to us good harmless sober Adam's liquor, fitto keep a man in the right way, and, in a word, mere element; more cool and clear than Argyrontes in Etolia,Peneus in Thessaly, Axius in Mygdonia, or Cydnus in Cilicia, a tempting sight of whose cool silver stream causedAlexander to prefer the short-lived pleasure of bathing him- self in it, to the inconveniences which he could not but foresee would attend so ill- timed an action.This, said Bacbuc, comes of not considering with ourselves,or understanding the motions of the musculous tongue, whenthe drink glides on it in its way to the stomach. Tell me,noble strangers, are your throats lined, paved, or enamelled,as formerly was that of Pithyllus,16 nicknamed Theutes, that you can have missed the taste, relish, and flavour of thisdivine liquor? Here, said she, turning towards her gentlewoman, bring my scrubbing- brushes, you know which, toscrape, rake, and clear their palates.They brought immediately some stately, swinging, jollyhams, fine substantial neat's-tongues, good hung- beef, pure15 Here the author has in his eye the badauds (co*ckneys we call them)of Paris. He before, in 1. 2, c. 14, calls them buvereaux (i . e. sippers,small drinkers, though it may mean water- drinkers) because, as Budæusobserves, 1. 5, of his De Asse, the people of Paris, generally, drink butlittle wine. Rabelais calls them calves (veaux. ) Now, to play thecalf, is properly to play the co*ckney (badaud. ) This badaud may well enough come from vitellus. 16 See Athenæus, l . 1 , c. 6.VOL. II. MN530 RABELAIS' WORKS.and delicate botargos, venison, sausages, and such othergullet-sweepers. And, to comply with her invitation, wecrammed and twisted till we owned ourselves thoroughlycured of thirst," which before did damnably plague us.We are told, continued she, that formerly a learned andvaliant Hebrew chief, leading his people through the deserts.where they were in danger of being famished, obtained ofGod some manna, whose taste was to them, by imagination,such as that of meat was to them before in reality: thus.drinking of this miraculous liquor, you will find its tastelike any wine that you shall fancy to drink. Come, then,fancy and drink. We did so, and Panurge had no soonerwhipped off his brimmer, but he cried, By Noah's openshop, it is vin de Baulne, better than ever was yet tippedover tongue, or may ninety and sixteen devils swallow me.Oh! that to keep its taste the longer, we gentlemen topershad but necks some three cubits long or so, as Philoxenusdesired to have, or, at least, like a crane's as Melanthus wished his.On the faith of true lanterners, quoth Friar John, it isgallant, sparkling Greek wine; 19 now, for God's sake, sweet- heart, do but teach me how the devil you make it. It seemsto me Mirevaux wine, said Pantagruel; for, before I drank,I supposed it to be such. Nothing can be disliked in it, butthat it is cold, colder, I say, than the very ice; colder thanthe water of Nonacris and Dirce," or the Conthoporian17 It is indeed, in the original, tres bien curé de soif. But how couldthat be? They had as yet been only preparing themselves to drink stoutly, and pour it down lustily, by eating high- seasoned meats. M. Duchat therefore, to make sense of it, has added forsque, thus read,tres-bien curez, forsque de soif, thoroughly cured, except as to thirst, &c.18 It is Athenæus, who 1. 1 , c. 5, relates the different wishes of these two drunkards. 19 The author does not use the word petiliantsparkling, but voltigeant, vaulting, bounding, curvetting, turning round on the toe. Neither does he mean real Greek wine, but a brisk wine,which like the north- east wind (vent grec in French, ) will make a man bound and curvet, instead of making any advances forward.20 See Pliny, 1. 13, c. 2. 21 The water of the fountain Dircéin Baotia, though very clear, yet not being particularly renowned for its coldness, I make no doubt but Rabelais had in his head the Dir- cenna of Martial, the water whereof was as cold as ice. “ Avidamrigens Dircenna placabit sitim, " says that poet, in the 51st epigr. of 1. 1. It is true, that instead of Dircenna, Rabelais, who did not so narrowly look into the thing, has writ it Dircé, doubtless misled by honest Nicholas Perrot, whose words on this passage of Martial, are:CHAP. XLIII. ] PANTAGRUEL. 531spring at Corinth, that froze up the stomach and nutritive parts of those that drank of it.Drink once, twice, or thrice more, said Bacbuc, stillchanging your imagination, and you shall find its taste andflavour to be exactly that on which you shall have pitched.Then never presume to say that any thing is impossible to God. We never offered to say such a thing, said I; farfrom it, we maintain he is omnipotent.CH. XLIII. -How the priestess Bacbuc equipt Panurge, in orderto have the word of the Bottle.WHEN We had thus chatted and tippled , Bacbuc asked, Whoof you here would have the word of the Holy Bottle? I,your most humble little funnel, if it please you, quoth Panurge. Friend, said she, I have but one thing to tell you,which is, that when you come to the Oracle, you take care to hearken and hear the word only with one ear. This, criedFriar John, is wine of one ear, as Frenchmen call it.She then wrapped him up in a gaberdine, bound his noddlewith a goodly clean biggin, clapped over it a felt, such asthose through which hypocras is distilled, at the bottom ofwhich, instead of a cowl, she put three obelisks, made himdraw on a pair of old - fashioned cod- pieces instead of mittens,girded him about with three bagpipes bound together, bathedhis jobbernol thrice in the fountain; then threw a handful ofmeal on his phiz, fixed three co*ck's feathers on the right sideof thehypocratical felt, made him take a jaunt nine times roundthe fountain, caused him to take three little leaps, and tobump his a seven times against the ground, repeating I donot know what kind of conjurations all the while in the Tuscan tongue, and ever and anon reading in a ritual or book ofceremonies, carried after her by one of her mystagogues.For my part, may I never stir if I do not really believe,that neither Numa Pompilius, the second King of theRomans, nor the Cerites of Tuscia, nor the old Hebrew captain, ever instituted so many ceremonies as I then saw performed; nor were ever half so many religious forms used bythe sooth-sayers of Memphis in Egypt to Apis; or by the" Dircê et Neme fontes sunt frigidissimi æstate inter Bilbilim et Sego- bregam, in ripa fere Salonis amnis. " So I have even left it Dircé inthe text; though I am satisfied it is wrong.MM 2532 RABELAIS' WORKS. [BOOK VEuboians, at Rhamnus, to Rhamnusia; ' or to Jupiter Am- mon, or to Faronia.³When she had thus accoutred my gentleman, she took himout of our company, and led him out ofthe temple, through agolden gate on the right, into a round chapel made of transparent speculary stones, by whose solid clearness the sun'slight shined there through the precipice of the rock withoutany windows or other entrance, and so easily and fully dispersed itself through the greater temple, that the light seemedrather to spring out of it than to flow into it.5The workmanship was not less rare than that of the sacredtemple at Ravenna, or that in the island of Chemnis in Egypt.Nor must I forget to tell you, that the work of that roundchapel was contrived with such a symmetry, that its diameter was just the height of the vault.In the middle of it was an heptagonal fountain of fine alabaster most artfully wrought, full of water, which was so clearthat it might have passed for element in its purity and simplicity. The sacred Bottle was in it to the middle, clad inpure fine crystal, of an oval shape, except its muzzle, whichwas somewhat wider than was consistent with that figure.Here M. Duchat says, Rabelais has confounded the false with the true, after a most ridiculous manner. M. Duchat's note, I think, is noless confused. He seems to me, at present, to have explained obscurum per obscurius. He says Rhamnusia was the Goddess Fortune. Camb.Dict. says, the Goddess of Revenge. 2 See Q. Curtius, 1. 4.3 A Goddess of the Woods; for it is storied, that when her grovein the mountain of Soracte was burned down, the people carriedthither her picture, and presently the wood sprang afresh. There is aspring also in that grove, according to Horace . Servius says, shewas a nymph of Campania: and makes her also the goddess of freemen, in whose temple, having shaved their heads, they put on their cap,the badge of liberty. 4 An imitation of Pliny's description ofthe temple of Fortune of Seius, built by Nero, l. 36, c. 22.5 The cathedral church of Ravenna was anciently a temple consecrated to Hercules. In the close of the fifth century, or in the beginning of the sixth, Theodoric, King of Italy, built on the ruins of thisancient edifice, the church which Rabelais here speaks of; a churchsuperb and magnificent in the highest degree, according to the accountTheodoric himself gives of it in his letter to Agapetus, prefect of Rome;but whose immense riches the French no more spared than they didthat of private families after the battle of Ravenna in 1512. See Car siodorus, 1. 1 , ep. 61, and Francis Scot's Itinerarium Italiæ.CHAP. XLIV. ] 533 PANTAGRUEL.CH. XLIV.-How Bacbuc, the high-priestess, brought Panurgebefore the Holy Bottle.THERE the noble priestess Bacbuc made Panurge stoop andkiss the brink of the fountain; then bade him rise and dancethree ithymbi. ' Which done, she ordered him to sit down,between two stools placed there for that purpose, his arseupon the ground, Then she opened her ritual book, and,whisperingin his left ear, made him sing an epileny, as follows.BOTTLE! whose mysterious deep Does ten thousand secrets keep,With attentive ear I wait;Ease my mind, and speak my fate.Soul ofjoy, like Bacchus, we More than India gain by thee.Truths unborn thy juice reveals,Which futurity conceals.Antidote to frauds and lies,Wine, that mounts us to the skies,May thy father Noah's brood Like him drown, but in thy flood.Speak, so may the liquid mine Of rubies or of diamonds, shine.,Bottle! whose mysterious deep,Does ten thousand secrets keep,With attentive ear I wait;Ease my mind, and speak my fate.Dances in honour of Bacchus.RABELAIS' WORKS. [BOOK V.534Friend PaWhen Panurge had sung, Babuc threw I do not knowwhatinto the fountain, and straight its water began to boil in good earnest, just for the world as doth the great monastical potat Bourgueil, when it is high holiday there.nurge was listening with one ear, and Bacbuc kneeled by him,when such a kind of humming was heard out of the Bottle,as is made by a swarm of bees bred in the flesh of a young bull, killed and dressed according to Aristæus's art, or such as is made when a bolt flies out of a cross bow, or when ashower falls on a sudden in summer. Immediately after thisBy cob's body, cried Panurge,was heard the word TRINC.it is broken, or cracked at least, not to tell a lie for the mater; for, even so do crystal bottles speak in our country,when they burst near the fire.Bacbuc arose, and gently taking Panurge under the arms,said, Friend, offer your thanks to indulgent heaven, as reason requires; you have soon had the word of the Goddess- Bottle:and the kindest, most favourable, and certain word of answethat I ever yet heard her give, since I officiated here at hemost sacred oracle; rise, let us go to the chapter, in whosegloss that fine word is explained . With all my heart, quoti Panurge; by jingo, I amjust as wise as I was last year light, where is the book? Turn it over, where is the chapter? Let us see this merry gloss.CH. XLV. How Bacbuc explained the word of the GoddesBottle. BACBUC having thrown I do not know what into the fountai straight the water ceased to boil: and then she took Panurinto the greater temple, in the central place, where there wthe enlivening fountain. There she took out a hugeous silver book, ' in the shapea half-tierce, or hogshead, of sentences; and having filSt. Peter ofBourgueil , of the order of St. Benedict, a royal abber 1 The monks used to make the indrinking the diocese cups inof the Angers shape. of mass-books and prayer-books, to decer It may not be impertinent here to refer:: the bookworld called . La Mappemonde Papistique, (Map of Popery,) p.§.which gives an account of a certain sham Saint at Venice, whotthe help of five or six such books, would spend five or six days gether in retirement, and make believe he subsisted all the while At last, these devotional books were found to be no ot than a miracle so many . cases, some filled with march- panes made of the be and fleshiest parts of capons and partridges, and the others so manLagons full of Malmsey wine.CHAP. XLV. ]PANTAGRUEL. 535it at the fountain, said to him: The philosophers, preachers,and doctors of your world, feed you up with fine words andcant at the ears; now, here we really incorporate our precepts at the mouth. Therefore I will not say to you, readthis chapter, see this gloss; no, I say to you, taste me thisfine chapter, swallow me this rare gloss. Formerly an ancientprophets of the Jewish nation eat a book, and became a clerk'even to the very teeth! now will I have you drink one, thatyou may be a clerk to your very liver. Here, open yourmandibules.Panurge gaping as wide as his jaws would stretch, Bacbuctook the silver book, at least we took it for a real book, forit looked just for the world like a breviary; but, in truth, itwas a breviary, a flask of right Falernian wine, as it camefrom the grape, which she made him swallow every drop.By Bacchus, quoth Panurge, this was a notable chapter,a most authentic gloss, on my word. Is this all that thetrismegistian Bottle's word means? In troth I like it extremely, it went down like mother's milk. Nothing more,returned Bacbuc; for Trinc is a panomphean word, that is,a word understood, used, and celebrated by all nations, andsignifies drink.Some say in your world, that sack is a word used in alltongues, and justly admitted in the same sense among allnations; for, as Æsop's fable hath it , all men are born witha sack at the neck, naturally needy, and begging of eachother; neither can themost powerful king be without the help ofother men, or can any one that is poor subsist without the rich,though he be never so proud and insolent; nay, even were itHippias' the philosopher, who boasted he could do every thing.Much less can any one make shift without drink than withouta sack. Therefore here we hold not that laughing, but thatdrinking is the distinguishing character of man. I do notsay drinking, taking that word singly and absolutely in thestrictest sense: no, beasts then might put in for a share; Imean drinking cool delicious wine. For you must know,my beloved, that by wine we become divine; neither canthere be a surer argument, or a less deceitful divinationYour academics ' assert the same, when they make the etymology of wine, which the Greeks call OINO】 to be .mm3 Ezekiel, c. ii. and iii.5 Varro, &c.4 See Plato in his as minor.536 [BOOK V. RABELAIS' WORKS.vis, strength, virtue, and power; for it is in its power to fillthe soul with all truth, learning, and philosophy.If you observe what is written in Ionic letters on thetemple gate, you may have understood that truth is in wine.The goddess Bottle therefore directs you to the divine liquor;"be yourself the expounder of your undertaking.It is impossible, said Pantagruel to Panurge, to speak moreto the purpose than does this true priestess; you may remember I told you as much when you first spoke to meabout it.Trinc then what says your heart, elevated by Bacchic enthusiasm?With this, quoth Panurge,Trinc, trinc; by Bacchus let us tope,And tope again; for, now I hopeTo see some brawny, juicy rump,Well tickled with my carnal stump.E'er long, my friends , I shall be wedded,Sure as my trap- stick has a red head;And my sweet wife shall hold the combat,Long as my baws can on her bum beat.O what a battle of a-fightingWill there be! which I much delight in?What pleasing pains then shall I takeTo keep myself and spouse awake!All heart and juice, I'll up and ride,And make a duch*ess of my bride.Sing Iö pæan! loudly singTo Hymen, who all joys will bring.Well, Friar John, I'll take my oath,This oracle is full of troth:Intelligible truth it bears,More certain than the sieve and shears.CH. XLVI. - How Panurge and the rest rhymed with poeticfury.WHAT a pox ails the fellow? quoth Friar John. Stark6 Only cheer up your hearts and be merry; and for every thing else,so you hold fast your integrity, and maintain the character of a worthy,honest man, whatever state or condition of life may fall to your lot,married or single, God will love you, and be your friend, and all good men will esteem you.CHAP. XLVI. ]PANTAGRUEL. 537staring mad, or bewitched on my word! Do but hear thechiming dotterel gabble in rhyme. What the devil has heswallowed? His eyes roll in his loggerhead, just for theworld like a dying goat's. Will the addle- pated wight havethe grace to sheer off? Will he rid us of his damned company, to go sh*te out his nasty rhyming balderdash in somebog-house? Will nobody be so kind as to cram some dog'sbur down the poor cur's gullet? or will he, monk- like, run his fist up to the elbow into his throat to his very maw, toscour and clear his flanks? Will he take a hair of the samedog?Pantagruel chid Friar John, and said:Bold monk, forbear; this , I'll assure ye,Proceeds all from poetic fury;Warmed by the God, inspired with wine,His human soul is made divine.For without jest,His hallowed breast,With wine possessed.Could have no rest,Till he had expressedSome thoughts at leastOf his great guest.Then strait he fliesAbove the skies,And mollifies,With prophesies,Our miseries.And since divinely he's inspired,Adore the soul by wine acquired,And let the tosspot be admired.How! quoth the friar, is the fit of rhyming upon you too?Is it come to that? Then we are all peppered, or the devilpepper me. What would I not give to have Gargantua seeus while we are in this maggoty crambo-vein! Now may Ibe cursed with living on that damned empty food, if I cantell, whether I shall escape the catching distemper. Thedevil a bit do I understand which way to go about it: however, the spirit of fustian possesses us all, I find. Well, bySt. John, I will poetise, since everybody does; I find itcoming. Stay, and pray pardon me, if I do not rhyme incrimson; it is my first essay.1 Craimosi (crimson) in French does not so much signify a particu538 RABELAIS' WORKS. Bco*k VThou, who canst water turn to wine,'Transform my bum, by power divine,Into a lantern, that may lightMy neighbour in the darkest night.Panurge then proceeds in his rapture, and says:From Pythian Tripos ne'er were heardMore truths, nor more to be revered.I think from Delphos to this spring,Some wizard brought that conjuring thing.Had honest Plutarch here been toping,He then so long had ne'er been gropingTo find according to his wishes,Why oracles are mute as fishesAt Delphos now the reason's clear,No more at Delphos they're, but here.Here is the tripos, out of whichIs spoke the doom of poor and rich.For Athenæus³ does relateThis Bottle is the womb of Fate;Prolific of mysterious wine,And big with prescience divine;It brings the truth with pleasure forth,Besides you havn't a pennyworth.So, Friar John, I must exhort you To wait a word that may import you,And to inquire, while here we tarry,If it shall be your luck to marry.lar colour as the perfection of any colour whatsoever. Thus they say,rouge-cramoisi (red crimson) violet cramoisi (violet- crimson . ) Wesy a knave in grain, and so too they say (sot en cramoisi) an ass in grain ,as much as to say an ass or fool in perfection . Thus, to rhyme in crimson, is, properly speaking, to make as excellent verses in their kind, as crimson is in matter of colours.ODieu, Père paterne,Qui müas l'eade en vin,Fays de mon cul lanterne,Pour luire a mon voisin.In imitation of Rabelais's usual doggrel rhyme it may be translated,O God paternal Father, Into a lantern turn my bum,Who made wine out of water, To light my neighbours home.Motteux has rhymed it so well, that Friar John's asking pardon fornot rhyming in crimson, as it is his first essay, is quite absurd.-W.2 It is more profane in the French original a good deal; it is tooimpious even in the translation: but, we must consider a monk speaks it, as honest Martin Luther used to excuse his rapping out an oath nowand then; Consider I was bred a monk. 3 Lib. 2, cap. 1.CHAP. XLVI. ] PANTAGRUEL. 539Friar John answers him in a rage, and says:How, marry! by St. Bennet's boot,And his gambadoes, I'll ne'er do't.No man that knows me ne'er shall judgeI mean to make myself a drudge;Or that pilgarlic e'er will doatUpon a paltry petticoat.I'll ne'er my liberty betrayAll for a little leap-frog play;And ever after wear a clogLike monkey or like mastiff-dog:No, I'd not have, upon my life ,Great Alexander for my wife,Nor Pompey, nor his dad- in - law,Who did each other clapper- claw.Not the best he that wears a head,Shall win me to his truckle- bed.Panurge, pulling off his gaberdine and mystical accoutrements, replied:Wherefore thou shalt, thou filthy beast,Be damned twelve fathoms deep at least;While I shall reign in Paradise,Whence on thy loggerhead I'll piss,Now when that dreadful hour is come,That thou in hell receiv'st thy doom,E'en there, I know, thou'lt play some trick,And Prosperine shan't scape a prick Of the long pin within thy breeches.But when thou'rt using these capriches,And catterwauling in her cavern,Send Pluto to the farthest tavern,For the best wine that's to be had,Lest he should see, and run horn mad:She's kind, and ever did admireA well-fed monk, or well-hung friar.Go to, quoth Friar John, thou old noddy, thou doddipoledninny, go to the devil thou art prating of; I have done withrhyming; the rheum¹ gripes me at the gullet. Let us talkof paying and going; come.He has rhymed himself into a rheum, as Marot says in his short epive to the king:-Fn rimant, bien souvent je m'enrhime. "540 RABELAIS' WORKS. [ BOOK Y.Cн. XLVII.-How we took our leave of Bucbuc, and left theOracle of the Holy Bottle.Do not troubleyourself about any thing here, said the priestess to the friar; if you be but satisfied, we are. Here below, inthese circumcentral regions, we place the sovereign good no'in taking and receiving, but in bestowing and giving; so thatwe esteem ourselves happy, not if we take and receive muchof others, as perhaps the sects of teachers do in your world,but rather if we impart and give much. All I have to begof you, is that you leave us here your names in writing, inthis ritual. She then opened a fine large book, and as wegave our names, one of her (she) mystagogues, with a goldpin, drew some lines on it, as if she had been writing; butwe could not see any characters.This done, she filled three small leather vessels with fantastic water, and giving them into our hands, said, Now, myfriends, you may depart, and may that intellectual sphere,whose centre is every where, and circumference no where,whom we call GOD, keep you in his almighty protection.When you come into your world, do not fail to affirm andwitness, that the greatest treasures, and most admirablethings, are hidden under ground; and not without reason.Ceres was worshipped, because she taught mankind theart of husbandry, and bythe use of corn, which she invented,abolished that beastly way of feeding on acorns; and shegrievously lamented her daughter's banishment into our subterranean regions, certainly foreseeing that Proserpine wouldmeet with more excellent things, more desirable enjoyments,below, than she her mother could be blessed with above.¹What do you think is become of the art of forcing thethunder and celestial fire down, which the wise Prometheushad formerly invented? It is most certain you have lost it;it is no more on your hemisphere: but here below we haveit. And, without a cause, you sometimes wonder to seewhole towns burned and destroyed bylightning and etherealfire, and are at a loss about knowing from whom, by whom,and to what end, those dreadful mischiefs were sent. Nowthey are familiar and usual to us; and your philosophers,who complain that the ancients have left them nothing to1 By what follows, one would think she should rather have envied her daughter. But great wits may say any thing, and reason any how.I wonder M. Duchat takes no notice ofthis inconsistency of Rabelais.CHAP. XLVII.]PANTAGRUEL. 541write of, or to invent, are very much mistaken.Those phenomena which you see in the sky; whatever the surface ofthe earth affords you, and the sea, and every river contains,is not to be compared with what is hid within the bowels of the earth .For this reason the subterranean ruler has justly gained inalmost every language, the epithet of rich. Now, whenyour sages shall wholly apply their minds to a diligent andstudious search after truth, humbly begging the assistance ofthe sovereign God, whom formerly the Egyptians in theirlanguage called The Hidden and the Concealed, and invoking him by that name, beseech him to reveal and makehimself known to them, that Almighty Being will, out of hisinfinite goodness, not only make his creatures , but even him- self known to them.Thus will they be guided by good lanterns. For all theancient philosophers and sages have held two things necessary, safely and pleasantly to arrive at the knowledge of God,and true wisdom; first, God's gracious guidance, then man's assistance .So among the philosophers, Zoroaster took Arimaspes forthe companion of his travels; Esculapius, Mercury; Or- pheus, Musæus; Pythagoras, Aglaophemus; and among.princes and warriors, Hercules, in his most difficult achievements, had his singular friend Theseus; Ulysses, Diomedes;Æneas, Achates: you followed their examples, and came under the conduct of an illustrious lantern; now, in God'sname depart, and may he go along with you! 2ON CHAP. XXXVII. &c . —The description of the temple, its gates,pavement, walls, lamps, and fountains, is a master-piece of architecture; by which the author showed, that he knew as well all the beau- ties of that art, as he did those of every other that deserves the applica- tion of a man of sense. If any have a mind to look for mysteries in allthis, perhaps they may find many whose discovery will reward their search. As for me, as I have not had leisure to say more in less room,I will only say something of it that may give a general idea of the author's design, and so conclude.Bacbuc, which is the name of the bottle, and also that of the priestess,who ministers at the oracle, is Hebrew, and, as we have said, signifies a bottle.Our mysterious author may perhaps be thought to have had a mind to hint, that the Hebrew original, or text of the Bible, is the first spring of truth, that flows out of it into the versions, as wine poured out of a2 The usual words of the French preachers concluding their sermons542 RABELAIS' WORKS. [BOOK. V.bottle into a glass or cup. Then, as on the portal of the temple, there was written in characters of the finest gold, EN ' OINQ ' AÅHØEJA some may think it implies, that the wine of truth is also to be found inthe Greek text of the New Testament, which gives the name of wineto truth: buy wine and honey without money. The two folding gates may be fancied to denote the Old Testament and the New, which must be opened to come to the oracle of truth. Every one will not like thismanner of explaining those passages; but all , I hope, will approve the following way of understanding the rest.The perspicuous lantern, which lighted and guided our votaries,opens those gates; but desires them not to take it amiss, that she does not go into the temple with them, leaving them wholly to the conduct of the priestess Bacbuc: for the lantern was not allowed to go in for certain causes, rather to be concealed than revealed to mortals. How- ever, she advised them to be resolute and secure.This mystical reason is, that as truth is hated in this world, most of the learned, who know it, are afraid of conversing with it openly, lest this make many men their enemies, spoil their preferment, ruin them,and perhaps cost them their lives. For this reason, they come to thevery portal of truth's temple, and even open the gates to others; yet do not enter within its sanctuary.The greatest men, both of the clergy and laity in France, acted thus in the reigns of Francis I. and Henry II.But another cause of that venerable lantern's staying without the temple, was the piercing glory which flowed out of the inextinguishable lamp, which filled the subterranean temple with a light infinitely quicker and clearer than that of the sun. So that this extreme brightness would have utterly dimmed and eclipsed that of the lantern.The author could never have concluded better than by saying, thatwhen our sages shall wholly apply their minds to a diligent and studious search after truth, beseeching the hidden God to make himself knownto them, that Almighty Being will do it, and impart to them also the knowledge of his creatures. -M.THE END OF THE FIFTH POOK.THE MOST CERTAIN, TRUE, AND INFALLIBLEPANTAGRUELIAN PROGNOSTICATION,FOR THE YEAR THAT IS TO COME, FOR EVER AND AYE. CALCULATEDFOR THE BENEFIT AND NODDIFICATION OF THE GIDDY-BRAINED ANDWEATHER-WISE WOULD- BE'S. BY MASTER ALCOFRIBAS NASIER, AR- CHITRICLIN TO THE AFORE- MENTIONED PANTAGRUEL.TO THE COURTEOUS READER,GREETING. Having considered the infinite abuses arising from the whole cart-loads of Louvain_Prognostications, made in theshadow of a pot of drink, ' or so; I have here calculated one of themost sure and unerring that ever was seen in black and white,as hereafter you will find. For, doubtless, considering what the royal prophet says to God in the fifth Psalm, Thou shalt destroythem that speak leasing, it is a heinous, foul, and crying sin to tella damned wilful lie, thereby to deceive the poor gaping world, greedy of novelties; such as the French, above all others, have been timeout of mind, as Cæsar in his Commentaries, and John de Gravot,in his Gallic Mythologies, have set down. Which is daily observable throughout all France, where the first questions, which youshall put to people newly arrived , are, What news? Is there no news stirring? What do they say? Whatisthe discourse abroad?And so inquisitive they are, that they will be stark staring mad atthose who come out of strange countries, unless they bring a wholebudget full of strange stories, calling them dolts, blockheads, ninnyhammers, and silly ouffs.Since then, they are so ready to ask after news, and consequentlythe more glibly swallow down every flim-flam story that is toldthem, were it not expedient that some people, on whose faith we might depend, should hold offices of intelligence on the frontiersof the kingdom, and have a competent salary allowed them for nothing else but to examine the news that is brought, whether it istrue or no? Yea, verily, friends. Even so did my good masterPantagruel through all the countries of Utopia and Dipsody:whence it comes that his territories are so prosperous, that at present they cannot tell now to make away with their wine fast enough,but are fain to let it run about in waste, if plenty of good fellowsfrom other parts do not come to help them off with it.Being therefore desirous to satisfy the curiosity of every good companion, I have tumbled over and over all the pantarchs of theheavens, calculated the quadrates of the moon, hooked out what- ever all the astrophiles,2, hypernephelists,3 anemophylaxes, * uranoIn the shadow of a glass of wine; à l'ombre d'ung verre de vin.2 Star-lovers.the clouds.3 Such as, by their speculations, raise themselves above Those who bend their thoughts to foretell the blowing of the winds.544 [BOOK V. RABELAIS' WORKS.petes,, ombrophores, and the devil and all of them, have thought;and then having conferred with Empedocles upon the whole, who,by the way, desires to be kindly remembered to you, I have herecrammed the pith, marrow, and matter of the substance of it intoa few chapters. Assuring you that I say nothing of it but what Ithink; and that I think nothing of it, but what it is; and there isno more to be known in those matters, than what you are going to read . As for any thing that may hereafter be said over and above,it will come to pass, peradventure aye, and peradventure no.Take notice, by the by, that if you do not believe every syllable,iota, and tittle of it, you do me a great deal of wrong, for which,either here or elsewhere, you may chance to be clawed off with avengeance. A good salt- eel, crab-tree, or bull's pizzle, may beplentifully bestowed on your outward man. Youmay take pepper in the nose, and snuff and suck up the air as you would oysters, as much as you please; it is all one for that."Well, however, come, snite your noses, my little children; andyou old doating father grey-beards pull out your best eyes, do onyour barnacles, and, in the scale of the sanctuary, weigh me every tittle of what I am going to tell you.Ofthe golden number. -The golden numbers non est inventusI cannot find it this year by any calculation that I have made.Let's go on; verte folium, turn over leaf.CH. I. Ofthe governor and lord ascendant this year.WHATSOEVER those blindfolded blockheadly fools, the astrologersof Louvain, Nuremberg, Tubing, and Lyons, may tell ye, don't youfeed yourselves up with whims and fancies, nor believe there is anygovernor of the whole universe this year, but God the Creator, who by his divine word rules and governs all; by whom all things arein their nature, propriety, and conditions, and without whose preservation and governance all things in a moment would be reducedto nothing, as out of nothing they were by him created. For of him comes, in him is, and by him is made perfect every being, andall life and motion, as says the evangelical trumpet, my Lord St. Paul, Romans, the 11th.Therefore the ruler of this year, and of all others, according to our authentic solution, will be God Almighty. And neither Saturn,nor Mars, nor Jupiter, nor any other planet, nor the very angels,nor saints, nor men, nor devils, shall have any virtue, efficacy, or 5 Those who scale the heavens.in foretelling the rain.6 Those whose application consists 7 Here M. Motteux should have added: For depend upon it, there will be hot work at the oven, if the baker do not fall asleep. Upon which conclusion of the sentence, and its beginning with the ar- guillades, (i . e. the whippings with an eel, or an eel's skin, ) M. Duchat observes that it is a warning to the French Protestants to quit the kingdom betimes, or prepare to be infallibly burned in it, since their enemies bad sworn to destroy them root and branch. 8 It runs thus in the original; Ofthe golden number,r.on dicitur; because I cannot find it, &c.PANTAGRUELIAN PROGNOSTICATIONS. 545influence whatsoever, unless God of his good pleasure gives it them.As Avicen says, second causes have not any influence or action whatsoever, if the first cause did not influence them. Does not thegood little mannikin speak truth, think ye?CH. II. Ofthe eclipses this year.THIS year there will be so many eclipses of the sun and moon, thatI fear ( not unjustly) our pockets ' will suffer inanition, be full empty,and our feeling at a loss. Saturn will be retrograde, Venus direct,Mercury as unfixed as quicksilver. And a pack of planets will not go as you would have them.For this reason the crabs will go side-long and the rope-makersbackward; the little stools will get upon the benches, and the spitson the racks, and the bands on the hats; and many a one's yardwill hang down and dandle for want of leathern pouches; fleas willbe generally black; bacon will run away from pease in Lent; the belly will waddle before; the a- will sit down first; there will notbe a bean left in a twelfth-cake, nor an ace in a flush; the dice willnot run as you wish, though you cog them, and the chance that youdesire will seldom come; brutes shall speak in several places;Shrovetide will have its day; one part of the world shall disguiseitself to gull and chouse the other, and run about the streets like aparcel of addle-pated animals and mad devils; such a hurly-burlywas never seen since the devil was a little boy; and there will beabove seven and twenty irregular verbs made this year, if Priscian do not hold them in. If God do not help us, we shall have ourhands and hearts full. But on the other side, if he be with us,nothing can hurt us, as says the celestial star-gazer, who was rapt into the third heaven, Romans the 8th. Si Deus pro nobis, quiscontra nos? If God be for us, who can be against us? In goodfaith, nemo domine, nobody is not like your worship; for he is aspowerful as he is good. Here for the same, praise ye his holy name.CH. III. Ofthe diseases this year.THIS year the stone-blind shall see but very little; the deaf shallhear but scurvily; the dumb shall not speak very plain; the rich shall be somewhat in a better case than the poor, and the healthy than the sick. Whole flocks, herds, and droves of sheep, swine,and oxen, co*cks and hens, ducks and drakes, geese and ganders,shall go to pot: but the mortality will not be altogether so great By the sun, chemists mean gold; and by the moon, silver. 2 Priscianis here put for grammar in general, and in particular for the French grammar, sc subject to changes, especially in the verbs at that time; some saying alla, others allit, allerent, allirent, and allarent; mors for mordu, querre for querir, and an hundred others, which were used for the most part indifferently.This chapter is so like that which Joach Fortius Rindelbergius of Antwerp nas entitled Ridicula, sed jucunda, quædam vaticinia, (anno 1529, ) that i know not which of the two is the original.VOL. II. N N546 RABELAIS' WORKS,among apes, monkies, baboons, and dromedaries. As for old age,it will be incurable this year, because of the years past. Those whoare sick of the pleurisy will feel a plaguy stitch in their sides; those who are troubled with the thorough-go- nimble, or wild- squirt, willoften prostitute their blind cheeks to the bog-house; catarrhs this year shall distil from the brain on the lower parts; sore eyes will by no means help the sight; ears shall be at least as scarce and short in Gascony, and among knights of the post, as ever; a most horrid and dreadful, virulent, malignant, catching, perverse, andodious malady, shall be almost epidemical, insomuch that manyshall run mad upon it, not knowing what nail to drive to keep the wolf from the door; very often plotting, contriving, cudgelling,and puzzling their weak shallow brains, and syllogizing and pryingup and down for the philosopher's stone, though they only get Mida's lugs by the bargain. I quake for very fear when I think on it; for I assure you, few will escape this disease, which Averroescalls lack of money; and by consequence of the last year's comet,and Saturn's retrogradation, a huge drivelling he- scoundrel, all be- crinkum'd, be- scabbed, and cauliflowered with the pox, shall diein the spital; at his death will be a horrid clutter between the cats and the rats, hounds and hares, hawks and ducks, and eke betweez the monks and eggs.CH. IV. Ofthefruits of the earth this year.I FIND, by the calculations of Albumazar, ¹ in his book of the GreatConjunction, and elsewhere, that this will be a plentiful year of allmanner of good things to those who have enough: but your hopsof Picardy will go near to fare the worse for the cold. As for oats,they will be a great help to horses. I dare say there will not be much more bacon than swine. Pisces having the ascendant, itwill be a mighty year for muscles, co*ckles, and periwinkles. Mer- cury somewhat threatens our parsley beds; yet parsley will be to be had for money. Hemp will grow faster than the children of thisage, and some will find there is but too much on't. There will bebut a very few bonchretiens, but choke- pears in abundance. As forcorn, wine, fruit, and herbs, there never was such plenty as will be now, if poor folks may have their wish.CH. V. Ofthe disposition of the people this year.It is the oddest whimsy in the world, to fancy there are stars forkings, popes, and great dons, any more than for the poor and needy.As if, forsooth, some new stars were made since the flood, or sinceRomulus or Pharamond, at the making somebody king; a thing that Triboulet or Caillette¹ would have been ashamed to have said,and yet they were men of no common learning or fame; and forAn Arabian philosopher and astrologer, who lived about the year 910 of the Christian era Two court-fools.PANTAGRUELIAN PROGNOSTICATIONS. 547aught you or I know, this same Triboulet may have been of thekings of Castille's blood in Noah's ark, and Caillette of that ofKing Priam. Now, mark ye me, those odd notions come fromnothing in the world but want of faith: I say, the true Catholicfaith. Therefore, resting fully satisfied that the stars care not afart more for kings than for beggars, nor a jot more for your richtopping fellows, than for the most sorry, mangy, lousy rascal; Iwill even leave other addle- pated fortune- tellers to speak of the great folks, and I will only talk of the little ones.And in the first place, of those who are subject to Saturn; asfor example, such as lack the ready, jealous, or horn-mad, selftormenting prigs, dreaming fops, crabbed eaves- droppers, raving,doating churls, hatchers and brooders of mischief, suspicious distrustful slouches, mole- catchers, close-fisted griping misers,usurers, and pawnbrokers, Christian- jews, pinch- crusts , holdfasts, michers, and penny- fathers, redeemers of dipped, mortgaged,and bleeding copyholds and messuages, fleecers of sheared asses,shoe- makers and translators, tanners, bricklayers, bell-founders,compounders of loans, patchers, clouters, and botchers of old trumpery stuff, and all moping melancholic folks, shall not havethis year whatever they would have; and will think more thanonce how they may get good store of the king's pictures * into theirclutches; in the mean time, they will hardly throw shoulders ofmutton out at the windows, and will often scratch their working noddles where they do not itch.76As for those who are under Jupiter, as canting vermin, bigots,pardon-pedlars, voluminous abbreviators, scribblers of breves,copists, pope's bull- makers, dataries, pettifoggers, capuchins,monks, hermits, hypocrites, cushion-thumping mountebanks, spiritual comedians, forms of holiness, pater-noster faces, wheedlinggabblers, wry- necked scoundrels, spoilers of paper, stately gulls,notched- cropt- eared meaco*cks, public register's clerks, clergytailors, wafermakers, rosary- makers, engrossers of deeds, notaries,2 He jokes upon those writers who very orderly trace the genealogy of the kings of Spain up to Adam, and deduce the descent of the kings of France from. King Priam. 3 Avaricious money- hunters, who, in order to come at riches, which the earth contains in its bowels, never cease digging and delving, as it were, like the ancient French Miners called franc- taupin (from talpo, a mole. ) 4 It is, in the original, Will study hard about the inven- tion of the holy cross . The invention (or finding) of the holy cross, is a solemn holiday celebrated by the Church of Rome on the third of May: also, a shift or device to get money; and that is what it means here: a merry allusion to the other. These double entendres, with which our author abounds, are very pretty in the French, but not always capable of being rendered into English.5 Petty scribes in the Court of Rome, who copy the bulls in order for engrossing.6 So indeed, Cotgrave has Englished Rabelais' word prelingnauts, but M. Du- chat is more particular: a chief in a court of judicature, who (in like manner as a taster (un preguste) takes the essay of meats with his tongue) sums up, and presents the opinion of the other judges before he declares his own.Esperrucquetz, which Cotgrave says is one that wears long locks, or curled hair; but it really means as M. M. translates it, what the Italians call tosato,banza zazzera, crop-haired, without a perriwig. (Esperruqué.)NN 2548 RABELAIS' WORKS.grave-bubbles, protocoles, prompters to speakers, and deceitful makers ofpromises, shall fare according as they have money. Somany clergymen will die, that there will not be men enough found on whom their benefices may be conferred, so that many will holdtwo, three, four, or more. The tribe of hypocrites shall lose agood deal of its ancient fame, since the world is grown a rake, andwill not be fooled much longer, as Avenzagel saith.Those who are under Mars, as hangmen, cut-throats, dead- doingfellows, freebooters, hedge-birds, footpads, and highwaymen, catch- poles, bum-bailiffs, beadles, and watchmen, reformadoes, tooth- drawers and corn-cutters, pintle- smiths, shavers, and frig-beards,butchers, coiners, paltry quacks, and mountebanks, renegadoes,apostates, and marranized miscreants, incendiaries or boutefeus,chimney-sweepers, boorish cluster-fists, charcoal-men, alchymists,merchants of eel-skins and egg- shells, gridiron and rattle- makers,cooks, paltry pedlars, thrashmongers and spangle- makers, bracelet- makers, lantern- makers and tinkers, this year will do fine things;but some of them will be somewhat subject to be rib- roasted, and have a St. Andrew's cross scored over their jobbernols at unawares.Thisyear, one of those worthy persons will go nigh to be made afield-bishop, and, mounted on a horse that was foaled of an acorn,give the passengers a blessing with his legs.Those who belong to Sol, as topers, quaffers, whipcans, tosspots,whittled, mellow, cupshotten swillers, merry grigs, with crimson snouts of their own dyeing; fat, pursy gorbellies, brewers of wine and of beer; bottlers of hay, porters, mowers, menders of tiled,slated, and thatched houses, burthen-bearers, packers, shepherds,ox- keepers, and cowherds, swine-herds, and hog- drivers, fowlers,and bird- catchers, gardeners, barn- keepers, hedgers, common mumpers and vagabonds, day- labourers, scourers of greasy thrum caps, stuffers, and bumbasters of pack saddles, rag-merchants, idlelusks, slothful idlebies, and drowsy loiterers, smell-feasts, and snap- gobbets, gentlemen generally wearing shirts with neck-bands, or heartily desiring to wear such; all these will be hale and sharp set,ud not be troubled with the gout at the grinders, or a stoppageat the gullet, when at a feast on free cost.Those whom Venus is said to rule, as punks. jilts, flirts, queans,morts, doxies, strumpets, buttocks, blowings, tit*, pure ones, concubines, convenients, cracks, drabs, trulls, light-skirts, wrigglers,misses, cats, rigs, tried virgins, bona-robas, barbers-chairs, hedgewhor*s, wag-tails, co*ckatrices, whipsters, twiggers, harlots, kept8 Tacuins. In the edition of 1542, it is avicennists. Most of the rest have taquins, because they knew not what tacuin meant. Buhaylyha, Ben-Gezla, an Arabian, physician to Charlemagne, writ a book, intituled, Tacions; a work which signifies tables, repertories, because they were tables containing an enu- meration ofall distempers, with their cures. Thisbook was translated from the Arabic into Latin, by a Jew, Farrogut, another physician of Charlemagne's. The translation is still in being, though the original is lost. See further in Duchat.PANTEGRUELIAN PROGNOSTICATIONS. 549wenches, kind-hearted things, ladies of pleasure, by what titles ornames soever dignified or distinguished; bawds, pimps, panders,procurers, and mutton - brokers; wenchers, lechers, shakers,smockers, cousins, cullies, stallions, and bellybumpers: ganymedes,bardachoes, hufflers, ingles, fricatrices, he-whor*s, and sodomites;swaggering huff- snuffs, bouncing bullies, braggadocios, tory- rory rakes, and tantivy- boys; peppered, clapped, and poxed dabblers;shankered, cauliflowered , carbuncled, martyrs, and confessors ofVenus; rovers, ruffian-rogues, and hedge- creepers, female cham- berlains; nomina mulierum desinentia in ess, ut, laundress, sempstress, hostess, &c. , and in er, ut, mantua-maker, bed-maker, barkeeper, fruiterer, &c. , all these will be famous this year. Butwhen the sun enters Cancer, and other signs, let them beware of the crinkams and its attendants; as shankers, claps, virulent gonorrhoeas, cordees, buboes, or running- nags, pock- royals, botches,wens, or condyloms, tetters, scabs, nodes, glands, tumours, car- nosities, &c. Nuns shall hardly conceive without carnal copula- tion; very few virgins shall have milk at the breasts.As for those who come under Mercury, as sharpers, rooks, cozeners, setters, as sherks, cheats, pickpockets, divers, buttockingfoils, thieves, millers, night-walkers, masters of arts , decretists,picklocks, deer-stealers, hedge rhymers, composers of serious doggrel metre, Merry- andrews, Jack-puddings, tumblers, masters inthe art of hocus pocus, legerdemain, and powder of prelinpinpin;such as break Priscian's head, quibblers and punsters, stationers,paper-makers, card-makers, and pirates, will strive to appear moremerry than they will often be: sometimes they will laugh withoutany cause, and will be pretty apt to be blown up, sh- in the plumbag, and march off, unless they find themselves better stored withchink, and stronger of the cod than they need be.Those who belong to Madam Luna, as hawkers of almanacksand pamphlets, huntsmen, ostrich-catchers, falconers, couriers.salt- carriers, lunatics, maggoty fools, crack- brained coxcombs,addle-pated frantic wights, giddy, whimsical foplings, exchangebrokers, post-boys, foot-boys, tennis- court keepers' boys, glassmongers, light- horse, watermen, mariners, messengers, rakers, andgleaners, will not long stay in a place this year. However, so many swagbellies and puff-bags will hardly go to St. Hiacco, 10 as theredid in the year 524." Great numbers of pilgrims 12 will come down9 Wrong. Read, if they find themselves, &c. , not, unless they find themselves,&c., " S'ils se trouvent plus d'argent, " &c , not " s'ils ne se trouvent plus d'ar- gent," &c. It means, that nothing can hinder them from running away with your money, but your not trustingthem with it Again, instead of, need be, read, should be. 10 St. James in Galicia. 11 There had been published many predictions ,which on account of the grand conjunction of Saturn, Jupiter, and Mars, in the sign of Pisces in 1524, did declare there would be in February that year a second universal deluge: there needed no more to send the Germans, at that time very much addicted to pilgrimaging, in shoals to St. James in Galicia. This is what is here meant by Rabelais, who by lifrelofres means the German pilgrims, who be.gan to grow scarce after the reformation had got good footing among them.12 Miquelots in the original. Young people who were wont to go on pilgrimage550 RABELAIS' WORKS.from the montains of Savoy and Auvergne; but Sagitarius sorely threatens them with kibed heels.CH. VI. Ofthe condition of ome countries.THE noble kingdom of France shall prosper and triumph thyear, in all pleasures and delights, so that foreign nations shallwillingly retire thither. Presents of nosegays, and feasts on birthdays, and saints - days, treats , pastimes, and a thousand sports, shallkeep up the mirth. There will be plenty of delicious wines; manyradishes in Limosin; store of chestnuts in Perigord and Dauphiné;a deal of olives in Languedoc; whole shoals of sand in Olone; aworld of fish in the sea; swarms of stars in the firmament; abundance of salt at Brouage; and prodigious quantities of corn, pulse,kitchen-herbs, flowers, fruit, butter, cheese, milk, and other dairygoods. No plague, no war, no vexation. A fart for poverty;hang sorrow, cast away care. Old gold, such, as your doubleducats, rose-nobles, angels, spankers, spur-royals, and well - wooledsheep of Berry, will once more be in fashion, and plenty of seraphsand crowns with a sun upon them. However, about midsummer,you are threatened with an invasion by black fleas, and weevils ofla Deviniere. A Deo, nil est ex omni parte beatum; nothing isyet found that is perfectly happy; but care must be taken to curbthem with store of evening nuncions.2Italy, Romania, Naples, and Sicily will remain where theystood last year. People will be very thoughtful there towards the latter end of Lent, and sometimes will rave and dream at noonday.3Germany, Switzerland, Saxony, Strasburgh, Antwerp, &c. , will thrive upon it, if they do not fail to do so. Woe be to pardonpedlars, if they come among them: I dare engage that therewill not be many yearly obits, trentals, and services for the dead founded there.Spain, Castile, Portugal, and Arragon will be subject to suddenthirst, and young and old will be wofully afraid of dying: forto St. Michael--thence their name miquelots, I suppose. These occasioned the proverb, Little beggars go to St. Michael, great ones to St. James.France enjoyed peace from the treaty concluded at Cambray, 1529; but the famine which happened in that kingdom about that time occasioned the plague,and both those scourges continued therein till the beginning of 1534. Therefore,either this prognostication was not published till 1534, at soonest, or Rabelais was much out in his guessing. 2 Will think oftheir sins, which they areto confess at Easter. 3 In the original there is no rave, but only dream, and M. Duchat says, Rabelais alludes to the constant custom of the people of Rome to take a nap of two hours immediately after dinner; not in bed, but in easy leather chairs made on purpose, with backs and springs to move higher or lower.See Mission's Travels, let. 33. 4 Wrong: read there will not be many obits,&c. , founded there this year, ceste année ( not yearly. ) For now the reformation had taken deep root. No sudden in Rabelais: great thirsts, if you will:alterations in French, not altercations, as some editions have it. M. Duchat's note here is two-fold: these countries are very hot, and the inquisition there spares nobody.PANTAGRUELIAN PROGNOSTICATIONS. 551which reason they will be sure to keep themselves warm when it is cold; and will often tell over their money, if they have any.7England, Scotland, and the Easterlings, will be but indifferentPantagruelists . Wine would at least prove as wholesome to themas beer, provided it were good and delicious. When they sit at table, their best hopes will be the after- game. St. Traignant of Scotland will work miracles and sh- wonders like mad; but thedevil-a-bit will he see the better for all the candles that will beoffered him, if Aries ascending does not fumble, and rumble,tumble, stumble, and be humble, though he grumble, and be scorned, and unhorned.9The Muscovites, Indians, Persians, and Troglodytes, will often be troubled with the bloody flux, because they will not be ridden,tupped, and rammed by the Romanists, considering the ball ofSagitarius ascendant. The Bohemians, Jews, and Egyptians, willnot be brought this year to conform with the said Romanists, asthey expect; Venus bitterly threatens them with wens at thethroat, 10 if they do not condescend to the will of the King of the Papillons.Escargots 12 ( snails ) , Sarabouytes, 13 cauquemares14 ( nightmares),cannibals shall be pestered with ox- flies, (informers, promoters, )and will have but little heart to play on the cymbals, and tongs,and keys (or, to lecher) unless guaiacum be in request.As for Austria, Hungary, and Turkey, by my troth, my dainty lads, I cannot tell how they will do; neither does pilgarlic troublehis head a jot about it, considering the sun's brave entrance intoCapricornus; and, if you chance to know more of the matter than I do, pray scatter no words, keep it to yourselves, but stay for the lame post.7 Other- 8 Will not always haveIt is only warm in the original: that is, says M. Duchat, people there should keep close and snug, not only, because the evening dews are mortal there, but that they may give the inquisition no advantage over them.wise Osterlins . See Commines, 1. 5 , c. 18.wine to drink when they have a mindto it. 9 The pope, and his power.10 Gibbets. 11 The King of France in the original, roy de parpaillons -see this explained elsewhere. What Rabelais seems to hint at here is the Bo- hemians, &c. , who by an edict were banished the kingdom, on pain of being hanged. [ Boemien likewise means a gipsy. ] 12 This does not mean snails strictly, in this place at least , but, as M. Duchat observes, monks and other re- ligions, to whom the discipline (whip) seems to be instead of a fly flap to drive away those troublesome insects Rabelais calls them escargots (snails) either be- cause, as in c. 40, l . 1 , we read that , like beetles, they eat the turd of the world,(feed upon the sins of the people, ) or else, because that being covered with the cowl, they resemble snails in their shells. 13 Or rather sarabaites, spoken of in the last ch of 1. 2 , and ch. liv. of 1. 4, were, in old times, a certain sort of religious, who lived in the utmost licentiousness and dissolution . 14 Fromcalcare mares. These are the same religious whom elsewhere Rabelais calls far- fadets, a name by which he likewise calls the hobgoblins, and raw-head and bloody- bones To these, and the preceding, our author declares that the disci- pline they will give themselveswill reduce them to the same condition with canni- bals, and other nations of America, who, not knowing how to make themselves clothes, (at least, not caring to do it, ) suffer great inconveniences from the flies,when the Europeans do not come and fetch their guaiacum, in return for which they generally give them clothes to cover them.552 RABELAIS' WORKS.OF THE FOUR SEASONS OF THE YEAR.CH. VII . -OF THE SPRING.-In all this year's revolution there will be but one moon, neither will it be new. I dare warrant, youare damnably down in the mouth about it; you who do not believein God, ' and persecute his holy and divine word, as also those that stand up for it. But you may even hang yourselves out of theway; I tell you there will never be any other moon than that whichGod created in the beginning of the world, and which was placedin the sky to light and guide mankind by night. But, in good sooth, I will not infer thence that it never shows to the earth andearthly people a decrease or increase of its light, according as it is nearer the sun or further from it . No, no; why should I say this?for, wherefore, because, however, notwithstanding, that, &c. , andlet none of you hereafter pray that heaven may keep her from thewolves; for they will not meddle with her for this twelve months,I will warrant you. Apropos, now I think on it, you will see asmany flowers again this season, as in all the other three; neither sball that man be thought a fool, who will have wit enough to lay by money, and get together more of it this quarter than he will doof cobwebs in the whole year. The griffons and marrons, ( menwho make the ways passable in great snows, and dwell on themountains of Savoy and Dauphiné,) and the hyperboreans, that areperpetually furred with snow, are to miss this season, and havenone on it for Avicenna tells us, it is not spring till the snow does melt away on the mountains. Believe the liar. I have knownthe time when men reckoned ver, or the spring, to begin when thesun entered into the first degree of Aries. If they reckon it other- wise now, I knock under, and mum is the word.CH. VIII . —OF SUMMER. - In the summer I cannot justly tellyou what kind of wind will blow; but this I know, that it ought to be warm weather then, and now and then a sea-breeze. However, if things should fall out otherwise, you must be sure not to curse God; for he is wiser than we, and knows what is fit for usfar better than we ourselves: you may take my word for it, whatever Haly¹ and his gang may have said. It will be a deliciousthing to be merry, and drink cool wine; though some have saidthere is nothing more contrary to thirst. I believe it; and indeed contraria contrariis curantur.CH. IX. OF AUTUMN. -In autumn men will make wine, orbefore or after it; it is all one to me, so we have but good bub and2 It 1 No Lutheran could have expressed himself in stronger terms.should be herrings, aranes: though some editions have it araignes. M. Duchat says, Rabelais here means, that in the spring people had better keep their money.than lay it out in herrings, which are good for nothing in that season ofthe year.3 Gryphons: men, who, like true griffins , climb up the sharpest and steepest rocks. 4 Croyez ce porteur, in the original; believe the bearer: i. e. istand to what he says about the matter. An Arabian philosopher and mathematician.AN EPISTLE. 553appitati enough foul mistakes will then be in season, for many aone will think only to burst at the broadside by the way of a fizzlecum-funk, and will foully give their breeches a clyster with a fæcal decoction. As for those men and women who have vowed to fasttill the stars be in the heavens, they may even from this presenthour begin to feed like farmers by my particular grant and dispensation. Neither do they begin of the soonest; for those prettytwinkling things have been fixed there above sixteen thousand and I cannot tell how many days, and stuck in to the purpose too, letme tell you. Nor would I have you for the future hope to catchlarks when the sky falls: for on my honour that will not happenin your time. Legions of hypocritical church-vermin, cucullated sham saints, pedlars and hawkers of pardons, perpetual mumpersi and mumblers of orisons, and other such gangs of rascally scoundrels will come out of their dens.2 Scape that scape can, say I.Harkee me! take heed also of the bones whenever you eat fish,and God preserve you from a dose of ratsbane too.CH. X. - OF WINTER. -In winter, in my silly opinion, thosem*n will not be overwise, who will sell their furred gowns, swans'skins, and other warm clothes, to buy fuel; neither did the ancients use to do so, says Avenzouart. If it chance to rain, do not fretyourselves; so much the less dust you will have when you goabroad. Keep yourselves as hot as toasts, do you hear: beware ofcatarrhs; drink of the best, till the other sort mend; and prayhenceforth sh― no more a bed. Oh oh! poultry, ' do you build your nests so high?AN EPISTLE BY PANTAGRUEL'S LIMOSIN,GRAND EXCORIATOR OF THE LATIALE TONGUE; MENTIONED BOOK II.CHAP. VI.To his own Amicissim, residing at the Incl*te ana Famosissim Urbof Lugdun.OUR auricles, percuss'd by fame sonorous,Your mirabundous acts have brought before us.Your placid life, here inaudite before,Repletes the town of Lugdun o'er and o´er:Where nymphs convening three times thrice divine,Prostrate themselves as vot'ries at your shrine.Some voluntarily fly into your arms,For your opiparous or aureous charins:1 In the original it is perpetuons, and means all monks; whose communities never die, but are perpetuai.folks all they can of their harvest.2 With a purpose to catch from the countryA merejoke, or trivial pleasantry, put here by Rabelais out of the garty or wantonness of his humour, without any relation to what went before. Other no- ted authors, both comica! and serious, have used the very same words at the winding up of their works. Philip d'Alcippe for one, John Edouard du Monin on another, cum multis aliix.554 RABELAIS' WORKS.Some, tender souls! on you themselves obtrude ,Mov'd byyour tongue's most melleous dulcitude .Your phrase, robustly propp'd, with ease producesFractions in many weak virgineous cruises:When you're placientated, the fort is won;Id est, whene'er y'impel the matter on.Youtherefore, if your appetite desiresNew dapes each hour, pursue what that requires.If stated with your urban stale fruitions,Or with your half unnatural coitions,You to your neighb'ring rural fund migrate,And there your lassate corps re-animate.There ev'ry joy to you is an oblation,In•which your ingeny finds delectation.The gay Merul and warbling Philomel,To please you, strive each other to excel.Their pleasant notes tristitious thoughts confound,And wake your soul with their letating sound.To that amæne recess the rural quire,Sylvanus, satyrs, fauns, and Pan retire:Gods, demigods, nymphs, dryads, naiads meet,And leave their mansions for your dulcior seat;And when the turb is once accumulate,Jocund jocundity's immensurate.With sumptuous cates divine ambrosia joins,And nectar there exuperates all your wines.With this each dry esuriant guest replete is,As at the feast of Peleus and his Thetis.Then all arise; the tables here sublate;In arbours, some themselves refocillate;Some in ferine venation take delight;For coney- caption some have appetite:In fine, ludes omniform are there invented,And every indoles and sense contented.Pleasure invades, pain abdicates the mind:What more in heaven can its grand tenants find:While we, alas! must still obambulate,Sequacious of the court and courtier's fate;O most infaust who optates there to live!An aulic life no solid joys can give.We've been cruciated since your last migration,With an indesinent obequitation:Our boots and legs have not been separated,While we the Burgadelands have conculate .Lute, unds, and sands did long our march oppose,And asp'rous rocks, the bulwarks of our foes.AN EPISTLE. 555But now I'll not too many verbs effindNor with our ills your auricles obtund:Nor all our martial conflicts represent,Obscesses, storms, and fights sanguinole:.!:When angry Mars Burgundia cicatris'dAnd friend with friend in dolours sympathis'd;Desp'rate of conquest, thro' dire accidents,Apert we jac'd to th' æther without tents.At last the kind, tho' rigid brume came on;The camp was derelict, and all are gone.For when hybernal evils appropinque,The legions on their hybernacles think.So, when the bellic season was expir'd,Wisely the regal majesty retired.To Fonsbellaqueus nowthe monarch's come,The noblest master to the noblest dome:No more had Nero's match'd its noble pride.Than with the king, the tyrant could have vied.Where ev'n Diana's temple rais'd again,The regal palace would eclipse the fane.'Tis true, you've ocull'd it in times præterit,But ev'ry day ' t has meliorated merit;And those who supervis'd it noct hestern,In hodiern hores, will major things discern.Opining to revise a structure new,Where art surpass'd itself, and nature too.Nowto apply my primary ingredient,That you move huc I think it not expedient:For, should you come before the brume's abated,Th' opime you'd linquish for the macerated:Since, thanks to Jove's benignity, you're valid,Choose not a frigid state, while your's is calid;Unless salubrity you vilipend,And from your own become your medic's friend;For in veracity, these times denote Morbs to the sane, and obits to th' ægrote;And alterate the suavest pulchritudeTo the complexion of its native mud.Incluse with silves behind, and lakes before us,Our outward man wants something that's calorous.Scarce one poor fascicle can we acquire;In fine all solaces from us retire.And were it not (in this extremity)Juvated by the town's proximity.To which we equitate with maturation,And to kind nature make sacrificatic ,556 RABELAIS' WORKS.Soon in our sepulchres we should all hide us;For, sure, one hebdomad would here occide us.By this imparity you plainly see Our life's distress, and your's jocundity;Our state's naufrageous and pericl*tating:If then you sape, as we are cogitating,Hither, till spring return, make no transition,Though you were stimulated by ambition.What though honoribilities it offersLarge heaps of numms to fill your largest coffers,Imperial favour too, and what not else?Ample munificence, and office celse,Such as you execute when here? yet theseHave no intrinsic valour, though they please.Our means of life are pote, and cibe, and vest;Who jugulates himself for wealth's a beast.To this epistle finis now we'll fix,Which to your school a transit does adnix;Where rules to prolix loquels are prescribed.And doct verbocination is imbibed:Excoriating the language latiale,To make reply let not your calam fail;But at rament at large the candid chart,With corresponding rhymes transcending art;Which will to him be the altest obligationWho is your serv. with maxim veneration,DESBRIDE GOUSIER.AN EPIGRAM.ALL strive of late to bring to purityOur tongue that once lay in obscurity;And profligating all barbarity,With th' Attic set the French in parity;So, to revive its old nobility;They shun the phrase of our mobility;But this disguised, by a fatality"Tis mere excoriated latiality.FRANCISCO RABELESIOPOETA SITIENS, PONEBAT.Vita, Lyme, sitis; liquisti, flebis. adures;Membra, hominem, tumulum; morte, liquore, face."Vita, liquisti membra morte:Lyæe, flebis hominem liquore;Sitis, adures tumulum face. "So it is to be read according to the editions of 1567, 1573, 1584, and 1603, ust foca as in that of 1596.THE PHILOSOPHICAL CREAMOF ENCYCLOPEDIC QUESTIONS.-BY PANTAGRUEL.WHICH WERE SORBONICOFICABILITUDINISSELY DEBATED IN THE SCHOOLS OF THE DECREE NEAR ST. DENYS DE LA CHARTRE AT PARIS.UTRUM, a platonic idea, hovering to the right on the orifice of thechaos, might drive away the squadrons of democratical atoms?Utrum, the flickermice flying through the translucidity of the cornered gate, might, spy-like, discover the morphean visions twirl- ing and unwinding in a circular manner the thread of the rete ad- mirabile that wraps up the attili 2 of ill- caulked brains?Utrum, the atoms turning about at the sound of the hermagoricalharmony, might make a compaction or a dissolution of a quintes- sence, by the subtraction of the pythagorical numbers?Utrum, the hybernal frigidity of the antipodes, passing in an orthogonal line, through the hom*ogeneous solidity of the centre,might warm the superficial connexity of our heels by a soft antipe- ristasis?Utrum, the tassels of the torrid zone might so far be dipped andwetted at the cataracts of the Nile, as to moisten the most causticparts ofthe imperial heaven?Utrum, by reason of the long hair that was bestowed on the bearat her metamorphosis, if her breech were but shaved the Italianway à la bougarone, to make Triton a beard, she might not bkeeper ofthe arctic pole?Útrum, an elementary sentence might allege a decennal prescription against amphibious animals, and è contra the other respectively put in her petition in case of seizure and novelty?Utrum, an historical grammar, and posteriority, by the triad of articles, might find some line or character of their chronicle on thezenonian palm? ( open hand, i . e. eloquence. )Utrum, the genera generalissima, by a violent elevation over their predicaments, might crawl and clamber up to the stories of the transcendants, and consequently let the special and predicable species follow, to the unspeakable loss and damage of poor masters of arts?Utrum, Proteus, that transformed himself into all manner ofshapes, turning himself into all manner of shapes, turning himselfinto a cigale, ³ and musically trying his voice in the dog- days, might make a third concoction with the morning dew carefully bottled upin May, before the full resolution of a zodiacal girdle?Utrum, the black scorpion might bear a solution of the continuumA certain fish in the river Po, which sometimes weighs 1000lb.[so says M. M. but not Torriano. ]! Bats.3 A thick, broad- headed flying insect, which sits on trees in hot countries, and sings after a shrieking fashion: it is called cicada, in Latin, and therefore mis- taken by some here for the grasshopper.558 RABELAIS WORKS.in his substance, and, by the effusion of his blood, darken andblacken the milky-way, to the great loss and grief of the swag- bellied Jacobites? 4TWO EPISTLESTO TWO WOMEN OF DIFFERENT HUMOURS.To the first old woman.OLD, toothless, pox'd mischievous hag of night;Old graceless witch, who liv'st in virtue's spite;Old treacherous beldam, burthen to the earth;Plots, broils, and wars, from thee derive their birth.Old arrant bawd, by whose destructive trade The lewd are sold, the modest are betray'd:Honour thou never knew'st, thou living tomb,Whor'd with thy father, in thy mother's womb.Thy charity does like the devil's prove,And damns the wretches who thy lewdness love.Thy livid blood with pois'nous rage is swell'd;Thy breast with gall, thy head with mischief fill'd .Thou ne'er of any but thyself spok'st well,And for detraction e'en surpassest hell.Old brimstone- bawd, with brandy flaming red,That mak'st a curst rank brothel of thy bed;Propitious to all malice and ill-luck,That hast a teat to give the devil suck:Damn'd witch, thou dost in magic far excelMedæa, and the blackest fiends of hell:Thou mak st thy hideous phiz more dreadful still;But when thou dost, we should thy hagship kill,Lest thy redoubled ugliness affright ,And, like Medusa's, ruin us at sight.Thou, scarlet whor*, ne'er mourn'st for doing ill ';Thy only tears are rheumes, and wines distill'd;Thy only sighs are vented at thy bum,Outstink a carrion, and outroar a drum.Old monstrous hag, of matchless, dreadful kind,Thou the three furies in one body join'd;Satan, outdone by thee, does envious grow,And longs to burn thee in revenge below.Dissembling witch, whose tongue, still muttering, daresMock frowning heav'n with thy unhallow'd pray'rs.• German Jacobites in the original. It alludes from these pilgrims of St. Jaines in Gallacia, to the philosophers, the followers of the Jacobin Albertus Magnus "Albertistæ dic*nt quòd galaxia est naturæ cœlestis, Thomistæ dic*nt quod galaxia est naturæ elementaris, " says Dr. Gerlam (sll-shcup) in part 2nd of Epist. Obs. Viror.TWO EPISTLES. 559Thou, bold bad sprite, with Satan's borrow'd force.Pretend'st to turn a rapid river's course;With spells to paleness fright the astonish'd moov,And darken quite the blushing sun at noon.Base murd'ring sorceress, with relentless heart.On innocence thou try'st thy cursed art;Bewitching infants in their mother's arms,And death alone can end the painful charms.No God thou own'st, but thy insatiate gut;Thou mak'st each trull turn up her filthy scut.Pity thou slight'st, by pity thou'rt abhorr'd,And more deserv'dst a fa*ggot than a cord.Thy cruel heart with rancour has its load,Natural to thee as poison to a toad.Thou worst of mischiefs, guide to endless death,Who scatter'st plagues with thy contagious breath,Canst thou expect unpunished to remain,And for each crime to escape a double pain?Millions in judgment will against thee rise,And loudly call for vengeance to the skies.Those whom thy arts to lawless flames decoyed,Shall be below to burn thy soul employed.But thou'rt the worst of hells for impious deeds,T'other perhaps in punishments exceeds.Prepare, prepare for its revenging pains,There to be rack'd in everlasting chains.Tremble, and loudly to the mountains call,That they may gape, and crush thee with their fall!For still thy latter sins the first excel,And, living on, thou'lt grow too bad for hell.Damn'd harridan, with reeking lust more drunkThan Messaline that great imperial punk:Ne'er tired, or sated, thou out- dost her more Than she out-did the utmost stint of whor*.Thy sweaty carcase (which kind heaven confound! )With noisome steams offends us all around.Old drunken piss-pot, sink of filth and sin,Plaister without, and rottenness within;Curst lump of lees; thou universal sore;Thou putrid product of the common-shore;Thou lowest, last degree of infamy;Thou very highest top of villany;Repent, or know I'll double every curse:But no, thou canst not mend, nor e'er be worse.An Epistle to another Woman of a quite different humoroHAIL! reverend matron, virtuous as you're fair;Hail! you, whose autumn may with spring compare;560 RABELAIS' WORKS.Matron, adorn'd so richly in your mind,That in your looks the treasures we may find.With pious doctrine you your faith improve,Shun idle talk, and books of idler love,And setting vice and needless forms apart,Your suffering God engrave within your heart:While you on earth a heavenly saint commence,Your charity is, like the world, immense;Ready to ease the afflicted of their load,At awful distance ye imitate your God.So sweet, so modest, and so void of pride,That e'en that God does own you for his bride.You to all folly wisely shut your eyes,And dare the world's alluring joys despise.That sacred writ alone is your delight,Which saves the soul from everlasting night.You temper still, yet never to a fault,Your wine with water, and your words with thought;And never cherish'd an unchaste desire,Or could be warm'd but by the nuptial fire;But, waiting for your Saviour, pass awayIn prayers the night, in pious acts the day.In faith, in piety alone extreme,You shun applause, yet best deserve esteem .The prophet's great inspirer fills your breast;Your head, your heart, by the whole God possest:While some unthinking virgins are betray'd,And made proficients in hell's thriving tradeYour wise advice, your great example drawsThe thoughtless wretches out of Satan's jaws.Matron, in wedlock faithful and sedate,An honour to that honourable state;Not weakness made you wed, but piety,Thus to increase the saint's society.Those wanton toys could ne'er your heart entice;Which stifle virtue, and encourage vice.Matron, whom all the Christian Pallas term ,Wise in your conduct, and your courage firm.I prize, admire, and love your matchless store,Your outward beauties much, your inward graces more.From heaven you came, and to that heaven are hora;Virtue adorns you, virtue you adorn.Oh that I may, e'en till my latest hours,Advance in knowledge, contemplating yours!May you obtain below what earth can crave What heaven can grant, above, you're sure to have.LETTERS, WRITTEN BY FRANCIS RABELAIS,DURING HIS STAY IN ITALY, IN THE YEAR 1536.LETTER I. TO MY LORD BISHOP OF MAILLEZAIS.MY LORD, -I writ to you at large on the nine and twentieth ofNovember, and sent you some Naples grain for your salads, ofevery sort that is eaten on this side, except pimpernell, which then I could not procure. I have sent you no great quantity at present,because it had been too much for the courier at one time; but ifyou please to have more, either for your gardens, or to dispose ofotherwise, I will send it you upon notice. I had written to youbefore, and sent to you the four signatures concerning the beneficesof Friar Dom. Philippe, obtained in the name of those whom youhave set down in the instructions you gave me. I have not received since any letter from you that mentions the receipt of the aforesaid signatures. I received only one dated from l'Ermenaud,when my Lady d'Estissac came thither, in which you let me knowthat you had received two packets from me; one from Ferrara, theother from this city, with the cypher which I writ to you; but foraught I understand, you had not yet received the packet where thesignatures were inclosed. I can now give you an account, that mybusiness has been granted and dispatched better, and with morecertainty, than I could have wished; and I have had therein the assistance and advice of worthy men, particularly of the Cardinal deGenutiis, who is judge of the palace, and of the Cardinal Simonetta, who was auditor of the chamber, a very knowing man, andwell versed in such matters. The pope was of opinion that I shouldproceed in my business per cameram: the above-mentioned car- dinals were of a mind that it should be by the court of contradicts:because, that in foro contentioso, it cannot be revocable in France,and " quæ per contradictoria transiguntur transeunt in rem judicatam: quæ autem per cameram, et impugnari possunt, et in judi- cium veniunt ." Those things which are transacted by contradictories, pass as determined; but those things which are done bythechamber, may be called into question, and tried over again.Upon the whole, I have nothing more to do, than to take up the bulls sub plumbo.My Lord Cardinal du Bellay, as likewise my Lord Bishop of Mascon, have assured me that the charges shall be remitted me,though the pope by old custom remits nothing, except of what isdispatched per cameram. There will remain to be paid, only the referendaries, proctors, and other such like scribblers and blottersof parchment. If my money falls short, I will recommend myselfto your lordship's alms; for I do not think to leave this place till the emperor goes.He is at present at Naples, whence, as he has written to the VOL. II. 0 0562 BABELAIS' Works.pope, he will depart on the sixth of January. This town is alreadyfull of Spaniards; and he has sent an extraordinary ambassador tothe pope, besides him who constantly resides at this court, to givehim notice of his coming. The pope leaves him half the palace,and all the borough of St. Peter for his retinue, and has orderedthree thousand beds to be prepared, according to the Roman custom, that is to say, with quilts; for the city has been unprovidedof them ever since it was sacked by the Lanskenets. He has got together as much hay, straw, oats, spelt-corn, and barley, as hecould find; and of wine, as much as is arrived in ripá. I fancy hewill be at no small charge, which cannot be very easy to him in thishis great poverty, so apparent in him, more than in any pope for these three hundred years past . The Romans have not yet resolved how to behave themselves upon this occasion, and have hadmany meetings, by order of the senators, conservators, and governor; but they cannot agree in their opinions. The emperor.has declared to them, by said ambassador, that he does not designhis people shall be entertained at free cost, but as the pope shall think fit to entertain them, which does the more sensibly touch thepope; for he understands well enough, that by this saying the emperor means to see how, and with what affection, he will treathim and his people.The holy father has sent two legates to him by the choice of the consistory; to wit, the cardinal of Sienna, and Cardinal Cæsarini.Since which, the Cardinal Salviati and Rodolph are also gone tohim , and with them my Lord de Xaintes. I understand it is aboutthe affair of Florence, and concerning the difference between theDuke Alexander de Medicis, and Philip Strozzi, whose estate, which is considerable, the duke had a mind to confiscate. Next to theFourques of Ausbourg, in Germany, he is counted the richest merchant in Christendom; and the duke has set people here to poison or kill him, whatever came on it. Being advertised of this attempt,he obtained of the pope to go armed. And he commonly went attended with thirty soldiers, armed at all points. The said Dukeof Florence having notice ( I suppose) that Strozzi, with the abovementioned cardinals, was gone to the emperor, and that he offeredto the emperor four hundred thousand ducats, only to give commissions to people who might inform against the tyranny and baseness of the said duke, left Florence, constituted Cardinal Cibohis governor, and came to this city the morrow after Christmasday, the twenty-third hour, entering at St. Peter's gate, followedby fifty light horse, in white armour, with lances, and about a hundred harquebusiers. The rest of his train was but little, and in novery good order. And no soul went to see him, but the emperor'sambassador, who met him at the same gate. As soon as he was intown, he came to the palace, and had a short audience of the pope;and had lodgings in St. George's palace. The next morning he went away, attended as before.LETTERS FROM ITALY . 563Eight days since, news came to this town, and his holiness has received letters from divers parts, that the Sophy, King of Persia,has defeated the army of the Turks. Yesterday night arrived herethe nephew of Monsieur de Vely, the king's ambassador, to theemperor, who assured my Lord Cardinal du Bellay, that the thing was true; and that this had been the greatest slaughter that hasbeen heard of these four hundred years; for above forty thousand horse were killed on the Turk's side .Consider what a number of foot fell there! As likewise on theSophy's side. For among people that do not willingly fly, non solet esse incruenta victoria; the victory does not use to be with- out blood.The principal defeat was near a little town called Coni, not fardistant from the great city of Tauris , for which the Sophy and the Turk contend; the other action was near a place called Batelis.The manner was thus: the Turks had divided their army, and onepart was sent to take Coni, of which the Sophy having intelligence,he, with his whole army, rushed upon this separated part, before they could stand upon their guard.See here the effect of ill counsel, in dividing his army before hehad gotten the victory. The French can give a good account ofthis, when the Duke of Albany drew out the strength and flower of the camp before Pavia. Upon the news of this rout and defeat,Barbarossa is retired to Constantinople to secure the country, andsays, by his good gods, that this is nothing, considering the mightypower of the Turk. But the emperor is eased of the fear that hehad of the Turk's coming into Sicily, as he had threatened in thebeginning of the spring. And this may give repose to Christendom for some considerable time; and those who would lay tithesupon the church, eo pretextu, that they would fortify themselvesagainst the approach of the Turk, are but ill furnished with demon- strative arguments.LETTER II.-MY LORD, -I have received letters from Monsieurde Sanct Cerdos, dated from Dijon, in which he tells me of a pro- cess that he has depending in the Court of Rome. I dare notanswer him, without running the hazard of incurring a great dealof displeasure. But I understand he has the greatest right in theworld, and that he suffers a manifest injury, and that he ought tocome hither in person . For there is no such affair, how equitablesoever, that is not lost for want of a man's own soliciting in it;especially when he has a strong party, who can overawe with threats those who solicit for him. The want of a cypher prevents mywriting to you more at large. But it troubles me to see so muchas I do, particularly, being sensible of the great kindness you have for him; and likewise because he has of a long time loved and favoured me. In my opinion Monsieur de Basilac, counsellor (one 002564 RABELAIS' WORKS.of the judge's assistants ) in the parliament of Tholouse, came hither this winter on a less occasion, and is older and more infirm thanhe, and yet has had a quick dispatch to his content.LETTER III. -MY LORD, -The Duke of Ferrara, who went tothe emperor at Naples, returned hither this morning. I know not yet how he has determined matters relating to the investiture andhomage of his lands: but I understand he is come back not wellsatisfied with the emperor. I fear he will be forced to empty hiscoffers of those crowns his father left him, and that the pope and emperor will fleece him at pleasure; considering also that it was for above six months before he refused to espouse the king's interest, notwithstanding all the emperor's remonstrances and threats.My Lord Bishop of Limoges, who was the king's ambassador atFerrara, seeing the said duke, without acquainting him with hisdesign, was retired to the emperor, is returned to France. It isfeared that Renée¹ will receive no little displeasure by it; the dukehaving removed Madam de Soubise her governess, and ordered herto be served by Italians, which does not look well.LETTER IV. —MY LORD, -Three days since arrived here a postfrom Monsieur de Crissé, who brings an account that some of the Lord Rancé's men, who went to the relief of Geneva, were defeatedby a party of the Duke of Savoy's . With him came a courier fromSavoy, who brought the news ofit to the emperor. This may unhappily prove seminarium futuri belli, the cause of an ensuing war.For these little wilful broils draw after them great battles, which isdemonstrable from ancient history, as well Greek and Roman as French, as appears by the battle at Vireton.LETTER V.-MY LORD, -About fifteen days since, Andrew Doria, who went with stores to those who hold the Gouletta nearTunis, for the emperor, as likewise to supply them with water, (forthe Arabians of the country make continual war upon them, andthey dare not stir out of their garrison , ) is arrived at Naples, wherehe staid not above three days with the emperor, since when, he issailed hence with nine and twenty gallies; it is said in quest ofJudeo and Cacciadiavolo, who have burnt a great deal of thecountry of Sardinia and Minorca. The grand master of Rhodes,who was born in Piedmont, is lately dead, in whose room the com- mander of Forton, between Montauban and Tholouse, is chosen.LETTER VI. MY LORD, -I here send you a book of Prognostications, which busies this whole town: it is entitled, " De Eversione Europa," of the overturning of Europe. For my part, I giveno credit at all to it. But Rome was never so wholly given over tovanities and prophecies as it is at present. I am apt to think thereason is. because mobile mutatur semper cum principe vulgus; theRenée of France, duch*ess of Ferrara.LETTERS FROM ITALY . 565giddy multitude always change with the prince. I have also sentyou an almanack for the ensuing year 1536. I send you besides,the copy of a brief which his holiness has lately decreed for thearrival ofthe emperor: as likewise the emperor's entry into Mes- sina and Naples, and the funeral oration at the interment of the deceased Duke of Milan.My lord, I humbly recommend myself to your good favour, pray- ing to our Lord for your good health and long life.Rome, Dec. 30, 1536.LETTER VII.-TO THE LORD DE MAILLEZAIS . -MY LORD,-I have received the letters you were pleased to write to me,dated the second of December: by which I understand that mytwo packets are come to your hands; one of the 18th, the other ofthe 22nd of October, with the four signatures which I sent you. Iwrit since to you more at large, on the ninth and twentieth ofNovember, and thirteenth of December. By this time, I believe,you have received the said packets . For Mr. Michael Parmentier,bookseller, living at the arms of Basil, writ to me the fifth of thisinstant, that he had received and sent them to Poitiers. You mayassure yourself, that the packets which I shall send you will besafely delivered at Lyons: for I put them into the great sealed packet, which is for the king's affairs; and when the courier comesto Lyons, he is despatched by the governor; then his secretary,who is much my friend, takes the packet, which I subscribe on the first sheet, to the aforesaid Michael Parmentier. Afterwards thereis no difficulty, unless from Lyons to Poitiers, which is the reasonthat obliges me to set an extraordinary postage upon it, that thegreater care may be taken of it by the messengers at Poitiers, inhopes to get a spill by it. For my part, I constantly encouragethe said Parmentier with some small presents, which I send him of novelties on this side, or to his wife, that he may be the more diligent to engage merchants or messengers at Poitiers to deliver thepackets to your lordship . And I very much approve of the advicewhich you gave me in your letter, that I should not trust them tothe hands of the bankers, for fear they should be picked and brokenopen. I think it will not be amiss, the first time you write to me,especially if it be business of consequence, that you write a line tothe said Parmentier, and enclose a piece of gold to him in your letter, in consideration of the care he takes to send your packets tome, and mine to you. A small matter sometimes highly obliges honest men, and makes them more diligent for the time to come,when the case requires a speedy dispatch.LETTER VIII. -MY LORD, -I have not as yet presented yourletters to my Lord Bishop de Xaintes; for he is not yet returned'from Naples, whither he went with the Cardinals Salviati andRodolph. He will return in two days; then I will give him your556 KABELAIS' WORKS.letters, and desire an answer of them, which I will send you by thefirst courier that goes hence. I understand their affairs have nothad that success with the emperor which they hoped for: and thatthe emperor had positively answered, that at their request and instance, as likewise at the late Pope Clement's, he had createdAlexander de Medicis, Duke of the territories of Florence andPisa, which he never thought to do, nor would have done: meanwhile to depose him, would be the trick of some stage- player,which does and undoes the same thing. However, that theyshould resolve to acknowledge him as their duke and lord, andobey him as his vassals and subjects, and be sure they did so .to the complaints they made against the said duke, he would takecognizance of them when he came to Florence.AsFor he designs, after some stay at Rome, to pass through Sienna,and thence to Florence, to Bolonia, to Milan, and Genoa. Thusthe aforesaid Cardinals, together with the Bishop of Xaintes,Strozzi, and some others, returned, re infecta, as wise as they went.The thirteenth of this month came back hither the Cardinals ofSienna and Cæsarini, who had been elected by the pope, and thewhole college, legates to the emperor. They have so negotiatedthe matter, that the emperor has deferred his coming hither to the latter end of February. If I had as many crowns as the popewould give days of pardon; proprio motu de plenitudinepotestatis;of his own free will, out of the plenitude of his power and other such like favourable circ*mstances, to any one that could defer itfor five or six years to come; I should be richer than ever wasJacques Coeur. Here are great preparations made in this city forhis reception; and a new way is made by the pope's command, by which he is to make his entry: that is, through St. Sebastian'sgate, towards Champidoli Templum Pacis, (the Temple of Peace, )and the amphitheatre, and he is to pass under the ancient triumphalarches of Constantine, Vespasian, and Titus, of Numetianus, andothers: then on one side of St. Mark's palace, by Campo de Fiore,and by the palace Farnese, where the pope used to reside; thenby the banks, and below St. Angelo's castle. To make and levelwhich way, above two hundred houses, and three or four churches.are pulled down to the ground, which most people take for an ill omen. On the day of the conversion of St. Paul, his holinesswent to St. Paul's to hear mass, and made a feast to all the cardinals. After dinner he returned, passing through the abovementioned way, and looked at St. George's palace. But it is asad sight to behold the ruins of the demolished houses that are notpaid for nor have the landlords any recompence made them.To- day arrived here the Venetian ambassadors, four brave oldgrey- headed gentlemen, who are going to the emperor at Naples.The pope has sent all his family before them; his bed-chambermen, chamberlains, janisaries, lanskenets; and the cardinals havesent their mules in pontificalibus.LETTERS FROM ITALY. 567Likewise the 7th of this month, the ambassadors of Siennawere introduced in good order, and after they had made their speech in open consistory, and that the pope had answered them infine Latin, they suddenly parted for Naples. I believe ambassa- dors will be sent from all parts of Italy to the emperor; and heknows well enough how to play his game, to get money out of them, as it has been discovered about ten days since . But I amnot yet fully acquainted with the subtilty, which, it is said, hemade use of at Naples; hereafter I may give you an account of it.The Prince of Piedmont, the Duke of Savoy's eldest son, died atNaples fifteen days ago: the emperor ordered him a very honour- able interment, at which he assisted in person.The King of Portugal, six days since, commanded his ambassador at Rome, that immediately upon receipt of his letter, heshould return to him in Portugal; which he did the same hour,and came ready booted and spurred to take his leave of the mostreverend the Lord Cardinal du Bellay. Two days after, was killednear the bridge of St. Angelo, in open day, a Portuguese gentleman, who solicited here for the whole body of the Jews that werebaptized under King Emanuel of Portugal, that he might succeedto their estates when they died. The king has also exacted severalthings of them against the edict and ordinance of the said KingEmanuel. I doubt we shall hear of some sedition at Portugal.LETTER IX.-MY LORD, -In the last packet I sent you, I gaveyou an account, that part of the Turk's army was defeated by theSophy, near Betelis. The Turk did not very long delay his revenge for two months after, he fell upon the Sophy with thegreatest fury imaginable; and , after having put to fire and sworda great part of the country of Mesopotamia, he has driven backthe Sophy on the other side of Mount Taurus. In the mean time,he causes a great number of gallies to be built upon the riverTanais, by which they may come to Constantinople. Barbarossais still at Constantinople, to secure the country, and has left severalgarrisons at Bona and Algiers, lest the emperor should by chanceattack him. I have sent you his picture, drawn to the life; asalso a map of Tunis, and of the sea- port towns adjacent. Thelanskenets, whom the emperor sent into the duchy of Milan, tokeep the strong places, are all drowned and lost at sea, to thenumber of fifteen hundred, in one of the biggest and stoutest shipsbelonging to the Genoese; and it was near to a port belonging tothe commonwealth of Lucca, called Lerza. The occasion was,because they being weary of the sea, and desirous to get ashore,which they could not for the tempest and stress of weather, imagined that the pilot of the ship would still keep them off at sea ,longer than he needed; for which cause they killed him, withsome other of the officers of the said ship, after whose death the568 RABELAIS' WORKS.ship remained without a command; and instead of taking in theirsails, the lanskenets hoisted them, as being unpractised in seaaffairs, and in this confusion they perished within a stone's throw of the aforesaid port.My Lord, I understand that my Lord Bishop de Lavaur, whowas the king's ambassador at Venice, has had his audience of leave,and is returning to France. The Bishop of Rhodes goes in hisplace, and is now at Lyons with all his retinue, ready to go, when the king has given him his instructions.My Lord, I humbly recommend myself to your favour, praying to our Lord to give you long life in good health.Your most humble servant, FRANCIS RABELAIS.Rome, Jan. 28, 1536.LETTER X.-MY LORD, -I writ to you at large all the news Icould learn, the 28th of January last past, by a gentleman, servantto Monsieur de Montreuil, called Tremeliere, who returned fromNaples, where he had bought some horses of that kingdom for hislord, and was returning to him with all speed . The same day Ireceived the packet that you were pleased to send me from Legugé,dated the 10th of the said month, in which you may see the methodI have taken for the delivery of your letters, by which they aresafely and suddenly brought to me here. Your said letters andpackets were delivered at the Arms of Basle, on the one and twentieth of the same month; the eight and twentieth they were delivered to me here. And to encourage at Lyons ( for that is thepoint and principal place) the bookseller at the Arms of Basle tobe diligent in this affair, I repeat what I writ to you in my aforementioned packet, if you chance to write to me about anything ofconsequence that it is my advice, that on the first occasion ofwriting to me, you write a word or two to him in a letter, in whichbe pleased to inclose some gold crowns, or some other piece of oldgold, as a royal, an angel, or salutation, in consideration of thepains and care he takes of them; so small a matter will more andmore endear him to your service,Now, to answer your letters, I have diligently searched theregisters of the palace, since the time that you commanded me,that is , the years 1529, 1530, and 1531 , to see if Dom Philippe'sact of resignation to his nephew were to be found, and have giventhe clerks of the register two gold crowns, which is but a smallrecompense for the great and tedious trouble in it. In short, they have found nothing of it, nor ever heard news of his procurations;wherefore, I doubt there is some foul play in his case, or the instructions you writ to me were not sufficient to find them. Andthat I may be more certified in it, you should tell me, cujus dioce- sis, of what diocese the said Friar Dom. Philippe was; and ifyouhave heard nothing to give more light in the matter, as if it waspurè et simpliciter, or causá permutationis.LETTERS FROM ITALY. 569LETTER XI.-MY LORD-What I writ to you ofmy Lord Car- dinal du Bellay's answer, when I presented him your letters, oughtvot to displease your lordship . My Lord of Mascon has sent you an account of the whole matter, and we are not yet like to have alegate in France. It is certain, that the king has presented the Cardinal of Lorrain to the pope. But I believe, that the Cardinaldu Bellay will endeavour by all means possible to get it for him- self. The old proverb is true, which says, Nemo sibi secundus.And I shrewdly suspect, by certain signs that I see, that my Lord Cardinal du Bellay will engage the pope on his behalf, and thus be made acceptable to the king. Nevertheless, be not uneasy, ifhis answer be a little ambiguous in your concern.LETTER XII.-MY LORD, -The grains which I sent you, Ican assure you, are the best of Naples, of the same which his holiness has caused to be sowed in his privy garden of Belvedere.There are no other kind of salads on this side but those of Nasidord and Arroussa; but those of Legugé seem to me altogetheras good, and somewhat more sweet and grateful to the stomach,and particularly better for you; for those of Naples, in my opinion,are too hot and tough.As for the season for sowing them, you must caution your gar- deners no. to sow them altogether so early as they do on this side,for it is not warm weather so soon without as here. They mayverywell sow your salads twice a year, that is to say, in Lent, and inNovember; and they may sow the white cardes or thistles in August and September; melons, pompions, and the others in March;fencing them for some days with mats, and a thin layer of horsedung, not altogether rotten, when they fear it will freeze . Manyother grains besides are sold here, as Alexandria gilliflowers, ma- tronal violets, and shrubs, with which they refresh their chambersn the summer, called Belvedere, and other physical herbs. Butthis would be more for my lady d'Estissac's turn . If you please tohave ofall sorts, I will send you without fail. But I amforced to haverecourse again to your alms; for the thirty crowns which you ordered to be paid me here are almost gone: yet I have converted none of them to any ill use; nor for eating; for I eat and drink atmy Lord Cardinal du Bellay's, or at my Lord Mascon's. But agreat deal of money goes away in these silly postage letters, chamber rent, and wearing apparel, though I am as frugal as I can be.If you will be pleased to send me a bill of exchange, I hope I shallmake use of it wholly to your service, and not remain ungrateful.I see in this city a thousand pretty cheap things, which are broughtfrom Cyprus, Candia, and Constantinople. If you think fit, I willsend what I think fittest of them to you and my Lady d'Estissac.The carriage from hence to Lyons will cost nothing .Thanks be to God I have made an end of my business, and it570 RABELAIS' WORKS.has cost me no more than the taking out of the bulls; his holiness,having of his own good nature, given me the composition. And Ibelieve you will find the proceedings right enough, and that Ihave obtained nothing by them, but what is just and lawful. ButI have been obliged to advise very much with able counsel, that every thing might be according to due form; and I dare modestlytell you, that I have in a manner hardly made use of my Lord Cardinal du Bellay, or my lord ambassador; though, out of their ownkindness, they not only offered me their own good word and favour,but absolutely to make use of the king's name.LETTER XIII. —MY LORD, -I have not as yet presented yourfirst letter to the Bishop of Xaintes, for he is not yet returned fromNaples, whither he went, as I writ to you before. He is expectedhere within these three days: then I will give him your second,and entreat an answer of it . I understand, that neither he, northe Cardinals Salviati, and Rodolph, nor Philip Strozzi with hismoney, have done any thing with the emperor in their affair, thoughthey were willing to pay him a million of gold upon the nail, inthe name of all the foreigners and exiles of Florence, also to finishla Rocca [ the fortress] begun at Florence, to maintain a sufficientgarrison in it for ever in the name of the emperor, and to pay himyearly 100,000 ducats, provided and upon condition he restoredthem to their former goods, lands, and liberty.On the contrary, the Duke of Florence was most honourably received by him at his arrival. The emperor went out before him,and, post manus oscula, he ordered him to be attended to the castle of Capua in the same town, where his natural daughter has an apartment; she is affianced to the said Duke of Florence, by thePrince of Salerne, Viceroy of Naples, the Marquis de Vast, the Duke d'Alva, and other principal lords of his court. He held discourse with her as long as he staid; kissed her, and supped with her: afterwards the above-mentioned cardinals, the Bishop of Xaintes and Strozzi, never left soliciting. The emperor has put them off for a final resolution to his coming to that town, to the Rocca, which is a place of prodigious strength, that the duke has built at Florence. Over the portico he has caused an eagle to be painted, with wings as large as the sails of the windmills of Mire- balais, thereby declaring and insinuating, that he holds of no- body but the emperor. And, in fine, he has so cunningly carried on his tyranny, that the Florentines have declared before the emperor, nomine communitatis [ in the name of the commonalty, ] that they will have no other lord but him. It is certain, that he hasseverely punished the foreigners and exiles. A pasquil has been lately set up, wherein it is said,TO STROZZI . -Pugna pro patria. Fight for thy country.To ALEXANDER DUKE OF FLORENCE. Datum serva. Whatis given thee, keep.LETTERS FROM ITALY. 571TO THE EMPEROR.Que nocitura tenes quamvis sint chara relinqueQuit what will hurt thee, though it is ne'er so dear.TO THE KING.-Quod potes id tenta. Dare what thou canst.TO THE CARDINALS SALVIATI AND RODOLPH.Hos brevitas sensus fecit conjungere binos.Pure want of sense unites these blocks,As petty tradesmen join their stocks.LETTER XIV.-MY LORD-I writ to you, that the Duke ofFerrara is returned from Naples, and retired to Ferrara. Her highness, the Lady Renée, is brought to bed of a daughter: she hadanother fine daughter before, between six and seven years of age,and a little son of three years old. He could not agree with thepope, because he demanded an excessive sum of money for the investiture of his lands. Notwithstanding he had abated fifty thousand crowns for the love of the said lady, and this by the solicitationsof my lords the Cardinals du Bellay and Mascon, still to increasethe conjugal affection of the said duke towards her. This was theoccasion of Lyon Jamet's coming to this town, and they only dif- fered for fifteen thousand crowns: but they could not agree, becausethe pope would have him acknowledge, that he held and possessedall his lands entirely in fee of the apostolical see, which the otherwould not. For he would acknowledge no more than his deceasedfather had acknowledged, and what the emperor had adjudged atBolonia, by a decree in the time of the deceased Pope Clement.Thus he departed, re infectâ, (without doing anything), andwent to the emperor, who promised him, at his coming, that hewould easily make the pope consent, and come to the point contained in his said decree; and that he should go home, leaving an ambassador with him to solicit the affair, when he came on thisside; and that he should not pay the sum already agreed upon,before he heard further from him. The craft lies here, that the emperor wants money, and seeks it on all hands, and taxes all theworld he can, and borrows it from all parts. When he come hither,he will demand some of the pope, it is a plain case. For he will represent to them, that he has made all these wars against the Turkand Barbarossa, to secure Italy and the pope, and that he must ofnecessity contribute to it. The pope will answer that he has no money, and will manifestly prove his poverty to him . Then the emperor, without disbursing any thing, will demand the Duke ofFerrara's of him, which he knows he maycommand at a word; andthis is the mystery of the matter. Yet it is not certain whetherthings will be managed thus or no.LETTER XV. - MY LORD, You ask whether the Lord PietroLudovico is the pope's legitimate son or bastard: be assured the pope was never married, which is as much as to say, that the aforesaid gentleman is certainly a bastard. The pope had a very beauti-572 RABELAIS' WORKS.ful sister. There is to be seen to this day, at the palace, in that apartment where the summists reside, built by Pope Alexander, an imageof our lady, which, it is said, was drawn after that gentlewoman:she was married to a gentleman, cousin to the Lord Rancé, who beingin the war, in the expedition of Naples, the said Pope Alexander

• • • • : now the Lord Rancé having certain knowledge of the thing,

gave notice of it to his cousin, telling him, that he ought not tosuffer such a wrong done to their family by a Spanish pope; and that if he would endure it, he himself would not. In short, herhusband killed her; for which fact the present pope grieved; and toassuage his sorrow, Alexander made him a cardinal, being yet but veryyoung, and bestowed several other marks of his favour upon him.At that time the pope kept a Roman lady, of the house of Ruffina, and by her had a daughter, who was married to the LordBaugé, Count of Sancta Fiore, who died in this town since I camehither. By her he has one of the two little cardinals, who is calledthe Cardinal of Sancta Fiore. The pope likewise had a son, who is the said Pietro Ludovico, concerning whom you inquire, who hasmarried the daughter of the Count de Cervelle, on whom he hasgot a whole house full of children, and among others the little Car- dinacule Farnese, who was made vice-chancellor by the death of the late Cardinal de Medicis. By what is said you may judge whythe pope did not very well love the Lord Rancé, and vice versa (onthe other side ) the Lord Rancé put no great confidence in him:whence arises a great quarrel between my Lord John Paul de Cere,son to the said Lord Rancé, and the above-named Pietro Ludovico,for he is resolved to revenge the death of his aunt .But he is quit of it on the part of the said Lord Rancé, for hedied the 11th day of this month, going a hunting, in which he ex- tremely delighted, old as he was. The occasion was this: he hadgot some Turkish horses from the fairs of Racana, and as he washunting on one of them that was very tender- mouthed, it fell,tumbled over him , and bruised him with the saddle-bow so severely,that he did not live above half an hour after the fall . This was agreat loss to the French, for the king in him has lost a good ser- vant for his affairs in Italy. It is rightly said that the Lord John Paul his son will be no less hereafter. But it will be a long timeere he gets such experience in feats of arms, or so great a reputation among the commanders and soldiers, as the late brave man had.I wish with all my heart, that my Lord d'Estissac, by his death,had the county of Pontoise; for, it is said, it brings a good revenue.To assist at the funeral, and to comfort the Marchioness hiswife, my lord cardinal has sent to Ceres, near twenty miles fromthis town, my Lord de Ramboullet, and the Abbot of St. Nicaise,who was a near kinsman to the deceased. (I believe you have seen him at court. ) He is a little man, all life; who was called the Archdeacon of the Ursins: besides, he has sent some others ofhisprothonotaries; which, likewise my lord of Mascon has done.LETTERS FROM ITALY. 573LETTER XVI.-MY LORD, -I defer to my next to give youmore at large, the news concerning the emperor; for his design is not yet perfectly discovered. He is still at Naples, but is ex- pected here by the end of this month. Great preparations are made for his coming, and abundance of triumphal arches. His four harbingers have been a good while here in town; two of themSpaniards, one Burgundian, and the fourth a Fleming.It is a great pity to see the ruins of the churches, palaces and houses, which the pope caused to be demolished, and pulled down,to make and level him a way. For the charges of his reception,he has laid a tax on the college of cardinals, on those who haveplaces at court, and the artificers of the town, as much as the veryaquarols. The town is already full of foreigners.On the 5th of this month, the Cardinal of Trent (Tridentinus )arrived, being sent here by the emperor. His train is very nume- rous, and more sumptuous than the pope's. He had with himabove a hundred Germans, all dressed alike: their gowns were red, with a yellow galloon; and on their right sleeve was embroi- dered a wheat- sheaf tied close, and round it was written unitas.66I hear he is much for peace, and reconciling all the Christian princes. He eagerly desires a general council, whatever is done in other matters. I was present when he said to my Lord Cardinaldu Bellay: His holiness, the cardinals, bishops, and prelates ofthe church, are against a council, and will by no means hear anything of it , though they are pressed by secular princes on thatsubject; but I see the time at hand, when the prelates of the church shall be reduced to demand a council, and the laity will not hearken to it. This will be when the latter have taken from thechurch all the wealth and patrimony which they had given, whileecclesiastics, by the means of frequent councils, maintained peace and unity among the laity." Andrew Doria came to this town onthe 3rd of this month, in no very good equipage. No manner of particular respect was shown him at his arrival save only the LordPietro Ludovico conducted him as far as the palace of the CardinalCamerlingo, who is a Genoese, of the house of Spinola . The nextday he saluted the pope, and the day after went away for Genoa,on the emperor's behalf, to inform himself underhand, concerning the disposition of the French about the war. We have had hereapositive account of the old 'Queen of England's death; and they add that the princess, her daughter, lies very ill. However, thebull that was issued out against the King of England to excommunicate him, and to interdict and proscribe his kingdom, did not pass at the consistory, because of the articles, " De commentibusexternorum et commerciis mutuis," of the passages of foreigners and mutual intercourses, which my Lord Cardinal du Bellay andthe Bishop of Mascon opposed, in the king's name, on account ofthe interest which he pretends to have in it . It has been put offtill the emperor's arrival.574 RABELAIS' WORKSMylord, I most humbly recommend myself to your kind favour,praying God that it may please him to keep you long in health and prosperity. Your Lordship's most humble servant,Rome, Feb. 15, 1536. FRANCIS RABELAIS.ON THE PANTAGRUELIAN PROGNOSTICATION, AND OTHER SHORT PIECES.OUR author, who was a learned astronomer, has chiefly ridiculedastrologers in his Prognostication. He published an Almanack, printed at Lyons in 1553; and perhaps this was printed with it. However,we cannot be sure of this; for it is not to be procured, no more than some of his letters, besides his sciomachy, and festivals at Rome, in Cardinal du Bellay's palace at the Duke of Orleans' birth. I am told,that something of the nature of these predictions has been printed here in Poor Robin's Almanack. I do not wonder at it; for as there iswit and satire in this piece, even one of the most learned men in Ger- many has not been ashamed to borrow a great deal of it; I mean Joachim Fortius Rindelbergius, who begins a small piece of this nature with the very beginning of the second chapter of this.

66 Thus he has it in Latin: Proximo anno cæci parum aut nihilvidebunt, surdi malè audient, muti non loquentur. Ver erit calidum ac humidum, æstas calida et sicca, autumnus frigidus et siccus, hyems frigida et sicca. Estate erunt quandoque pluviæ, interdum fulmina et tonitrua. Bellum erit inter aucupes et aves, inter piscatores et pisces, inter canes et lepores, inter feles et mures, inter lupos et oves,inter monachos et ova. Multi interibunt pisces, boves, oves, porci.capræ, pulli, et capones; inter simias, canes et equos, mors non tanto- perè sæviet. Senectus eodem anno erit immedicabilis propter annos qui præcesserunt. Non pauci inopiâ laborabunt, " &c. , p. 556.There runs a vein of Protestantism through most of this work,which is undoubtedly Rabelais's, though it is said to be calculated by Alcofribus Nasier; for that name is only an anagram of the author's,Francois Rabelais.The Epistle, said to be written by the Limosin, partly in an affected Frenchified Latin, is to ridicule that way of writing, as appears by theepigram after it. The Cream of Encyclopedic Questions is a trifle,which, like many other insignificant of other great men, has been kept from oblivion merely for the sake of its author, and added to his works,with the epistles, after his death, as appears by the title page ofsome old editions of the fifth book. The Epistle to the Old Hag, seems to be asharp invective against the church of Rome. The Epistle to the Wise Matron, seems to be an encomium on the reformed church.

• The present editor hath seen several English imitations of this Prognostic tion , that are much older than the rise of Poor Robin's Almanack. The Owle':

Almanack, Jackdaw's Prognostications, and some others in the reign of King James I. were of this kind.4415THE FND..

onkish ves"=

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See also

• Bohn's Extra Volume edition of Rabelais

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