Chapter VII: Part 7

It was quite seven o'clock at night when we reached a small town, where to repose me they dragged me into a gaol; for the reader would not believe me if I said they buried me in a hole. And yet that is so true that in one pirouette I visited the whole of it. In fine, anyone who saw me there would have taken me for a lighted candle under a chimney. Before my gaoler threw me into this cavern I said:

"If you give me this stony garment as a suit it is too large, but if as a grave it is too narrow. There the days can only be counted by nights and of my five senses only two are left me, smell and touch; one to let me smell the stinks of my prison and the other to make it palpable. Truly, I confess to you, I should think I were damned if I did not know that there are no innocent folk in hell."

At the word "innocent" the gaoler burst out laughing. "Faith!" said he, "you are one of our people, I see. I have never had anyone under lock and key who was not innocent."

After other compliments of this nature the fellow took the trouble to search me, I know not for what purpose, but from the diligence he displayed in it I conjecture it was for my own good. His researches were fruitless, because I had slipped my gold into my boots during the battle of _Diabolas_, but when after a very close examination he remained with hands as empty as before, I was as near dying of fear as he of despite.

"Ho! Body o' me!" cried he, foaming at the mouth, "I saw he was a warlock at first glance, he is penniless as the devil. Away, comrade, take good heed to your conscience."

He had scarcely finished these words when I heard the peal of a bunch of keys from which he was selecting those of my cell. His back was turned and so, for fear he should avenge himself on me for the failure of his search, I nimbly drew three _pistoles_ from their hiding-place, and said to him:

"Master Gaoler, here is a _pistole_; I pray you bring me some food, for I have had nothing to eat for eleven hours."

He received it most graciously and vowed that my misfortune touched his heart. When I saw I had softened his bosom I went on:

"And here is another to compensate for the trouble I am ashamed of giving you."

He opened his ears, his heart and his hand; and, counting him out three instead of two, I added that by the third I begged him to send one of his men to keep me company, because the unhappy are bound to dread solitude. Ravished by my prodigality, he promised me everything, embraced my knees, declaimed against the Law, said he perceived now I had enemies, but that I should come out of it all with honour, that I should keep up my courage and, in short, he pledged himself I should be free before three days had passed. I thanked him most gravely for his courtesy and, after he had nearly strangled me with a thousand embraces, this dear friend locked and double-locked the door.

I remained alone and very melancholy, my body hunched up on a bundle of crumbled straw, which was not yet so small but that more than fifty rats were still gnawing it. The roof, the walls and the floor were composed of six tombstones so that, having death above, beneath and about me, I might be in no doubt of my interment. The cold slime of slugs and the sticky venom of toads dripped on to my face; the lice had teeth longer than their bodies. I saw myself tormented by the stone, which though external was none the less painful. In fine, I think I needed only a wife and a broken pot to play the part of Job.

Nevertheless I overcame there the duration of two very difficult hours when the noise of twelve dozen keys added to that of the bolts on my door drew me from the consideration of my miseries. Following upon this clatter a stalwart knave appeared in the light of a lamp. He set down an earthen pot between my legs.

"There, there!" said he, "comfort yourself, that's cabbage soup, and when it is ... in sooth 'tis our good dame's own soup; and faith! there's not a drop of fat lost, as they say."

So speaking he thrust his five fingers down to the bottom of the pot to invite me to do likewise. I laboured after his example, for fear of discontenting him, and with a joyful eye--

"_Morguiene!_" cried he, "you are a lad of mettle! They say you have detractors, _jerniguay!_ they are traitors; ay, _testiguay!_ they are traitors. Hey! Let them come and see. Well, well, so it is, dancers always move."

This rusticity filled my throat twice or thrice with laughter, but I was fortunate enough to choke it back. I saw that Fortune seemed to offer me a chance of freedom through this clodhopper and therefore it seemed to me very necessary to cultivate his favour; for, as to escaping by other means--the architect who built my prison made several entrances but forgot to make a way out. These divers considerations led me to sound him as follows:

"My dear friend, you are poor, are you not?"

"Alas! sir", the clown replied, "if you came from the fortune-teller's you could not hit the mark more surely."

"Here, then", I went on, "take this _pistole_."

I found his hand so trembled, when I put the _pistole_ in it, that he could scarce shut it. This beginning seemed to me of evil omen, but I soon discovered from the fervour of his thanks that he was only trembling with joy, and therefore I went on:

"If you were the man to share in the accomplishment of a vow I have made, twenty _pistoles_ (as well as your soul's salvation) would be as much yours as your hat; for you must know that about a quarter of an hour since, just before you arrived, an angel appeared to me and promised to make known the justice of my cause, provided that I go to-morrow to have Mass said for Our Lady of this town at the high altar. I tried to excuse myself because I am too narrowly warded, but the angel answered that there would come to me a man, sent by the gaoler to keep me company, and I had only to bid this man in the angel's name convey me to church and bring me back to prison; I am to warn him to be secret and to obey without question on pain of dying within the year; and if he doubts my word I am to tell him for a token that he is a Member of the Scapulary." The reader must be informed that I had noticed a scapulary through the opening of his shirt and this at once suggested to me the whole fabric of the apparition.

"Ay, ay, master", said he, "I'll do what the angel bids us, but it must be nine o'clock, because our gaffer will be at Toulouse then for the betrothal of his son to the daughter of the hangman. Marry, the hangman has a name as well as a louse; they say her father will give her crowns enough for a king's ransom for her wedding. She's rich and beautiful, but such bits never fall to a poor man. Alas, good master, you must know...."

I failed not to cut him short at this point; for by this induction I foresaw a long series of cock-and-bull stories. Well, when we had worked out our plot, the knave took leave of me. Next morning he was there to disinter me precisely at the hour promised. I left my clothes in the prison and wrapped myself in rags; we had agreed upon this the night before as a means of disguise. As soon as we were in the air I did not forget to count him out his twenty _pistoles_. He looked at them hard, with his eyes almost starting.

"They are gold and unclipped", said I, "on my word."

"Hey, sir", he replied, "'tisn't of that I'm thinking, but I'm thinking big Macé's house is for sale, with the meadow and the vineyard. I can get it for two hundred _francs_, but it will take a week to knock up the bargain and I beseech you, good master, if it is your will and pleasure, not to let your _pistoles_ change into oak leaves until big Macé holds them well and truly counted in his chest."

The knave's rusticity made me laugh. However, we continued on our way to church and soon arrived there. Some time afterwards High Mass began, but as soon as I saw my gaoler rise in his turn for the offertory, I traversed the nave in three steps and in as many more nimbly lost myself in an unfrequented alley. Out of the many thoughts which then agitated my mind I chose that of reaching Toulouse, from which this town was only half a league distant, with the purpose of taking post. I soon reached the suburbs; but I was so ashamed to see that everyone was looking at me that I was put out of countenance. Their astonishment was caused by my appearance; for I was but a novice in beggary and my rags were arranged so fantastically, my gait was so unsuitable to my clothes, that I seemed rather a masquer than a beggar, and in addition I passed people quickly, with my eyes on the ground, asking no alms. Finally I realised that to be the object of so general a curiosity exposed me to dangerous consequences and, overcoming my repugnance, I held out my hand as soon as I perceived someone looking at me. I even besought the charity of those who did not look at me; but observe how often by adding too many precautions to a plan in which Fortune will have her share we ruin it by irritating her vanity. I make this reflection on my adventure here; for seeing a man dressed as a small shopkeeper with his back turned to me, I said to him as I plucked his sleeve:

"Sir, if compassion can touch...."

I had not begun the word which was to follow when the man turned his head. Gods! How he changed! And O ye Gods, how I changed! The man was my gaoler. We were both struck with amazement to see each other where we were. I was the sole object of his eyes, he filled the whole of my sight. Finally our own interests, although so different, drew us both from the surprise into which we were plunged.

"Ah! Wretch that I am", cried the gaoler, "shall I be caught thus?"

This ambiguous word "caught" immediately suggested to me the following stratagem:

"Help, gentlemen, help in the name of the Law!" cried I as loud as I could screech. "This thief has stolen the Countess of Mousseaux's jewels--I have been seeking him a year. Gentlemen", I continued warmly, "a hundred _pistoles_ to the man who arrests him!"

I had scarcely uttered these words ere a party of the mob fell upon the poor amazed devil. The astonishment into which he was cast by my impudence, joined with his supposition that I could only have escaped from my cell by penetrating the unbroken wall like a hand of glory, so staggered him that for a time he was beyond himself. At last he came to himself and the first words he used to disabuse the crowd were to take care not to mistake he was a man of honour. He was undoubtedly about to reveal the mystery, but a dozen fruit-women, lackeys and chairmen, desirous to serve me for my money, closed his mouth with their punches. And as they supposed their reward would be measured out according to the extent they outraged this poor dupe, each pressed in to earn it with foot or hand.

"Hear the man of honour!" howled the mob, "yet he could not prevent himself from saying he was caught, as soon as he saw the gentleman."

The cream of the comedy was that my gaoler was in his best clothes, he was ashamed to admit he was the Hangman's assistant and was afraid he would be worse beaten if he admitted it. For my part I took to my heels during the hottest of the scuffle. I entrusted my safety to my legs and they would soon have brought me off happily but, unluckily, the looks which everybody once more turned on me, threw me afresh into my former fears. If the sight of a hundred rags, which danced around me like a maypole-dance of the rabble, caused some gaper to stare at me, straightway I apprehended that he read upon my forehead that I was a prisoner at large. If a saunterer put out his hand from beneath his cloak, I imagined a catchpole stretching out his hand to arrest me. If I noticed another striding along without lifting his eyes upon me I was convinced he was pretending not to see me in order to grasp me from the rear. If I saw a tradesman enter his shop I said: "He is taking down his halberd." If I passed through a district more crowded than usual I thought, "So many people have not met here without a purpose." If another part was deserted, "They are watching for me here." Was there some impediment to my flight, "They have barricaded the streets to surround me." At last my fear debauched my reason and I imagined every man was an archer, every word "arrest" and every noise the unendurable creaking of the bolts in my late prison.

Hag-ridden by this panic terror I resolved to beg once more, in order to pass through the remainder of the town to the posting station without suspicion, but as I feared my voice might be recognized, I added to the exercise of begging the device of counterfeiting dumbness. I therefore went up to those who, as I perceived, were looking at me; then I pointed a finger above my chin, then above my mouth and gaped it wide with an inarticulate cry to make it understood by my grimace that a poor mute was asking alms. Sometimes I was charitably given an eleemosynary shrug; sometimes I felt some oddment thrust into my hand; and sometimes I heard women say that it might well be that I had been martyrized in this way in Turkey. In short I learned that begging is a large book which teaches us the manners of people far more cheaply than all those great voyages of Columbus and Magellan.

This device nevertheless failed to weary the obstinacy of my fate or to win over its evil disposition; yet what other course could I adopt? For, in crossing a town like Toulouse, where my engraving had made me familiar even to the fish-wives, dressed as I was in rags as motley as Harlequin's, was it not probable that I should be observed and immediately recognized? And that the counter-spell to this danger was to play the beggar, whose part is played by all manner of faces? And even if this ruse were not devised with all the necessary caution, I still think that amid so many unhappy circumstances I showed strong judgment by not losing my head entirely.

I continued thus on my way when on a sudden I found myself obliged to return on my steps; for my venerable gaoler, with some dozen archers of his acquaintance, who had delivered him from the hands of the rabble, were up in arms and patrolling the whole town in search of me, and unhappily crossed my path. As soon as they saw me with their lynx eyes with one accord they rushed upon me full speed and I fled away at the top of mine. I was so sharply pursued that every moment my liberty felt at my neck the breath of the tyrants who would oppress it; but it seemed the air they puffed out as they ran behind me blew me before them. At last Heaven or fear gave me a space of four or five turnings in front of them. My pursuers lost track and scent of me and I lost the sight and turmoil of this troublesome chase. Certainly those who have not experienced similar agonies at first hand will hardly understand with what joy I trembled when I found I had escaped. But since my safety demanded all my attention, I resolved to employ most carefully the time which would elapse before they caught up with me. I daubed my face, rubbed my hair with dust, put off my doublet, loosened my breeches, threw my hat in a ventilator; then I spread out my handkerchief on the pavement with a little stone at each corner, like those who are sick of the plague, lay beside it with my belly on the ground and began to groan very grievously in a piteous tone. I had scarcely done this when I heard the noise of this hoarse-throated populace long before the sound of their feet; but I had enough self-control to remain in the same position in the hope of not being recognized; in this I was not deceived, for they all took me to be plague-smitten and passed me very nimbly, holding their noses and most of them throwing a farthing into my handkerchief.

The storm over, I went down an alley, put on my clothes again and abandoned myself to Fortune once more, but I had run so hard she was weary of following me. I suppose this was the case: the glorious Goddess was not accustomed to walk so quickly, and as I went through squares and crossroads, through and across streets, to conceal my way the better, she let me fall blindly into the hands of the archers who were pursuing me. At meeting me they uttered so furious a yell that I was deafened. They seemed to think they had not enough arms to arrest me, so they used their teeth and even then were not sure they had me; one dragged me along by the hair, another by the collar, while the more temperate went through my pockets. This search was more successful than that in the prison; they found the rest of my gold.

While these charitable physicians were occupied in curing the dropsy of my purse, a great clamour arose; the whole square echoed with the words "Kill, kill!" and at the same time I saw the glitter of swords. The gentlemen who were haling me along exclaimed that these were the Grand Provost's archers who wanted to rob them of their prey. "But", said they to me, dragging me harder than ever, "beware of falling into their hands, you will be condemned in twenty-four hours and the King himself cannot save you." At last, however, they grew apprehensive as the scuffle involved them and they abandoned me so completely that I was standing alone in the middle of the street while the aggressors dispatched everyone they met.

I leave you to imagine whether I took to my heels, I who had reason to fear both parties equally. In a little time I drew away from the hubbub, but as I was asking the way to the posting station, a torrent of people running from the brawl dashed into my street. I was unable to resist the crowd, so I went with it, and growing angry at so much running I reached at length a small very dark door into which I rushed pell-mell with other fugitives. We bolted it behind us and when everyone had recovered breath one of the group said:

"Comrades, if you will take my advice, we shall go through the two gates and hold firm in the prison-yard."

These terrible words hit my ears with so astounding a pain that I thought I should fall dead on the spot. Alas! I perceived immediately, but too late, that instead of escaping to a refuge as I had thought, I had merely cast myself into prison, so impossible is it for any man to escape the influence of his star. I looked at this man more attentively and I saw he was one of the archers who had so long pursued me. A cold sweat rose to my forehead and I became pale and ready to swoon. Those who saw me so ill were moved by compassion and called for water; everyone drew near to help me, unhappily that accursed archer was one of the first and he no sooner cast his eyes upon me than he recognised me. He made a sign to his companions and at the same time greeted me with a "I take you prisoner in the King's name." They had not far to go to my cell.

I remained in the lower prison until evening, when each of the warders, one after the other, by means of an exact and critical examination of all the parts of my face drew my picture on the canvas of his memory.[56]

[Footnote 56: Mr Pickwick in the Fleet, "sitting for his portrait"!]

As seven o'clock struck, the noise of a bunch of keys gave the signal for bed. I was asked if I wished to be shown into the one-pistole room; I replied with a nod. "The money then!" replied my guide. I knew I was in a place where I should have to swallow many more insults. I therefore prayed him, if his courtesy could not bring him to trust me until the morning, to ask the gaoler from me to return the money which had been taken from me.

"Ho! By my faith", responded the rascal, "our master has a stout heart, he never returns anything. Do you think your lovely nose.... Hey, off with you, into the black dungeons!"

With these words he showed me the way with a savage blow from his bunch of keys, whose weight overthrew me and tumbled me from top to bottom of a dark flight of stairs down to the foot of a door which stopped me; I should not have known it was one without the sparks from the shock with which I struck it, for I had lost my eyes, they remained at the top of the stairs in the shape of a candle held twenty-four steps above me by my hangman of a warder. This man came down gradually, opened some thirty large locks, undid as many bolts, pushed the door a little and with a blow of his knee hurled me into this hole, whose horrors I had not time to see, he closed the door so quickly. I was standing in mud up to the knees. If I tried to reach the side I sank up to the waist. The awful croaking of frogs as they squatted in the mud made me long to be deaf; I felt lizards wandering along my thighs and snakes twining about my neck; I perceived one by the sombre glow of its glinting eye-balls darting a three-pronged tongue from its venom-blackened throat, while its brusque movement made it seem like a thunderbolt with the look of the eyes for the flash.

I am completely unable to express the remainder; it surpasses all belief and I dare not attempt to recollect it, so much do I fear that my present certainty of having escaped this prison may turn out to be a dream from which I shall awake. The hand on the dial of the great tower pointed to ten before anyone knocked at my tomb, but about that time when the anguish of a bitter grief began to grip my heart and to disturb that equilibrium which makes life, I heard a voice bidding me grasp a rod that was held out to me. After groping for some time in obscurity to find it I touched the end, grasped it with emotion, and my gaoler, pulling it towards him, fished me out of the bog. I suspected my affairs had taken a turn for the better, because he offered me profound civilities, only spoke to me with his head uncovered and told me that five or six people of quality were waiting in the courtyard to see me. This savage brute who had shut me in the dungeon I have described had the impudence to accost me. Having kissed my hands, with one knee on the ground, he plucked out with one paw a quantity of slugs which had stuck in my hair and with the other he pulled off a great heap of leeches which masked my face. After this exquisite courtesy he said:

"You will at least remember, good master, the care and trouble taken of you by fat Nicholas. Pardi, even if it had been for the King, it isn't to be grudged you."

Enraged by the rogue's effrontery, I made a sign that I would remember. By a thousand terrifying windings I reached the light at last and then the courtyard, where as soon as I entered I was grasped by two men I could not recognize, because they threw themselves on me at once and each kept his face pressed against mine. For some time I did not know who they were, but when their transports of friendship were a little abated I recognised my dear Colignac and the brave Marquis. Colignac had his arm in a sling and Cussan was the first to emerge from his ecstasy.

"Alas!" said he, "we should never have suspected such a disaster, had it not been for your horse and the mule which arrived last night at the gates of my house; their breast-pieces, their saddle, girths and their cruppers were all broken, which made us anticipate something of your misfortune. We got to horse at once and had ridden but two or three leagues towards Colignac, when the whole countryside, alarmed by the accident, described to us what had happened. We galloped off immediately to the town where you were imprisoned, but learning there that you had escaped and hearing a rumour that you had gone in the direction of Toulouse, we came on at full speed with the servants we had with us. The first person whom we asked for news of you said you had been recaptured. We turned our horses towards this prison, but other people assured us you had vanished from the hands of the police. And as we pushed on we heard the bourgeois relating to each other the story that you had become invisible. At length by continually making inquiries we learned that after you had been taken, lost and retaken I know not how many times, you were being carried to prison in the Large Tower. We intercepted your archers and with a good fortune more apparent than real we met them, attacked them, fought them and put them to flight, but we failed to learn even from the wounded we had captured what had become of you, until this morning, when we were informed that you had blindly come to prison of your own accord for safety. Colignac is wounded in several places, but very slightly. For the rest, we have arranged for you to be lodged in the best room here. Since you like fresh air we have furnished a little room for you alone at the top of the Large Tower, where the terrace will serve you as a balcony; your eyes at least will be at liberty, in spite of the body which confines them."

"Ah! My dear Drycona", cried the Count, taking his turn to speak, "we were very unlucky not to have taken you with us when we left Colignac. Through a blind depression whose cause I did not know, my heart warned me of something terrible; but no matter, I have friends, you are innocent and in any case I know how men die with glory. One thing alone troubles me. That rascal whom I designed to feel the first blows of my vengeance (you may easily divine I am speaking of my _Curé_) is no longer in a condition to feel them; the wretch has given up the ghost. This is how he died. He and his servant were running to drive your horse into his stable when the animal, with a fidelity increased perhaps by the secret enlightenment of instinct, began to plunge so successfully that in three kicks with which that brute's head came in contact he rendered his benefice vacant. No doubt you fail to understand the reasons for the madman's hatred; I will tell you them. Know then, to begin with, that this holy man, Norman by race and a pettifogger by trade, cast his eyes upon the curacy of Colignac, and in spite of all my efforts to retain the possessor in his just rights, the scoundrel wheedled the judges so well that in spite of everything he became our parson.

"At the end of a year he sued me also, because he claimed that I should pay tithes. It was in vain to show him that from time immemorial my land was exempt, he continued his suit and lost it, but in the course of the proceedings he brought up so many other incidents that a swarm of more than twenty law-suits grew out of the first and are now hung up, thanks to your horse, whose hoof was harder than M. Jean's head. That is all I can conjecture of our parson's giddiness. But observe with what foresight he governed his madness. I have just been informed that when he took into his head this unhappy design of getting you into prison, he secretly exchanged the curacy of Colignac for another in his own district, whither he meant to retire as soon as you were taken. His servant even said that when he saw your horse near his stable he murmured to himself that it would help to take him somewhere he was not expected to be."

After this, Colignac warned me to be on my guard against the visits and offers which a very powerful personage (whom he named) might make me, and told me that it was through this person's influence Messire Jean had won the case about his benefice, and that this person of quality had acted on his behalf to repay the services rendered by the good priest, when he was an usher, to his son at school.

"And so", Colignac went on, "since it is very difficult to go to law without bitterness and without there remaining in the mind a certain enmity which never wholly disappears, although we have been reconciled he is always secretly looking for opportunities to thwart me. But, no matter, I have more relatives in the law than he, and I have plenty of friends, and at the worst we can secure the intervention of the King."

After Colignac had finished, they both attempted to console me, but it was by means of so tender a grief that my own was increased. At this moment the gaoler returned to tell us that the room was ready.

"Let us go and look at it", said Cussan. He started off and we followed him. I found it well fitted up.

"There is nothing else I want", said I, "except books."

Colignac promised to send me next day all that I marked on a list. When we had looked about and had recognised from the height of the Tower, from the flat-bottomed moat which surrounded it and from the whole arrangement of my room that it was an enterprise beyond human power to rescue me, my two friends gazed upon each other, then turned their eyes upon me and began to weep. But suddenly, as if our grief had moved Heaven, a rapid joy took possession of my soul; joy brought hope, hope brought secret insight which dazzled my reason as with a powerful emotion against my will which seemed ridiculous even to me.

"Go", said I, "go and wait for me at Colignac, I shall be there in three days; and send me all the mathematical instruments I usually work with; moreover, you will find in a large box a number of crystal glasses cut in different ways, do not forget them; but I had better specify in writing the things I need."

They took the note I wrote for them without being able to discover my intention. After which I sent them away. When they had gone I could do nothing but reflect on how to carry out the things I had determined upon and I was still reflecting in the morning, when I was presented in their name with everything I had marked on the list. One of Colignac's footmen told me that his master had not been seen since the day before and that nobody knew what had become of him. This did not distress me, for it occurred to me at once that he might have gone to Court to solicit my release; and therefore without troubling myself I took my work in hand. For eight days I hammered, I planed, I glued and at last constructed the machine I am about to describe to you. It was a large very light box which shut very exactly. It was about six feet high and about three wide in each direction. This box had holes in the bottom, and over the roof, which was also pierced, I placed a crystal vessel with similar holes made globe shape but very large, whose neck terminated exactly at and fitted in the opening I had made in the top. The vessel was expressly made with several angles, in the shape of an icosahedron, so that as each facet was convex and concave my globe produced the effect of a burning mirror. Neither the gaoler nor the warders ever came into the room without finding me occupied with this work; but they were not surprised, on account of all the pleasant mechanical pieces they saw in the room, of which I called myself the inventor. Among other things there were a wind-clock, an artificial eye to see by night and a sphere where the stars follow the movement they have in the sky. All this convinced them that the machine I was working at was a similar curiosity and the money with which Colignac had greased their palm made them go gently in many difficult occasions.

It was nine o'clock in the morning. My gaoler had gone down and the sky was overcast when I exposed this machine on the summit of the Tower, that is to say in the most open portion of my terrace; it closed so exactly that not a single grain of air could slip in except through the two openings. I had fitted inside a small, very light plank which served me as a seat. All being arranged in this way I shut myself up inside and remained there nearly an hour, waiting until it pleased Fortune to command me. When the Sun emerged from the clouds and began to shine on my machine the transparent icosahedron received the treasures of the sun through its facets and transmitted the light through the globe into my cell; and since this splendour was weakened, because the rays could not reach me without being several times broken, this strength of tempered light converted my shrine into a little sky of purple enamelled with gold.

I was admiring in an ecstasy the beauty of so mingled a colouring when suddenly I felt my entrails stirred in the same way a man feels them stir when he is lifted up by a pulley. I was about to open the door to find out the cause of this sensation, but, as I was stretching out my hand, I looked through the hole in the floor of my box and saw my Tower already far below me; and my little castle in the air thrusting upwards against my feet showed me in a twinkling Toulouse disappearing into the earth. This prodigy surprised me, not because of the suddenness of the flight, but because of the terrible emotion of the human reason at the success of a design which had appalled me even in the imagination. The rest did not surprise me, because I had foreseen that the void which would occur in the icosahedron through the sun's rays uniting by way of the concave glasses would attract a furious abundance of air to fill it, which would lift up my box, and in proportion as I rose up the horrible wind which rushed through the hole could not reach the roof except by passing furiously through the machine and thereby lifting it up. Although my plan had been thought out with great care, I was wrong in one particular, through my not having placed sufficient faith in the power of my mirrors. I had placed around the box a little sail easily moved by a string, which I held in my hand and which passed through the glass globe; I had supposed that when I was in the air I could make use of as much wind as was needed to carry me to Colignac; but in a twinkling the sun, beating perpendicularly and obliquely upon the burning mirrors of the icosahedron, bore me up so high that I lost sight of Toulouse. This caused me drop the string and very soon after I saw through one of the windows I had made in the four sides of the machine my little sail torn off and flying away in the grip of a whirlwind.

I remember that in less than an hour I found myself above the middle region. I perceived this by noticing that it rained and hailed beneath me. I shall be asked perhaps how it happened that there was wind--without which my box could not rise--in a part of the sky which is free from meteors; but if you will hearken to me, I will satisfy this objection. I have told you that the sun beat vigorously upon my concave mirrors, and uniting its rays in the middle of the globe drove out with ardour through the upper vent the air inside; the globe became a vacuum and, since Nature abhors a vacuum, she made it draw up air through the lower opening to fill itself. If it lost a great deal it gained as much; and in this way we should not be surprised that in a space above the middle region of the winds I should continue to rise, because the ether became wind through the furious speed with which it rushed through to prevent a vacuum and consequently was bound to force up my machine continually.

I was scarcely troubled with hunger at all, except when I traversed this middle region; for certainly the coldness of the climate made me see it at a distance. I say "at a distance," because I drank a few drops from a bottle of essence I always carried with me and this forbade it to approach. During the remainder of my journey I was not in the least attacked by it; on the contrary, the nearer I came to this flaming world the stronger I felt. I found my face was a little hot and gayer than usual; my hands appeared of an agreeable vermilion colour and an unsuspected gladness flowing with my blood took me completely out of myself.

I remember that as I reflected on this adventure I reasoned once in this way: "Hunger no doubt cannot attack me, because this pain is simply Nature's instinct, warning animals to repair with food the losses of their substance; and to-day the pure, continuous and close irradiation of the sun causes me to take in more radical heat than I lose and therefore Nature no longer gives me a desire which would be useless." I objected to these reasons that, since the composition which makes life consists not only in natural heat, but in radical moisture, to which this fire must be attached as flame to the oil of a lamp, the rays alone of that brasier of life could not make the soul unless they met with some unctuous matter to fix them. But I vanquished this difficulty immediately, after I had taken notice that in our bodies the radical moisture and the natural heat are the same thing; for, that which is called moisture either in animals or in the Sun--that great soul of the world--is merely a flow of sparks more continuous on account of their mobility; and that which is called heat is a mist of atoms of fire, which appear less liberated because of their interruption; but even if the radical moisture and the radical heat were two distinct things, it is certain that the moisture would not be necessary in order to live so near the Sun; for, since this moisture serves the living only to grasp the heat, which would evaporate too quickly and would not feed them soon enough, I could not lack it in a region where more of these little bodies of flame which made life were united to my being than were detached from it.

Another thing may cause astonishment, and that is why as I approached this burning globe I was not consumed, since I had almost reached the full activity of its sphere. This is the reason: properly speaking it is not the fire itself which burns, but a grosser matter which the fire thrusts hither and thither by the vehemence of its mobile nature; and that powder of sparkles which I call fire, moving of itself, finds all this action possible from the roundness of its atoms; for they caress, heat or burn according to the shape of the bodies they draw with them. Thus, straw does not send out so hot a flame as wood; wood burns with less violence than iron, and the reason for this is that the fire of iron, wood and straw, although it is the same fire, nevertheless acts differently, according to the diversity of the bodies it moves; that is why in straw the fire (that almost spiritual dust) is less corrosive, because it is hindered by a soft body only; in wood, whose substance is more compact, it enters more harshly; and in iron, whose mass is almost entirely solid and bound together with angular parts, it penetrates and consumes what is cast upon it in a flash. All these observations are so familiar that no one will be surprised that I approached the sun without being burned, because that which burns is not fire, but the matter to which it is attached, and because the Sun's fire cannot be mingled with any matter. Do we not experience ourselves that joy, which is a fire, because it only moves an aery blood, whose very loose particles slide gently against the membranes of our flesh, caresses us and creates I know not what blind pleasure, and that this pleasure or rather this first step of pain, not going so far as to menace the animal with death, but making him feel his good constitution by a natural instinct, causes a movement in our minds which we call joy? Fever, which has entirely contrary effects, is a fire just as much as joy, but it is a fire enveloped in a body whose grains are horny, such as black bile or melancholy, and this fire darting its hooked points everywhere, its mobile nature carries it, pierces, cuts, flays and produces by this violent agitation what is called the burning of fever. But this chain of proofs is quite useless; the commonest experiments are sufficient to convince the most obstinate. I have no time to lose, I must think of myself; like Phaethon, I am in the midst of a career, where I cannot turn back, and in which if I make one false step all Nature together cannot help me.

I perceived very distinctly, as I had formerly suspected in travelling to the Moon, that it is indeed the Earth which turns about the Sun from East to West, and not the Sun which turns about the Earth; for I saw in succession France, the foot of the boot of Italy, then the Mediterranean, then Greece, then the Bosphorus, the Euxine Sea, Persia, the Indies, China and finally Japan pass across the hole of my box, and some hours after my elevation the whole South Sea passed by and left in its place the Continent of America. I clearly distinguished all these revolutions and I even remember that a long time afterwards I again saw Europe moving up once more on the scene, but I could not distinguish the different States, because my elevation was now too high. On my way I passed, sometimes on the left, sometimes on the right, several worlds like ours and I felt myself deflected whenever I reached the spheres of their activity. However, the rapid vigour of my upward flight overcame these attractions.

I passed near the Moon, which at that time was between the Sun and the Earth, and I left Venus on the right hand. As touching this star, the old Astronomy has so preached that the planets are spheres which turn around the Earth that modern Astronomy dare not doubt it. And yet I noticed that as long as Venus appeared on this side of the Sun, around which she turns, I saw her as a crescent; but as she continued her orbit I noticed that in proportion as she passed behind the Sun the horns drew together and her black belly became golden. This alternation of light and darkness showed very plainly that the planets, like the Moon and the Earth, are globes without light of their own and are only capable of reflecting what they borrow. Moreover, as I continued to rise, I made the same observation in the case of Mercury. I also noticed that all these worlds have other little worlds moving about them. Musing afterwards on the causes of the construction of this great Universe I have supposed that at the disentangling of chaos, after God had created matter, like bodies were joined to like bodies, through that unknown principle of love, whereby we see that everything seeks its like. Particles formed in a certain way joined together and that made the air; others, whose shape perhaps gave them a circular movement, gathered together and composed the globes we call planets, which, accumulated in the round shape we see, because of that inclination to spin on their poles to which their shape forces them; and also they cause those lesser orbs, which are met with in the sphere of their activity, to turn likewise, since these evaporate from their mass and move in their flight on a similar course. That is why Mercury, Venus, the Earth, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn have been forced to spin and roll all together around the Sun. It is quite possible to imagine that these globes may formerly have been Suns, since, in spite of its present extinction, the Earth still retains sufficient heat to cause the Moon to turn about through the circular movement of the bodies which are detached from its mass, and Jupiter has enough to turn four. But in the course of time, owing to the continual emission of the little bodies which make heat and light, these Suns have lost so much of their heat and light that they remain a cold, dark and almost impotent residuum. We even discover that the spots in the Sun, which were not perceived by the Ancients, increase from day to day. How do we know that this is not a crust forming on its outer surface, that its mass grows fainter as the light abandons it and that, when all these mobile bodies abandon it, it will not become an opaque globe like the Earth?[57] There are very distant centuries beyond which there appears no vestige of the human race; perhaps the Earth was formerly a Sun peopled with animals fitted for the climate, which had produced them, and perhaps these animals were the demons whereof Antiquity relates so many examples. Why not? Might it not be that these animals still inhabited the Earth for a time after its extinction and that the change in their globe did not destroy their whole race at once? In fact, their life lasted until the time of Augustus, according to Plutarch. It even appears that the sacred and prophetic Testament of our first Patriarchs meant to lead us by the hand to this truth; for, before man is spoken of, we read of the revolt of the Angels. This sequence of time observed by the Scriptures is perhaps a half-proof that Angels inhabited the Earth before us and that these proud beings, who had dwelt in our World since it was a Sun, disdaining to continue there perhaps when it was extinguished and knowing that God had placed His throne in the Sun, dared to undertake to occupy it? But God, desirous of punishing their insolence, drove them out of the Earth and to occupy their vacant place created man less perfect but therefore less proud.

[Footnote 57: These ideas and speculations are remarkable for 1650.]

At the end of about four months' travelling, at least as nearly as can be calculated, when there is no night to distinguish one day from another, I reached one of those little Worlds which fly around the Sun, called by Mathematicians "Spots". There my mirrors did not collect so much heat on account of the intervening clouds; consequently the air did not drive my cabin with so much vigour and there was only sufficient wind to break my fall and set me down on the point of a very high mountain, where I gently landed.

I leave you to imagine the joy I felt at seeing my feet on a solid floor after having played the part of a bird so long. Words indeed are too weak to express the happiness with which I trembled when at last I perceived my head crowned with the light of the Heavens. Yet this ecstasy did not so transport me but that I remembered as I left my box to cover its top with my shirt before going away from it, because if the air became serene, as was very probable, I apprehended the Sun would relight my mirrors and I should lose my house.

By way of gorges, which traces of water showed had been hollowed out by its action, I reached the plain, where I could scarcely walk on account of the thickness of the soil with which the earth was fat; nevertheless, after walking for some time I reached a quagmire, where I met a little man entirely naked sitting on a stone to repose himself. I do not remember if I spoke the first or if he questioned me; but it is fresh in my memory, as if I had just heard him, that he discoursed to me for three long hours in a language which I know I had never heard before, which bore no relation to any in this world, yet which I understood more quickly and more intelligibly than my nurse's. He explained to me, when I inquired about so marvellous a thing, that in the sciences there is one Truth, outside which one is always distant from what is easy; that the more distant an idiom is from this truth the further it is below one's conception and the less easy it is to understand.

"In the same way", he continued, "this Truth is never met with in music but that the uplifted soul immediately moves blindly towards it. We do not see it, but we feel that Nature sees it; and without being able to understand how it is we are absorbed, it does not fail to delight us and yet we cannot tell where it is. It is just the same with languages; whoever hits upon this Truth of letters, words and sequence in expressing himself can never fall below his conception; his speech is always equal to his thought; and it is because you do not possess this perfect idiom that you hesitate, and do not know what order or what words can express what you imagine."

I told him that the first man in our world had indubitably made use of this mother-tongue, because every name he had imposed upon every thing declared its essence. He interrupted me and continued: