Gargantua and Pantagruel
also said that there were but three things of which he would repent: if
ever he had trusted his wife with his secret, if he had idled away a day,
and if he had 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 cause or reason; for thou wert not
born to be drowned, but rather to be hanged and exalted in the air, or to
be roasted in the midst of a jolly bonfire. My lord, would you have a good
cloak for the rain; leave me off your wolf and badger-skin mantle; let
Panurge but be flayed, and cover yourself with his hide. But do not come
near the fire, nor near your blacksmith’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 dive down 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’ll never take in a drop of water; make
bladders of it to lay under boys to teach them to swim, instead of corks,
and they will learn without the least danger. His skin, then, said
Pantagruel, 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 you please; and for that reason is called
Adiantos.
Friend Panurge, said Friar John, I pray thee never be afraid of water; thy
life for mine thou art threatened with a contrary element. Ay, ay, replied
Panurge, but the devil’s cooks dote sometimes, and are apt to make horrid
blunders as well as others; often putting to boil in water what was
designed to be roasted on the fire; like the head-cooks of our kitchen, who
often lard partridges, queests, and stock-doves with intent to roast them,
one would think; but it happens sometimes that they e’en turn the
partridges into the pot to be boiled with cabbages, the queests with leek
pottage, and the stock-doves with turnips. But hark you me, good friends,
I protest before this noble company, that as for the chapel which I vowed
to Mons. St. Nicholas between Quande and Montsoreau, I honestly mean that
it shall be a chapel of rose-water, which shall be where neither cow nor
calf shall be fed; for between you and I, I intend to throw it to the
bottom of the water. Here is a rare rogue for you, said Eusthenes; here is
a pure rogue, a rogue in grain, a rogue enough, a rogue and a half. He is
resolved to make good the Lombardic proverb, Passato el pericolo, gabbato
el santo.
The devil was sick, the devil a monk would be;
The devil was well, the devil a monk was he.
Chapter 4.XXV.
How, after the storm, Pantagruel went on shore in the islands of the
Macreons.
Immediately after we went ashore at the port of an island which they called
the island of the Macreons. The good people of the place received us very
honourably. An old Macrobius (so they called their eldest elderman)
desired Pantagruel to come to the town-house to refresh himself and eat
something, but he would not budge a foot from the mole till all his men
were landed. After he had seen them, he gave order that they should all
change clothes, and that some of all the stores in the fleet should be
brought on shore, that every ship’s crew might live well; which was
accordingly done, and God wot how well they all toped and caroused. The
people of the place brought them provisions in abundance. The
Pantagruelists returned them more; as the truth is, theirs were somewhat
damaged by the late storm. When they had well stuffed the insides of their
doublets, Pantagruel desired everyone 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. None but the largest island was
inhabited, having three ports and ten 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, monuments, and ancient tombs, with divers inscriptions
and epitaphs; some of them in hieroglyphic characters; others in the Ionic
dialect; some in the Arabic, Agarenian, Slavonian, and other tongues; of
which Epistemon took an exact account. In the interim, Panurge said to
Friar John, Is this the island of the Macreons? Macreon signifies in Greek
an old man, or one much stricken in years. What is that to me? said Friar
John; how can I help it? I was not in the country when they christened it.
Now I think on’t, quoth Panurge, I believe the name of mackerel (Motteux
adds, between brackets,--‘that’s a Bawd in French.’) was derived from it;
for procuring is the province of the old, as buttock-riggling is that of
the young. Therefore I do not know but this may be the bawdy or Mackerel
Island, the original and prototype of the island of that name at Paris.
Let’s go and dredge for cock-oysters. Old Macrobius asked, in the Ionic
tongue, How, and by what industry and labour, Pantagruel got to their port
that day, there having been such blustering weather and such a dreadful
storm at sea. Pantagruel told him that the Almighty Preserver of mankind
had regarded the simplicity and sincere affection of his servants, who did
not travel for gain or sordid profit, the sole design of their voyage being
a studious desire to know, see, and visit the Oracle of Bacbuc, and take
the word of the Bottle upon some difficulties offered by one of the
company; nevertheless this had not been without great affliction and
evident danger of shipwreck. After that, he asked him what he judged to be
the cause of that terrible tempest, and if the adjacent seas were thus
frequently subject to storms; as in the ocean are the Ratz of Sammaieu,
Maumusson, and in the Mediterranean sea the Gulf of Sataly, Montargentan,
Piombino, Capo Melio in Laconia, the Straits of Gibraltar, Faro di Messina,
and others.
Chapter 4.XXVI.
How the good Macrobius gave us an account of the mansion and decease of the
heroes.
The good Macrobius then answered, Friendly strangers, this island is one of
the Sporades; not of your Sporades that lie 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 are grown old, and we believe 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 his death there arose this horrible
storm; for while they are alive all happiness attends both this and the
adjacent islands, and a settled calm and serenity. At the death of every
one of them, we commonly hear in the forest loud and mournful groans, and
the whole land is infested with pestilence, earthquakes, inundations, and
other calamities; the air with fogs and obscurity, and the sea with storms
and hurricanes. What you tell us seems to me likely enough, said
Pantagruel. For as a torch or candle, as long as it hath life enough and
is lighted, shines round about, disperses its light, delights those that
are near it, yields them its service and clearness, and never causes any
pain or displeasure; but as soon as ‘tis extinguished, its smoke and
evaporation infects the air, offends the bystanders, and is noisome to all;
so, as long as those noble and renowned souls inhabit their bodies, peace,
profit, pleasure, and honour never leave the places where they 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 at
sea; together with sad complaints amongst the people, broaching of
religions, changes in governments, and ruins of commonwealths.
We had a sad instance of this lately, said Epistemon, at the death of that
valiant and learned knight, William du Bellay; 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
soon after his decease it hath for a considerable time been the scorn of
the rest of the world.
Thus, said Pantagruel, Anchises being dead at Drepani in Sicily, Aeneas was
dreadfully tossed and endangered by a storm; and perhaps for the same
reason Herod, that tyrant and cruel King of Judaea, finding himself near
the pangs of a 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, the Greek poet Alcmaeon, and others--and
foreseeing that the Jews would make bonfires at his death, caused all the
nobles and magistrates to be summoned to his seraglio out of all the
cities, towns, and castles of Judaea, fraudulently pretending that he had
some things of moment to impart to them. They made their personal
appearance; whereupon he caused them all to be shut up in the hippodrome of
the seraglio; then said to his sister Salome and Alexander her husband: I
am certain that the Jews will rejoice at my death; but if you will observe
and perform what I tell you, my funeral shall be honourable, and there will
be a general mourning. As soon as you see me dead, let my guards, to whom
I have already given 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, be obliged to mourn and
lament, and foreigners will imagine it to be for my death, as if some
heroic soul had left her body. A desperate tyrant wished as much when he
said, When I die, let earth and fire be mixed together; which was as good
as to say, let the whole world perish. Which saying the tyrant Nero
altered, saying, While I live, as Suetonius affirms it. This detestable
saying, of which Cicero, lib. De Finib., and Seneca, lib. 2, De Clementia,
make mention, is ascribed to the Emperor Tiberius by Dion Nicaeus and
Suidas.
Chapter 4.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.
I would not, continued Pantagruel, have missed the storm that hath thus
disordered us, were I also to have missed the relation of these things told
us by this good Macrobius. Neither am I unwilling to believe what he said
of a comet that appears in the sky some days before such a decease. For
some of those souls are so noble, so precious, and so heroic that heaven
gives us notice of their departing some days before it happens. And as a
prudent physician, seeing by some symptoms that his patient draws towards
his end, some days before gives notice of it to his wife, children,
kindred, and friends, that, in that little time he hath yet to live, they
may admonish him to settle all things in his family, to tutor and instruct
his children as much as he can, recommend his relict to his friends in her
widowhood, and declare what he knows to be necessary about a provision for
the orphans; that he may not be surprised by death without making his will,
and may take care of his soul and family; in the same manner the heavens,
as it were joyful for the approaching reception of those blessed souls,