Gargantua and Pantagruel
philosopher, saw, and partly of Carpasian flax (Ozell’s correction.
Motteux reads, ‘which Cleombrotus, a most studious philosopher, and
Pandelinus of Carpasium had, which were,’ &c.), which were rather renewed
than consumed by the fire.
About two foot and a half below that gold plate, the three chains were
fastened to three handles that were fixed to a large round lamp of most
pure crystal, whose diameter was a cubit and a half, and opened about two
hands’ breadths o’ top; by which open place a vessel of the same crystal,
shaped somewhat like the lower part of a gourd-like limbec, or an urinal,
was put at the bottom of the great lamp, with such a quantity of the
afore-mentioned burning water, that the flame of the asbestine wick reached
the centre of the great lamp. This made all its spherical body seem to burn
and be in a flame, because the fire was just at the centre and middle point,
so that it was not more easy to fix the eye on it than on the disc of the
sun, the matter being wonderfully bright and shining, and the work most
transparent and dazzling by the reflection of the various colours of the
precious stones whereof the four small lamps above the main lamp were made,
and their lustre was still variously glittering all over the temple. Then
this wandering light being darted on the polished marble and agate with
which all the inside of the temple was pargetted, our eyes were entertained
with a sight of 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, in my opinion, what
added much to the beauty of the whole, was that round the body of the
crystal lamp there was carved in cataglyphic work a lively and pleasant
battle of naked boys, mounted on little hobby-horses, with little whirligig
lances and shields that seemed made of vine-branches with grapes on them;
their postures generally were very different, and their childish strife and
motions were so ingeniously expressed that art equalled nature in every
proportion and action. Neither did this seem engraved, but rather hewed
out and embossed in relief, or at least like grotesque, which, by the
artist’s skill, has the appearance of the roundness of the object it
represents. This was partly the effect of the various and most charming
light, which, flowing out of the lamp, filled the carved places with its
glorious rays.
Chapter 5.XLII [‘This and the next chapter make really but one, tho’ Mr.
Motteux has made two of them; the first of which contains but eight lines,
according to him, and ends at the words fantastic fountain.’--Ozell.).
How the Priestess Bacbuc showed us a fantastic fountain in the temple, and
how the fountain-water had the taste of wine, according to the imagination
of those who drank of it.
While we were admiring this incomparable lamp and the stupendous structure
of the temple, the venerable priestess Bacbuc and her attendants came to us
with jolly smiling looks, and seeing us duly accoutred, without the least
difficulty took us into the middle of the temple, where, just under the
aforesaid lamp, was the fine fantastic fountain. She then ordered some
cups, goblets, and talboys of gold, silver, and crystal to be brought, and
kindly invited us to drink 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, and
admirable than anything Plato ever dreamt of in limbo.
Its basis or groundwork was of most pure and limpid alabaster, and its
height somewhat more than three spans, being a regular heptagon on the
outside, with its stylobates or footsteps, arulets, cymasults or blunt
tops, and Doric undulations about it. It was exactly round within. On the
middle point of each angle brink stood a pillar orbiculated in form of
ivory or alabaster solid rings. These were seven in number, according to
the number of the angles (This sentence, restored by Ozell, is omitted by
Motteux.).
Each pillar’s length from the basis to the architraves was near seven
hands, taking an exact dimension of its diameter through the centre of its
circumference and inward roundness; and it was so disposed that, casting
our eyes behind one of them, whatever its cube might be, to view its
opposite, we found that the pyramidal cone of our visual line ended at the
said centre, and there, by the two opposites, formed an equilateral
triangle whose two lines divided the pillar into two equal parts.
That which we had a mind to measure, going from one side to another, two
pillars over, at the first third part of the distance between them, was met
by their lowermost and fundamental line, which, in a consult line drawn as
far as the universal 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 all angular figures odd in number.
This tacitly gave us to understand that seven semidiameters are in
geometrical proportion, compass, and distance somewhat less than the
circumference of a circle, from the figure of which they are extracted;
that is to say, three whole parts, with an eighth and a half, a little
more, or a seventh and a half, a little less, according to the instructions
given us of old by Euclid, Aristotle, Archimedes, and others.
The 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 the colour of the
flower into which Ajax’s choleric blood was transformed; the Greek letters
A I being seen on it in many places.
The third, an anachite diamond, as bright and glittering as lightning.
The fourth, a masculine ruby balas (peach-coloured) amethystizing, its
flame and lustre ending in violet or purple like an amethyst.
The fifth, an emerald, above five hundred and fifty times more precious
than that of Serapis in the labyrinth of the Egyptians, and more verdant
and shining than those that were 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 which Pyrrhus, King of Epirus, so
mightily esteemed.
The seventh, of syenites, transparent, of the colour of a beryl and the
clear hue of Hymetian honey; and within it the moon was seen, such as we
see it in the sky, silent, full, new, and in the wane.
These stones were assigned to the seven heavenly planets by the ancient
Chaldaeans; and that the meanest capacities might be informed of this, just
at the central perpendicular line, on the chapter of the first pillar,
which was of sapphire, stood the image of Saturn in elutian (Motteux reads
‘Eliacim.’) lead, with his scythe in his hand, and at his feet a crane of
gold, very artfully enamelled, according to the native hue of the saturnine
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.
On the third was Phoebus of the purest gold, and a white cock in his right
hand.
On the fourth was Mars in Corinthian brass, and a lion at his feet.
On the fifth was Venus in copper, the metal of which Aristonides made
Athamas’s statue, that expressed in a blushing whiteness his confusion at
the sight of his son Learchus, who died at his feet of a fall.
On the sixth was Mercury in hydrargyre. I would have said quicksilver, had
it not been fixed, malleable, and unmovable. That nimble deity had a stork
at his feet.
On the seventh was the Moon in silver, with a greyhound at her feet.
The size of these statues was somewhat more than a third part of the
pillars on which they stood, and they were so admirably wrought according
to mathematical proportion that Polycletus’s canon could hardly have stood
in competition with them.
The bases of the pillars, the chapters, the architraves, zoophores, and
cornices were Phrygian work of massive gold, purer and finer than any that
is found in the rivers Leede near Montpellier, Ganges in India, Po in
Italy, Hebrus in Thrace, Tagus in Spain, and Pactolus in Lydia.
The small arches between the pillars were of the same precious stone of
which the pillars next to them were. Thus, that arch was of sapphire which
ended at the hyacinth pillar, and that was of hyacinth which went towards
the diamond, and so on.
Above the arches and chapters of the pillars, on the inward front, a cupola
was raised to cover the fountain. It was surrounded by the planetary
statues, heptagonal at the bottom, and spherical o’ top, and of crystal so
pure, transparent, well-polished, whole and uniform in all its parts,
without veins, clouds, flaws, or streaks, that Xenocrates never saw such a
one in his life.
Within it were seen the twelve signs of the zodiac, the twelve months of
the year, with their properties, the two equinoxes, 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, pear fashion, perfectly imitating a
tear, and so joined together as to represent a flower-de-luce or lily, each
of the flowers seeming above a hand’s breadth. A carbuncle jetted out of
its calyx or cup as big as an ostrich’s egg, cut seven square (that number
so beloved of nature), and so prodigiously glorious 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 unsufferably bright.
Now, were some judicious appraisers to judge of the value of this
incomparable fountain, and the lamp of which we have spoke, they would
undoubtedly affirm it exceeds that of all the treasures and curiosities in
Europe, Asia, and Africa put together. For that carbuncle alone would have
darkened the pantarbe of Iarchus (Motteux reads ‘Joachas.’) the Indian
magician, with as much ease as the sun outshines and dims the stars with
his meridian rays.
Nor let Cleopatra, that Egyptian queen, boast of her pair of pendants,
those two pearls, one of which she caused to be dissolved in vinegar, in
the presence of Antony the Triumvir, her gallant.
Or let Pompeia Plautina be proud of her dress covered all over with
emeralds and pearls curiously intermixed, she who attracted the eyes of all
Rome, and was said to be the 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 a snail-like line, winding equally on both sides.
We looked on them a while, and had cast our eyes on another side, when
Bacbuc directed us to watch the water. We then heard a most harmonious
sound, yet somewhat stopped 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 those delightful objects.
Bacbuc then said, Your philosophers will not allow that motion is begot by
the power of figures; look here, and see the contrary. By that single
snail-like motion, equally divided as you see, and a fivefold infoliature,
movable at every inward meeting, such as is the vena cava where it enters