blance of an Ape's face, sprucified up with | ing a pretty box, wherein he purposely ears of pasted paper, and having about caused a little linnet to be put, willing that low drudgery made shift so to pick up a sorry livelihood. It happened that he lost his hatchet. Now tell me who ever had more cause to be vexed than poor Tom? Alas, his whole estate and life depended on his hatchet; by his hatchet he earned many a fair penny of the best wood-mongers or log-merchants, among whom he went a jobbing; ng: for want of his hatchet he was like to starve; and had Death but met 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 his neck a bucked ruff, raised, furrowed, and ridged, with pouting sticks, of the shape and fashion of small organ pipes; he first with all the force of his lungs, coughed two or three times, and then pronounced the following sentence: The court declared, that the porter, who ate his bread at the smoke of the roast, hath civilly paid the cook with the sound of his money: and the said court ordaineth, that every one return to his own home, and attend his proper business, without cost and charges, and for a cause. This verdict, award and arbitrament of the Parisian fool, did appear so equitable, yea, so admirable to the doctors of the law, that they very much doubted, if the matter had been brought before the Sessions for Justice of the said place, or that the Judges of the Rota at Rome had been umpires therein; or yet that the Areopagites themselves had been the deciders thereof, if by any one part, or all of them together, it had been so judicially sententiated and awarded. THE SECRET-TELLING BOX. POPE JOHN XXII. passing on a day through the Abbey of Toucherome, was in all humility required and besought by the Abbess, and other discreet mothers of the said Convent, to grant them an indulgence, by means whereof they might confess themselves to one another, alleging, that religious women were subject to some petty secret slips and imperfections, which would be a foul and burning shame for them to discover and to reveal to men, how sacerdotal soever their function were: but that they 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 any thing, answered the Pope, fitting for you to impetrate of me, which I would not most willingly condescend unto: but I find one inconvenience; you know, confession should be kept secret: and you women are not able to do so. Exceeding well, quoth they, most Holy Father, and much more closely than the best of men. The Holy Father on the very same day, gave them in keep them very gently and cautiously to lock it up 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 inclosed within that deposited box: enjoining them withal, not to presume one way nor other, directly or indirectly, to go about the opening thereof, under pain of the highest ecclesiastical censure, eternal excommunication. The prohibition was no sooner made, but that they did all of them boil with a most ardent desire to know, and see what kind of thing it was that was within it: they thought long already, that the Pope was not gone, to the end they might jointly, with the more leisure and ease apply themselves to the boxopening curiosity. The Holy Father, after he had given them his benediction, retired and withdrew himself to the Pontifical lodgings of his own palace; but he was hardly gone three steps from without the gates of their cloister, when the good ladies throngingly, and as in a huddled crowd, pressing hard on the backs of one another, ran thrusting and shoving who should be first at the setting open of the forbidden box, and descrying of the quod latitat within. On the very next day thereafter, the Pope made them another visit, of a full design, purpose, and intention (as they imagined) to dispatch the grant of their sought and wished-for indulgence: but before he would enter into a chat or communing with them, he commanded the casket to be brought unto him: it was done so accordingly; but by your leave the bird was no more there. Then was it, that the Pope did represent to their maternities, how hard a matter and difficult it was for them to keep secrets revealed to them in confession, unmanifested to the ears of others; seeing for the space of four-and-twenty hours they were not able to lay up in secret a box, which he had highly recommended to their discretion, charge, and custody. THE LOST HATCHET. THERE once lived a poor honest country fellow of Gravot, Tom Wellhung by name, a wood-cleaver by trade, who in all this, for so 'tis written in the Book of Fate (Do you 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 kingdom to a king. Come, come, let no more words be scattered about it, let him have his hatchet again. Run down 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 take his own, and be satisfied with it, give him t' other two. If he take another, to be in a heavy taking, and called upon chop his head off with his own; and Jupiter with most eloquent prayers (for henceforth serve me all those losers of you know, Necessity was the mother of hatchets after that manner. Having said Eloquence), with the whites of his eyes this, Jupiter, with an awkward turn of turned up towards heaven, down on his his head, like a jackanapes swallowing of marrow-bones, his arms reared high, his pills, made so dreadful a phiz that all fingers stretched wide, and his head bare, the vast Olympus quaked again. Heathe poor wretch without ceasing was ven's foot-messenger, thanks to his low roaring out by way of Litany at every repetition of his supplications, my hatchet, Lord Jupiter, my hatchet, my hatchet, only my hatchet, O Jupiter, or money to buy another, and nothing else; alas, my poor hatchet! Jupiter happened then to be holding a grand council about certain urgent affairs, and old Gammer Cybele was just giving her opinion, or if you had rather have it so, it was young Phœbus the Beau: but in short, Tom's outcry and lamentations were so loud that they were heard with no small amazement at the council-board by the whole consistory of the gods. What a devil have we below, quoth Jupiter, that howls so horridly? By the mud of Styx, haven't we had all along, and have n't we here still, enough to do to set to rights a world of puzzling businesses of consequence ? Let us, crowned, narrow-brimmed hat, and plume of feathers, heel-pieces, and runningstick with pigeon wings, flings himself out at heaven's wicket, thro' 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 to him, thou hast bawled long enough to be a dry; thy prayers and requests are granted by Jupiter; see which of these three 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, cods-zouks this is none of mine; I won't ha't. The same he did with the silver one, and said, 'tis not this either, you may e'en take them again. At last, he takes up his own hatchet, examines the end of the helve, and finds his mark there; then, ravished with joy, like a fox that meets some straggling poultry, and sneering from the tip of the nose, he cryed, 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. however, dispatch this howling fellow below; you, Mercury, go see who it is, and know what he wants. Mercury looked out at Heaven's trap-door, through which, as I am told, they hear what's said here below; by the way, one might well enough mistake it for the scuttle of a ship; tho' Icaromenippus said it was like the mouth of a well: the light-heeled deity saw that it was honest Tom, who asked for his lost hatchet; and accordingly he made his report to the Synod. Marry, said Jupiter, we are finely holped up, as if we had now nothing else to do here but to restore lost wherewith to make thyself rich: be hatchets. Well, he must then have it for honest. Honest Tom gave Mercury a 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 little mill and little field, to have wherewithal to make a figure at the next muster, having been told that this treasure was come to him by that means only, sold the only badge of their gentility, their swords, to purchase hatchets to go to lose them, as the silly clodpates did, in hopes to gain store of chink by that loss. You would 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 penny-worth of a new-made pope. whole cartload of thanks, and revered the most great Jupiter. His old hatchet he fastened close to his leathern girdle, and girds it about his breech like Martin of Cambray; the two others, being more heavy, he lays on his shoulder. Thus he plods on, trudging over the fields, keeping a good countenance amongst his neighbors and fellow parishioners, with one merry saying or other 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, yea, the first city in the world, according to the judgment and assertion of the most learned Massoreths. In Chinon he turned his silver hatchet into fine testons, crown-pieces, and other white cash; his golden hatchet into fine angels, curious ducats, substantial ridders, spankers, and rose nobles. Then with them purchases a good number of farms, barns, houses, out-houses, thatch-houses, stables, Mercury was nimble in bringing them meadows, orchards, fields, vineyards, woods, arable lands, pastures, ponds, mills, gardens, nurseries, oxen, cows, sheep, goats, swine, hogs, asses, horses, hens, cocks, capons, chickens, geese, ganders, ducks, drakes, and a world of all other necessaries, and in a short time became the richest man in all the country. His brother bumpkins, and the yeomen and other country-puts thereabouts, perceiving his good fortune were not a little amazed, insomuch that their former pity of poor Tom was soon changed into envy of his so great and unexpected rise; and, as they could not for their souls devise how this came about, they made it their business to pry 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 this great treasure. an 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? With this they all fairly lost their hatchets out of hand. The devil a one that had a hatchet left; he was not his mother's son, that did not lose his hatchet. No more was wood felled or cleared in that country thro' want of hatchets. Nay, the Æsopian apologue even saith, that certain petty country gents, of the lower class, who had sold Wellhung, their Now they cried out and brayed, and prayed and bawled, and lamented 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 with the cries and howlings of these rascally losers of hatchets. hatchets; to each offering that which he had lost, as also another of gold, and a third of silver. Everywhere he still was for that of gold giving thanks in abundance to the great giver Jupiter; but in the very nick of time, that they bowed and stooped to take it from the ground, whip in a trice, Mercury lopped off their heads, as Jupiter had commanded; and of heads thus cut off, the number was just equal to that of the lost hatchets. You see how it is now, you see how it goes with those who in the simplicity of their hearts wish and desire with moderation. Take warning by this, all you greedy, fresh-water shirks, who scorn to wish for any thing under ten thousand pounds: And do not for the future run on impudently, as I have sometimes heard you wishing, would to God, I had now one hundred and seventy-eight millions of 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 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, one of whom only wished to have in good old gold as much as hath been spent, bought and sold in Paris, since its first foundations were laid, dreds of botargoes, and thousands of fine to this hour; all of it valued at the price, angels, for the souls of the dead, to be sale, and rate of the dearest year in all thrown on board their ships. Pantagruel that space of time. Do you think the fellow was bashful; had he eaten sour plums unpeeled? Were his teeth on edge, I pray you? The other wished our lady's church brimful of steel needles, from the floor to the top 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 of these 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 did they get by 't, in your opinion? Why, at night both my gentlemen had kybed-heels, a tetter in the chin, a church-yard cough in the lungs, a catarrh in the throat, a swinging boil at the rump, and the devil of 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, provided you bestir yourselves manfully, and do your best in the mean time. HOW PANTAGRUEL MET WITH A seemed 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 began to overcast, judged that we should have wind; therefore he bid the boatswain call hands upon deck, officers, sailors, fore-mast men, swabbers, and cabin boys, and even the passengers; made them first settle their topsails, take in their spreet-sail, then he cried, In with your topsails, lower the foresail, tallow under the parrels, brade up close all them sails, strike your top-masts to the cap, make all sure with your sheeps-feet, lash your guns fast. All this was nimbly done. Immediately it blowed a storm, the sea began to roar, and swell mountain-high: the rut of the sea was great, the waves breaking upon our ship's quarter; the north-west wind blustered and overblowed; boisterous gusts, dreadful clashings and deadly scuds of wind whistled through our yards, and made our shrouds rattle again. The thunder grumbled so horridly, that you would have thought [The storm here described, was encountered by Pan- heaven had been tumbling about our ears; tagruel and his friends while on the way to Lanternland to consult the oracle of the Holy Bottle, which bottle is supposed to represent Truth, the figure being at the same time it lightened, rained, hailed; the sky lost its transparent hue, derived, probably, from the fact that under the influ- grew dusky, thick and gloomy, so that we ence of wine men forget their craft and disguises and speak without guile or insincerity.] had no other light than that of the flashes of lightning and rending of the clouds: the hurricanes, flaws and sudden whirlwinds began to make a flame about us by the lightnings, fiery vapors, and other aerial ejaculations. Oh! how our looks Theatins, Egnatins, gnatins, Amadeans, Corde- the saucy winds did rudely lift up above liers, Carmelites, Minims, and the devil us the mountainous waves of the main. THE next day we espied nine sail that came spooning before the wind; they were full of Dominicans, Jesuits, Capuchins, Hermits, Austins, Bernardins, Celestins, were full of amazement and trouble, while and all of other holy monks and friars, who were going to the Council of Chesil, to sift and garble some Articles of Faith against the new heretics; Panurge was overjoyed to see them, being most certain of good luck for that day, and a long train of others. So having courteously saluted the goodly (blessed) Fathers, and recommended the salvation of his precious soul Believe me, it seemed to us a lively image of the chaos, where fire, air, sea, land, and all the elements were in a refractory confusion. Poor Panurge, having, with the full contents of the inside of his doublet, plentifully fed the fish, greedy enough of such odious fare, sat on the deck all in a heap, most sadly cast down, moping and to their devout prayers and private ejac- half dead; invoked and called to his ulations, he caused seventy-eight dozen assistance all the blessed he and she of Westphalia hams, units of pots of saints he could muster up, swore and caviar, tens of Bologna sausages, hun- vowed to confess in time and place condrowned." venient, and then bawled out frightfully, drowned, I'm gone, good people, I'm "Steward, Maistre d' hostel, see hoe! my friend, my father, my uncle, prythee let's have a piece of powdered beef or pork, we shall drink but too much anon, for ought I see. Eat little and drink the more will hereafter be my motto, I fear, Would to our dear Lord and to our blessed, worthy, and sacred Lady, I were now, I say, this very minute of an hour, well on shore, on terra firma, hale and easy. O Pantagruel, having first implored the help of the great and almighty Deliverer, and prayed publicly with fervent devotion, by the pilot's advice held tightly the mast of the ship. Friar John had stripped himself to his waistcoat to help the seamen. Epistemon, Ponocrates, and the rest did as much. Panurge alone sat on the deck, weeping and howling. twice and thrice happy those that plant "Odzooks!" cried Friar John: "What! cabbages! O destinies, why did you not spin me for a cabbage-planter? O how few are they to whom Jupiter hath been so favorable as to predestinate them to plant cabbage! They have always one foot on the ground, and the other not far from it. Dispute who will of felicity, and summum bonum, for my part, whosoever plants cabbage, is now by my decree proclaimed most happy; for as good a reason as the philosopher Pyrrho being in the same danger, and seeing a hog near the shore eating some scattered cats, declared it happy in two respects, first, because it had plenty of oats, and besides that, was on shore. Hah, for a divine and princely habitation, commend me to the cows' floor. Panurge playing the calf! Panurge whining! Panurge braying! Would it not become thee much better to lend us a helping hand, than to keep sitting there like a baboon and lowing like a cow?" Be, be, be, bous, bous, bous," returned Panurge; (he was blubbering, and swallowing the water that broke over them) "Friar John, my friend, my good father, I'm drowning; I drown; I'm a dead man, my dear father in God; I'm a dead man, my friend; your cutting hanger cannot save me from this: Alas! alas! we're above E la (a term in music), above the pitch, out of tune, and off the hinges. Be, be, be, bou, bous. Alas! we're now above G Sol Re Ut. I sink, I sink, ha, my father, my uncle, my all. The water's got into my shoes by the collar. Bous, bous, bous, pash, hu, hu, he, he, ha, ha, I drown. Alas! alas! hu, hu, hu, hu, hu, hu, hu, be, be, bous, bous, bobous, bobous, ho, ho, ho, ho, ho, alas! alas! Now am than my head. Would to Heaven I were now with those good holy fathers we met this morning going to council, so godly. "Murther! This wave will sweep us away, blessed Saviour! O my friends! A little vinegar. I sweat again with mere agony. Alas, the mizzen sail 's split, the gallery's washed away, the masts are sprung, the main-top-mast-head dives into I like your tumbler, my feet stand higher father, my friend;-confess me. Here I am down on my knees. I confess my sins-your holy blessing." the sea; the keel is up to the sun; our shrouds are almost all broke, and blown away. Alas! Alas! Where is our main course? All ist verloren bei Gott, our top- so fat, so merry, so plump and comely. mast is run adrift. Alas! Who shall Holos, holos, holas, holas, alas! ah, see have this wreck? Friend, lend me here there! This devilish wave (God forgive behind you one of these whales. Your me) I mean this wave of Providence, will lanthorn is fallen, my lads. Alas! Don't sink our vessel. Alas, Friar John, my let go the main tack nor the bowlin. I hear the block crack, is it broke? For the Lord's sake, let us save the hull, and let all the rigging be damned. Be, be, be, bous, bous, bous. Look to the needle of your compass, I beseech you, good Sir Astrophil, and tell us, if you can, whence comes this storm. My heart's sunk down below my midriff. By my troth I am in "Don't let us swear at this time," said a sad fright; bou, bou, bou, bous, bous, I Panurge, "Holy Father, my friend, don't am lost forever. 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'm Come hither and be damned, thou pitiful devil and help us," said Friar John, who fell a swearing and cursing like a tinker; "in the name of thirty legions of black devils, come, will you come?" swear I beseech you; to-morrow as much as you please. Holos, holos, alas! our ship leaks. I drown, alas! alas! I will give eighteen hundred thousand crowns |