Part 25 (2/2)

I answered, ”I know not either, but this I do know of a surety, that the arts here specified be natural and no witchcraft.” Which if he would not believe, let him but say which he held to be the most wonderful and impossible and I would at once to satisfy him (provided only that 'twas one that asked not long time but only such means as I had then at hand), make trial of it, for I must presently be a-foot and pursue my journey. At that he said this seemed to him the most impossible, that gunpowder should not burn if fire were put to it, unless one should first pour the powder into water; which if I could by natural means effect he would believe concerning all the other arts, though there were over sixty of them, what he might not see and before such trial could not believe. I answered, let him bring me quickly a charge of powder and also a certain substance which I had need of, and fire also, and presently he should see that the trick would hold. This being done, I caused him to follow my process and then set light to the powder: yet could he do no more than burn here and there a grain though he worked at it for a quarter of an hour, and accomplished no more than that he cooled a red-hot iron and quenched matches and lighted coals in the very powder itself. ”Aha!” says he, ”the powder is bad.” But I answered him in act, and without much ado, before he could count a score, so worked it that the powder blew up when he had scarce touched it with the fire.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: _Lit._, ”Bohemian Villages,” _i.e._, with unp.r.o.nounceable names.]

[Footnote 2: William, Duke of Aquitaine, and afterwards a Saint noted for the acerbity of his penances.]

[Footnote 3: A proverb: on Saint Gertrude's day spinning ceases and garden-work begins.]

[Footnote 4: Viz. ”ihnen den Hintern zu lecken.”]

[Footnote 5: The commandments are here numbered according to the Roman arrangement, but the meaning is obscure.]

[Footnote 6: The hermit.]

[Footnote 7: _i.e._ full of innocence.]

[Footnote 8: Given as an example of a Roman of luxurious tastes.]

[Footnote 9: Refers to an episode omitted in this translation.]

[Footnote 10: Allusion to a cruel practice in use in falconry.]

[Footnote 11: Proverbial: an allusion to a popular story.]

[Footnote 12: Lit. there are folk dwelling beyond the mountains too.]

[Footnote 13: I.e., he was bewitched.]

[Footnote 14: Hessian General.]

[Footnote 15: It is difficult to translate the German expression.

Probably this word, meaning a maritime trader in illicit wares, represents it best.]

[Footnote 16: Obscure lines: many of the expressions in this chapter are now inexplicable.]

[Footnote 17: He wrote the words down as he was told as if they meant the _judge's_ mother.]

[Footnote 18: The cuira.s.s would be well lined to prevent chafing.]

[Footnote 19: Some 120 years before.]

[Footnote 20: Besieged by the Spaniards from 1601 to 1604.]