Part 15 (2/2)

de Fontenelle entertaining the same ideas. But all this is but a vain imagination, fit only to unhinge weak minds. What does it matter if the physical world is larger or smaller, of one shape or another? It is quite sufficient that it can be duly considered only by intelligence and reason for G.o.d to be manifest therein.

”If a wise man's meditations could be of some use to you, sir, I will inform you how such proof of G.o.d's existence, better than the proof of St. Anselm, and quite independent of that resulting from Revelation, appeared to me suddenly in unclouded limpidity. It was at Seez, five and twenty years ago when I was the bishop's librarian. The gallery windows opened on a courtyard where, every morning, I saw a kitchen wench clean the saucepans. She was young, tall, st.u.r.dy. A slight down, shadowlike, over her lips lent irritating and proud gracefulness to her countenance.

Her entangled hair, meagre bosom, and long, naked arms were worthy of an Adonis or a Diana. She was of a boyish beauty. I loved her for it, loved her strong, red hands. All in all that girl evoked in me a longing as rude and brutal as herself. You know how imperious such longings are. I made her understand by sign and word. Without the slightest hesitation she quickly let me know that my longings were not stronger than hers, and appointed the very next night for a meeting, to take place in the loft, where she slept on the hay, by gracious permission of the bishop, whose saucepans she cleaned. Impatiently I waited for the night. When at last her shadow covered the earth I climbed, by means of a ladder, to the loft, where the girl expected me. My first thought was to embrace her, my second to admire the links which brought me into her arms. For, sir, a young ecclesiastic--a kitchen wench--a ladder--a bundle of hay.

What a train! What regulation! What a concourse of pre-established harmonies! What a concatenation of cause and effect! What a proof of G.o.d's existence! I was strangely struck by it, and mightily glad I am to be able to add this profane demonstration to the reasons furnished by theology, which are, however, amply sufficient.”

”Abbe,” said Catherine, ”the only weak point in your story is that the girl had a meagre bosom. A woman without b.r.e.a.s.t.s is like a bed without pillows. But don't you know, d'Anquetil, what we might do?”

”Yes,” said he, ”play a game of ombre, which is played by three.”

”If you will,” she said. ”But, dear, have the pipes brought in. Nothing is pleasanter than to smoke a pipe of tobacco when drinking wine.”

A lackey brought the cards and pipes, which we lit. Soon the room was full of dense smoke, wherein our host and the Abbe Coignard played gravely at piquet.

Luck followed my dear tutor up to the moment when M. d'Anquetil, fancying he saw him for the third time score fifty-five when he had only made forty points, called him a Greek, a villainous trickster, a Knight of Transylvania, and threw a bottle at his head, which broke on the table, flooding it with wine.

”Well, sir,” said the abbe, ”you'll have to take the trouble to open another bottle: we are thirsty.”

”With pleasure,” replied M. d'Anquetil. ”But, abbe, know that a gentleman does not mark points he has not made, and does not cheat at cards except at the king's card-table, round which all sorts of people are a.s.sembled, to whom one owes nothing. On any other table it is a vile action. Abbe, say, do you want to be looked on as an adventurer?”

”It is remarkable,” said my good tutor, ”that you blame at cards or dice a practice so much commended in the art of war, politics and trade; in each of these people glorify themselves by correcting the injuries of fortune. It is not that I do not pique myself on honesty when playing at cards. Thank G.o.d, I always play straight, and you must have been dreaming, sir, when you fancied I had marked points I did not make. Had it been otherwise, I would appeal to the example given by the blessed Bishop of Geneva, who did not scruple to cheat at cards. But I cannot defend myself against the reflection that at play men are much more sensitive than in serious business, and that they employ the whole of their probity at the backgammon board, where it incommodes them but indifferently, whereas they put it entirely in the background in a battle or a treaty of peace, where it would be troublesome. Polyaenus, sir, has written, in the Greek language a book on Stratagems, wherein is shown to what excess deceit is pushed by the great leaders.”

”Abbe,” said M. d'Anquetil, ”I have not read your Polyaenus, and do not think I ever shall read him. But like every true gentleman, I have been to the wars. I have served the king for eighteen months. It is the n.o.blest of all professions. I'll tell you exactly what war is. I may tell the secret of it, as n.o.body is present to listen but yourself, some bottles, yonder gentleman whom I intend to kill very shortly, and that girl, who begins to undress herself.”

”Yes,” said Catherine, ”I undress, and will keep only my chemise on, because I feel too hot.”

”Well then,” M. d'Anquetil continued, ”whatever may be printed of it in the gazettes, war consists, above all things, of stealing the pigs and chickens of peasants. Soldiers in the fields have no other occupation.”

”You are right,” said M. Coignard, ”and in days of yore it was the saying in Gaul that the soldier's best friend was Madame Marauding. But I beg of you not to kill my pupil, Jacques Tournebroche.”

”Ouf!” exclaimed Catherine, arranging the lace of her chemise on her bosom. ”Now I feel easier.”

”Abbe,” replied M. d'Anquetil, ”honour compels me to do it.”

But my kind-hearted tutor went on:

”Sir, Jacques Tournebroche is very useful to me for the translation, I have undertaken, of Zosimus the Panopolitan. I would give you many thanks not to fight him before the finis.h.i.+ng touch has been given to that grand work.”

”To the deuce with your Zosimus,” said M. d'Anquetil. ”To the deuce with him! Do you hear, abbe! I'll send him to the deuce, as a king would do with his first mistress.”

And he sang:

”Pour dresser un jeune courrier Et l'affermir sur l'etrier Il lui fallait une routiere Laire lan laire.”

”What's that Zosimus?”

”Zosimus, sir, Zosimus of Panopolis, was a learned Greek, who flourished at Alexandria in the third century of the Christian era, and wrote treatises on the spagyric art.”

”Do you fancy it matters to me? Why do you translate it?

”Battons le fer quand il est chaud Dit-elle, en faisant sonner haut Le nom de sultan premiere Laire lan laire.”

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