|
Rabelais, from Gargantua and
Pantagruel
I must refer you to the great chronicle of Pantagruel for the
knowledge of that genealogy and antiquity of race by which Gargantua is come
unto us. In it you may understand more at large how the giants were born in
this world, and how from them by a direct line issued Gargantua, the father
of Pantagruel: and do not take it ill, if for this time I pass by it, although
the subject be such, that the oftener it were remembered, the more it would
please your worshipful Seniorias; according to which you have the authority
of Plato in Philebo and Gorgias; and of Flaccus, who says that there are some
kinds of purposes (such as these are without doubt), which, the frequentlier
they be repeated, still prove the more delectable. Chapter 1.I.—Of the Genealogy and Antiquity of Gargantua Would to God everyone had as certain knowledge of his genealogy since the time of the ark of Noah until this age. I think many are at this day emperors, kings, dukes, princes, and popes on the earth, whose extraction is from some porters and pardon-pedlars; as, on the contrary, many are now poor wandering beggars, wretched and miserable, who are descended of the blood and lineage of great kings and emperors, occasioned, as I conceive it, by the transport and revolution of kingdoms and empires, from the Assyrians to the Medes, from the Medes to the Persians, from the Persians to the Macedonians, from the Macedonians to the Romans, from the Romans to the Greeks, from the Greeks to the French. And to give you some hint concerning myself, who speaks unto you, I cannot think but I am come of the race of some rich king or prince in former times; for never yet saw you any man that had a greater desire to be a king, and to be rich, than I have, and that only that I may make good cheer, do nothing, nor care for anything, and plentifully enrich my friends, and all honest and learned men. But herein do I comfort myself, that in the other world I shall be so, yea and greater too than at this present I dare wish. As for you, with the same or a better conceit consolate yourselves in your distresses, and drink fresh if you can come by it. To return to our wethers, I say that by the sovereign gift of heaven, the antiquity and genealogy of Gargantua hath been reserved for our use more full and perfect than any other except that of the Messias, whereof I mean not to speak; for it belongs not unto my purpose, and the devils, that is to say, the false accusers and dissembled gospellers, will therein oppose me. This genealogy was found by John Andrew in a meadow, which he had near the pole-arch, under the olive-tree, as you go to Narsay: where, as he was making cast up some ditches, the diggers with their mattocks struck against a great brazen tomb, and unmeasurably long, for they could never find the end thereof, by reason that it entered too far within the sluices of Vienne. Opening this tomb in a certain place thereof, sealed on the top with the mark of a goblet, about which was written in Etrurian letters Hic Bibitur, they found nine flagons set in such order as they use to rank their kyles in Gascony, of which that which was placed in the middle had under it a big, fat, great, grey, pretty, small, mouldy, little pamphlet, smelling stronger, but no better than roses. In that book the said genealogy was found written all at length, in a chancery hand, not in paper, not in parchment, nor in wax, but in the bark of an elm-tree, yet so worn with the long tract of time, that hardly could three letters together be there perfectly discerned. I (though unworthy) was sent for thither, and with much help of those spectacles, whereby the art of reading dim writings, and letters that do not clearly appear to the sight, is practised, as Aristotle teacheth it, did translate the book as you may see in your Pantagruelizing, that is to say, in drinking stiffly to your own heart's desire, and reading the dreadful and horrific acts of Pantagruel. At the end of the book there was a little treatise entitled the Antidoted Fanfreluches, or a Galimatia of extravagant conceits. The rats and moths, or (that I may not lie) other wicked beasts, had nibbled off the beginning: the rest I have hereto subjoined, for the reverence I bear to antiquity. Chapter 1.III.—How Gargantua was carried
eleven months in his mother's belly
Grangousier was a good fellow in his time, and notable jester;
he loved to drink neat, as much as any man that then was in the world, and
would willingly eat salt meat. To this intent he was ordinarily well furnished
with gammons of bacon, both of Westphalia, Mayence and Bayonne, with store
of dried neat's tongues, plenty of links, chitterlings and puddings in their
season; together with salt beef and mustard, a good deal of hard roes of powdered
mullet called botargos, great provision of sausages, not of Bolonia (for
he feared the Lombard Boccone), but of Bigorre, Longaulnay, Brene, and Rouargue.
In the vigour of his age he married Gargamelle, daughter to the King of the
Parpaillons, a jolly pug, and well-mouthed wench. These two did oftentimes
do the two-backed beast together, joyfully rubbing and frotting their bacon
'gainst one another, in so far, that at last she became great with child
of a fair son, and went with him unto the eleventh month; for so long, yea
longer, may a woman carry her great belly, especially when it is some masterpiece
of nature, and a person predestinated to the performance, in his due time,
of great exploits. As Homer says, that the child, which Neptune begot upon
the nymph, was born a whole year after the conception, that is, in the twelfth
month. For, as Aulus Gellius saith, lib. 3, this long time was suitable to
the majesty of Neptune, that in it the child might receive his perfect form.
For the like reason Jupiter made the night, wherein he lay with Alcmena,
last forty-eight hours, a shorter time not being sufficient for the forging
of Hercules, who cleansed the world of the monsters and tyrants wherewith
it was suppressed. My masters, the ancient Pantagruelists, have confirmed
that which I say, and withal declared it to be not only possible, but also
maintained the lawful birth and legitimation of the infant born of a woman
in the eleventh month after the decease of her husband. Hypocrates, lib.
de alimento. Plinius, lib. 7, cap. 5. Plautus, in his Cistelleria. Marcus
Varro, in his satire inscribed The Testament, alleging to this purpose the
authority of Aristotle. Censorinus, lib. de die natali. Arist. lib. 7, cap.
3 & 4, de natura animalium. Gellius, lib. 3, cap. 16. Servius, in his
exposition upon this verse of Virgil's eclogues, Matri longa decem, &c.,
and a thousand other fools, whose number hath been increased by the lawyers
ff. de suis, et legit l. intestato. paragrapho. fin. and in Auth. de restitut.
et ea quae parit in xi mense. Moreover upon these grounds they have foisted
in their Robidilardic, or Lapiturolive law. Gallus ff. de lib. et posth. l.
sept. ff. de stat. hom., and some other laws, which at this time I dare not
name. By means whereof the honest widows may without danger play at the close
buttock game with might and main, and as hard as they can, for the space
of the first two months after the decease of their husbands. I pray you,
my good lusty springal lads, if you find any of these females, that are worth
the pains of untying the codpiece-point, get up, ride upon them, and bring
them to me; for, if they happen within the third month to conceive, the child
should be heir to the deceased, if, before he died, he had no other children,
and the mother shall pass for an honest woman. When she is known to have conceived, thrust forward boldly, spare her not, whatever betide you, seeing the paunch is full. As Julia, the daughter of the Emperor Octavian, never prostituted herself to her belly-bumpers, but when she found herself with child, after the manner of ships, that receive not their steersman till they have their ballast and lading. And if any blame them for this their rataconniculation, and reiterated lechery upon their pregnancy and big-belliedness, seeing beasts, in the like exigent of their fulness, will never suffer the male-masculant to encroach them, their answer will be, that those are beasts, but they are women, very well skilled in the pretty vales and small fees of the pleasant trade and mysteries of superfetation: as Populia heretofore answered, according to the relation of Macrobius, lib. 2. Saturnal. If the devil will not have them to bag, he must wring hard the spigot, and stop the bung-hole. Chapter 1.IV.—-How Gargamelle, being
great with Gargantua, did eat a huge deal of tripes
The occasion and manner how Gargamelle was brought to bed, and
delivered of her child, was thus: and, if you do not believe it, I wish your
bum-gut fall out and make an escapade. Her bum-gut, indeed, or fundament escaped
her in an afternoon, on the third day of February, with having eaten at dinner
too many godebillios. Godebillios are the fat tripes of coiros. Coiros are
beeves fattened at the cratch in ox-stalls, or in the fresh guimo meadows.
Guimo meadows are those that for their fruitfulness may be mowed twice a
year. Of those fat beeves they had killed three hundred sixty-seven thousand
and fourteen, to be salted at Shrovetide, that in the entering of the spring
they might have plenty of powdered beef, wherewith to season their mouths
at the beginning of their meals, and to taste their wine the better.
They had abundance of tripes, as you have heard, and they were so delicious, that everyone licked his fingers. But the mischief was this, that, for all men could do, there was no possibility to keep them long in that relish; for in a very short while they would have stunk, which had been an undecent thing. It was therefore concluded, that they should be all of them gulched up, without losing anything. To this effect they invited all the burghers of Sainais, of Suille, of the Roche-Clermaud, of Vaugaudry, without omitting the Coudray, Monpensier, the Gue de Vede, and other their neighbours, all stiff drinkers, brave fellows, and good players at the kyles. The good man Grangousier took great pleasure in their company, and commanded there should be no want nor pinching for anything. Nevertheless he bade his wife eat sparingly, because she was near her time, and that these tripes were no very commendable meat. They would fain, said he, be at the chewing of ordure, that would eat the case wherein it was. Notwithstanding these admonitions, she did eat sixteen quarters, two bushels, three pecks and a pipkin full. O the fair fecality wherewith she swelled, by the ingrediency of such shitten stuff! After dinner they all went out in a hurl to the grove of the willows, where, on the green grass, to the sound of the merry flutes and pleasant bagpipes, they danced so gallantly, that it was a sweet and heavenly sport to see them so frolic. Chapter 1.V.—The Discourse of the Drinkers
Then did they fall upon the chat of victuals and some belly furniture
to be snatched at in the very same place. Which purpose was no sooner mentioned,
but forthwith began flagons to go, gammons to trot, goblets to fly, great
bowls to ting, glasses to ring. Draw, reach, fill, mix, give it me without
water. So, my friend, so, whip me off this glass neatly, bring me hither some
claret, a full weeping glass till it run over. A cessation and truce with
thirst. Ha, thou false fever, wilt thou not be gone? By my figgins, godmother,
I cannot as yet enter in the humour of being merry, nor drink so currently
as I would. You have catched a cold, gammer? Yea, forsooth, sir. By the belly
of Sanct Buff, let us talk of our drink: I never drink but at my hours, like
the Pope's mule. And I never drink but in my breviary, like a fair father
guardian. Which was first, thirst or drinking? Thirst, for who in the time
of innocence would have drunk without being athirst? Nay, sir, it was drinking;
for privatio praesupponit habitum. I am learned, you see: Foecundi calices
quem non fecere disertum? We poor innocents drink but too much without thirst.
Not I truly, who am a sinner, for I never drink without thirst, either present
or future. To prevent it, as you know, I drink for the thirst to come. I
drink eternally. This is to me an eternity of drinking, and drinking of eternity.
Let us sing, let us drink, and tune up our roundelays. Where is my funnel?
What, it seems I do not drink but by an attorney? Do you wet yourselves to
dry, or do you dry to wet you? Pish, I understand not the rhetoric (theoric,
I should say), but I help myself somewhat by the practice. Baste! enough!
I sup, I wet, I humect, I moisten my gullet, I drink, and all for fear of
dying. Drink always and you shall never die. If I drink not, I am a-ground,
dry, gravelled and spent. I am stark dead without drink, and my soul ready
to fly into some marsh amongst frogs; the soul never dwells in a dry place,
drouth kills it. O you butlers, creators of new forms, make me of no drinker
a drinker, a perennity and everlastingness of sprinkling and bedewing me
through these my parched and sinewy bowels. He drinks in vain that feels
not the pleasure of it. This entereth into my veins,—the pissing tools and
urinal vessels shall have nothing of it. I would willingly wash the tripes
of the calf which I apparelled this morning. I have pretty well now ballasted
my stomach and stuffed my paunch. If the papers of my bonds and bills could
drink as well as I do, my creditors would not want for wine when they come
to see me, or when they are to make any formal exhibition of their rights
to what of me they can demand. This hand of yours spoils your nose. O how
many other such will enter here before this go out! What, drink so shallow?
It is enough to break both girds and petrel. This is called a cup of dissimulation,
or flagonal hypocrisy. What difference is there between a bottle and a flagon. Great difference; for the bottle is stopped and shut up with a stopple, but the flagon with a vice (La bouteille est fermee a bouchon, et le flaccon a vis.). Bravely and well played upon the words! Our fathers drank lustily, and emptied their cans. Well cacked, well sung! Come, let us drink: will you send nothing to the river? Here is one going to wash the tripes. I drink no more than a sponge. I drink like a Templar knight. And I, tanquam sponsus. And I, sicut terra sine aqua. Give me a synonymon for a gammon of bacon. It is the compulsory of drinkers: it is a pulley. By a pulley-rope wine is let down into a cellar, and by a gammon into the stomach. Hey! now, boys, hither, some drink, some drink. There is no trouble in it. Respice personam, pone pro duos, bus non est in usu. If I could get up as well as I can swallow down, I had been long ere now very high in the air. Thus became Tom Tosspot rich,—thus went in the tailor's stitch. Thus did Bacchus conquer th' Inde—thus Philosophy, Melinde. A little rain allays a great deal of wind: long tippling breaks the thunder. But if there came such liquor from my ballock, would you not willingly thereafter suck the udder whence it issued? Here, page, fill! I prithee, forget me not when it comes to my turn, and I will enter the election I have made of thee into the very register of my heart. Sup, Guillot, and spare not, there is somewhat in the pot. I appeal from thirst, and disclaim its jurisdiction. Page, sue out my appeal in form. This remnant in the bottom of the glass must follow its leader. I was wont heretofore to drink out all, but now I leave nothing. Let us not make too much haste; it is requisite we carry all along with us. Heyday, here are tripes fit for our sport, and, in earnest, excellent godebillios of the dun ox (you know) with the black streak. O, for God's sake, let us lash them soundly, yet thriftily. Drink, or I will,—No, no, drink, I beseech you (Ou je vous, je vous prie.). Sparrows will not eat unless you bob them on the tail, nor can I drink if I be not fairly spoke to. The concavities of my body are like another Hell for their capacity. Lagonaedatera (lagon lateris cavitas: aides orcus: and eteros alter.). There is not a corner, nor coney-burrow in all my body, where this wine doth not ferret out my thirst. Ho, this will bang it soundly. But this shall banish it utterly. Let us wind our horns by the sound of flagons and bottles, and cry aloud, that whoever hath lost his thirst come not hither to seek it. Long clysters of drinking are to be voided without doors. The great God made the planets, and we make the platters neat. I have the word of the gospel in my mouth, Sitio. The stone called asbestos is not more unquenchable than the thirst of my paternity. Appetite comes with eating, says Angeston, but the thirst goes away with drinking. I have a remedy against thirst, quite contrary to that which is good against the biting of a mad dog. Keep running after a dog, and he will never bite you; drink always before the thirst, and it will never come upon you. There I catch you, I awake you. Argus had a hundred eyes for his sight, a butler should have (like Briareus) a hundred hands wherewith to fill us wine indefatigably. Hey now, lads, let us moisten ourselves, it will be time to dry hereafter. White wine here, wine, boys! Pour out all in the name of Lucifer, fill here, you, fill and fill (peascods on you) till it be full. My tongue peels. Lans trinque; to thee, countryman, I drink to thee, good fellow, comrade to thee, lusty, lively! Ha, la, la, that was drunk to some purpose, and bravely gulped over. O lachryma Christi, it is of the best grape! I'faith, pure Greek, Greek! O the fine white wine! upon my conscience, it is a kind of taffetas wine,—hin, hin, it is of one ear, well wrought, and of good wool. Courage, comrade, up thy heart, billy! We will not be beasted at this bout, for I have got one trick. Ex hoc in hoc. There is no enchantment nor charm there, every one of you hath seen it. My 'prenticeship is out, I am a free man at this trade. I am prester mast (Prestre mace, maistre passe.), Prish, Brum! I should say, master past. O the drinkers, those that are a-dry, O poor thirsty souls! Good page, my friend, fill me here some, and crown the wine, I pray thee. Like a cardinal! Natura abhorret vacuum. Would you say that a fly could drink in this? This is after the fashion of Switzerland. Clear off, neat, supernaculum! Come, therefore, blades, to this divine liquor and celestial juice, swill it over heartily, and spare not! It is a decoction of nectar and ambrosia. Chapter 1.VI.—How Gargantua was born
in a strange manner
Whilst they were on this discourse and pleasant tattle of drinking,
Gargamelle began to be a little unwell in her lower parts; whereupon Grangousier
arose from off the grass, and fell to comfort her very honestly and kindly,
suspecting that she was in travail, and told her that it was best for her
to sit down upon the grass under the willows, because she was like very shortly
to see young feet, and that therefore it was convenient she should pluck up
her spirits, and take a good heart of new at the fresh arrival of her baby;
saying to her withal, that although the pain was somewhat grievous to her,
it would be but of short continuance, and that the succeeding joy would quickly
remove that sorrow, in such sort that she should not so much as remember
it. On, with a sheep's courage! quoth he. Despatch this boy, and we will
speedily fall to work for the making of another. Ha! said she, so well as
you speak at your own ease, you that are men! Well, then, in the name of
God, I'll do my best, seeing that you will have it so, but would to God that
it were cut off from you! What? said Grangousier. Ha, said she, you are a
good man indeed, you understand it well enough. What, my member? said he.
By the goat's blood, if it please you, that shall be done instantly; cause
bring hither a knife. Alas, said she, the Lord forbid, and pray Jesus to
forgive me! I did not say it from my heart, therefore let it alone, and do
not do it neither more nor less any kind of harm for my speaking so to you.
But I am like to have work enough to do to-day and all for your member, yet
God bless you and it. Courage, courage, said he, take you no care of the matter, let the four foremost oxen do the work. I will yet go drink one whiff more, and if in the mean time anything befall you that may require my presence, I will be so near to you, that, at the first whistling in your fist, I shall be with you forthwith. A little while after she began to groan, lament and cry. Then suddenly came the midwives from all quarters, who groping her below, found some peloderies, which was a certain filthy stuff, and of a taste truly bad enough. This they thought had been the child, but it was her fundament, that was slipped out with the mollification of her straight entrail, which you call the bum-gut, and that merely by eating of too many tripes, as we have showed you before. Whereupon an old ugly trot in the company, who had the repute of an expert she-physician, and was come from Brisepaille, near to Saint Genou, three score years before, made her so horrible a restrictive and binding medicine, and whereby all her larris, arse-pipes, and conduits were so oppilated, stopped, obstructed, and contracted, that you could hardly have opened and enlarged them with your teeth, which is a terrible thing to think upon; seeing the Devil at the mass at Saint Martin's was puzzled with the like task, when with his teeth he had lengthened out the parchment whereon he wrote the tittle-tattle of two young mangy whores. By this inconvenient the cotyledons of her matrix were presently loosed, through which the child sprang up and leaped, and so, entering into the hollow vein, did climb by the diaphragm even above her shoulders, where the vein divides itself into two, and from thence taking his way towards the left side, issued forth at her left ear. As soon as he was born, he cried not as other babes use to do, Miez, miez, miez, miez, but with a high, sturdy, and big voice shouted about, Some drink, some drink, some drink, as inviting all the world to drink with him. The noise hereof was so extremely great, that it was heard in both the countries at once of Beauce and Bibarois. I doubt me, that you do not thoroughly believe the truth of this strange nativity. Though you believe it not, I care not much: but an honest man, and of good judgment, believeth still what is told him, and that which he finds written. Is this beyond our law or our faith—against reason or the holy Scripture? For my part, I find nothing in the sacred Bible that is against it. But tell me, if it had been the will of God, would you say that he could not do it? Ha, for favour sake, I beseech you, never emberlucock or inpulregafize your spirits with these vain thoughts and idle conceits; for I tell you, it is not impossible with God, and, if he pleased, all women henceforth should bring forth their children at the ear. Was not Bacchus engendered out of the very thigh of Jupiter? Did not Roquetaillade come out at his mother's heel, and Crocmoush from the slipper of his nurse? Was not Minerva born of the brain, even through the ear of Jove? Adonis, of the bark of a myrrh tree; and Castor and Pollux of the doupe of that egg which was laid and hatched by Leda? But you would wonder more, and with far greater amazement, if I should now present you with that chapter of Plinius, wherein he treateth of strange births, and contrary to nature, and yet am not I so impudent a liar as he was. Read the seventh book of his Natural History, chap.3, and trouble not my head any more about this. Chapter 1.VII.—After what manner Gargantua
had his name given him, and how he tippled, bibbed, and curried the can
The good man Grangousier, drinking and making merry with the
rest, heard the horrible noise which his son had made as he entered into
the light of this world, when he cried out, Some drink, some drink, some
drink; whereupon he said in French, Que grand tu as et souple le gousier!
that is to say, How great and nimble a throat thou hast. Which the company
hearing, said that verily the child ought to be called Gargantua; because
it was the first word that after his birth his father had spoke, in imitation,
and at the example of the ancient Hebrews; whereunto he condescended, and
his mother was very well pleased therewith. In the meanwhile, to quiet the
child, they gave him to drink a tirelaregot, that is, till his throat was
like to crack with it; then was he carried to the font, and there baptized,
according to the manner of good Christians. Immediately thereafter were appointed for him seventeen thousand, nine hundred, and thirteen cows of the towns of Pautille and Brehemond, to furnish him with milk in ordinary, for it was impossible to find a nurse sufficient for him in all the country, considering the great quantity of milk that was requisite for his nourishment; although there were not wanting some doctors of the opinion of Scotus, who affirmed that his own mother gave him suck, and that she could draw out of her breasts one thousand, four hundred, two pipes, and nine pails of milk at every time. Which indeed is not probable, and this point hath been found duggishly scandalous and offensive to tender ears, for that it savoured a little of heresy. Thus was he handled for one year and ten months; after which time, by the advice of physicians, they began to carry him, and then was made for him a fine little cart drawn with oxen, of the invention of Jan Denio, wherein they led him hither and thither with great joy; and he was worth the seeing, for he was a fine boy, had a burly physiognomy, and almost ten chins. He cried very little, but beshit himself every hour: for, to speak truly of him, he was wonderfully phlegmatic in his posteriors, both by reason of his natural complexion and the accidental disposition which had befallen him by his too much quaffing of the Septembral juice. Yet without a cause did not he sup one drop; for if he happened to be vexed, angry, displeased, or sorry, if he did fret, if he did weep, if he did cry, and what grievous quarter soever he kept, in bringing him some drink, he would be instantly pacified, reseated in his own temper, in a good humour again, and as still and quiet as ever. One of his governesses told me (swearing by her fig), how he was so accustomed to this kind of way, that, at the sound of pints and flagons, he would on a sudden fall into an ecstasy, as if he had then tasted of the joys of paradise; so that they, upon consideration of this, his divine complexion, would every morning, to cheer him up, play with a knife upon the glasses, on the bottles with their stopples, and on the pottle-pots with their lids and covers, at the sound whereof he became gay, did leap for joy, would loll and rock himself in the cradle, then nod with his head, monochordizing with his fingers, and barytonizing with his tail. Chapter 1.VIII.—How they apparelled
Gargantua
Being of this age, his father ordained to have clothes made to
him in his own livery, which was white and blue. To work then went the tailors,
and with great expedition were those clothes made, cut, and sewed, according
to the fashion that was then in request. I find by the ancient records or
pancarts, to be seen in the chamber of accounts, or court of the exchequer
at Montsoreau, that he was accoutred in manner as followeth. To make him every
shirt of his were taken up nine hundred ells of Chasteleraud linen, and two
hundred for the gussets, in manner of cushions, which they put under his
armpits. His shirt was not gathered nor plaited, for the plaiting of shirts
was not found out till the seamstresses (when the point of their needle (Besongner
du cul, Englished The eye of the needle.) was broken) began to work and occupy
with the tail. There were taken up for his doublet, eight hundred and thirteen
ells of white satin, and for his points fifteen hundred and nine dogs' skins
and a half. Then was it that men began to tie their breeches to their doublets,
and not their doublets to their breeches: for it is against nature, as hath
most amply been showed by Ockham upon the exponibles of Master Haultechaussade.
For his breeches were taken up eleven hundred and five ells and a third of white broadcloth. They were cut in the form of pillars, chamfered, channelled and pinked behind that they might not over-heat his reins: and were, within the panes, puffed out with the lining of as much blue damask as was needful: and remark, that he had very good leg-harness, proportionable to the rest of his stature. For his codpiece were used sixteen ells and a quarter of the same cloth, and it was fashioned on the top like unto a triumphant arch, most gallantly fastened with two enamelled clasps, in each of which was set a great emerald, as big as an orange; for, as says Orpheus, lib. de lapidibus, and Plinius, libro ultimo, it hath an erective virtue and comfortative of the natural member. The exiture, outjecting or outstanding, of his codpiece was of the length of a yard, jagged and pinked, and withal bagging, and strutting out with the blue damask lining, after the manner of his breeches. But had you seen the fair embroidery of the small needlework purl, and the curiously interlaced knots, by the goldsmith's art set out and trimmed with rich diamonds, precious rubies, fine turquoises, costly emeralds, and Persian pearls, you would have compared it to a fair cornucopia, or horn of abundance, such as you see in antiques, or as Rhea gave to the two nymphs, Amalthea and Ida, the nurses of Jupiter. And, like to that horn of abundance, it was still gallant, succulent, droppy, sappy, pithy, lively, always flourishing, always fructifying, full of juice, full of flower, full of fruit, and all manner of delight. I avow God, it would have done one good to have seen him, but I will tell you more of him in the book which I have made of the dignity of codpieces. One thing I will tell you, that as it was both long and large, so was it well furnished and victualled within, nothing like unto the hypocritical codpieces of some fond wooers and wench-courtiers, which are stuffed only with wind, to the great prejudice of the female sex. For his shoes were taken up four hundred and six ells of blue crimson-velvet, and were very neatly cut by parallel lines, joined in uniform cylinders. For the soling of them were made use of eleven hundred hides of brown cows, shapen like the tail of a keeling. For his coat were taken up eighteen hundred ells of blue velvet, dyed in grain, embroidered in its borders with fair gilliflowers, in the middle decked with silver purl, intermixed with plates of gold and store of pearls, hereby showing that in his time he would prove an especial good fellow and singular whipcan. His girdle was made of three hundred ells and a half of silken serge, half white and half blue, if I mistake it not. His sword was not of Valentia, nor his dagger of Saragossa, for his father could not endure these hidalgos borrachos maranisados como diablos: but he had a fair sword made of wood, and the dagger of boiled leather, as well painted and gilded as any man could wish. His purse was made of the cod of an elephant, which was given him by Herr Pracontal, proconsul of Lybia. For his gown were employed nine thousand six hundred ells, wanting two-thirds, of blue velvet, as before, all so diagonally purled, that by true perspective issued thence an unnamed colour, like that you see in the necks of turtle-doves or turkey-cocks, which wonderfully rejoiced the eyes of the beholders. For his bonnet or cap were taken up three hundred, two ells and a quarter of white velvet, and the form thereof was wide and round, of the bigness of his head; for his father said that the caps of the Marrabaise fashion, made like the cover of a pasty, would one time or other bring a mischief on those that wore them. For his plume, he wore a fair great blue feather, plucked from an onocrotal of the country of Hircania the wild, very prettily hanging down over his right ear. For the jewel or brooch which in his cap he carried, he had in a cake of gold, weighing three score and eight marks, a fair piece enamelled, wherein was portrayed a man's body with two heads, looking towards one another, four arms, four feet, two arses, such as Plato, in Symposio, says was the mystical beginning of man's nature; and about it was written in Ionic letters, Agame ou zetei ta eautes, or rather, Aner kai gune zugada anthrotos idiaitata, that is, Vir et mulier junctim propriissime homo. To wear about his neck, he had a golden chain, weighing twenty-five thousand and sixty-three marks of gold, the links thereof being made after the manner of great berries, amongst which were set in work green jaspers engraven and cut dragon-like, all environed with beams and sparks, as king Nicepsos of old was wont to wear them: and it reached down to the very bust of the rising of his belly, whereby he reaped great benefit all his life long, as the Greek physicians know well enough. For his gloves were put in work sixteen otters' skins, and three of the loupgarous, or men-eating wolves, for the bordering of them: and of this stuff were they made, by the appointment of the Cabalists of Sanlouand. As for the rings which his father would have him to wear, to renew the ancient mark of nobility, he had on the forefinger of his left hand a carbuncle as big as an ostrich's egg, enchased very daintily in gold of the fineness of a Turkey seraph. Upon the middle finger of the same hand he had a ring made of four metals together, of the strangest fashion that ever was seen; so that the steel did not crash against the gold, nor the silver crush the copper. All this was made by Captain Chappuys, and Alcofribas his good agent. On the medical finger of his right hand he had a ring made spire-wise, wherein was set a perfect Balas ruby, a pointed diamond, and a Physon emerald, of an inestimable value. For Hans Carvel, the king of Melinda's jeweller, esteemed them at the rate of threescore nine millions, eight hundred ninety-four thousand, and eighteen French crowns of Berry, and at so much did the Foucres of Augsburg prize them. |