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Asmodeus; or, The Devil on Two Sticks

by Alain René Le Sage · English · Gutenberg #51145 · 611,085 chars · public domain (US)

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Title: Asmodeus; or, The Devil on Two Sticks

Author: Alain René Le Sage

Contributor: Jules Gabriel Janin

Illustrator: Tony Johannot

Translator: Joseph Thomas


        
Release date: February 8, 2016 [eBook #51145]
                Most recently updated: October 23, 2024

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/51145

Credits: Produced by Clare Graham and Marc D'Hooghe


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ASMODEUS; OR, THE DEVIL ON TWO STICKS ***
ASMODEUS; OR, The Devil on Two Sticks.


 By ALAIN RENÉ LE SAGE.


 WITH A BIOGRAPHICAL NOTICE OF THE AUTHOR, By JULES JANIN.


 [Illustration: Asmodeus and Zambullo fly over Madrid]


 Illustrated by TONY JOHANNOT.

 [Translated by Joseph Thomas.]


 GEORGE ROUTLEDGE AND SONS, LONDON: BROADWAY, LUDGATE HILL. NEW YORK:
 416 BROOME STREET.


 1879.




TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE.


When I first determined on the publication of a new edition of "THE
DEVIL ON TWO STICKS," I had certainly no idea of engaging in a new
translation. I had not read an English version since my boyhood,
and naturally conceived that the one which had passed current for
upwards of a century must possess sufficient merit to render anything
beyond a careful revision, before passing it again through the press,
unnecessary. However, on reading a few pages, and on comparing them
with the much-loved original, I no longer wondered, as I had so often
done, why LE DIABLE BOITEUX was so little esteemed by those who had
only known him in his English dress, while Gil Blas was as great a
favourite with the British public as any of its own heroes of story.
To account for this, I will not dwell on the want of literal fidelity
in the old version, although in some instances that is amusing enough;
but the total absence of style, and that too in the translation of a
work by one of the greatest masters of verbal melody that ever existed,
was so striking as to induce me, rashly perhaps, to endeavour more
worthily to interpret the witty and satirical ASMODEUS for the benefit
of those who have not the inestimable pleasure of comprehending him in
his _native_ tongue--for, as Jules Janin observes, he is a Devil truly
French.

In the translation which I here present, I do not myself pretend, at
all times, to have rendered the words of the 'graceful Cupid' with
strict exactness, but I have striven to convey to my reader the ideas
which those words import. Whether I have succeeded in so doing is for
others to determine; but, if I have not, I shall at all events have the
satisfaction of failing in company,--which, I am told, however, is only
an Old Bailey sort of feeling after all.

I have not thought it necessary to attempt the Life of the Author;
it will be enough to me, for fame, not to have murdered one of his
children. I have therefore adopted the life, character, and behaviour
of Le Sage from one of the most talented of modern French writers,
and my readers will doubtless congratulate themselves on my resolve.
Neither have I deemed it needful to enter into the controversy as to
the originality of this work, except by a note in page 162: and this
I should probably not have appended, had I, while hunting over the
early editions there referred to, observed the original dedication
of Le Sage to 'the illustrious Don Luis Velez de Guevara,' in which
are the following words: "I have already declared, and do now again
declare to the world, that to your Diabolo Cojuelo I owe the title and
plan of this work ...; and I must further own, that if the reader look
narrowly into some passages of this performance, he will find I have
adopted several of your thoughts. I wish from my soul he could find
more, and that the necessity I was under of accommodating my writings
to the genius of my own country had not prevented me from copying you
exactly." This is surely enough to exonerate Le Sage from the many
charges which have been urged against him; and I quote the concluding
sentence of the above, because it is an excuse, from his own pen, for
some little liberties which I have, in my turn, thought it necessary to
take with his work in the course of my labours.

 JOSEPH THOMAS.





 TABLE OF CONTENTS.


 TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE.

 BIOGRAPHICAL NOTICE OF LE SAGE.

 CHAPTER I. WHAT SORT OF A DEVIL HE OF THE TWO STICKS WAS--WHEN AND BY
 WHAT ACCIDENT DON CLEOPHAS LEANDRO PEREZ ZAMBULLO FIRST GAINED THE
 HONOUR OF HIS ACQUAINTANCE.

 CHAPTER II. WHAT FOLLOWED THE DELIVERANCE OF ASMODEUS.

 CHAPTER III. WHERE THE DEVIL TRANSLATED THE STUDENT; AND THE FIRST
 FRUITS OF HIS ECCLESIASTICAL ELEVATION.

 CHAPTER IV. STORY OF THE LOVES OF THE COUNT DE BELFLOR AND LEONORA DE
 CESPEDES.

 CHAPTER V. CONTINUATION OF THE STORY OF THE LOVES OF THE COUNT DE
 BELFLOR AND LEONORA DE CESPEDES.

 CHAPTER VI. NEW OBJECTS DISPLAYED TO DON CLEOPHAS; AND HIS REVENGE ON
 DONNA THOMASA.

 CHAPTER VII. THE PRISON, AND THE PRISONERS.

 CHAPTER VIII. OF VARIOUS PERSONS EXHIBITED TO DON CLEOPHAS BY
 ASMODEUS, WHO REVEALS TO THE STUDENT WHAT EACH HAS DONE IN HIS DAY.

 CHAPTER IX. THE MADHOUSE, AND ITS INMATES.

 CHAPTER X. THE SUBJECT OF WHICH IS INEXHAUSTIBLE.

 CHAPTER XI. OF THE FIRE, AND THE DOINGS OF ASMODEUS ON THE OCCASION,
 OUT OF FRIENDSHIP FOR DON CLEOPHAS.

 CHAPTER XII. OF THE TOMBS, OF THEIR SHADES, AND OF DEATH.

 CHAPTER XIII. THE FORCE OF FRIENDSHIP.

 CHAPTER XIV. THE SQUABBLE BETWEEN THE TRAGIC POET AND THE COMIC AUTHOR.

 CHAPTER XV. CONTINUATION, AND CONCLUSION, OF THE FORCE OF FRIENDSHIP.

 CHAPTER XVI. THE DREAMERS.

 CHAPTER XVII. IN WHICH ORIGINALS ARE SEEN OF WHOM COPIES ARE RIFE.

 CHAPTER XVIII. RELATING TO OTHER MATTERS WHICH THE DEVIL EXHIBITED TO
 THE STUDENT.

 CHAPTER XIX. THE CAPTIVES.

 CHAPTER XX. OF THE LAST HISTORY RELATED BY ASMODEUS: HOW, WHILE
 CONCLUDING IT, HE WAS SUDDENLY INTERRUPTED; AND OF THE DISAGREEABLE
 MANNER, FOR THE WITTY DEMON, IN WHICH HE AND DON CLEOPHAS WERE
 SEPARATED.

 CHAPTER XXI. OF THE DOINGS OF DON CLEOPHAS AFTER ASMODEUS HAD LEFT
 HIM; AND OF THE MODE IN WHICH THE AUTHOR OF THIS WORK HAS THOUGHT FIT
 TO END IT.




[Illustration: bust of Le Sage between Asmodeus and Gil Blas]

NOTICE OF LE SAGE.


I shall at once place LE SAGE by the side of Molière; he is a comic
poet in all the acceptation of that great word,--COMEDY. He possesses
its noble instincts, its good-natured irony, its animated dialogue,
its clear and flowing style, its satire without bitterness, he has
studied profoundly the various states of life in the heights and
depths of the world. He is perfectly acquainted with the manners of
comedians and courtiers,--of students and pretty women. Exiled from
the Théâtre-Français, of which he would have been the honour, and
less fortunate than Molière, who had comedians under his direction,
and who was the proprietor of his own theatre, Le Sage found himself
obliged more than once to bury in his breast this Comedy, from want of
a fitting stage for its exhibition, and actors to represent it. Thus
circumstanced, the author of "Turcaret" was compelled to seek a new
form, under which he might throw into the world the wit, the grace, the
gaiety, the instruction which possessed him. In writing the biography
of such men, there is but one thing to do, and that is to praise. The
more humble and obscure have they been in their existence, the greater
is the duty of him who tells the story of their lives, to heap upon
them eulogy and honour. This is a tardy justice, if you will, but it is
a justice nevertheless; and besides, of what importance, after all, are
these vulgar events? All these biographies are alike. A little more of
poverty, a little less of misery, a youth expended in energy, a manhood
serious and filled with occupation, an old age respected, honourable;
and, at the end of all these labours, all these troubles, all these
anguishes of mind and heart, of which your great men alone have the
secret,--the Académie-Française in perspective. Then, are you possessed
of mediocre talents only? all doors are open to you;--are you a man of
genius? the door opens with difficulty;--but, are you perchance one of
those excelling spirits who appear but from century to century? it may
turn out that the Académie-Française will not have you at any price.
Thus did it with the great Molière; thus also has it done for Le Sage;
which, by-the-bye, is a great honour for the illustrious author of "Gil
Blas."

René Le Sage was born in the Morbihan, on the 8th of May, 1668:[1] and
in that year Racine produced "Les Plaideurs," and Molière was playing
his "Avare." The father of Le Sage was a man slightly lettered,--as
much so as could be expected of an honourable provincial attorney,
one who lived from day to day like a lord, without troubling himself
too much as to the future fortunes of his only son. The father died
when the child was only fourteen years of age; and soon afterwards the
youthful René lost his mother. He was now alone, under the guardianship
of an uncle, and he was fortunate enough to be placed under the
tutelage of those learned masters of the youth of the seventeenth
century, the Jesuits who subsequently became the instructors of
Voltaire, as they have been of all France of the great age. Thanks
to this talented and paternal teaching, our young orphan quickly
penetrated into the learned and poetical mysteries of that classic
antiquity, which is yet in our days, and will be to the end of time,
the exhaustless source of taste, of style, of reason, and of good
sense. It is to praise Le Sage to say that he was educated with as
much care and assiduity as Molière and Racine, as La Fontaine and
Voltaire; they one and all prepared themselves, by severest study, and
by respect for their masters, to become masters in their turn; and they
have themselves become classic writers, because they reverenced their
classic models,--which may, in case of need, serve as an example for
the beaux-esprits of our own time.

[1] According to Moreri, in his "Grand Dictionnaire Historique,"
(folio, Paris, 1759,) and he cites as his authority M. Titon de
Tillet's second supplement to the "Parnasse Français," Le Sage was
born at Ruis in Brittany, in 1677. There is, however, every reason
to believe that M. Jules Janin is correct, both as to the year and
the place of his birth, notwithstanding that Mr. Chalmers, in his
"Biographical Dictionary," while he assigns to the former the year
1668, places the latter at Vannes, as does also the "Biographie
Universelle," which he appears to have followed.

But, when this preliminary education was completed, and when he left
these learned mansions, all filled with Greek and Latin, all animated
with poetic fervour, Le Sage encountered those terrible obstacles that
await invariably, as he emerges from his studies, every young man
without family, and destitute of fortune. The poet Juvenal has well
expressed it, in one of his sublimest verses: "They with difficulty
rise, whose virtues are opposed by the pinching wants of home."

    "Haud facile emergunt, quorum virtutibus obstat
    Res angusta domi."

But what matters poverty when one is so young,--when our hopes are so
vast, our thoughts so powerful and rich? You have nothing, it is true;
but the world itself belongs to you,--the world is your patrimony;
you are sovereign of the universe; and around you, the twentieth year
touches every thing with its golden wand. Your clear and sparkling
eye may look in the sun's bright face as dauntless as the eagle's. It
is accomplished: all the powers of your soul are awakened, all the
passions of your heart join in one swelling choir, to chant _Hosanna in
excelsis!_ What matter then that you are poor! A verse sublime, a noble
thought, a well-turned phrase, the hand of a friend, the soft smile of
some bright-eyed damsel as she flits across your path,--there is a
fortune for a week. Those who, at the commencement of every biography,
enter into all sorts of lamentation, and deplore with pathetic voice
the mournful destiny of their hero, are not in the secret of the facile
joys of poetry, of the exquisite happiness of youth,--the simpletons!
They amuse themselves in counting, one by one, the rags that cover
yonder handsome form; and they see not, through the holes of the cloak
which envelopes it, those Herculean arms, or that athletic breast!
They look with pity on that poor young man with well-worn hat, and
beneath that covering deformed they see not those abundant, black,
and tended locks, the flowing diadem of youth! They will tell you,
with heart-rending sighs, how happy Diderot esteemed himself, when to
his crust of bread he joined the luxury of cheese, and how this poor
René le Sage drank at his repasts but pure spring water;--a lamentable
matter, truly! But Diderot, while he ate his cheese, already meditated
the shocks of his "Encyclopædia"; but this same clear fountain from
which you drink, at twenty, in the hollow of your hand, as pure, will
intoxicate more surely than will, after twenty other years, alas! the
sparkling produce of Champagne, poured out in cups of crystal.

This is sufficient reason why we should not trouble ourselves overmuch
as to the early life of Le Sage; he was young and handsome, and as he
marched, his head upturned like a poet, he met as he went along with
those first loves which one always meets when the heart is honest
and devoted. A charming woman loved him, and he let her love him
to her heart's content; and, without concerning himself as to his
good fortune, more than would master Gil Blas have done on a similar
occasion, these first amours of our poet lasted just as long as such
sort of amours ought to last--long enough that they should leave no
subject for regret, not enough that they should evoke hatred. When,
therefore, they had loved each other as much as they could, she and
he, they separated, still to please themselves; she found a husband of
riper age and better off than her lover; he took a wife more beauteous
and less wealthy than his mistress. And blessings on the amiable and
devoted girl who consented, with a joyous heart, to encounter all the
risks, all the vexations, and also to expose herself to the seducing
pleasures of a poetic life! Thus Le Sage entered, almost without
thinking of it, into that laborious life in which one must daily
expend the rarest and most charming treasures of his mind and soul. As
a commencement, he made a translation of the Letters of Calisthenes,
without imagining that he was himself possessed of more wit than all
the Greeks of the fourth century. The work had no success, and it ought
not to have had. He who has the genius of Le Sage must create original
works, or not meddle in the craft. To translate is a trade of manual
skill--to imitate, is one of plagiary. However, the failure of this
first book rendered Le Sage less proud and haughty; and he accepted,
what he would never have done had he at once succeeded, a pension from
M. l'Abbé de Lyonne. This pension amounted to six hundred francs;
and thereupon the biographers of our author are in extacies at the
generosity of the Abbé de Lyonne.

Six hundred francs! and when we reflect that had Le Sage lived in our
day, depending only on his Théâtre de la Foire, he would have gained
thirty thousand francs a year! In our days, a romance like "Gil Blas"
would not be worth less than five hundred thousand francs; "Le Diable
Boiteux" would have brought him a hundred thousand, at least: still,
we must not be angry with M. l'Abbé de Lyonne, for having bestowed a
pension of six hundred on the author of "Gil Blas." The abbé did more;
he opened to Le Sage an admirable treasure of wit, of imagination,
and of poetry; he taught him the Spanish tongue, that lovely and
noble instructress of the great Corneille; and it is doubtless no
slight honour for the language of Cervantes to have given birth in
our land to "The Cid" and to "Gil Blas." You may imagine with what
delight Le Sage accepted this instruction, and how perfectly at home
he found himself in those elegant and gracious manners; with what good
will he studied that smiling gallantry, that loyal jealousy; those
duennas in appearance so austere, in reality so accessible; those
lovely women, their feet ensatined, their head in the mantilla; those
charming mansions, all carved without, and within all silence; those
exciting windows, lighted by smiles above, while concerts murmur at
their feet! You may imagine if he adopted those lively and coquetish
waiting-women, those ingenious and rascally valets, those enormous
mantles so favourable to love, those ancient bowers so friendly to its
modest blisses! Thus, when he had discovered this new world of poesy,
of which he was about to be the Pizarro and the Fernando Cortes, and
of which Corneille had been the Christopher Columbus, René le Sage
clapped his hands for joy. In his noble pride, he stamped his feet on
this enchanted land; he began to read, you may fancy with what delight,
that admirable epic, "Don Quixote," which he studied for its grace,
its charms, its poetry, its passion; putting for the time aside its
satire, and the sarcasm concealed in this splendid drama, as weapons
for a later use, when he should attack the financiers. Certainly, the
Abbé de Lyonne never dreamt that he was opening to the light this
exhaustless mine for the man who was to become the first comic poet of
France--since Molière is one of those geniuses apart, of whom all the
nations of the earth, all literary ages, claim alike with equal right
the honour and the glory.

The first fruit of this Spanish cultivation was a volume of comedies
which Le Sage published, and in which he had translated some excellent
pieces of the Spanish stage. It contained only one from Lopez de Vega,
so ingenious and so fruitful; that was certainly too few: there was
in it not one of Calderon de la Barca; and that was as certainly not
enough. In this book, which I have read with care, in search of some
of those luminous rays which betoken the presence of the man of genius
wherever he has passed, I have met with nothing but the translator.
The original writer does not yet display himself: it is because style
is a thing which comes but slowly; it is because, in this heart of
comedy more especially, there are certain secrets of trade which no
talent can replace, and which must be learned at whatever cost. These
secrets Le Sage learned, as every thing is learned, at his own expense.
From a simple translator as he was, he became an arranger of dramatic
pieces, and in 1702 (the eighteenth century had begun its course, but
with timid steps, and none could have predicted what it would become)
Le Sage brought out at the Théâtre Français a comedy in five acts,
"Le Point d'Honneur:" it was a mere imitation from the Spanish. The
imitation had small success, and Le Sage comprehended not this lesson
of the public; he understood not that something whispered to the
pit, so reserved in its applause, that there was in this translator
an original poet. To avenge himself, what did Le Sage? He fell into
a greater error still: he set to work translating--will you believe
it?--the continuation of "Don Quixote," as if "Don Quixote" could
have a continuation; as if there were a person in the world, even
Cervantes himself, who had the right to add a chapter to this famous
history! Verily, it is strange, indeed, that with his taste so pure,
his judgment so correct, Le Sage should have ever thought of this
unhappy _continuation_. This time, therefore, again his new attempt had
no success; the Parisian public, which, whatever may be said to the
contrary, is a great judge, was more just for the veritable Quixote
than Le Sage himself; and he had once more to begin anew. However, he
yet once more attempted this new road, which could lead him to nothing
good. He returned to the charge, still with a Spanish comedy, "Don
César Ursin," imitated from Calderon. This piece was played for the
first time at Versailles, and applauded to the skies by the court,
which deceived itself almost as often as the town. Le Sage now thought
that the battle at last was won. Vain hope! it was again a battle lost,
for, brought from Versailles to Paris, the comedy of "Don César Ursin"
was hissed off the stage by the Parisian pit, which thus unmercifully
annihilated the eulogies of the court, and the first victory of the
author. It was now full time to yield to the force of evidence.
Enlightened by these rude instructions, Le Sage at last comprehended
that it was not permitted to him, to him less than to all others, to be
a plagiarist; that originality was one of the grand causes of success;
and that to confine himself for ever to this servile imitation of the
Spanish poets was to become a poet lost.

Now, therefore, behold him, determined in his turn to be an original
poet. This time he no longer copies, he invents; he arranges his fable
to his mind, and seeks no further refuge in the phantasmagoria of
Spain. With original ideas, comes to him originality of style; and he
at last lights on that wondrous and imperishable dialogue which may
be compared to the dialogue of Molière, not for its ease, perhaps,
but unquestionably for its grace and elegance. He found at the same
time, to his great joy, now that he was himself--that he walked in the
footsteps of nobody, he found that the business was much more simple;
this time he was at his ease in his plot, which he disposed as it
pleased him; he breathed freely in the space which he had opened to
himself; nothing constrained his march, any more than his poetical
caprice. Well! at last then we behold him the supreme moderator of his
work, we behold him such as the pit would have him, such as we all
hoped he was.

This happy comedy, which is, beyond all doubt, the first work of Le
Sage, is entitled "Crispin, Rival de son Maître." When he had finished
it, Le Sage, grateful for the reception which the court had given to
"Don César Ursin," was desirous that the court should also have the
first hearing of "Crispin, Rival de son Maître." He remembered, with
great delight, that the first applauses he had received had been echoed
from Versailles! Behold him then producing his new comedy before the
court. But, alas! this time the opinion of the court had changed:
without regard for the plaudits of Versailles, the pit of the Paris
theatre had hissed "Don César Ursin"; Versailles in its turn, and as
if to take its revenge, now hissed "Crispin, Rival de son Maître." We
must allow that, for a mind less strong, here was enough to confound
a man for ever, and to make him comprehend nothing either as to the
success or the failure of his productions. Happily, Le Sage appealed
from the public of Versailles to the pit of Paris; and as much as
"Crispin, Rival de son Maître" had been hissed at Versailles, so much
was this charming comedy applauded at Paris. On this occasion, it
was not alone to give the lie to the court, that the pit applauded;
Paris had refound, in truth, in this new piece, all the qualities of
true comedy,--the wit, the grace, the easy irony, the exhaustless
pleasantry, a noble frankness, much biting satire, and a moderate
seasoning of love.

As to those who would turn into accusation the hisses of Versailles,
they should recollect that more than one chef-d'oeuvre, hissed at
Paris, has been raised again by the suffrages of Versailles;--"Les
Plaideurs" of Racine, for instance, which the court restored to the
poet with extraordinary applause, with the bursting laughter of Louis
XIV., which come deliciously to trouble the repose of Racine, at five
o'clock in the morning. Happy times, on the contrary, when poets had,
to approve them, to try them, this double jurisdiction; when they could
appeal from the censures of the court to the praises of the town, from
the hisses of Versailles to the plaudits of Paris!

Now we behold René le Sage, to whom nothing opposes: he has divined his
true vocation, which is comedy; he understands what may be made of the
human race, and by what light threads are suspended the human heart.
These threads of gold, of silver, or of brass, he holds them at this
moment in his hand, and you will see with what skill he weaves them.
Already in his head, which bears Gil Blas and his fortune, ferment the
most charming recitals of "Le Diable Boiteux." Silence! "Turcaret"
is about to appear,--Turcaret, whom Molière would not have forgotten
if Turcaret had lived in his day; but it was necessary to wait till
France should have escaped from the reign, so decorous, of Louis XIV.,
to witness the coming, after the man of the Church, after the man of
the sword, this man without heart and without mind,--the man of money.
In a society like our own, the man of money is one of those bastard
and insolent powers which grow out of the affairs of every day, as the
mushroom grows out from the dunghill. We know not whence comes this
inert force,--we know not how it is maintained on the surface of the
world, and nothing tells how it disappears, after having thrown its
phosphorus of an instant. It is necessary, in truth, that an epoch
should be sufficiently corrupt, and sufficiently stained with infamy,
when it replaces, by money, the sword of the warrior, by money the
sentence of the judge, by money the intelligence of the legislator, by
money the sceptre of the king himself. Once that a nation has descended
so low, as to adore money on its knees--to require neither fine arts,
nor poesy, nor love, it is debased as was the Jewish people, when it
knelt before the golden calf. Happily, of all the ephemeral powers in
the world, money is the most ephemeral; we extend to it our right hand,
it is true, but we buffet it with our left; we prostrate ourselves
before it as it passes along,--yes; but when it has passed, we kick it
with our foot! This is what Le Sage marvellously comprehended, like a
great comic poet as he was. He found the absurd and frightful side of
those gilded men who divide our finances, menials enriched overnight,
who, more than once, by a perfectly natural mistake, have mounted
behind their own coaches. And such is Turcaret. The poet has loaded him
with vices the most disgraceful, with follies the most dishonouring;
he tears from this heart, debased by money, every natural affection;
and nevertheless, even in this fearful picture, Le Sage has confined
himself within the limits of comedy, and not once in this admirable
production does contempt or indignation take the place of laughter. It
was then with good cause that the whole race of financiers, as soon as
they had heard of Turcaret, caballed against this chef-d'oeuvre; the
cry resounded in all the rich saloons of Paris; it was echoed from the
usurers who lent their money to the nobles, and re-echoed by the nobles
who condescended to borrow from the usurers; it was a general hue and
cry.

"Le Tartufe" of Molière never met with greater opposition among the
devotees than "Turcaret" experienced from financiers; and, to make
use of the expression of Beaumarchais in reference to "Figaro," it
required as much mind for Le Sage to cause his comedy to be played as
it did to write it. But on this occasion, again, the public, which
is the all-powerful manager in these matters, was more potent than
intrigue; Monseigneur le Grand Dauphin, that Prince so illustrious by
his piety and virtue, protected the comedy of Le Sage, as his ancestor,
Louis XIV., had protected that of Molière. On this, the financiers,
perceiving that all was lost as far as intrigue was concerned, had
recourse to money, which is the last reason of this description of
upstarts, as cannon is the _ultima ratio_ of kings. This time again
the attack availed not: the great poet refused a fortune that his
comedy might be played, and unquestionably he made a good bargain by
his resolve, preferable a hundred thousand times to all the fortunes
which have been made and lost in the Rue Quincampoix.[2] The success of
"Turcaret" (1709) was immense; the Parisian enjoyed with rare delight
the spectacle of these grasping money-hunters devoted to the most
cruel ridicule. What if Le Sage had deferred the production of this
masterpiece! These men would have disappeared, to make room for others
of the kind, and they would have carried with them into oblivion the
comedy they had paid for. It would have been a _chef-d'oeuvre_ lost to
us for ever; and never, that we know of, would the good men on 'Change
have dealt us a more fatal blow.

[2] In this street, in 1716, the famous projector Law established his
bank; and the rage for speculation which followed, made it for a time
the Bourse of Paris. A hump-backed man made a large fortune by lending
himself as a desk, whereon the speculators might sign their contracts,
or the transfer of shares. The Rue Quincampoix is still a leading
street for business, but its trade is now confined to more honest
wares, such as drugs and grocery.

Who would credit it, however? After this superb production, which
should have rendered him the master of French comedy, Le Sage was soon
compelled to abandon that ungrateful theatre which understood him not.
He renounced,--he, the author of "Turcaret,"--pure comedy, to write, as
a pastime, farces, little one-act pieces mingled with couplets, which
made the life of the Théâtre de la Foire Saint Laurent, and of the
Théâtre de la Foire Saint Germain. Unfortunate example for Le Sage to
set, in expending, without thought, all his talent, from day to day,
without pity for himself, without profit for anyone. What! the author
of "Turcaret" to fill exactly the same office as M. Scribe; to waste
his time, his style, and his genius upon that trifling comedy which a
breath can hurry away! And the French comedians were all unmoved, and
hastened not to throw themselves at the feet of Le Sage, to pray, to
supplicate him to take under his all-powerful protection that theatre
elevated by the genius and by the toils of Molière! But these senseless
comedians were unable to foresee anything.

Nevertheless, if he had renounced the Théâtre Français, Le Sage had not
abandoned true comedy. All the comedies which thronged his brain, he
heaped them up in that grand work which is called "Gil Blas," and which
includes within itself alone the history of the human heart. What can
be said of "Gil Blas" which has not already been written? How can I
sufficiently eulogise the only book truly gay in the French language?
The man who wrote "Gil Blas" has placed himself in the first rank among
all the authors of this world; he has made himself, by the magic of
his pen, the cousin-german of Rabelais and Montaigne, the grandfather
of Voltaire, the brother of Cervantes, and the younger brother of
Molière; he takes his place, in plenitude of right, in the family of
comic poets, who have themselves been philosophers. In the same vein,
he has further composed the "Bachelier de Salamanque," which would be a
charming book if "Gil Blas" existed not, if above all, before writing
his "Gil Blas," he had not written this charming book, "LE DIABLE
BOITEUX."

And now, _sauve qui peut!_ the Devil is let loose upon the town, a
devil truly French, who has the wit, the grace, and the vivacity of Gil
Blas. Beware! Look to yourselves, you the ridiculous and the vicious,
who have escaped the high comedy of the stage, for, by the virtue of
this all-potent wand, not alone your mansions but your very souls
shall in a twinkling change to glass. Beware! I say; for Asmodeus,
the terrible scoffer, is about to plunge his pitiless eye into those
mysterious places which you deemed so impenetrable, and to each of you
he will reveal his secret history; he will strike you without mercy
with that ivory crutch which opens all doors and all hearts; he will
proclaim aloud your follies and your vices. None shall escape from
that vigilant observer, who, astride upon his crutch, glides upon
the roofs of the best secured houses, and divines their ambitions,
their jealousies, their inquietudes, and, above all, their midnight
wakefulness. Considered with relation to its wit without bitterness,
its satire which laughs at everything, and with regard to its style,
which is admirable, "Le Diable Boiteux" is perhaps the book most
perfectly French in our language; it is perhaps the only book that
Molière would have put his name to after "Gil Blas."

Such was this life, all filled with most delightful labour, as also
with the most serious toil; thus did this man, who was born a great
author, and who has raised to perfection the talent of writing, go
on from chef-d'oeuvre to chef-d'oeuvre without pause. The number of
his productions is not exactly known; at sixty-five years of age, he
yet wrote a volume of _mélanges_, and he died without imagining to
himself the glories which were reserved for his name. An amiable and
light-hearted philosopher, he was to the end full of wit and good
sense; an agreeable gossiper, a faithful friend, an indulgent father,
he retired to the little town of Boulogne-sur-Mer, where he became
without ceremony a good citizen, whom everybody shook by the hand
without any great suspicion that he was a man of genius. Of three sons
who had been born to him, two became comedians, to the great sorrow of
their noble father, who had preserved for the players, as is plainly
perceptible in "Gil Blas," a well-merited dislike. However, Le Sage
pardoned his two children, and he even frequently went to applaud the
elder, who had taken the name of Monmenil; and when Monmenil died,
before his father, Le Sage wept for him, and never from that time
(1743) entered a theatre. His third son, the brother of these two
comedians, was a good canon of Boulogne-sur-Mer; and it was to his
house that Le Sage retired with his wife and his daughter, deserving
objects of his affection, and who made all the happiness of his latest
days.

One of the most affable gentlemen of that time, who would have been
remarkable by his talents, even though he had not been distinguished
by his nobility, M. le Comte de Tressan, governor of Boulogne-sur-Mer,
was in the habit of seeing the worthy old man during the last year of
his life; and upon that fine face, shaded with thick white hairs, he
could still discern that love and genius had been there. Le Sage rose
early, and his first steps took him to seek the sun. By degrees, as
the luminous rays fell upon him, thought returned to his forehead,
motion to his heart, gesture to his hand, and his eyes were lighted
with their wonted fire: as the sun mounted in the skies, this awakened
intelligence appeared, on its side, more brilliant and more clear;
so much so, that you beheld again before you the author of "Gil
Blas." But, alas! all this animation drooped in proportion as the sun
declined; and, when night was come, you had before your eyes but a good
old man, whose steps must be tended to his dwelling.

Thus died he, one day in summer. The sun had shown itself in heaven's
topmost height on that bright day; and it had not quite left the earth
when Le Sage called the members of his family around to bless them. He
was little less than ninety when he died (1747).

To give you an idea of the popularity that this man enjoyed even
during his life-time, I will finish with this anecdote: When the
"Diable Boiteux" appeared, in 1707, the success of this admirable and
ingenious satire upon human life was so great, the public esteemed
the lively epigrams it contains so delightful, that the publisher was
obliged to print two editions in one week. On the last day of this
week, two gentlemen, their swords by their sides, as was then the
custom, entered the bookseller's shop to buy the new romance. A single
copy remained to sell: one of these gentlemen would have it, the other
also claimed it; what was to be done? Why, in a moment, there were our
two infuriate readers with their swords drawn, and fighting for the
first blood, and the last "Diable Boiteux."

But what, I pray you, had they done, were it a question then of the
"DIABLE BOITEUX" illustrated by TONY JOHANNOT?

 JULES JANIN.




[Illustration: a street in Madrid]

ASMODEUS; OR, THE DEVIL ON TWO STICKS.




CHAPTER I.


WHAT SORT OF A DEVIL HE OF THE TWO STICKS WAS--WHEN AND BY WHAT
ACCIDENT DON CLEOPHAS LEANDRO PEREZ ZAMBULLO FIRST GAINED THE HONOUR OF
HIS ACQUAINTANCE.


A night in the month of October covered with its thick darkness the
famous city of Madrid. Already the inhabitants, retired to their homes,
had left the streets free for lovers who desired to sing their woes
or their delights beneath the balconies of their mistresses; already
had the tinkling of guitars aroused the care of fathers, or alarmed
the jealousy of husbands; in short, it was near midnight, when Don
Cleophas Leandro Perez Zambullo, a student of Alcala, suddenly emerged,
by the skylight, from a house into which the incautious son of the
Cytherean goddess had induced him to enter. He sought to preserve his
life and his honour, by endeavouring to escape from three or four hired
assassins, who followed him closely, for the purpose of either killing
him or compelling him to wed a lady with whom they had just surprised
him.

[Illustration: Zambullo fleeing from the hired assassins]

Against such fearful odds he had for some time valiantly defended
himself; and had only flown, at last, on losing his sword in the
combat. The bravos followed him for some time over the roofs of the
neighbouring houses; but, favoured by the darkness, he evaded their
pursuit; and perceiving at some distance a light, which Love or Fortune
had placed there to guide him through this perilous adventure, he
hastened towards it with all his remaining strength. After having more
than once endangered his neck, he at length reached a garret, whence
the welcome rays proceeded, and without ceremony entered by the
window; as much transported with joy as the pilot who safely steers his
vessel into port when menaced with the horrors of shipwreck.

He looked cautiously around him; and, somewhat surprised to find nobody
in the apartment, which was rather a singular domicile, he began to
scrutinize it with much attention. A brass lamp was hanging from the
ceiling; books and papers were heaped in confusion on the table; a
globe and mariner's compass occupied one side of the room, and on the
other were ranged phials and quadrants; all which made him conclude
that he had found his way into the haunt of some astrologer, who, if he
did not live there, was in the habit of resorting to this hole to make
his observations.

He was reflecting on the dangers he had by good fortune escaped,
and was considering whether he should remain where he was until the
morning, or what other course he should pursue, when he heard a deep
sigh very near him. He at first imagined it was a mere phantasy of his
agitated mind, an illusion of the night; so, without troubling himself
about the matter, he was in a moment again busied with his reflections.

[Illustration: Lucifer, the mountebank's devil]

But having distinctly heard a second sigh, he no longer doubted its
reality; and, although he saw no one in the room, he nevertheless
called out,--"Who the devil is sighing here?" "It is I, Signor
Student," immediately answered a voice, in which there was something
rather extraordinary; "I have been for the last six months enclosed
in one of these phials. In this house lodges a learned astrologer,
who is also a magician: he it is who, by the power of his art, keeps
me confined in this narrow prison." "You are then a spirit?" said Don
Cleophas, somewhat perplexed by this new adventure. "I am a demon,"
replied the voice; "and you have come in the very nick of time to free
me from slavery. I languish in idleness; for of all the devils in hell,
I am the most active and indefatigable."

[Illustration: Uriel, patron of tradesmen]

These words somewhat alarmed Signor Zambullo; but, as he was naturally
brave, he quickly recovered himself, and said in a resolute tone:
"Signor Diabolus, tell me, I pray you, what rank you may hold among
your brethren. Are you an aristocrat, or a burgess?" "I am," replied
the voice, "a devil of importance, nay, the one of highest repute in
this, as in the other world." "Perchance," said Don Cleophas, "you
are the renowned Lucifer?" "Bah," replied the spirit; "why, he is
the mountebank's devil." "Are you Uriel then?" asked the Student.
"For shame!" hastily interrupted the voice; "no, he is the patron of
tradesmen; of tailors, butchers, bakers, and other cheats of the
middle classes." "Well, perhaps you are Beelzebub?" said Leandro.
"Are you joking?" replied the spirit; "he is the demon of duennas and
footmen." "That astonishes me," said Zambullo; "I thought Beelzebub
one of the greatest persons at your court." "He is one of the meanest
of its subjects," answered the Demon; "I see you have no very clear
notions of our hell."

[Illustration: Leviathan, Belphegor and Ashtaroth]

"There is no doubt then," said Don Cleophas, "that you are either
Leviathan, Belphegor, or Ashtaroth." "Ah! those three now," replied
the voice, "are devils of the first order, veritable spirits of
diplomacy. They animate the councils of princes, create factions,
excite insurrections, and light the torches of war. They are not
such peddling devils as the others you have named." "By the bye! tell
me," interrupted the Scholar, "what post is assigned to Flagel?"
"He is the soul of special pleading, and the spirit of the bar. He
composes the rules of court, invented the law of libel, and that for
the imprisonment of insolvent debtors; in short, he inspires pleaders,
possesses barristers, and besets even the judges.

[Illustration: Flagel]

"For myself, I have other occupations: I make absurd matches; I marry
greybeards with minors, masters with servants, girls with small
fortunes with tender lovers who have none. It is I who introduced into
this world luxury, debauchery, games of chance, and chemistry. I am
the author of the first cookery book, the inventor of festivals, of
dancing, music, plays, and of the newest fashions; in a word, I am
ASMODEUS, surnamed THE DEVIL ON TWO STICKS."

"What do I hear," cried Don Cleophas; "are you the famed Asmodeus, of
whom such honourable mention is made by Agrippa and in the Clavicula
Salamonis? Verily, you have not told me all your amusements; you have
forgotten the best of all. I am well aware that you sometimes divert
yourself by assisting unhappy lovers: by this token, last year only, a
young friend of mine obtained, by your favour, the good graces of the
wife of a Doctor in our university, at Alcala." "That is true," said
the spirit: "I reserved that for my last good quality. I am the Demon
of voluptuousness, or, to express it more delicately, Cupid, the god
of love; that being the name for which I am indebted to the poets,
who, I must confess, have painted me in very flattering colours. They
say I have golden wings, a fillet bound over my eyes; that I carry
a bow in my hand, a quiver full of arrows on my shoulders, and have
withal inexpressible beauty. Of this, however, you may soon judge for
yourself, if you will but restore me to liberty."

"Signor Asmodeus," replied Leandro Perez, "it is, as you know, long
since I have been devoted to you: the perils I have just escaped will
prove to you how entirely. I am rejoiced to have an opportunity of
serving you; but the vessel in which you are confined is undoubtedly
enchanted, and I should vainly strive to open, or to break it: so I do
not see clearly in what manner I can deliver you from your bondage.
I am not much used to these sorts of disenchantments; and, between
ourselves, if, cunning devil as you are, you know not how to gain your
freedom, what probability is there that a poor mortal like myself can
effect it?" "Mankind has this power," answered the Demon. "The phial
which encloses me is but a mere glass bottle, easy to break. You have
only to throw it on the ground, and I shall appear before you in human
form." "In that case," said the Student, "the matter is easier of
accomplishment than I imagined. But tell me in which of the phials you
are; I see a great number of them, and all so like one another, that
there may be a devil in each, for aught I know." "It is the fourth from
the window," replied the spirit. "There is the impress of a magical
seal on its mouth; but the bottle will break, nevertheless." "Enough,"
said Don Cleophas; "I am ready to do your bidding. There is, however,
one little difficulty which deters me: when I shall have rendered you
the service you require, how know I that I shall not have to pay the
magician, in my precious person, for the mischief I have done?" "No
harm shall befall you," replied the Demon: "on the contrary, I promise
to content you with the fruits of my gratitude. I will teach you all
you can desire to know; I will discover to you the shifting scenes of
this world's great stage; I will exhibit to you the follies and the
vices of mankind; in short, I will be your tutelary demon: and, more
wise than the Genius of Socrates, I undertake to render you a greater
sage than that unfortunate philosopher. In a word, I am yours, with all
my good and bad qualities; and they shall be to you equally useful."

"Fine promises, doubtless," replied the Student; "but if report speak
truly, you devils are accused of not being religiously scrupulous
in the performance of your undertakings." "Report is not always a
liar," said Asmodeus, "and this is an instance to the contrary. The
greater part of my brethren think no more of breaking their word than
a minister of state; but for myself, not to mention the service you
are about to render me, and which I can never sufficiently repay, I am
a slave to my engagements; and I swear by all a devil holds sacred,
that I will not deceive you. Rely on my word, and the assurances I
offer: and what must be peculiarly pleasing to you, I engage, this
night, to avenge your wrongs on Donna Thomasa, the perfidious woman
who had concealed within her house the four scoundrels who surprised
you, that she might compel you to espouse her, and patch up her damaged
reputation."

The young Zambullo was especially delighted with this last promise. To
hasten its accomplishment, he seized the phial; and, without further
thought on the event, he dashed it on the floor. It broke into a
thousand pieces, inundating the apartment with a blackish liquor: this,
evaporating by degrees, was converted into a thick vapour, which,
suddenly dissipating, revealed to the astonished sight of the Student
the figure of a man in a cloak, about two feet six inches high, and
supported by two crutches. This little monster had the legs of a goat,
a long visage, pointed chin, a dark sallow complexion, and a very flat
nose; his eyes, to all appearance very small, resembled two burning
coals; his enormous mouth was surmounted by a pair of red mustachios,
and ornamented with two lips of unequalled ugliness.

[Illustration: Asmodeus revealed to Zambullo]

The head of this graceful Cupid was enveloped in a sort of turban of
red crape, relieved by a plume of cock's and peacock's feathers. Round
his neck was a collar of yellow cloth, upon which were embroidered
divers patterns of necklaces and earrings. He wore a short white
satin gown, or tunic, encircled about the middle by a large band of
parchment of the same colour, covered with talismanic characters. On
the gown, also, were painted various bodices, beautifully adapted for
the display of the fair wearers' necks; scarfs of different patterns,
worked or coloured aprons, and head-dresses of the newest fashion;--all
so extravagant, that it was impossible to admire one more than another.

[Illustration: Detail of the cloak: the Spanish lady and her admirer]

But all this was nothing as compared with his cloak, the foundation
of which was also white satin. Its exterior presented an infinity of
figures delicately tinted in Indian ink, and yet with so much freedom
and expression that you would have wondered who the devil could have
painted it. On one side appeared a Spanish lady covered with her
mantilla, and leering at a stranger on the promenade; and on the other
a Parisian grisette, who before her mirror was studying new airs to
victimize a young abbé, at that moment opening the door. Here, the gay
Italian was singing to the guitar beneath the balcony of his mistress;
and there, the sottish German, with vest unbuttoned, stupefied with
wine, and more begrimed with snuff than a French petit-maître, was
sitting, surrounded by his companions, at a table covered with the
filthy remnants of their debauch. In one place could be perceived a
Turkish bashaw coming from the bath, attended by all the houris of his
seraglio, each watchful for the handkerchief; and in another an English
gentleman, who was gallantly presenting to his lady-love a pipe and a
glass of porter.

[Illustration: The gamesters]

Besides these there were gamesters, marvellously well portrayed; some,
elated with joy, filling their hats with pieces of gold and silver;
and others, who had lost all but their honour, and willing to stake on
that, now turning their sacrilegious eyes to heaven, and now gnawing
the very cards in despair. In short, there were as many curious things
to be seen on this cloak as on the admirable shield which Vulcan forged
for Achilles, at the prayer of his mother Thetis; with this difference
however,--the subjects on the buckler of the Grecian hero had no
relation to his own exploits, while those on the mantle of Asmodeus
were lively images of all that is done in this world at his suggestion.




CHAPTER II.

WHAT FOLLOWED THE DELIVERANCE OF ASMODEUS.


Upon perceiving that his appearance had not prepossessed the student
very greatly in his favour, the Demon said to him, smiling: "Well,
Signor Don Cleophas Leandro Perez Zambullo, you behold the charming
god of love, that sovereign master of the human heart. What think you
of my air and beauty? Confess that the poets are excellent painters."
"Frankly!" replied Don Cleophas, "I must say they have a little
flattered you. I fancy, it was not in this form that you won the love
of Psyche." "Certainly not," replied the Devil: "I borrowed the graces
of a little French marquis, to make her dote upon me. Vice must be
hidden under a pleasing veil, or it wins not even woman. I take what
shape best pleases me; and I could have discovered myself to you under
the form of the Apollo Belvi, but that as I have nothing to disguise
from you, I preferred you should see me under a figure more agreeable
to the opinion which the world generally entertains of me and my
performances." "I am not surprised," said Leandro, "to find you rather
ugly--excuse the phrase, I pray you; the transactions we are about to
have with each other demand a little frankness: your features indeed
almost exactly realise the idea I had formed of you. But tell me, how
happens it that you are on crutches?"

"Why," replied the Demon, "many years ago, I had an unfortunate
difference with Pillardoc, the spirit of gain, and the patron of
pawnbrokers. The subject of our dispute was a stripling who came to
Paris to seek his fortune. As he was capital game, a youth of promising
talents, we contested the prize with a noble ardour. We fought in the
regions of mid-air; and Pillardoc, who excelled me in strength, cast me
on the earth after the mode in which Jupiter is related by the poets
to have tumbled Vulcan. The striking resemblance of our mishaps gained
me, from my witty comrades, the sobriquet of the Limping Devil, or the
Devil on Two Sticks, which has stuck to me from that time to this.
Nevertheless, limping as I am, I am tolerably quick in my movements;
and you shall witness for my agility.

"But," added he, "a truce to idle talk; let us get out of this
confounded garret. My friend the magician will be here shortly; as he
is hard at work on rendering a handsome damsel, who visits him nightly,
immortal. If he should surprise us, I shall be snug in a bottle in no
time; and it may go hard but he finds one to fit you also. So let us
away! But first to throw the pieces, of that which was once my prison,
out of the window; for such 'dead men' as these _do_ tell tales."

"What if your friend does find out that you are 'missing?'" "What!"
hastily replied the Demon; "I see you have never studied the Treatise
on Compulsions. Were I hidden at the extremity of the earth, or in the
region where dwells the fiery salamander; though I sought the murkiest
cavern of the gnomes, or plunged in the most unfathomable depths of the
ocean, I should vainly strive to evade the terrors of his wrath. Hell
itself would tremble at the potency of his spells. In vain should I
struggle: despite myself should I be dragged before my master, to feel
the weight of his dreaded chains."

[Illustration: Asmodeus carried off]

"That being the case," said the Student, "I fear that our intimacy will
not be of long duration: this redoubtable necromancer will doubtless
soon discover your flight." "That is more than I know," replied the
Spirit; "there is no foreseeing what may happen." "What!" cried Leandro
Perez; "a demon, and ignorant of the future!" "Exactly so," answered
the Devil; "and they are only our dupes who think otherwise. However,
there are enough of them to find good employment for diviners and
fortune-tellers, especially among your women of quality; for those are
always most eager about the future who have best reason to be contented
with the present, which and the past are all we know or care for. I am
ignorant, therefore, whether my master will soon discover my absence;
but let us hope he will not: there are plenty of phials similar to
the one in which I was enclosed, and he may never miss that. Besides,
in his laboratory, I am something like a law-book in the library of a
financier. He never thinks of me; or if he does, he would think he did
me too great an honour if he condescended to notice me. He is the most
haughty enchanter of my acquaintance: long as he has deprived me of my
liberty, we have never exchanged a syllable."

"That is extraordinary!" said Don Cleophas; "what have you done
to deserve so much hatred or scorn?" "I crossed him in one of his
projects," replied Asmodeus. "There was a chair vacant in a certain
Academy, which he had designed for a friend of his, a professor of
necromancy; but which I had destined for a particular friend of my own.
The magician set to work with one of the most potent talismans of the
Cabala; but I knew better than that: I had placed my man in the service
of the prime minister; whose word is worth a dozen talismans, with the
Academicians, any day."

While the Demon was thus conversing, he was busily engaged in
collecting every fragment of the broken phial; which having thrown out
of the window, "Signor Zambullo," said he, "let us begone! Hold fast by
the end of my mantle, and fear nothing." However perilous this appeared
to Leandro Perez, he preferred the possible danger to the certainty of
the magician's resentment; and, accordingly, he fastened himself as
well as he could to the Demon, who in an instant whisked him out of the
apartment.

[Illustration: Asmodeus and Zambullo flying over Madrid]




CHAPTER III.


WHERE THE DEVIL TRANSLATED THE STUDENT; AND THE FIRST FRUITS OF HIS
ECCLESIASTICAL ELEVATION.


Cleophas found that Asmodeus had not vainly boasted of his agility.
They darted through the air like an arrow from the bow, and were
soon perched on the tower of San Salvador. "Well, Signor Leandro,"
said the Demon as they alighted; "what think you now of the justice
of those who, as they slowly rumble in some antiquated vehicle, talk
of a devilish bad carriage?" "I must, hereafter, think them most
unreasonable," politely replied Zambullo. "I dare affirm that his
majesty of Castile has never travelled so easily; and then for speed,
at your rate, one might travel round the world nor care to stretch a
leg."

"You are really too polite," replied the Devil; "but can you guess now
why I have brought you here? I intend to show you all that is passing
in Madrid; and as this part of the town is as good to begin with as
any, you will allow that I could not have chosen a more appropriate
situation. I am about, by my supernatural powers, to take away the
roofs from the houses of this great city; and notwithstanding the
darkness of the night, to reveal to your eyes whatever is doing within
them." As he spake, he extended his right arm, the roofs disappeared,
and the Student's astonished sight penetrated the interior of the
surrounding dwellings as plainly as if the noon-day sun shone over
them. "It was," says Luis Velez de Guevara, "like looking into a pasty
from which a set of greedy monks had just removed the crust."

[Illustration: the miser counting his gold and silver]

The spectacle was, as you may suppose, sufficiently wonderful to rivet
all the Student's attention. He looked amazedly around him, and on
all sides were objects which most intensely excited his curiosity. At
length the Devil said to him: "Signor Don Cleophas, this confusion of
objects, which you regard with an evident pleasure, is certainly very
agreeable to look upon; but I must render useful to you what would
be otherwise but a frivolous amusement. To unlock for you the secret
chambers of the human heart, I will explain in what all these persons
that you see are engaged. All shall be open to you; I will discover
the hidden motives of their deeds, and reveal to you their unbidden
thoughts.

[Illustration: the miser's nephews consulting the sorceress]

"Where shall we begin? See! do you observe this house to my right?
Observe that old man, who is counting gold and silver into heaps. He is
a miserly citizen. His carriage, which he bought for next to nothing at
the sale of an alcade of the Cortes, and which to save expense still
sports the arms of its late owner, is drawn by a pair of worthless
mules, which he feeds according to the law of the Twelve Tables, that
is to say, he gives each, daily, one pound of barley: he treats them
as the Romans treated their slaves--wisely, but not too well. It is
now two years since he returned from the Indies, bringing with him
innumerable bars of gold, which he has since converted into coin. Look
at the old fool! with what satisfaction he gloats over his riches. And
now, see what is passing in an adjoining chamber of the same house. Do
you observe two young men with an old woman?" "Yes," replied Cleophas,
"they are probably his children." "No, no!" said the Devil, "they are
his nephews, and, what is better in their opinion, his heirs. In their
anxiety for his welfare, they have invited a sorceress to ascertain
when death will take from them their dear uncle, and leave to them the
division of his spoil. In the next house there are a pair of pictures
worth remarking. One is an antiquated coquette who is retiring to rest,
after depositing on her toilet, her hair, her eyebrows and her teeth;
the other is a gallant sexagenarian, who has just returned from a love
campaign. He has already closed one eye, in its case, and placed his
whiskers and peruke on the dressing table. His valet is now easing him
of an arm and one leg, to put him to bed with the rest."

[Illustration: the valet removing the sexagenarian's wooden leg]

"If I may trust my eyes," cried Zambullo, "I see in the next room a
tall young damsel, quite a model for an artist. What a lovely form and
air!" "I see," said the Devil. "Well! that young beauty is an elder
sister of the gallant I have just described, and is a worthy pendant
to the coquette who is under the same roof. Her figure, that you so
much admire, is really good; but then she is indebted for it to an
ingenious mechanist, whom I patronise. Her bust and hips are formed
after my own patent; and it is only last Sunday that she generously
dropped her bustle at the door of this very church, on the occasion of
a charity sermon. Nevertheless, as she affects the juvenile, she has
two cavaliers who ardently dispute her favour;--nay, they have even
come to blows on the occasion. Madmen! two dogs fighting for a bone.

[Illustration: the old lady being unlaced by her maid]

"Prithee, laugh with me at an amateur concert which is performing in
a neighbouring mansion; an after-supper offering to Apollo. They are
singing cantatas. An old counsellor has composed the air; and the
words are by an alguazil, who does the amiable after that fashion
among his friends--an ass who writes verses for his own pleasure, and
for the punishment of others. A harpsichord and clarionet form the
accompaniment; a lanky chorister, who squeaks marvellously, takes
the treble, and a young girl with a hoarse voice the bass." "What a
delightful party!" cried Don Cleophas. "Had they tried expressly to get
up a musical extravaganza, they could not have succeeded better."

[Illustration: the amateur concert]

"Cast your eyes on that superb mansion," continued the Demon; "and
you will perceive a nobleman lying in a splendid apartment. He has,
near his couch, a casket filled with billets-doux; in which he is
luxuriating, that the sweet nothings they contain may lull his senses
gently to repose. They ought to be dear to him, for they are from
a signora he adores; and who so well appreciates the value of her
favours, that she will soon reduce him to the necessity of soliciting
the exile of a viceroyalty, for his own support. Let us leave him to
his slumbers, to watch the stir they are making in the next house
to the left. Can you distinguish a lady in a bed with red damask
furniture? Her name is Donna Fabula. She is of high rank, and is about
to present an heir to her spouse, the aged Don Torribio, whom you
see by her side, endeavouring to soothe the pangs of his lady until
the arrival of the midwife. Is it not delightful to witness so much
tenderness? The cries of his dear better-half pierce him to the soul:
he is overwhelmed with grief; he suffers as much as his wife. With
what care,--with what earnestness does he bend over her!" "Really,"
said Leandro, "the man does appear deeply affected; but I perceive, in
the room above, a youngster apparently a domestic, who sleeps soundly
enough: he troubles himself not for the event." "And yet it ought to
interest him," replied Asmodeus; "for the sleeper is the first cause of
his mistress's sufferings.

[Illustration: Don Torribio soothing Donna Fabula]

"But see,--a little beyond," continued the Demon: "in that low room,
you may observe an old wretch who is anointing himself with lard. He
is about to join an assembly of wizards, which takes place to-night
between San Sebastian and Fontarabia. I would carry you thither in a
moment, as it would amuse you; but that I fear I might be recognised by
the devil who personates the goat."

"That devil and you then," said the Scholar, "are not good friends?"
"No, indeed! you are right," replied Asmodeus, "he is that same
Pillardoc of whom I told you. The scoundrel would betray me, and soon
inform the magician of my flight." "You have perhaps had some other
squabble with this gentleman?" "Precisely so," said the Demon: "some
ten years ago we had a second difference about a young Parisian who was
thinking of commencing life. He wanted to make him a banker's clerk;
and I, a lady-killer. Our comrades settled the dispute by making him
a wretched monk. This done, they reconciled us: we embraced; and from
that time have been mortal foes."

"But, have done with this belle assemblée," said Don Cleophas; "I am
not at all curious to witness it: let us continue our scrutiny into
what is before us. What is the meaning of those sparks of fire which
issue from yonder cellar?" "They proceed from one of the most absurd
occupations of mankind," replied the Devil. "The grave personage
whom you behold near the furnace is an alchymist; and the flames
are gradually consuming his rich patrimony, never to yield him what
he seeks in return. Between ourselves, the philosopher's stone is a
chimera that I myself invented to amuse the wit of man, who ever seeks
to pass those bounds which the laws of nature have prescribed for his
intelligence.

"The alchymist's neighbour is an honest apothecary, who you perceive
is still at his labours, with his aged wife and assistant. You would
never guess what they are about. The apothecary is compounding a
progenerative pill for an old advocate who is to be married to-morrow;
the assistant is mixing a laxative potion; and the old lady is pounding
astringent drugs in a mortar."

[Illustration: the apothecary, his wife, and his assistant]

"I perceive, in the house facing the apothecary's," said Zambullo, "a
man who has just jumped out of bed, and is hastily dressing." "Pshaw!"
replied the Spirit, "he need not hurry himself. He is a physician; and
has been sent for by a prelate who since he has retired to rest--about
an hour--has absolutely coughed two or three times.

"But look a little further, in a garret on the right, and try if you
cannot distinguish a man half dressed, who is walking up and down the
room, dimly lighted by a single lamp." "I see," said the Student; "and
so clearly that I would undertake to furnish you with an inventory of
his chattels,--to wit, a truckle-bed, a three-legged stool, and a deal
table; the walls seem to be daubed all over with black paint." "That
exalted personage," said Asmodeus, "is a poet; and what appears to
you black paint, are tragic verses with which he has ornamented his
apartment, being obliged, for want of paper, to commit his effusions to
the wall." "By his agitation and phrenzied air, I conclude he is now
busily engaged on some work of importance," said Don Cleophas. "You are
not far out," replied the Devil: "he only yesterday completed the last
act of an interesting tragedy, intitled The Universal Deluge. He cannot
be reproached with having violated the unity of place, at all events,
as the entire action is limited to Noah's ark.

[Illustration: The poet, composing his dedication]

"I can assure you it is a first-rate drama: all the animals talk as
learnedly as professors. It of course must have a dedication, upon
which he has been labouring for the last six hours; and he is, at
this moment, turning the last period. It will be indeed a masterpiece
of adulatory composition: every social and political virtue; every
grace that can adorn; all that tends to render man illustrious, either
by his own deeds or those of his ancestors, are attributed to its
object;--never was praise more lavishly bestowed, never was incense
burnt more liberally." "For whom, then, of all the world, is so
magnificent an apotheosis intended?" "Why," replied the Demon, "the
poet himself has not yet determined that; he has put in every thing but
the name. However, he hopes to find some vain noble who may be more
liberal than those to whom he has dedicated his former productions;
although the purchasers of imaginary virtues are becoming every
day more rare. It is not my fault that it is so; for it is a fault
corrected in the wealthy patrons of literature, and a great benefit
rendered to the public, who were certain to be deluged by trash from
the Swiss of the press, so long as books were written merely for the
produce of their dedications.

"Apropos of this subject," added the Demon, "I will relate to you a
curious anecdote. It is not long since an illustrious lady accepted
the honour of a dedication from a celebrated novelist, who, by the
bye, writes so much in praise of other women, that he thinks himself
at liberty to abuse the one peculiarly his own. The lady in question
was anxious to see the address before it was printed; and not finding
herself described to her taste, she wisely undertook the task, and
gave herself all those inconvenient virtues, which the world so much
admires. She then sent it to the author, who of course had weighty
reasons for adopting it."

"Hollo!" cried Leandro, "surely those are robbers who are entering
that house by the balcony." "Precisely so," said Asmodeus; "they are
brigands, and the house is a banker's. Watch them! you will be amused.
See! they have opened the safe, and are ferreting everywhere; but the
banker has been before them. He set out yesterday for Holland, and has
taken with him the contents of his coffers for fear of accidents.
They may make a merit of their visit, by informing his unfortunate
depositors of their loss."

[Illustration: The brigands opening the banker's safe]

"There is another thief," said Zambullo, "mounting by a silken ladder
into a neighbouring dwelling." "You are mistaken there," replied the
Devil; "at all events it is not gold he seeks. He is a marquis, who
would rob a young maiden of the name, of which, however, she is not
unwilling to part. Never was 'stand and deliver' more graciously
received: he of course has sworn he will marry her, and she of course
believes him; for a marquis's 'promises' have unlimited credit upon
Love's Exchange."

[Illustration: the registrar and Griffael]

"I am curious to learn," interrupted the Student, "what that man in a
night-cap and dressing-gown is about. He is writing very studiously,
and near him is a little black figure, who occasionally guides his
hand." "He is a registrar of the civil courts," replied the Demon; "and
to oblige a guardian, is, for a consideration, altering a decree made
in favour of the ward: the gentleman in black, who seems enjoying the
sport, is Griffael the registrars' devil." "Griffael, then," said Don
Cleophas, "is a sort of deputy to Flagel; for, as he is the spirit of
the bar, the registrars are doubtless included in his department." "Not
so," replied Asmodeus; "the registrars have been thought deserving of
their peculiar demon, and I assure you they find him quite enough to
do."

[Illustration: the widow, her lover, and her uncle]

"Near the registrar's house, you will perceive a young lady on the
first floor. She is a widow; and the man, whom you see in the same
room, is her uncle, who lodges in an apartment over hers. Admire the
bashfulness of the dame! She is ashamed to put on her chemise before
her aged relative; so, modestly seeks the assistance of her lover, who
is hidden in her dressing-room.

[Illustration: Donoso receives the pages in his apartment]

"In the same house with the registrar lives a stout graduate, who has
been lame from his birth, but who has not his equal in the world for
pleasantry. Volumnius, so highly spoken of by Cicero for his delicate
yet pungent wit, was a fool to him. He is known throughout Madrid as
'the bachelor Donoso,' or 'the facetious graduate;' and his company
is sought by old and young, at the court and in the town: in short,
wherever there is, or should be, conviviality, he is so much the rage,
that he has discharged his cook, as he never dines at home; to which
he seldom returns until long after midnight. He is at present with
the marquis of Alcazinas, who is indebted for this visit to chance
only." "How, to chance?" interrupted Leandro. "Why," replied the
Demon, "this morning, about noon, the graduate's door was besieged by
at least half-a-dozen carriages, each sent for the especial honour of
securing his society. The bachelor received the assembled pages in his
apartment, and, displaying a pack of cards, thus addressed them:--'My
friends, as it is impossible for me to dine in six places at one time,
and as it would not appear polite to show an undue preference, these
cards shall decide the matter. Draw! I will dine with the king of
clubs.'"

[Illustration: The cavalier serenades his inamorata]

"What object," said Don Cleophas, "has yonder cavalier, who is sitting
at a door on the other side of the street? Is he waiting for some
pretty waiting-woman to usher him to his lady's chamber?" "No, no,"
answered Asmodeus; "he is a young Castilian, whose modesty exceeds his
love; so, after the fashion of the gallants of antiquity, he has come
to pass the night at his mistress's portal. Listen to the twang of that
wretched guitar, with which he accompanies his tender strains! On the
second floor you may behold his inamorata: she is weeping as she hears
him;--but it is for the absence of his rival.

"You observe that new building, which is divided into two wings. One
is occupied by the proprietor, the old gentleman whom you see now
pacing the apartment, now throwing himself into an easy chair." "He is
evidently immersed in some grand project," said Zambullo: "who is he?
If one may judge by the splendour which is displayed in his mansion,
he is a grandee of the first order." "Nevertheless," said Asmodeus,
"he is but an ancient clerk of the treasury, who has grown old in
such lucrative employment as to enable him to amass four millions of
reals. As he has some compunctions of conscience for the means by
which all this wealth has been acquired, and as he expects shortly to
be called upon to render his account in another world, where bribery
is impracticable, he is about to compound for his sins in this, by
building a monastery; which done, he flatters himself that peace will
revisit his heart. He has already obtained the necessary permission;
but, as he has resolved that the establishment shall consist of monks
who are extremely chaste, sober, and of the most Christian humility,
he is much embarrassed in the selection. He need not build a very
extensive convent.

"The other wing is inhabited by a fair lady, who has just retired to
rest after the luxury of a milk bath. This voluptuary is widow of a
knight of the order of Saint James, who left her at his death her
title only; but fortunately her charms have secured for her valuable
friends in the persons of two members of the council of Castile, who
generously divide her favours and the expenses of her household."

"Hark!" cried the Student; "surely I hear the cries of distress. What
dreadful misfortune has occurred?" "A very common one," said the
Demon: "two young cavaliers have been gambling in a hell (the name is
a scandal on the infernal regions), which you perceive so brilliantly
illuminated. They quarrelled upon an interesting point of the game,
and I naturally drew their swords to settle it: unluckily, they were
equally skilful with their weapons, and are both mortally wounded. The
elder is married, which is unfortunate; and the younger an only son.
The wife and father have just come in time to receive their last sighs;
and it is their lamentations that you hear. 'Unhappy boy,' cries the
fond parent over the still breathing body of his son, 'how often have I
conjured thee to renounce this dreadful vice!--how often have I warned
thee it would one day cost thee thy life. Heaven is my witness, that
the fault is none of mine!' Men," added the Demon, "are always selfish,
even in their griefs. Meanwhile the wife is in despair. Although her
husband has dissipated the fortune she brought him on their marriage;
although he has sold, to maintain his shameful excesses, her jewels,
and even her clothes, not a word of reproach escapes her lips. She is
inconsolable for her loss. Her grief is vented in frantic exclamations,
mixed with curses on the cards, and the devil who invented them; on the
place in which her husband fell, and on the people who surround her,
and to whom she fondly attributes his ruin."

[Illustration: the expiring duellists]

"How much to be lamented," interrupted the Student, "is the love of
gaming which possesses so large a portion of mankind; in what an awful
state of excitement does it plunge its victims. Heaven be praised! I
am not included in their legion." "You are in high feather," replied
the Demon, "in another, whose exploits are not much more ennobling, and
scarcely less dangerous. Is the conquest of a courtezan a glory worth
achievement? Is the possession of charms common to a whole city worth
the peril of a life? Man is an amusing animal! The vision of a mole
would enable him to discover the vices of his fellows, while that of
the vulture could scarce detect a folly of his own. But let us turn to
another affecting spectacle. You can discern, in the house just beyond
the one we have been contemplating, a fat old man extended on a bed: he
is a canon, who is now in a fit of apoplexy. The two persons, whom you
see in his room, are said to be his nephew and niece: they are too much
affected by his situation to be able to assist him; so, are securing
his valuable effects. By the time this is accomplished, he will be
dead; and they will be sufficiently recovered, and at leisure, to weep
over his remains.

[Illustration: the canon's nephew and niece steal his possessions]

"Close by, you may perceive the funeral of two brothers; who, seized
with the same disorder, took equally successful but different means of
ensuring its fatality. One of them had the most utter confidence in
his apothecary; the other eschewed the aid of medicine: the first died
because he took all the trash his doctor sent him; the last because he
would take nothing." "Well! that is very perplexing," said Leandro;
"what is a poor sick devil to do?" "Why," replied Asmodeus, "that is
more than the one who has the honour of addressing you can determine.
I know, for certain, that there are remedies for most ills; but I am
not so sure that there are good physicians to administer them when
necessary."

"And now I have something more amusing to unriddle. Do you not hear a
frightful din in the next street? A widow of sixty was married this
morning to an Adonis of seventeen; and all the merry fellows of that
part of the town have assembled to celebrate the wedding by a concert
of pots and pans, marrow-bones and cleavers." "You told me," said the
Student, "that these matches were under your control: at all events,
you had no hand in this." "No, truly," answered the Demon, "not I. Had
I been free, I should not have meddled with them. The widow had her
scruples; and has married for no better reason than that she may enjoy,
without remorse, the pleasures she so dearly loves. These are not the
unions I care to form; I prefer troubling people's consciences to
setting them at rest."

"Notwithstanding this charming serenade," said Zambullo, "it seems to
me that it is not the only concert performing in the neighbourhood."
"No," said the cripple; "in a tavern in the same street, a lusty
Flemish captain, a chorister of the French opera, and an officer of the
German guard are singing a trio. They have been drinking since eight
in the morning; and each deems it a duty to his country, to see the
others under the table."

[Illustration: the three drinkers]

"Look for a moment on the house which stands by itself, nearly opposite
to that of the apoplectic canon: you will see three very pretty but
very notorious courtezans enjoying themselves with as many young
courtiers." "They are, indeed, lovely!" exclaimed Don Cleophas. "I
am not surprised that they should be notorious: happy are the lovers
who possess them! They seem, however, very partial to their present
companions: I envy them their good fortune." "Why, you are very green!"
replied the Demon: "their faces are not disguised with greater skill
than are their hearts. However prodigal of their caresses, they have
not the slightest tenderness for their foolish swains; their affection
is bounded to the purses of their lovers. One of them has just secured
the promise of a liberal establishment; and the others are prepared
with settlements which they are in expectation of securing ere they
part. It is the same with them all. Men vainly ruin themselves for the
sex: gold buys not love. The well-paid mistress soon treats her lover
as a husband: that is a rule which I found necessary to establish in my
code of intrigue. But we will leave these fools to taste the pleasures
they so dearly purchase; while their valets, who are waiting in the
street, console themselves with the pleasing anticipation of enjoying
them gratis."

"Tell me," interrupted Leandro Perez, "what is passing in that splendid
mansion on the left. The house is filled with well-dressed cavaliers
and ladies; and all seems dancing and conviviality. It is indeed a
joyous festival." "It is another wedding," said Asmodeus; "and happy
as they now are, it is not three days since that house witnessed the
deepest affliction. It is a story worth hearing: it is rather long,
certainly; but it will repay your patience." The Devil then began as
follows.




CHAPTER IV.


STORY OF THE LOVES OF THE COUNT DE BELFLOR AND LEONORA DE CESPEDES.


Leonora de Cespedes was passionately beloved by the young Count de
Belflor, one of the most distinguished nobles of the court. He had,
however, no thoughts of suing for her hand; the daughter of a private
gentleman might command his love, but had no pretensions in his eyes to
rank above his mistress; and such was the honour he designed for her.

Accordingly, he followed her everywhere; and lost no opportunity of
testifying by his glances the extent of his affection for her person;
but he was unable to converse with her, or even to communicate by
letter, so incessantly and vigilantly was she guarded by an austere
duenna, the lady Marcella. He was almost in despair; yet, incited by
the obstacles which were thus opposed to his desires, he was constantly
occupied in devising means for their attainment, and for deceiving the
Argus who so carefully watched his Io.

In the meanwhile, Leonora had perceived the attention with which the
Count regarded her; and flattered by that first homage, so delightful
to the unworn heart, she soon yielded to the soft persuasion of his
eyes, and insensibly formed for him a passion as violent as his own.
The flames of love are seldom kindled at the altar but they burn the
temple. I did not, however, fan those thus lighted in her bosom, for
the magician had put a stopper on my operations; but Nature, and
woman's nature especially, is generally potent enough in such cases,
without my assistance. Indeed, I doubt if she does not manage these
matters best by herself; the only difference in our modes of procedure
being, that Nature saps the heart by slow degrees, while I love to
carry it by storm.

Affairs were in this posture, when Leonora, and her eternal governante,
going one morning to church, were accosted by an old woman, carrying
in her hand one of the largest chaplets ever framed by hypocrisy.
"Heaven bless you!" said she, addressing herself, with a saintly
smile, to the duenna, "the peace of God be with you! Have I not the
honour of speaking to the lady Marcella, the chaste widow of the
lamented Signor Martin Rosetta?" "You have," replied the governante.
"How fortunate!" exclaimed the old hypocrite; "I have a relation, at
this moment lying at my house, who would see you ere he dies. He was
intimately acquainted with your dear husband, and has matters of the
utmost importance to communicate to you. It is only three days since
he arrived in Madrid, from Flanders, for the express purpose of seeing
you; but scarcely had he entered my house when he was stretched on a
bed of sickness, and he has now, I fear, but a few hours to live. Let
us hasten, while there is yet time, to soothe the pangs of his passing
spirit: a few steps will bring us to his side."

[Illustration: Leonora, Marcella and the old woman]

The wary duenna, who had seen enough of the world to be suspicious of
the best even of her own sex, still, however, hesitated to follow:
which the old lady perceiving, "My dear lady Marcella," said she,
"surely you do not doubt me. You must have heard of La Chichona. Why!
the licentiate Marcos de Figuerna and the bachelor Mira de Mesqua
would answer for me as for their grandmothers. If I desire that you
accompany me to my house, it is for your good only. Heaven forbid
that I should touch the smallest portion of that which is your due,
and which my poor relation is so anxious to repay to the wife of his
friend!" At the word "repay," the lady Marcella hesitated no longer:
"Let us go, my child," said she to Leonora; "we will see this good
woman's relation;--to visit the sick is among the first of our duties."
"Verily," said the Demon, "charity does cover a multitude of sins!"

[Illustration: at the house of La Chichona]

They soon arrived at the house of La Chichona, who introduced them to
a mean apartment, where they found a man in bed: he had a long beard,
and if he were not really desperately ill, he at least appeared to
be so. "See, cousin!" said the old woman, presenting the governante;
"behold the person whom you sought so anxiously; this is the lady
Marcella, the respected widow of your friend Rosetta." At these words,
the old man raised himself on his pillow with apparent difficulty;
and, making signs for the duenna to approach him, said with a feeble
voice,--"Heaven be praised, for its mercy in permitting me to live till
now!--to see you, my dear lady, was all that I desired upon earth.
Indeed, I feared to die, without the satisfaction of seeing you, and of
rendering into your hands the hundred ducats which your late husband,
my dearest friend, so kindly lent me in my dire necessity, at Bruges,
when but for that assistance my honour had been for ever lost:--but you
must have often heard of me and my adventures."

"Alas! no," replied Marcella, "he never mentioned it to me. God rest
his soul! he was ever so generous as to forget the services he rendered
to his friends; and so far from boasting of such kindnesses as these,
I can declare that I even never heard of his doing a good action in
his life." "His was indeed a noble mind," replied the sick man, "as
I have perhaps better reason to know than most persons; and to prove
this to you I must relate the history of the unfortunate affair from
which his liberality so happily released me. But as I shall have to
speak of things which should be disclosed to no other ears than thine,
honourable as they are to the memory of my deceased friend, it were
better that we should be alone."

"Oh, certainly!" cried Chichona, "though it would delight me to hear
of the good Rosetta, whom you are always praising, we will retire to
my closet;" saying which, she led Leonora into the next apartment. No
sooner had she done so, and closed the door, than without ceremony the
old woman thus addressed her companion:--"Charming Leonora, our moments
are too precious to be wasted. You know the young Count de Belflor, at
least by sight. Need I say how long he has loved you, and how ardently
he desires to tell you so? Driven to despair by the vigilance and
austerity of Marcella, he has had recourse to my assistance to procure
him an interview; and I, who could refuse nothing to so handsome a
cavalier, have dressed up his valet as the sick man you have just seen,
that I might engage your governante's attention and bring you hither."

As she finished speaking, the Count, who was concealed by the drapery
of a little window, discovered himself, and, falling at the feet of
Leonora: "Madam," said he, "pardon the stratagem of a lover, who could
no longer conceal from you the passion that is destroying the life to
which it alone gives value:--but for this good woman's kindness, I had
perished in despair." These words, uttered with respectful earnestness,
by a man whose appearance was far from displeasing, affected, while
they perplexed Leonora, and she remained for some time speechless.
But at length recovering herself, she looked, or endeavoured to look,
haughtily on her prostrate lover, and replied: "Truly you are deeply
indebted to your obliging confidante for this attention, but I am not
so sure that I have equal reason to be thankful, or that you will gain
by her kindness the object you desire."

In saying these words, she moved towards the door; but the Count,
gently detaining her, exclaimed: "Stay, adorable Leonora! deign to
listen to me but for an instant. Be not alarmed! my affection for you
is pure as your own thoughts. I feel that the artifice to which I have
descended must revolt you; but consider how vainly I have striven by
more honourable means to address you. You cannot be ignorant that for
many months, at the church, in the public walk, at the theatre, I have
vainly sought to confirm with my lips that passion which my eyes could
not disguise. Alas! while I implore pardon for a crime to which the
cruelty of the merciless duenna has compelled me, let me also entreat
your pity for the torments I have endured; and judge, by the charms
which your happy mirror discloses, of the extent of his wretchedness
who is banished from their sight."

[Illustration: Belflor woos Leonora]

Belflor did not fail to accompany these words with all the arts of
persuasion commonly practised with so much success by my devotees:
tender looks, heart-broken sighs, and even a few tears were not
wanting; and Leonora was of course affected. Despite herself, she began
to feel those little flutterings of the heart, which are the usual
preludes of capitulation with woman; but far from yielding without a
struggle to her tenderness, or pity, or weakness, the more sensible
she became of treason in the garrison, the more hastily she resolved
to vacate the place. "Count," she exclaimed, "it is in vain you tell
me this. I will listen no longer. Do not attempt to detain me: let me
leave a house in which my honour is exposed to suspicion; or my cries
shall alarm the neighbourhood, and expose your audacity which has dared
to insult me." This she uttered with so resolute an air that Chichona,
who was on very punctilious terms with the police, prayed the Count
not to push matters to extremity. Finding his entreaties useless, he
released Leonora, who hastened from the apartment, and, what never
happened to any maiden before, left it as she had entered it.

"Let us quit this dangerous house," said Leonora, on rejoining her
governante: "finish this idle talk,--we are deceived." "What ails you,
child?" cried Marcella in reply; "and why should we leave this poor man
so hastily?" "I will tell you," said Leonora; "but let us fly: every
instant I remain here but adds to my affliction." However desirous
was the duenna to learn the cause of her ward's anxiety, she saw that
the best way to be satisfied was to yield to her entreaties; and they
quitted the apartment with a celerity which quite discomposed the
stately governante, leaving Chichona, the Count, and his valet as much
disconcerted as a company of comedians, when the curtain falls on a
wretched farce, which the presiding deities of the pit have consigned
to a lower deep.

When Leonora found herself safely in the street, she related, as well
as her extreme agitation, and Marcella's exclamations of astonishment,
would permit, all that had passed in the chamber with the Count and
Chichona. "I must confess, child," said the duenna, when they had
reached home, "that I am exceedingly mortified to hear what you have
just been telling me. To think that I have been the dupe of that wicked
woman! You will allow, however, that I was not without my doubts. Why
did I yield them? I should have been suspicious of so much kindness
and honesty. I have committed a folly which is absolutely inexcusable
in a person of my sagacity and experience. Ah! why did you not tell
me this in her presence? I would have torn her eyes out: I would have
loaded the Count de Belflor with reproaches for his perfidy: and as
for the scoundrel with his ducats and his beard, he should not have
had a hair left on his head. But I will return, this instant, with the
money which I have received as a real restitution; and if I find them
still together, they shall not have waited for nothing." So saying, the
enraged widow of the generous Rosetta folded her mantilla around her,
and left Leonora to weep over the treachery of mankind.

Marcella found the Count with Chichona, in despair at the failure of
his design. Most of my pupils, in his place, would have been abashed at
seeing her: it is extraordinary what scruples I have to overcome. But
Belflor was of another stamp: to a thousand good qualities, he added
that of yielding implicit obedience to my inspirations. When he loved,
nothing could exceed the ardour with which he followed the devoted
object of his affections; and though naturally what the world calls
an honourable man, he was then capable of violating the most sacred
duties for the attainment of his desires. No sooner, therefore, did he
perceive Marcella, than, as he saw that their fulfilment could only be
completed through the duenna's agency, he resolved to spare nothing to
win her to his interests. He shrewdly guessed that, rigidly virtuous
as the lady appeared, she, like her betters, had her price; and as he
was disposed to bid pretty liberally, you will own he did no great
injustice to a duenna's fidelity: for so rare a commodity will only be
found where lovers are not over-rich, or not sufficiently liberal.

The instant Marcella entered the room, and perceived the three persons
she sought, her tongue went as though possessed; and while she poured
a torrent of abuse on the Count and Chichona, she sent the restitution
flying at the head of the valet. The Count patiently endured the
storm; and throwing himself on his knees before the duenna, to render
the scene more moving, he pressed her to take back the purse she had
rejected; and offering to add to it a thousand pistoles, he besought
her compassion on his sufferings. As Marcella had never before been so
earnestly entreated, it is no wonder that she was, on this occasion,
not inexorable: her invectives, therefore, speedily ceased; and
on comparing the tempting sum now offered to her, with the paltry
recompence she expected from Don Luis de Cespedes, she was not slow in
discovering that it would be much more profitable to turn Leonora from
her duty, than to keep her in its path. Accordingly, after some little
affectation, she again received the purse, accepted the offer of the
thousand pistoles, promised to assist the Count in his designs, and
departed at once to labour for their accomplishment.

[Illustration: Belflor bribes Marcella]

As she knew Leonora to be strictly virtuous, she was extremely cautious
of exciting the least suspicion of her intelligence with the Count,
lest the plot should be discovered to Don Luis, her father; so,
desirous of skilfully effecting her ruin, she thus addressed her on her
return: "My dear Leonora, I have revenged myself on the wretches who
deceived us. I found them quite confounded at your virtuous resolution;
and, threatening the infamous Chichona with your father's resentment,
and the most rigorous severity of the law, I bestowed on the Count
de Belflor all the insulting epithets that my anger could suggest. I
warrant that the Signor will make no more attempts of this kind on you;
and that henceforth his gallantries will cease to engage my attention.
I thank Heaven that, by your firmness, you have escaped the snare that
was laid for you. I could weep for joy to think that the deceiver has
gained nothing by his stratagem; for these noble signors make it
their amusement to seduce the young and innocent. Indeed, the greater
part even of those who pique themselves on their honourable conduct
have no scruples on this point, as though it were no disgrace to carry
ruin into virtuous families. Not that I think the Count absolutely of
this character, nor even that he intends studiously to deceive you: we
should not judge too harshly of our neighbours; and perhaps, after all,
he meant you honourably. Although his rank would give him pretensions
to the hand of the noblest at our court, your beauty may yet have
induced him to resolve on marriage with yourself. In fact, I recollect
that in his answers to my reproaches, which I heeded not at the time, I
might have perceived something of the sort."

"What say you, dear Marcella?" interrupted Leonora. "If that were
his intention, he would have sought me of my father, who would never
have refused his daughter to a person of his rank." "What you say
is perfectly just," replied the governante, "and I am quite of your
opinion; the Count's proceedings are certainly suspicious, or rather
his designs cannot be good: for a trifle, I would return and scold him
again." "No, good Marcella," replied Leonora, "we had better forget
the past, and revenge ourselves by contempt." "Very true," said the
duenna; "I believe that is the best plan: you are more prudent than
myself. But, after all, may we not do the Count injustice? Who knows
that he has not been actuated by the purest and most delicate motives?
It is possible that, before obtaining your father's consent, he may
have resolved to deserve and to please you; to render your union more
delightful by first gaining your heart. If that were so, child, would
it be a very great sin to listen to him? Tell me your thoughts, love;
you know my affection: does your heart incline towards the Count, or
would it be very disagreeable to marry such a man?"

To this malicious question, the too-sincere Leonora replied, with
down-cast eyes, and face suffused with blushes, by avowing that she
had no aversion to the Count; but, as modesty prevented her explaining
herself more openly, the duenna still pressed her to conceal nothing
from her; and at last succeeded, by affected tenderness, in obtaining a
full confession of her love. "Dearest Marcella," said the unsuspicious
girl, "since you desire me to speak to you without disguise, I must
confess that Belflor has appeared to me not unworthy of my love. I was
struck by his appearance; and I have heard him so much praised, that
I could not remain insensible to the affection he displayed for me.
Your watchful care to guard me from his addresses has cost me many a
sigh: nay, I will own I have in secret wept his absence; and repaid
with my tears the sufferings your vigilance has caused him. Even at
this moment, instead of hating him for the insult he has offered to my
honour, my heart against my will excuses him, and throws his fault on
your severity."

"My child," said the governante, "since you give me reason to believe
that his attentions are pleasing to you, I will endeavour to secure
this lover." "I am very sensible," replied Leonora, "of the kindness
you intend me. It is not that the Count holds the first place at court;
were he but an honourable private gentleman, I should prefer him to all
others upon earth, but let us not flatter ourselves: Belflor is a noble
signor, destined, without doubt, for one of the richest heiresses in
our kingdom. Let us not expect that he would descend to ally himself
with Don Luis, who has but a moderate fortune to offer with his
daughter. No, no," she added, "he entertains for me no such favourable
thoughts: he thinks not of me as one worthy to bear his name, but seeks
only my dishonour."

"Ah! wherefore," said the duenna, "will you insist he loves you not
well enough to seek your hand? Love daily works much greater miracles.
One would imagine, to hear you, that Heaven had made some infinite
distinction between you and the Count. Do yourself more justice,
Leonora! He would not condescend, in uniting his destiny with yours.
You are of an ancient and noble family, and your alliance would never
call a blush upon his cheek. However, you love him," continued she;
"and I must therefore see him, and sound him on the subject; and if I
find his designs as honourable as they should be, I will indulge him
with some slight hopes." "Not for the world!" cried Leonora; "on no
account would I have you seek him: should he but suspect my knowledge
of your proceedings, he must cease even to esteem me." "Oh! I am more
cunning than you think me," answered Marcella. "I shall begin by
accusing him of a design to seduce you. He of course will not fail
to defend himself; I shall listen to his excuses, and shall mark the
event: in short, my dear child, leave it to me; I will be as careful of
your honour as of my own."

Towards night, the duenna left the house, and found Belflor watching
in the neighbourhood. She informed him of her conversation with his
mistress, not forgetting to boast of the address with which she had
elicited from Leonora the confession of her love. Nothing could more
agreeably surprise the Count than this discovery; and accordingly his
gratitude was displayed in the most ardent manner; that is to say, he
promised to Marcella the thousand ducats on the morrow, and to himself
the most complete success of his enterprise; well knowing, as he
did, that a woman prepossessed is half seduced. They then separated,
extremely well satisfied with each other, and the duenna returned to
her home.

Leonora, who had waited for her with extreme anxiety, timidly inquired
if she brought any news of the Count. "The best news you could hear,"
replied the governante. "I have seen him, and I can assure you of
the purity of his intentions: he declared that his only object is to
marry you; and this he confirmed by every oath that man holds sacred.
I did not, however, as you may suppose, yield implicitly to these
protestations. 'If you are sincere,' said I to him, 'why do you not at
once apply to Don Luis, her father?' 'Ah! my dear Marcella,' replied
he, without appearing in the least embarrassed by this question,
'could you, even, approve that, without assuring myself of Leonora's
affection, and following, blindly, the dictates of a devouring passion,
I should seek her of Don Luis as a slave? No! her happiness is dearer
to me than my own desires; and I have too nice a sense of honour, even
to endanger that happiness by an indiscreet avowal.'

"While he thus spoke," continued the duenna, "I observed him with
extreme attention; and employed all my experience to discover in his
eyes if he were really possessed of all the love that he expressed.
What shall I say?--He appeared to me penetrated by the truest love;
I felt elated with joy, which I took good care, however, to conceal:
nevertheless, when I felt persuaded of his sincerity, I thought that,
in order to secure for you so important a conquest, it would be but
proper to give him some faint idea of your feelings towards him.
'Signor,' said I, 'Leonora has no aversion for you; I know that she
esteems you; and, as far as I can judge, her heart would not be grieved
by your addresses.' 'Great God,' he cried, transported with delight,
'what do I hear? Is it possible, that the charming Leonora should be
disposed so favourably towards me? What do I not owe to you, kindest
Marcella, for thus relieving me from such torturing suspense? I am
the more rejoiced, too, that this should be announced by you;--you,
who have ever opposed my love; you, who have inflicted on me such
lengthened suffering. But, my dear Marcella, complete my bliss! let me
see my divine Leonora, and pledge to her my faith; let me swear, in
your presence, to be hers only for ever.'

"To all these expressions of his devotion," continued the governante,
"he added others still more touching. At last, my dear child, he
entreated me in so pressing a manner to procure for him a secret
interview, that I could not forbear promising he should see you."
"Ah! why have you done so?" exclaimed Leonora, with emotion. "How
often have you told me, that a virtuous girl should ever shun such
secret conversations,--always wrong, and almost always dangerous?"
"Certainly," replied the duenna, "I acknowledge to have said so, and a
very good maxim it is; but you are not obliged to adhere to it strictly
on this occasion; for you may look upon the Count as your husband."
"He is not so yet," said Leonora, "and I ought not to see him until my
father permits his addresses."

Marcella, at this moment, repented of having imbued the mind of her
pupil with those notions of propriety which she found so much trouble
to overcome. Determined, however, at any rate to effect her object, she
thus recommenced her attack: "My dear Leonora! I am proud to witness
so much virtuous delicacy. Happy fruit of all my cares! You have truly
profited by the lessons I have taught you. I am delighted with the
result of my labours. But, child, you have read rather too literally;
you construe my maxims too rigidly; your susceptibility is indeed
somewhat prudish. However much I pique myself on my severity, I do not
quite approve of that precise chastity which arms itself indifferently
against guilt or innocence. A girl ceases not to be virtuous who yields
her ear only to her lover, especially when she is conscious of the
purity which chastens his desires; and she is then no more wrong in
responding to his love, than she is for her sensibility to the passion.
Rely upon me, Leonora; I have too much experience, and am too much
interested in your welfare, to suffer you to take a step that might be
prejudicial to it."

"But where would you have me see the Count?" said Leonora. "In this
room, to be sure," replied the duenna. "Where could you see him so
safely? I will introduce him to-morrow evening." "You are not surely
serious, Marcella!" exclaimed Leonora. "What! think you I would permit
a man----" "To be sure you will!" interrupted the duenna; "there is
nothing so wonderful in that, as you imagine. It happens daily; and
would to heaven that every damsel who receives such visits, had desires
as pure as those by which you are animated! Besides, what have you to
fear? shall not I be with you?" "Alas!" said Leonora, "should my father
surprise us!" "Do not trouble yourself about that," replied Marcella.
"Your father is perfectly satisfied as to your conduct: he knows my
fidelity, and would not do me so much wrong as to suspect it." Poor
Leonora, thus artfully instigated by the duenna, and secretly moved
by her own feelings, could withstand no longer; and at last yielded,
although unwillingly, to her governante's proposal.

The Count was soon informed of Marcella's success, of which he was
so well satisfied, that he at once gave her five hundred pistoles,
and a ring of equal value. The duenna, finding his promises so well
performed, was determined to be as scrupulously exact in the fulfilment
of her own; and, accordingly, on the following night, when she felt
assured that every one in the house was fast asleep, she fastened
to the balcony a silken ladder, which the Count had provided, and
introduced his lordship to the chamber of his mistress.

In the meanwhile, the fair Leonora was immersed in reflections of the
most painfully agitating nature. Notwithstanding her affection for the
Count, and despite her governante's assurances, she bitterly reproached
herself for her weakness, in yielding a consent to an interview which
she still felt was in violation of her duty; nor could a knowledge of
the purity of her intentions bring comfort to her bosom. To receive,
by night, in her apartment, a man whose love was unsanctioned by her
parent, and not certainly known even by herself, now appeared to her
not only criminal, but calculated to degrade her in the estimation of
her lover also; and this last thought tortured her almost to madness,
when that lover entered.

He threw himself on his knees before her; and, apparently penetrated
by love and gratitude, thanked her for that confidence in his honour,
which had permitted this visit, and assured her of his determination to
merit it, by shortly espousing her. However, as he was not as explicit
upon this point as Leonora desired, "Count," said she to him, "I am too
anxious to believe that you have no other views than those you express
to me; but whatever assurances you may offer must always appear to me
suspicious, so long as my father is ignorant of your designs, and has
not ratified them by his consent."

"Madam," replied Belflor, "that would have been long since demanded
by me, had I not feared to have obtained it at the sacrifice of your
repose." "Alas!" said Leonora, "I do not reproach you that you have
not yet sought Don Luis,--I cannot but be sensible of your delicacy;
but nothing now restrains you, and you must at once resolve to see my
father, or never to see me more."

[Illustration: Belflor climbs up to Leonora's balcony]

"What do I hear?" exclaimed the Count,--"never to see you more!
Beauteous Leonora! how little sensible are you to the charms of love!
Did you know how to love like me, you would delight in secret to
receive my vows; and, for some time at least, to conceal them from
your father as from all the world. Oh! who can paint the charms of
that mysterious intercourse, in which two hearts indulge, united by
a passion as intense as pure." "It may have charms for you," replied
Leonora; "to me, such intercourse would bring but sorrow: this
refinement of tenderness but ill becomes a virtuous maiden. Speak not
to me of such impure delights! Did you esteem me, you had not dared
to do so; and were your intentions such as you would persuade me, you
would, from your soul, reproach me that I could listen to you with
patience. But, alas!" she added, while tears filled her eyes, "my
weakness alone has exposed me to this outrage: I have indeed deserved
it, that I see you here."

"Adorable Leonora!" cried the Count, "you wrong my love most cruelly!
Your virtue, too scrupulous, is causelessly alarmed. What! can you
conceive that, because I have been so happy as to prevail on you to
favour my passion, I should cease to esteem you? What injustice! No,
madam, I know, too well, the value of your kindness; it can never
deprive you of my esteem; and I am ready to do as you require me. I
will, to-morrow, see Don Luis; and nothing shall be wanting on my part
to ensure my happiness: but I cannot conceal from you, that I scarcely
indulge a hope." "How!" replied; Leonora, with extreme surprise;
"is it possible that my father should refuse me to the Count de
Belflor?"--"Ah! it is that very title which gives me cause for alarm.
But I see this surprises you: your astonishment, however, will soon
cease.

"Only a few days ago," continued he, "the King was pleased to declare
his will, that I should marry: you know how these matters are managed
at our Court. He has not, however, named the lady for whom I am
intended; but has contented himself with intimating that she is one
who will do me honour, and that he has set his mind upon our union.
As I was then ignorant of your disposition towards me,--for, as you
well know, your rigorous severity has never until now, permitted me
to divine it,--I did not let him perceive in me any aversion to the
accomplishment of his desires. You may now therefore, judge, madam,
whether Don Luis would hazard the King's displeasure, by accepting me
as his son-in-law."

"No, doubtless," said Leonora; "I know my father well: however
desirable he might esteem your alliance, he would not hesitate to
renounce it, rather than expose himself to the anger of his Majesty.
But, even though my father had consented to our union, we should not
be less unfortunate; for, Belflor, how could you possibly bestow on
me a hand which the King has destined for another?" "Madam," replied
the Count, "I will not disguise that your question embarrasses me.
Still, I am not without hope that, by prudent management with the King,
and by availing myself of the influence which his friendship for me
secures, I should find means to avoid the misfortune which threatens
me; and yourself, lovely Leonora, might assist me in so doing, did
you but deem me worthy of the happiness of being yours." "I assist
you!" she exclaimed; "how could I possibly enable you to avert an
union which the King proposes for you?" "Ah! madam," he replied, with
impassioned looks, "would you deign to receive my vows of eternal
fidelity to you, I should have no difficulty in preserving my faith
inviolate, without offending my sovereign. Permit, charming Leonora,"
he continued, throwing himself at her feet, "permit me to espouse you
in the presence of our friend Marcella; she is a witness who will vouch
for the sanctity of our engagements. I shall thus escape the hateful
bonds they would impose upon me; for, should the King still press me
to accept the lady he designs for me, I will prostrate myself before
him, and, on my knees, confess how long and ardently my love has been
devoted to you, and that we are secretly married. However desirous he
may be to unite me with another, he is too gracious to think of tearing
me from the object I adore, and too just to offer so grievous an
affront to your honourable family.

"What is your opinion, discreet Marcella?" added he, turning towards
the governante; "what think you of this project with which love has
so opportunely inspired me?" "I am charmed with it," said the duenna;
"the rogue, Cupid, is never at a loss for an expedient." "And you,
dearest Leonora," resumed the Count, "what do you say to it? Can your
heart, always mistrustful, refuse its assent to my proposal?" "No," she
replied, "provided my father consent to it; and I do not doubt that
he will, when you have explained to him your reasons for secrecy."
"You must be very cautious how you consult him upon the subject,"
interrupted the abominable duenna; "you do not know Don Luis: his
notions of honour are too scrupulous to permit him to engage himself
with secret amours. The proposal of a private marriage would shock
him; besides which, he is too prudent not to foresee the possible
consequences of one which interfered with the designs of the King.
And, once proposed to him, and his suspicion aroused, his eyes will
be constantly upon you; and he will take good care to prevent your
marriage, by separating you for ever."

"And I should die with grief and despair," cried our courtier. "But
madam," continued he, addressing himself to Marcella, with an air of
profound disappointment, "do you really think, then, that there is
no chance of Don Luis yielding to our prayer?" "Not the slightest!"
replied the governante. "But suppose he should! Exact and scrupulous
as he is, he would never consent to the omission of a single religious
ceremony on the occasion; and if they are all to be observed in your
marriage, the secret will be soon known in Madrid."

"Ah! my dear Leonora," said the Count, taking her hand, and tenderly
pressing it within his own, "must we, then, to satisfy a vain notion
of decorum, expose ourselves to the frightful danger of an eternal
separation? Our happiness is in your hands; since it depends on you
alone to bestow yourself on me. A father's consent might, perhaps,
spare you some uneasiness; but since our kind Marcella has convinced us
of the impossibility of obtaining it, yield yourself, without further
scruple, to my innocent desires. Receive my heart and hand; and when
the time shall have arrived, that we may inform Don Luis of our union,
we shall have no difficulty in satisfying him as to our reasons for
its concealment." "Well, Count," said Leonora, "I consent to your not
at once speaking to my father, but that you first sound the King upon
the subject. Before, however, I receive thus secretly your hand, I
would have this done. See his Majesty; tell him even, if necessary,
that we are married. Let us endeavour, by this show of confidence,----"
"Alas! madam," interrupted Belflor, "what do you ask of me? No, my
soul revolts at the thoughts of falsehood. I cannot lie; and you would
despise me, could I thus dissemble with the King;--besides, how could I
hope for pardon at his hands, should he discover the meanness of which
I had been guilty?"

"I should never have done, Signor Don Cleophas," continued the Demon,
"were I to repeat word for word all that Belflor said, in order to
seduce his lovely mistress; I will only add, that he repeated, without
my assistance, all those passionate phrases with which I usually
inspire gallants upon similar occasions. But in vain did he swear
he would publicly confirm, as soon as possible, the faith which he
proposed to pledge in secret: Leonora's virtue was proof against his
oaths; and the blushing day, which surprised him while he called Heaven
to witness for his fidelity, compelled him to retire less triumphant
than he had anticipated."

On the following morning, the duenna, conceiving that her honour, or
rather her interest, engaged her not to abandon the enterprise, took
an opportunity of reverting to the subject. "Leonora," said she, "I
am confounded by what passed last evening; you appear to disdain the
Count's affection, or to regard it as inspired by an unworthy motive.
Perhaps, however, after all, you remarked something in his person or
manner that displeased you?" "No, good governante," replied Leonora;
"he never appeared to me more amiable; and his conversation discovered
to me a thousand new charms." "If that be the case," said the duenna,
"I am still more perplexed. You acknowledge to be strongly prepossessed
in his favour, and yet refuse to yield in a point, the absolute
necessity of which he has so clearly demonstrated."

"My dear Marcella," replied her ward, "you are wiser, and have had more
experience in these matters, than myself; but have you sufficiently
reflected on the consequences of a marriage contracted without my
father's knowledge?" "Yes, certainly," answered the duenna, "I have
maturely considered all that; and I regret to find you oppose yourself,
with an obstinacy of which I deemed you incapable, to the brilliant
establishment which fortune presents so uselessly. Have a care that
your perverseness does not weary and repel your lover; remember that
he may discover the inequality of your station and fortune, which his
passion overlooks. While he offers you his faith, receive it without
hesitation. His word is his bond; there is no tie more sacred with a
man of honour, like Belflor: besides, I am witness that he acknowledges
you as his wife; and I need not tell you that a testimony like mine
would be more than sufficient to condemn a lover who should dare to
perjure himself, and attempt to evade a legal contract."

By this and similar conversations, the resolution of the artless
Leonora was at last shaken; and the perils which surrounded her were
so adroitly concealed by her perfidious governante, that, some days
afterwards, she abandoned herself, without further reflection, to the
will of the Count. Belflor was introduced nightly, by the balcony, into
his mistress's apartment; which he left again before daybreak, when
summoned by the duenna.

One morning, the old lady overslept herself; and Aurora had already
half opened the golden chambers of the east, when the Count hastily
departed, as usual. Unfortunately, in his hurry to descend the ladder,
his foot missed, and he fell heavily on the ground.

Don Luis de Cespedes, who slept in the room over Leonora's, had
that morning risen earlier than usual to attend to some important
engagements; and hearing the noise of Belflor's fall he opened his
window to learn whence it proceeded. To his astonishment, he perceived
a man just raising himself, with difficulty, from the earth, while
Marcella was busily engaged in the balcony with the silken ladder,
of which the Count had made such bad use in his descent. Scarcely
believing his eyes, and rubbing them to make sure that he was awake,
Don Luis stood for some time in amazement; but he was too soon
convinced that what he saw was no illusion; and that the light of day,
although just breaking, was bright enough to discover to him, too
clearly, his disgrace.

[Illustration: Don Luis de Cespedes looking out of the window]

Afflicted at this fatal sight, transported by a just wrath, he
instantly sought the apartment of Leonora, holding the light by which
he had been writing in one hand, and his sword in the other. With a
frantic determination of sacrificing his daughter and her governante
to his resentment, he struck the door of their chamber violently, and
commanded them to admit him. Trembling, they obeyed his summons; when
he entered with infuriated looks, and displaying his naked sword: "I
come," he cried, "to wash out, in the blood of an infamous child, the
stains on the wounded honour of her father; and to punish the crime of
a perfidious wretch, who has betrayed his confidence."

[Illustration: Don Luis confronts Leonora and Marcella]

They were in a moment on their knees before him; and, as he raised his
arm, the trembling duenna exclaimed: "In mercy hold, Signor! Before
you inflict on us the punishment you meditate, deign but to listen to
me for a moment." "Speak, then, unhappy woman," said Don Luis; "I will
retard my vengeance but for the instant you require: speak, I repeat!
tell me all the circumstances of my misfortune. But what do I say,--all
the circumstances? Alas! I am ignorant but of one; it is, the name of
the villain who has dishonoured me." "Signor," replied Marcella, "the
cavalier who has just left us is the Count de Belflor." "The Count de
Belflor!" repeated Don Luis; "and where did he see my daughter? By
what means has he seduced her? On your life, hide nothing from me!"
"Signor," replied the governante, "I will relate the whole history to
you, with all the sincerity of which I am capable."

She then related, with infinite art, all the conversations she had
previously narrated to Leonora, as having passed between herself and
the Count; whom she painted in the most flattering colours, as a lover
tender, delicate, and sincere, beyond description. As, however, there
was no escaping the event in which this heroic love most naturally
terminated, she was obliged to avow the truth. But she managed this
so adroitly, insisting on the weighty reasons which Belflor had for
secrecy in his nuptials, and on the regret he had always expressed for
its necessity, that she gradually appeased the fury of her master. This
she was not slow to perceive; and, to completely soften the old man,
she wound up by a peroration that would have done as much honour to a
wig as to a gown:--"Signor," said she, "I have thus told you the simple
truth: now punish us if you will, and plunge your sword into your
daughter's bosom! But what say I? No! Leonora is innocent; she has but
followed the faithful counsels of her to whom you confided the guidance
of her conduct. It is my heart against which your sword should be
directed; it was I who first introduced the Count to her apartment; it
is I who formed those ties which bind him to your daughter. I would
not perceive the irregularity of his engagement, although unauthorised
by you: I saw in him but a son-in-law, whom I was anxious to secure to
you; but the channel through which the favours of our Court might reach
you. I forgot all but the happiness of Leonora, and the advancement of
your family, in the brilliant alliance of the Count. I have erred: the
excess of my zeal has made me forgetful of my duty."

While the subtle Marcella was speaking thus, poor Leonora was not
sparing of her tears; and her grief appeared so excessive that the good
old man could not resist it. He was affected. His anger was changed
into compassion; his sword fell on the ground; and, quitting the air of
an irritated parent: "Ah! my daughter," he cried, while tears sprung
from his aged eyes, like water from the rock of Horeb, "what a fatal
passion is love! Alas! you know not yet all the causes it will bring
you for affliction. The shame which a father's presence alone excites,
can bring tears to your eyes at this moment; but you foresee not the
woes which your lover is, perhaps even now, preparing for the future.
And you, imprudent Marcella, what have you done? Into what an abyss has
your indiscreet zeal for my family plunged us! I allow that an alliance
with a man like Belflor might dazzle you, and it is that which alone
excuses and saves you; but, miserable that you are, why were you not
more cautious with a lover of his station? The greater his credit and
favour at court, the more guarded should you have been against his
approaches. Should he not scruple to break his faith with my daughter,
how shall I avenge the insult? Shall I implore the power of our laws?
A person of his rank can easily shelter himself from its severity.
I will suppose that, faithful to his oaths, he would abide by his
engagements with my daughter: if the King, as you say, has decreed that
he shall marry with another, is it likely that our sovereign will fail
to be obeyed?"

"Oh! my father," replied Leonora, "that need not alarm us. The Count
has assured us that the King would never do so great a violence to his
feelings--" "Of which I am convinced," interrupted the duenna; "for,
besides that the monarch loves Belflor too much to exercise so great a
tyranny upon his favourite, he is of too noble a character to afflict
so grievously the valiant Don Luis de Cespedes, who has devoted to the
service of the state the best years of his life."

"Heaven grant," exclaimed the old man, sighing, "that all my fears
are vain! I will seek the Count, and demand a full explanation of his
conduct: the eyes of a father, alarmed for a daughter's welfare, will
pierce his very soul. If I find him what I would hope, and what you
would persuade me he is, I will pardon what has passed; but," added he
firmly, "if in his discourse I discern the perfidy of his heart, you
go, both of you, to bewail in retirement, for the rest of your days,
the imprudence of which you have been guilty." As he finished, he took
up his sword, and retired to his own room, leaving his daughter and
her governante to recover themselves from the fright into which this
discovery had so unexpectedly thrown them.

[Illustration: The lady, her husband and her lover]

Asmodeus was at this moment interrupted in his recital by the Student,
who thus addressed him:--"My dear Devil, interesting as is the history
you are relating to me, my eyes have wandered to an object which
prevents my listening to you as attentively as I could wish. I see a
lady, who is rather good-looking, seated between a young man and a
gentleman old enough to be his grandfather. They seem to enjoy the
liqueurs which are on the table near them, but what amuses me, is, that
as from time to time the amorous old dotard embraces his mistress, the
deceiver conveys her hand to the lips of the other, who covers it with
silent kisses. He is doubtless her gallant." "On the contrary," replied
the cripple, "he is her husband, and the old fool is her lover. He is
a man of consequence,--no less than a commandant of the military order
of Calatrava; and is ruining himself for the lady, whose complaisant
husband holds some inferior place at court She bestows her caresses on
the sighing knight, for the sake of his gold; and is unfaithful to him
in favour of her husband, from inclination."

"That is a marvellously pretty picture," said Zambullo. "The husband of
course is French?" "No, no," replied the Demon: "he is a Spaniard. Oh!
the good city of Madrid can boast within its walls a fair proportion
of such well-bred spouses: still, they do not swarm here as in Paris,
which is, beyond contradiction, the most fruitful city of the world
in such inhabitants." "I thought so," said Don Cleophas; "but pardon
me, Signor Asmodeus, if I have broken the thread of the fair Leonora's
story. Continue it, I pray you; it interests me exceedingly; and
exhibits such variety in the art of seduction as transports me with
admiration."




CHAPTER V.


CONTINUATION OF THE STORY OF THE LOVES OF THE COUNT DE BELFLOR AND
LEONORA DE CESPEDES.


Don Luis, (continued Asmodeus), on returning to his apartment, dressed
himself hastily, and, while it was still early, repaired to the Count;
who, not suspecting a discovery, was much surprised by this visit.
On the old man's entrance, however, Belflor ran to meet him, and,
embracing him cordially, exclaimed, "Ah Signor Don Luis; I am delighted
to see you. To what do I owe this happiness? Am I so fortunate as
to have an opportunity of serving you?" "Signor," replied Don Luis
sternly, "I would speak with you alone."

Belflor desired his attendants to withdraw; and as soon as they
were seated, "Signor," said Cespedes, "I come to ask of you an
explanation of circumstances in which my honour and happiness are
deeply interested. I saw you this morning leaving the apartment of my
daughter. She has disguised nothing from me: she informed that----"
"She has told you that I love her," interrupted the Count, to avoid
hearing what he knew could not be very agreeable; "but she can but have
feebly described all that I feel for her. I am enchanted with her; she
is an adorable creature: beauty, wit, virtue,--nothing is wanting to
perfect her charms. I am told you have a son, too, who is finishing his
studies at Alcala: does he resemble his sister? If he have her beauty,
and have at all inherited the noble bearing of his father, he must be a
perfect cavalier. I die with anxiety to see him; and I assure you that
I shall be proud to advance his fortunes."

"I am obliged to you for so kind an offer," gravely replied Don Luis;
"but to return to the subject of----" "He must enter the service at
once," again interrupted the Count: "I charge myself with the care of
his interests: he shall not grow old among the crowd of subalterns;
on that you may depend." "Answer me, Count!" replied the old man
vehemently, "and cease these interruptions. Do you intend, or not, to
fulfil the promise----?" "Yes, certainly," interrupted Belflor for
the third time; "I engage faithfully to support your son with all
the interest I possess: rely on me; I am a man of my word." "This is
too much, Count," cried Cespedes, rising: "after having seduced my
daughter, you dare thus to insult me! But I also am a noble; and the
injury you have done me shall not remain unpunished." In finishing
these words, he left the Count, his heart swelling with anger, and his
mind tormented with a thousand projects of revenge.

[Illustration: Don Luis de Cespedes interviews Belflor]

On arriving at home, still greatly agitated, he immediately went to
Leonora's apartment, where he found her with Marcella. "It was not
without reason," said he, addressing them, "that I was suspicious of
the Count: he is a traitor; but I will avenge myself. For you, you
shall at once hide your shame within a convent: both of you, prepare
to leave this house to-morrow; and thank Heaven that my wrath contents
itself with so moderate a punishment." He then left them, to shut
himself in his cabinet, that he might maturely reflect on the conduct
it would be proper to observe in so delicate a conjuncture.

How poignant was the grief of Leonora, when thus informed of Belflor's
perfidy! She remained for some time motionless; a death-like paleness
overspread her lovely features; life itself seemed about to abandon
her, and she fell senseless into the arms of her governante. The
alarmed duenna at first thought that the victim of her intrigues
was really dead; but, on perceiving that she still breathed, used
every effort to restore her to consciousness, and at last succeeded.
Existence, however, had no longer charms for Leonora; and when,
somewhat recovered, she unclosed her eyelids, and perceived the
officious governante busy about her person, "Cruel Marcella!" she
exclaimed, sighing deeply; "wherefore have you drawn me from the happy
state in which I was? Then, I felt not the horror of my destiny. Why
did you not let me perish? You, who know so well that life henceforth
must be but one long misery, why have you sought to preserve it?"

The duenna endeavoured to console her, but her words only added to
Leonora's sufferings. "It is in vain you would comfort me," she cried,
"I will not hear you: strive not to combat my despair. Rather seek to
add to its profundity; you, who have plunged me into the frightful
gulph in which all my hopes are swallowed:--you it was who assured
me of the Count's sincerity; but for you I had never yielded to my
passion for him; I should have insensibly triumphed over it, or at
least, he would never have had cause to boast of my weakness. But no!
I will not," she continued, "attribute to you my misfortunes; it is
myself alone I should accuse. I ought not to have followed your advice,
in accepting the faith of a man, without the sanction of my father.
However flattering to me were the attentions of Count de Belflor, I
should have despised them, rather than have endeavoured to secure them
at the price of my honour: I should have mistrusted him, you! Marcella,
and myself. For my folly in listening to his perfidious oaths, for the
affliction I have caused to the unhappy Don Luis, and for the dishonour
I have brought upon my family, I detest myself; and, far from fearing
the state of seclusion with which I am menaced, I would willingly
conceal my guilt and shame in the most frightful dungeon in the world."

[Illustration: Marcella tries to console Leonora]

While her grief thus vented itself in exclamations, and tears streamed
from her eyes, she frantically tore her clothes, and revenged the
injustice of her lover on the beautiful locks which fell around her
neck. The duenna, also, to appear in keeping with her mistress's
grief, was not sparing of grimaces; she managed to squeeze out some
convenient tears, and directed a thousand imprecations against mankind
in general, and against Belflor in particular. "Is it possible," she
cried, "that the Count, who had all the semblance of amiability and
rectitude, should be so great a villain as to have deceived us both?
I cannot get over my surprise, or rather, I cannot even yet persuade
myself that he is so."

"Indeed," said Leonora, "when I picture him myself at my feet, what
maiden could but have confided to so much tenderness,--to his oaths,
which he so daringly called on Heaven to witness,--to his boundless
transports, which seemed so sincere? His eyes to me discovered a love
far more intense than his lips could express; and the very sight of me
appeared to charm him:--no, he did not deceive me; I cannot believe
it. My father has not spoken to him with sufficient caution; they have
quarrelled, and the Count has replied to his reproaches less as the
lover than the lord. Still, may I not deceive myself? I will, however,
end this horrible suspense. I will write to Belflor,--tell him I expect
him here this night: I am resolved he comes to reassure my troubled
heart, or to confirm, himself, his treachery."

Marcella loudly applauded this resolution; she even conceived a hope
that the Count, all ambitious as he was, might yet be affected by the
tears of his Leonora, which could not fail at this interview, and that
he might determine on espousing her in truth.

Meanwhile, Belflor, relieved of the presence of Don Luis, was revolving
in his mind the probable consequences of the reception he had given to
the good old man. He felt certain that all the Cespedes, enraged at
the injury he had done their family, would unite to avenge it: this,
however, gave him but little trouble; the possible loss of Leonora
occasioned him far greater anxiety. She would, he imagined, at once be
placed in a convent, or, at least, that she would be carefully guarded
from his sight; and that she was consequently lost to him for ever.
This thought afflicted him; and he was occupied in devising some means
to prevent so great a misfortune, when his valet entered the apartment,
and presented a letter which Marcella had placed in his hands. It was
from Leonora, and ran as follows:--

 "MY STILL DEAREST BELFLOR,

 "I shall to-morrow quit the world, to bury myself in a convent.
 Dishonoured, odious to my family and to myself, such is the deplorable
 condition to which I am reduced by listening to you. Still I will
 expect you to-night. In my despair, I seek new tortures: come, and
 avow to me that your heart disowned the protestations which your lips
 have made to me; or come to confirm them by your sympathy, which alone
 can soften the harshness of my destiny. As there may, however, be
 some danger in this meeting, after what has passed between you and my
 father, be sure you are accompanied by a friend. Although you have
 rendered life worthless to me, I cannot cease to interest myself in
 thine.

 "LEONORA."

While the Count perused this letter, which he read over several times,
his imagination depicted the situation of Leonora, in colours more
sombre even than the reality, and he was deeply affected. He bitterly
reflected on his past conduct: reason, probity, honour, all whose laws
he had violated in the phrenzy of his passion, now regained their
empire in his breast. The blindness which selfishness inflicts upon
its victims was dissipated; and as the fevered convalescent blushes for
the follies which, in the access of his disorder, he has committed, so
was Belflor ashamed of the meanness and artifice of which he had been
guilty to satisfy his lust.

"What have I done?" he cried; "wretch that I am, what demon has
possessed me? I promised Leonora to espouse her, and called on Heaven
to witness for the lie; I falsely told her that the King had designed
me for another; lying, treachery, perjury,--I have hesitated at nothing
to corrupt innocence itself. What madness! Oh! had I used, to control
it, the efforts I have made to gratify my passion! To seduce one of
whose beauty and virtue I was unworthy, to abandon her to the wrath
of her relations, whom I have equally dishonoured, and to plunge her
in misery as a return for the happiness she bestowed on me,--what
ingratitude! Ought I not then to repair the injury I have inflicted?
Yes, I ought, and I will; my hand shall at the altar fulfil the pledge
I gave for it. Who shall oppose me in so righteous a determination?
Should her tenderness for me at all prejudice her virtue? No, I know
too well what that cost me to vanquish. She yielded less to my love
than to her confidence in my integrity, and to my vows of fidelity.
But, on the other hand, if I resolve on this marriage, I make a great
sacrifice,--I, who may pretend to the heiresses of the richest and most
noble houses in the kingdom, shall I content myself with the daughter
of a respectable gentleman, of small fortune? What will they think of
me at court? They will say that I have made a splendid alliance indeed!"

Belflor, thus divided between love and ambition, knew not how to
resolve; but although undetermined whether he should marry Leonora
or not, he had no difficulty in making up his mind to see her that
evening, and at once directed his valet so to inform Marcella.

Don Luis was all this time in his cabinet, engaged in reflections on
the mode he should adopt to vindicate his honour; and he was not a
little embarrassed in his choice. To have recourse to the laws, was to
publish his disgrace, besides which, he suspected with great reason
that justice was likely to be one side, and the judges on the other.
Again, he dared not to seek reparation of the King himself; as he
believed that prince had views with regard to Belflor which must render
such an application useless. There remained, then, but his own sword
and those of his friends, and on these he concluded to rely.

In the heat of his resentment, he at first meditated a challenge to the
Count; but on consideration of his great age and weakness, he feared
to trust his arm; so resolved to confide the matter to his son, whose
thrust he thought was likely to be surer than his own. He therefore
sent one of his domestics to Alcala, with a letter commanding his son's
immediate presence in Madrid, to revenge, as he stated it, an insult
offered to the family of the Cespedes.

"This son, Don Pedro, is a cavalier of eighteen years of age, perfectly
handsome, and so brave, that he passes at Alcala for the most valiant
student of that university; but you know him," added the Devil, "and I
need not enlarge on the subject." "I can answer," said Don Cleophas,
"for his having all the valour and all the merit that can adorn a
gentleman."

"But this young man," resumed Asmodeus, "was not then at Alcala, as
his father imagined. Love had brought him also to Madrid, where the
object of his passion resided; and where he had met her for the first
time, on the Prado, on the occasion of his last visit to his family.
Who she was, he knew not: and his fair conquest had exacted of him a
pledge that he would take no steps to inform himself on this head,--and
although he was as good as his word, it cost him some trouble to keep
it. I need hardly add, that she was of higher rank than her lover; and
that, wisely mistrusting the discretion and constancy of a student--no
offence to your highness--she thought proper to test him as to these
necessary qualifications for a suitor, before she disclosed to him her
station or name."

[Illustration: portrait of Don Pedro]

His thoughts were, of course, more occupied by his lovely incognita
than with the philosophy of Aristotle; and the vicinity of Alcala to
Madrid occasioned the youthful Pedro to play truant to his studies
as frequent as yourself; but, I must say, with a better excuse than
your Donna Thomasa afforded. To conceal from his father, Don Luis, his
amorous excursions, he usually lodged at a tavern at the other end of
the town, where he passed under a borrowed name; and only went abroad
at a certain hour in the morning, that he might repair to a house where
the lady, for the love of whom he neglected his Ovid, did him the
honour to wait, in company with a trusty female attendant. During the
rest of the day he shut himself up in his hotel; but as soon as night
was come, he wandered fearlessly throughout the city.

He happened one evening, as he was traversing a bye-street, to hear the
sound of instruments and voices, which attracted his attention, and he
stopped to listen. It was a serenade, and tolerably performed; but the
cavalier, who was drunk, and naturally brutish, no sooner perceived our
student than he hurried towards him, and, without preface,--"Friend,"
said he, with an insolent air, "make yourself scarce; or your curiosity
may find you more than you expect." "I would have withdrawn," replied
Don Pedro, proudly, "had you requested me to do so with civility; but
I shall now stay, to teach you better manners." "We shall see, then,"
said the serenading gallant, drawing his sword, "which of us two will
give place to the other."

Don Pedro also drew his sword, their weapons were crossed in a moment,
and a furious combat ensued; but although the Student's adversary was
not wanting in skill, he could not parry a mortal thrust of Don Pedro,
and fell dead upon the pavement. The musicians, who had already quitted
their instruments, or stopped their singing, and had drawn their swords
to protect their patron, now came in a body to avenge his death, and
attacked Don Pedro all together. He, however, gave them satisfactory
proofs of what he could do upon occasion; for, besides parrying, with
surprising dexterity, all the thrusts which they designed for him, he
dealt furiously among them, and found work for them all to protect
themselves.

Still, they were so numerous, and apparently so determined on the
Student's death, that, skilful as he was with his weapon, they would
have most probably accomplished their object, had not the Count de
Belflor, who was accidentally passing through the street, come to his
assistance. The Count was of too noble a nature to see so many armed
men striving against one man to hesitate upon the part he should take.
His sword was therefore instantly directed against the musicians, and
with so much vigour that they were soon put to flight, some wounded,
and the others for fear they should be.

The field thus cleared, the Student, with what breath remained to him,
began to express his sense of the valuable service he had so seasonably
received; but Belflor at once stopped him: "Not a word, my dear Sir,"
said he; "are you not wounded?" "No," replied Don Pedro. "Then let
us leave this place at once," said the Count: "I see you have killed
your man; and it will be dangerous to stay in his company, lest the
officers of justice surprise you." They immediately decamped as quickly
as possible, and did not stop until they had gained a street at some
distance from the field of battle.

Don Pedro, filled with a natural gratitude, then begged the Count not
to conceal from him the name of a person to whom he owed so great an
obligation. Belflor made no difficulty in complying with this request;
but when in turn he asked that of the Student, the latter, unwilling to
discover himself to any person in Madrid, replied, that he was Don Juan
de Maros, and that he should eternally bear in his remembrance the debt
of gratitude which he owed to the Count.

[Illustration: the swordfight]

"Well," said Belflor to him, "I will this night give you an
opportunity of repaying it in full. I have an appointment, which is not
without risk; and I was about, when I fell in with you, to seek the
protection of a friend. However, I know your valour, Don Juan: will you
accompany me?" "To doubt it, were to insult me," replied the Student:
"I cannot better employ the life you have preserved, than in exposing
it in your defence. Go! I am ready to follow you." Accordingly, Belflor
conducted Don Pedro to the house of Don Luis, and they both entered, by
the balcony, the apartment of Leonora.

Here Don Cleophas interrupted the Devil: "Signor Asmodeus," said he,
"impossible! What! not know his own father's house? No, no, no; that
will never do." "It was not possible he should know it," replied
the Demon; "for it was a new one: Don Luis had lately changed his
habitation, and had only taken this house a week before; which was just
what Don Pedro did not know, and was what I was just going to tell you
when you stopped me. You are too sharp; and have that shocking habit of
displaying your intelligence by interrupting people in their stories:
get rid of that fault, I pray you."

"Well," continued the Devil, "Don Pedro did not think he was in his
father's house; nor did he even perceive that it was Marcella who let
him into it; since she received him without a light, in an antechamber,
where Belflor requested his companion to remain while he was in the
next room with his mistress. To this the Student made no demur; so
quietly sat himself down in a chair, with his drawn sword in his hand
for fear of surprise, while his thoughts ran on the favours which he
suspected love was heaping on the Count, and his wishes that he might
be as happy with his incognita,--for although he had no great cause of
complaint as to her kindness, still it was not exactly paid after the
kind of that of Leonora for the Count."

While he was making, upon this subject, all those pleasing reflections
which occur so readily to an impassioned lover, he heard some one
endeavouring quietly to open a door, which was not that of The
Delights, but one which discovered a light through the keyhole. He rose
quickly, and advanced towards it; and, as the door opened, presented
the point of his sword to his father; for he it was who entered
Leonora's apartments, for the purpose of seeing that the Count was not
there. The good old man did not exactly suppose, after what had passed,
that his daughter and Marcella would dare to receive him again, which
had prevented his assigning to them other chambers; but he had thought
it probable that, as they were to go to a nunnery on the following day,
they might desire to converse with him, for the last time, ere they
left his roof.

"Whoever thou art," said the Student, "enter not this room, or it may
cost thee thy life." At these words, Don Luis stared at Don Pedro,
who also regarding the old man with attention, they soon recognised
each other. "Ah! my son," cried the old man, "with what impatience
have I expected you: why did you not inform me of your arrival? Did
you fear to disturb my rest? Alas! that is for ever banished, in the
cruel situation in which I am placed." "Ah, my father!" said Don Pedro,
utterly amazed, "is it you whom I behold? Are not my eyes deceived
by some fantastic vision?" "Whence this astonishment?" replied Don
Luis; "are you not within your father's house? Have I not, a week ago,
informed you where to find me?" "Just Heaven!" cried the Student, "what
do I hear?--and this then is my sister's apartment."

As he finished these words, the Count, whom the noise had alarmed,
and who expected that his escort was attacked, came out, sword in
hand, from Leonora's chamber. No sooner did the old man perceive him
than, with fury in his eyes, he pointed to Belflor, and exclaimed to
his son,--"There is the villain who has robbed me of my happiness,
and who has stained our honour with a mortal taint. Revenge! Let us
hasten to punish the traitor!" As he thus vented his rage, he opened
his dressing-gown, and drew from beneath it his sword, with which he
was about to fall on the Count, when Don Pedro restrained him. "Stay,
my father," said he; "moderate, I entreat you, the fury of your wrath:
what are you about to do?" "My son," replied the old man, "you withhold
my arm. You doubtless think it is too weak to revenge our wrongs. Be
it so! Do you then exact full satisfaction for the injury he has done
us: it was for this purpose that I summoned you to Madrid. Should you
perish, I will take your place; for either shall the Count fall beneath
our arms, or he shall take from both of us our lives, after having
blasted our reputation."

"My father," said Don Pedro, "I cannot yield to your impatience that
which it requires of me. Far from attempting the life of the Count,
I am now here to defend it. For that my word is pledged,--to that my
honour is assured. Let us depart, Count," continued he, addressing
himself to Belflor. "Ah! wretch," interrupted Don Luis, while he
surveyed his son with anger and astonishment,--"thus to oppose thyself
to a vengeance, which it should be the business of thy life to
accomplish! My son, my own son, is leagued, then, with the villain who
has corrupted my daughter! But think not to escape my resentment: I
will place a sword in the hand of every servant in my house, to punish
his treachery and thy despicable meanness."

[Illustration: Don Pedro restrains Don Luis from attacking Belflor]

"Signor," replied Don Pedro, "be more just towards your son. Call him
not despicable or mean--he merits not those odious appellations. The
Count this night saved my life. He proposed to me, in ignorance of my
real name, to accompany him here; and I freely consented to share the
perils he might run, without knowing that my gratitude imprudently
engaged my arm against the honour of my family. My word is passed,
then, here to defend his life; that done, I stand acquitted of my
obligation towards him: but I am not the less insensible of the wrong
that he has done to you and to us all; and to-morrow you shall find
that I will as readily shed his blood, as you behold me now determined
to preserve it from your hands."

The Count had witnessed in silence all that passed, so much was
he surprised at this extraordinary adventure; he now, however,
thus addressed the Student: "It is possible that the injury I have
inflicted might be but imperfectly avenged by your sword; I will,
therefore, present to you a means much more certain of repairing it.
I will confess to you that, until this day, I did not intend to marry
Leonora; but I this morning received from her a letter which touched
my heart, and her tears have finished what her letter began. The
happiness of being united to your sister is now my dearest hope." "But
if the King has destined you for another," said Don Luis, "how can you
dispense----?" "The King has not troubled himself upon the subject,"
interrupted Belflor, blushing: "pardon, I beseech you, that fiction,
to a man whose reason was deranged by love; it is a crime that the
violence of my passion incited me to commit, and which I expiate in
avowing to you my shame."

"Signor," replied the old man, "after this frankness, which belongs
only to noble minds, I cannot doubt your sincerity. I see, with joy,
that you are anxious to repair the injury you have done us; my anger
yields to this assurance of your contrition; I will forget it for ever
in your arms." He advanced towards the Count, who rushed to meet him,
and they embraced each other cordially. Then, turning towards Don
Pedro, "And you, false Don Juan," said Belflor,--"you, who have already
gained my esteem by your valour, come, let me vow to you a brother's
love." Don Pedro received the Count's embraces with a submissive and
respectful air, saying, "Signor, in offering to me so valuable a
friendship, you secure mine for yourself: rely on me, as one devoted to
your service to the last moment of his life."

While these cavaliers were thus discoursing, Leonora was at the door of
her chamber, intently listening to every syllable they uttered. She had
been, at the first, tempted to discover herself, and to throw herself
in the midst of their swords; but fear, and Marcella, had withheld
her. But when the adroit duenna saw that matters were arranging very
amicably, she guessed that the presence of her mistress, and her own,
would spoil nothing. Accordingly, she appeared, her handkerchief in one
hand and her ward in the other; and, with tears in their eyes, they
prostrated themselves before Don Luis. Neither of them, indeed, felt
perfectly assured; for they recollected the surprise of the previous
night, and feared the old man's reproaches for this renewal of their
disobedience. However, raising Leonora,--"My child," said he, "dry your
tears; I will not upbraid you now: since your lover is disposed to keep
the faith he has sworn to you, it is fitting that I should forget the
past."

"Yes, Signor Don Luis," interrupted Belflor, "I will indeed keep my
faith with Leonora; and as some amends for the insult I had intended,
as the fullest satisfaction I can give to you, and as a pledge of that
friendship I have vowed to Don Pedro, I offer him in marriage my sister
Eugenia." "Signor!" cried Don Luis, "how can I express my satisfaction
at the honour you confer upon my son? Was ever father happier than
myself? You overpay me, in joy, for the grief you have caused me."

[Illustration: Don Luis raises Leonora]

Though the old man was charmed with the Count's proposals, I cannot say
as much for his son. Being sincerely taken with love for his incognita,
he was so overcome with surprise and chagrin at Belflor's offer, that
he had not a word to say for himself; when the latter, who did not
observe his embarrassment, took leave, stating that he should at once
order the necessary preparations for this double union, and that he was
impatient to be bound to them eternally, by ties so endearing.

After his departure, Don Luis left Leonora with the duenna, taking
with him his son, who, when they had reached his father's apartment,
said, with all the frankness of a student: "Signor, do not insist, I
pray you, on my marriage with the Count's sister; it is enough for
the honour of our family, that he should espouse Leonora." "What! my
son," replied the old man, "can you have any objection to an union with
Eugenia de Belflor?" "Yes, my father," said Don Pedro; "I must confess
to you, that union would prove to me the most cruel of punishments; and
I will not disguise from you the reason. I love, or, rather, I adore
another: for the last six months she has listened to my vows: and now,
on her alone depends the happiness of my life."

"How miserable is the condition of a father!" exclaimed Don Luis: "how
rarely does he find his children disposed to do as he desires them. But
who is this lady that has made such deep impression on your heart?"
"That, I do not yet know," replied Don Pedro. "She has promised to
inform me of her name when I shall have satisfied her of my constancy
and discretion; but I doubt not she does honour to one of the noblest
houses of Spain."

"And you think then," said the old man, changing his tone, "that I
shall be so obliging as to sanction this romantic love!--that I shall
permit you to renounce an alliance, as glorious as fortune could offer
to you, that you may remain faithful to an illustrious lady of whose
very name you are ignorant! Do not expect so much of my kindness. No,
rather strive to vanquish feelings that are inspired by an object which
is most probably unworthy of them; and seek, in so doing, to merit the
honour which the Count proposes for you." "You speak to me in vain,
my father," replied the Student; "I feel that I can never forget her
whom I have sworn to love--unknown though she be,--and that nothing
can tear me from her. Were the Infanta proposed to me----" "Hold!"
cried the old man angrily; "it is too much to boast thus insolently of
a constancy which excites my displeasure: leave me, and let me not see
you again until you are prepared to obey my will."

Don Pedro did not dare to reply to these words, for fear of hearing
others more unpleasant still; so he retired to his chamber, where he
passed the remainder of the night in reflections in which sorrow was
not all unmixed with joy. He thought with grief that he was about to
estrange himself from his family, by refusing the hand of Belflor's
sister; but then he was consoled, when he reflected that his incognita
would worthily esteem the greatness of the sacrifice. He even flattered
himself that, after so convincing a proof of his fidelity, she would
no longer conceal from him her station, which he imagined also must be
equal at least to that of Eugenia.

In this hope, as soon as day appeared, he went out, and directed his
steps towards the Prado, that he might pass away the time until the
hour of his meeting with his mistress. With what impatience did he
count the minutes as they lingered,--with what joy did he hail the
happy moment when it arrived!

He found his fair unknown with Donna Juanna, the lady at whose house
they met; but alas, he found her in tears, and apparently in the
deepest affliction. What a sight for a lover! His own grief was
forgotten: he approached her with tenderness; and throwing himself on
his knees before her, "Madam," he exclaimed, "what must I think of the
condition in which I see you? What dreadful misfortune do these tears,
which pierce my heart, forbode?" "You dream not," she replied, "of
the fatal news I bring you. Cruel fortune is about to separate us for
ever;--yes! we shall meet no more."

[Illustration: Don Pedro kneels before his fair unknown]

She accompanied these words with so many and such heart-rending sighs,
that I know not if Don Pedro was more affected at what she told him,
than at the affliction with which she appeared oppressed in telling it.
"Just Heaven!" he cried, in a transport of fury, which he could not
control, "is it thy will that they prevent an union whose innocence
is worthy of thy protection? But, Madam," he continued, "you are
perhaps falsely alarmed! Is it certain that they would snatch you from
the most faithful of lovers? Can it be possible that I should be so
unhappy?" "Our misfortune is but too certain," answered the Unknown;
"my brother, upon whom my hand depends, has bestowed it this very day;
he has this moment announced to me his decision." "And who is the happy
man?" exclaimed Don Pedro. "Tell me! In my despair I will seek him,
and----" "I do not know his name," interrupted the Unknown. "I cared
not to ask, nor did my brother inform me; he told me indeed that it was
his wish that I should first see the cavalier."

"But, Madam," said Don Pedro, "will you then yield without resistance
to your brother's will? Will you be dragged to the altar, without
complaint? Will you go, a willing sacrifice, and abandon me so easily?
Alas! I have not hesitated to expose myself to the anger of a father
for love of you; nor could his menaces for a moment shake my fidelity.
No! nor threats, nor persuasion, could move me to espouse another,
although the lady he proposed for me was one to whom I had hardly
dared aspire." "And who is this lady?" asked the Unknown. "She is the
sister of the Count de Belflor," replied the scholar. "Ah, Don Pedro!"
cried the Unknown, with extreme surprise, "surely, you are mistaken;
it cannot be she whom they propose to you. What! Eugenia, the sister
of Belflor? Are you sure of what you say?" "Yes, Madam," replied the
Student; "the Count himself offered me her hand." "How!" cried she,
"is it possible that you are the cavalier for whom my brother designs
me?" "What do I hear?" cried the Student in his turn, "is it possible
that my incognita is the Count de Belflor's sister?" "Yes, Don Pedro,"
replied Eugenia. "But I can hardly believe it myself, at this moment;
so difficult do I find it to persuade myself of the happiness you
assure to me."

Don Pedro now fell again at her feet, and seizing her hand, he kissed
it with all the transport that lovers only can feel who pass suddenly
from the depths of despair to the highest pinnacle of hope and joy.
While he abandoned himself to the feelings of his heart, Eugenia for
the first time forgot her reserve, and freely returned his caress--she
felt that her love was sanctioned, and gave, her lips where her heart
had long been engaged. "Alas!" said she, when her love could form
itself into words, "what tortures had my brother spared me, had he
but here named the husband of his choice! What aversion had I already
conceived for my future lord! Ah, my dear Don Pedro, how I have hated
you!" "Lovely Eugenia," replied he, "what charms has that hatred for me
now! I will endeavour to merit it by adoring you for ever."

After the happy pair had exhausted love's vocabulary, and the tumult
of their hearts was somewhat calmed, Eugenia was anxious to know by
what means the Student had gained her brother's friendship. Don Pedro
did not conceal from her the amours of the Count and his sister, and
related all that had passed the night before. It was for Eugenia an
additional pleasure to learn that Belflor was to marry the sister of
her own lover. Donna Juanna was too much interested in the welfare of
her friend not to partake of her joy for this happy event, and warmly
congratulated her, as also Don Pedro thereon. At last the lovers
separated, after having agreed that they should not appear to know each
other when they met before the Count and Don Luis.

Don Pedro returned to his father, who, finding his son disposed to
obey him, was the more pleased, inasmuch as he attributed this ready
compliance to the firm manner in which he had spoken to him overnight.
They presently received a note from Belflor, in which he informed them
that he had obtained the King's consent to his marriage, as also for
that of his sister with Don Pedro, on whom his Majesty had been
pleased to confer a considerable appointment. He added, so diligently
had his orders for the nuptials been executed, that everything was
arranged for their taking place on the following day; and he came soon
after they had received his letter, to confirm what he had written, and
to present to them his sister Eugenia.

[Illustration: Belflor presents Eugenia]

Don Luis received the lady with every mark of affection, and Leonora
kissed her so much that her brother was almost jealous--although,
whatever he might feel, he managed to constrain his love and delight,
so as not to give the Count the least suspicion of their intelligence.

As Belflor remarked his sister with great attention, he thought he
could discover, notwithstanding her reserve, which he attributed to
modesty, that Don Pedro was by no means displeasing to her. To be
certain, however, he took an opportunity of speaking to her aside, and
drew from her an avowal of her entire satisfaction. He then informed
her of the name and rank of her intended, which he would not before
communicate, lest the inequality of the stations should prejudice her
against him; all which she feigned, marvellously well, to hear as for
the first time.

At last, after many compliments, which were remarkable for their
sincerity, it was resolved that the weddings should take place at the
house of Don Luis the next day, as Belflor had arranged. They were
accordingly celebrated this evening, the rejoicing still continues,
and now you know why they are so merry in that house. Every one is
delighted--except the lady Marcella: she, while all else are laughing,
is at this moment in tears. They are real tears too, this time! for
the Count de Belflor, after the ceremony, informed Don Luis of the
facts which preceded it; and the old gentleman has sent the duenna to
the _Monasterio de las Arrepentidas_, where the thousand pistoles she
received for seducing Leonora will enable her to repent having done so
for the rest of her days.




CHAPTER VI.


NEW OBJECTS DISPLAYED TO DON CLEOPHAS; AND HIS REVENGE ON DONNA THOMASA.


The Demon now directed the Student's attention to another part of the
city. "You see," he continued, "that house which is directly under
us: it contains something curious enough,--a man loaded with debt and
sleeping profoundly." "Of course then," said Leandro, "he is a person
of distinction?" "Precisely so," answered Asmodeus: "he is a marquis,
possessed of a hundred thousand ducats per annum, but whose expenses,
nevertheless, exceed his income. His table and his mistresses require
that he should support them with credit, but that causes him no
anxiety; on the contrary, when he opens an account with a tradesman,
he thinks that the latter is indebted to him. 'It is you,' said he the
other day to a draper, 'it is you, that I shall henceforth trust with
the execution of my orders; it is a preference which you owe to my
esteem.'

"While the marquis enjoys so tranquilly the sweet repose of which he
deprives his creditors, look at a man who----" "Stay, Signor Asmodeus,"
interrupted Don Cleophas hastily; "I perceive a carriage in the street,
and cannot let it pass without asking what it contains." "Hush," said
the Cripple, lowering his voice, as though he feared he should be
heard:--"learn that that vehicle conceals one of the most dignified
personages in this kingdom, a president, who is going to amuse himself
with an elderly lady of Asturia, who is devoted to his pleasures. That
he may not be known, he has taken the precaution of imitating Caligula,
who on a similar occasion disguised himself in a wig.

"But,--to return to the picture I was about to present to your sight
when you interrupted me,--observe, in the very highest part of the
mansion, where sleeps the marquis, a man who is writing in a chamber
filled with books and manuscripts." "He is probably," said Zambullo,
"the steward, labouring to devise some means for discharging his
master's obligations." "Excellent," exclaimed the Devil; "that, indeed,
forms a great part of the amusement of such gentry in the service of
noblemen! They seek rather to profit from derangement of their masters'
affairs than to put them in order. He is not, then, the steward whom
you see; he is an author: the marquis keeps him in his house, to obtain
the reputation of a patron of literature." "This author," replied Don
Cleophas, "is apparently a man of eminence." "Judge for yourself!"
replied the Demon. "He is surrounded by a thousand volumes, and is
composing one, on Natural History, in which there will not be a line of
his own. He pillages these books and manuscripts without mercy; and,
although he does nothing but arrange and connect his larcenies, he has
more vanity than the most original writer upon earth.

[Illustration: the author at work]

"You are not aware," continued the Spirit, "who lives three doors from
this mansion: it is La Chichona, the very lady who acted so honourable
a part in the story of the Count de Belflor." "Ah!" said Leandro, "I am
delighted to behold her. The dear creature, so considerate for youth,
is doubtless one of the two old ladies whom I perceive in that room.
One of them is leaning with both her elbows on the table, looking
attentively at the other, who is counting out some money. Which of
them is La Chichona?" "Not the one who is counting," said the Demon;
"her name is La Pebrada, and she is a distinguished member of the same
profession: they are, indeed, partners; and are at this moment dividing
the profits of an adventure which, by their assistance, has terminated
favourably.

[Illustration: La Chichona and La Pebrada divide the profits]

"La Pebrada is the more successful of the two: she has among her
clients several rich widows, who subscribe to her daily register."
"What do you mean by her register?" interrupted the Student. "Why,"
replied Asmodeus, "it contains the names of all handsome foreigners,
and particularly Frenchmen, who come to Madrid. The instant La Pebrada
hears of an arrival, away she posts to the hotel of the new comer,
to learn every particular as to his country, birth, parentage, and
education,--his age, form, and appearance, all which are duly reported
to her subscribers; and if, on reflection, the heart of any of her
widows is inclined to an acquaintance, she adroitly manages a speedy
interview with the stranger."

"That is extremely convenient," replied Zambullo, smiling, "and in
some sort very proper; for, in truth, without these kind ladies and
their agents, the youthful foreigner, who comes without introductions
to Madrid, would lose an immense deal of time in gaining them. But,
tell me, are there in other countries widows as generous and women as
intriguing?" "Capital!" exclaimed the Devil--"if there are? Why! can
you doubt it? I should be unworthy of my demonship if I neglected to
provide all large towns with them in plenty."

"Cast your eyes upon Chichona's neighbour,--yon printer, who is working
at his press, alone. He has dismissed the devils in his employ these
three hours; and he is now engaged, for the night, on a work which
he is printing privately." "Ah! what may it be?" said Leandro. "It
treats of insults," replied the Demon; "and endeavours to prove that
Religion is preferable to Honour; and that it is better to pardon than
to avenge an affront." "Oh! the scoundrel!" exclaimed the Student "Well
may he print in secret his infamous book. Its author had better not
acknowledge his production: I would be one of the first to answer it
with a horsewhip. What! can Religion forbid the preservation of one's
honour?"

"Let us not discuss that point," interrupted Asmodeus, with a malicious
smile. "It appears that you have made the most of the lectures on
morality you listened to at Alcala; and I give you joy of the result."
"You may say what you please," interrupted Cleophas in his turn, "and
so may the writer of this wretched absurdity: but though his reasonings
were clear as the noon-day sun, I should despise him and them. I am a
Spaniard, and nothing is to me so delightful as revenge; and, by the
by, since you have pledged yourself to satisfy me for the perfidy of my
mistress, I call on you at once to keep your promise."

"I yield with pleasure," replied the Demon, "to the wrath which
agitates your breast. Oh! how I love those noble spirits who follow
without scruple the dictates of their passions! I will obey your will
at once; and indeed, the hour to avenge your wrongs is come: but first
I wish to show you something which will amuse you vastly. Look beyond
the printing-office, and observe with attention what is passing in an
apartment, hung with drab cloth." "I perceive," said Leandro, "five or
six women, who are with eagerness offering phials of something to a
sort of valet, and they appear desperately agitated."

"They are," replied Asmodeus, "devotees, who have great reason to be
agitated. There is in the next room a sick inquisitor. This venerable
personage, who is about thirty-five years old, is attended by two of
his dearest penitents, with untiring watchfulness. One is concocting
his gruel, while the other at his pillow is employed in keeping his
head warm, and is covering his stomach with a kind of blanket made of
at least fifty lamb-skins." "What on earth is the matter with him,
then?" asked Zambullo. "He has a cold in his head," answered the Devil;
"and there is danger lest the disorder should extend to his lungs."

[Illustration: the inquisitor nursed by two penitents]

"The ladies whom you see in his antechamber have hastened, on the
alarm of his indisposition, with all sorts of remedies. One brings,
to allay his apprehended cough, syrups of jujubes, mallows, coral,
and coltsfoot; another, to preserve the said lungs of his reverence,
syrups of long-life, speedwell, amaranth, and the elixir vitæ; this
one, to fortify his brain and stomach, has brought balm, cinnamon, and
treacle waters, besides gutta vitæ, and the essences of nutmegs and
ambergris; that offers anacardine and bezoardic confections; while a
fifth carries tinctures of cloves, gilly-flowers, sunflowers, and of
coral and emeralds. All these zealous penitents are boasting to the
valet of the virtues of the medicines they offer; and each by turns,
drawing him aside, and slipping a ducat in his hand, whispers in his
ear: 'Laurence, my dear Laurence, manage so, I beg of you, that what I
bring for the dear man may have the preference.'"

"By Jupiter!" cried Don Cleophas, "it must be allowed that
inquisitors--even sick inquisitors--are happy mortals." "I can answer
for that," replied Asmodeus; "I almost envy them their lot, myself;
and, like the son of Philip of Macedon, who once said that he would
have been Diogenes, if he had not been Alexander, I can unhesitatingly
say, that, if I were not a devil I would be an inquisitor."

"But, Signor Student," continued he, "let us go! Let us away, to punish
the ingrate who so ill-requited your tenderness." Zambullo instantly
seized the end of the Demon's cloak, and a second time was whirled with
him through the air, until they alighted on the house of Donna Thomasa.

This frail damsel was seated at table, with the four gentlemen who,
a few hours before, had so eagerly sought the acquaintance of Don
Cleophas on the roof of her house. He trembled with rage, as he beheld
them feasting on a brace of partridges and a rabbit, which, with some
choice wine, he had sent to the traitress for his own supper; and, to
add to his mortification, he perceived that joy reigned in the repast;
and that it was evident, by the deportment of the lady, that the
company of these scoundrels was much more agreeable to her than that of
himself. "Oh! the wretches!" he cried, in a perfect fury, "to see them
enjoying themselves at my expense! Vastly pleasant, is it not?"

"Why, I must confess," replied the Demon, "that you have witnessed
spectacles more pleasing; but he who rejoices in the favours of such
fair ones must expect to share them. This sort of thing has happened a
thousand times; especially in France, among the abbés, the gentlemen of
the long robe, and the financiers." "If I had a sword, though," said
Leandro, "I would fall upon the villains, and spoil their sport for
them." "You would be hardly matched," replied the Demon;--"what were
one among so many? Leave your revenge to me! I will manage it better
than you could. I will soon set them together by the ears, in inspiring
each of them with a fit of tenderness for your mistress: their swords
will be out in no time, and you will be delighted with the uproar."

[Illustration: The guests quarrel over Donna Thomasa]

Asmodeus had no sooner spoken than he breathed forcibly, and from his
mouth issued a violet-coloured vapour which descended tortuously,
like a fiery serpent, and spread itself round the table of Donna
Thomasa. In an instant, one of her guests, more inflammable than his
companions, rose from his seat, and, approaching the lady, embraced
her amorously; when the others, in whom the spirit had begun to work,
hastened together to snatch from him the dainty prize. Each claimed
a preference: words ensued; a jealous rage possessed them; blows
succeeded, and, as the Devil had foretold, they drew their weapons and
commenced a furious combat. In the meanwhile Donna Thomasa exerted
her lungs, and the neighbourhood was speedily alarmed by her cries.
They call for the police; the police arrive: they break open the
door, and find two of the Hectors extended on the floor. They seize
upon the others, and take them with the Helen of the party to prison.
In vain did she weep; in vain did she tear her locks, and exclaim
in despair:--the tears of unfortunate beauty had no more effect on
the cavaliers who conducted her, than they had on her former knight
Zambullo, who almost died with laughter, in which the god of love most
unnaturally joined him.

"Well!" said the Demon to the Student, "are you content?" "No, no!"
replied Don Cleophas; "to satisfy me in full, place me upon the prison,
that I may have the pleasure of beholding in her dungeon, the miserable
who trifled with my love. I feel for her, now, a hatred which exceeds
even the affection with which she formerly inspired me." "Be it so!"
said the Devil; "you shall ever find me a slave to your will, though
it interfered with mine and my interests,--provided always, that it is
safe to indulge you."

[Illustration: Donna Thomasa in prison]

They flew through the air, and were on the prison before the officers
arrived with their captives. The two assassins were at once consigned
to one of its lowest deeps, while Thomasa was led to a bed of straw,
which she was to share with three or four other abandoned women, who
had fallen into the hands of justice the same day; and with whom she
was destined to be transported to the colonies, which a grateful mother
country generally endows with this description of female inhabitants.

"I am satisfied," said Zambullo; "I have tasted a delicious revenge:
my dear Thomasa will not pass the night quite so pleasantly as
she had anticipated. So, now, if you please, we will continue our
observations." "We could not be in a better place, then," replied the
Spirit. "Within these walls is much to interest you. Innocent and
guilty, in somewhat equal numbers, are here enclosed: it is the hell
in which commences the punishment of the one, and the purgatory in
which the virtue of the others may be purified,--you see I'm a good
Catholic, Signor Student! Of both of these species of prisoners I will
show you examples, and I will inform you why they are here enfettered."




CHAPTER VII.


THE PRISON, AND THE PRISONERS.


"And before I commence my memoirs, just observe the gaolers at the
entrance of this horrible place. The poets of antiquity placed but one
Cerberus at the gate of their hell: there are many more here, however,
as you perceive. They are creatures who have lost all the feelings
of humanity, if they ever possessed any;--the most malicious of my
brethren could hardly replace one of them. But I observe that you are
looking with horror on those cells whose only furniture consists of a
wretched bed,--those fearful dungeons appear to you so many tombs. You
are reasonably astonished at the misery you behold; and you deplore
the fate of those unhappy persons whom the law restrains; still, they
are not all equally to be pitied; and I will enable you to distinguish
between them.

"To begin, in that large cell to the right are four men sleeping in
two beds; one of them is an innkeeper, accused of having poisoned a
foreigner who died suddenly the other day in his house. They assert
that the deceased owed his death to the quality of the wine he partook
of; the host maintains, that the quantity, alone, killed him: and the
accused will be believed, for the stranger was a German." "Well! who
is in the right, the innkeeper or his accusers?" said Don Cleophas.
"It is difficult to decide," replied the Devil "The wine was certainly
drugged; but, i' faith, the Baron drank so largely, that the judges may
for the nonce most conscientiously acquit a tavern-keeper of poisoning
his customer."

"His bedfellow is an assassin by profession;--not a soldier, but one of
those scoundrels who are called _Valientes_, and who for four or five
pistoles obligingly minister to all who will go to so great an expense
for the purpose of secretly ridding themselves of some one to whom they
owe an obligation. The third prisoner is a dancing-master, who has
been teaching one of his female pupils a step not usually practised
in genteel society; and the fourth is an unlucky gallant caught by
the patrole in the act of entering, by the balcony, the apartment of
a lady, whom he was about to console for the absence of her husband.
He has only to declare the charitable object of his visit, to withdraw
himself from the hands of justice; but he nobly prefers to suffer as a
robber, rather than endanger the reputation of his mistress."

"He is a model of discretion, indeed," said the Student; "but it
must be allowed that the cavaliers of Spain excel those of all
other nations in affairs of gallantry; I would bet anything that a
Frenchman, for example, would never permit himself to be hanged under
similar circumstances." "And I would back you for that," answered the
Devil; "he would rather scale the balcony of a lady, of whose favours
he could boast, in broad day-light, for the express purpose of
proclaiming her disgrace."

"In a cell near that of the four men I have just spoken of," continued
Asmodeus, "is a celebrated witch, who enjoys the reputation of doing
all impossible things. By the power of her magic, old dowagers can
find, they say, youthful admirers who will love them for their bloom;
husbands are rendered faithful to their wives; and coquettes sincerely
devoted to the rich fools who keep them: all which is, I need not tell
you, absurd enough. Her only secret is in persuading people that she
has one, and in making the most of that opinion. The Holy Office is
jealous of the poor creature, so have called her to account; and she is
likely to be burnt at the first _aúto de fé_."

"Under this cell, in a dark dungeon, lodges a young tavern
keeper."--"What! another?" cried Leandro,--"surely these people are
going to poison all the world." "Mine host, in this case," replied
Asmodeus, "will not suffer for his wine; it is for an illegal traffic
in spirits that he was arrested yesterday, at the instance of the Holy
Office also. I will explain the matter to you in a few words.

"An old soldier, having risen by his courage, or rather by his
patience, to the rank of serjeant, came to Madrid in search of
recruits, and demanded a lodging in a tavern to which he was directed
by his billet. The host told the serjeant that he certainly had spare
rooms in his house, but that he could not think of putting him into any
one of them, as they were haunted by a ghost who visited them nightly,
and most shockingly ill-treated those who had the temerity to occupy
them. The serjeant was not however to be daunted: 'Place me,' said
he, 'in any room you please; give me a light, some wine, a pipe and
tobacco, and never trouble yourself for my safety; ghosts, depend upon
it, have the highest respect for an old campaigner, whose hairs have
whitened under arms.'

"As he appeared so resolute, they showed the old soldier to a chamber,
gave him all he had required; and he began to smoke and drink at his
ease. The hour of midnight sounded, but no ghost appeared to disturb
the profound silence that reigned throughout the house; it seemed as
though the spirit did indeed respect the valiant bearing of his new
guest: but, between one and two o'clock, the wakeful sentinel was
alarmed by a horrible din, as of rattling chains, and beheld, entering
his apartment, a fearful spectre, clothed in black, and enveloped
with iron chains. Our old smoker, not in the least alarmed at this
spectacle, rose calmly from his chair, advanced towards the spirit,
drew his sword, and gave him with the flat side of it, a terrible blow
on the head.

"The phantom, unaccustomed to find such courageous tenants in his
domain, and perceiving that the soldier was preparing to repeat the
blow, fell upon his knees before him, crying out,--'Pardon, signor
serjeant; for the love of Heaven, do not kill me: have pity upon a poor
devil, who throws himself at your feet to implore your clemency. I
conjure you by St James, who, like yourself, was a valiant soldier----'
'If you would preserve your life,' interrupted the serjeant, 'tell me
who you are, and what you do here. Speak the truth,--or, by our Lady,
I will cut you in two, as the knights of old split the giants they
encountered.' At these words, the spirit, finding with whom he had to
do, saw that he had better lose no time in his explanation.

[Illustration: William kneels before the serjeant]

"'I am,' said he, 'the head-waiter of this inn; my name is William;
and I love Juanilla, the only daughter of the landlord, and I do not
love without return; but as her parents have a better match in view,
my sweetheart and myself have arranged that, in order to compel them
to choose me for their son-in-law, I shall nightly disguise myself
in this manner. I clothe myself in a long black cloak, and put the
jack-chain round my neck; and, thus equipped, I go about the house,
from the cellar to the garret, making all the noise I can, of which
you have heard a specimen. When I arrive at the door of my master and
mistress's bed-room, I rattle my chains, and cry loud enough for them
to hear,--"Hope not to rest in peace, until you have married Juanilla
to your head-waiter, William!"'

"'After having pronounced these words in a hoarse and broken voice,
I continue my clatter, and vanish by a window into the chamber where
Juanilla sleeps alone, to inform her of what I have done. And now,
signor serjeant, you may be assured that I have told you the whole
truth. I know that after this confession you may ruin me, by informing
my master of the affair; but if, instead of thus injuring me, you are
inclined to serve me, I swear that my gratitude----' 'Ah!' interrupted
the soldier, 'what service can you hope from me?' 'You have only in the
morning,' replied the young man, 'to say that you have seen the ghost,
and that it has so terribly frightened you,----' 'What, the deuce!
frightened me!' again interrupted the old warrior; 'do you expect
that Serjeant Hannibal Antonio Quebrantador is going to say that he
was frightened? I would rather say that a hundred thousand devils had
me----' 'That is not absolutely necessary,' in his turn interrupted
William; 'and after all, it is of no great consequence what you say,
provided that you but assist me in my design: only let me marry
Juanilla, and see myself established by the assistance of her father,
and I promise to keep open house for you and all your friends.'

"'You are a regular seducer, master William,' cried the soldier; 'you
want to join me in a downright cheat: the matter may be serious,
and you take it so lightly, as to make me, even, tremble for the
consequences. But away with you! continue your infernal noise, and go
to Juanilla to render your account: I will manage the rest.'

[Illustration: the serjeant speaks to his host and hostess]

"Accordingly, on the following morning, the serjeant said to his
host and hostess: 'Well! I have seen the ghost, conversed with it,
and found it very civil and reasonable.' "I am," said he to me, "the
great-great-grandfather of the master of this house. I had a daughter,
whom I solemnly promised to the father of master William's grandfather:
nevertheless, despite my pledge, I gave her hand to another, and died
shortly afterwards. Ever since then, I have remained in purgatory,
suffering for this perjury; and I shall continue in torment until
some one of my descendants has married into the family of the head
waiter. To accomplish this, I come here nightly; but it is in vain
that I command them to unite Juanilla and young William,--the son of
my grandchild turns a deaf ear to my entreaties, as well as his wife;
but tell them, if you please, signor serjeant, that if they do not as
I desire of them soon, I shall come to extremities with them, and will
plague them both in a way they little dream of."'

"The host, who is simple enough, was somewhat shaken by this discourse;
but the hostess, still more silly than her husband, was so much
affected by it, that she fancied she already saw the ghost at her
heels, and at once consented to the match, which took place on the
following day. William shortly afterwards took an inn in another
part of the town, and serjeant Quebrantador failed not to visit him
frequently. The new tavern-keeper at first, out of gratitude, filled
him with wine at discretion; which so pleased the old moustache, that
he took all his friends to the house: he even there enrolled his
recruits, and made them drunk at the host's expense.

"At last, therefore, master William became tired of constantly wetting
so many parching throats; but, on communicating his ideas upon the
subject to the serjeant, the latter, with a disregard of his own
infraction of their treaty which would have fitted him to command an
army, was unjust enough to accuse mine host of ingratitude. William
replied, the other rejoined, and the conversation ended, as their
first had begun, with a blow of the serjeant's long sword on the thick
head of the unfortunate tavern-keeper. Some passers-by naturally
sided with the civilian: of these Quebrantador wounded three or four;
and his wrath was yet unsatisfied, when he was suddenly assailed
by a host of archers, who arrested him as a disturber of the peace.
They conducted him to prison, where he declared all that I have told
you; and upon his deposition the ex-head-waiter was encaged also. His
father-in-law demands a divorce; and the Holy Office, hearing that
William has acquired some considerable property, has kindly undertaken
to investigate the matter."

[Illustration: the serjeant is restrained from attacking William]

"Egad!" cried Don Cleophas, "our holy inquisition is ever alive to its
interests. No sooner do they light upon a profitable----" "Softly!"
interrupted the devil, "have a care how you launch out against that
tribunal:--for it, the very walls have ears. They echo even words that
the mouth has never spoken; and for myself, I hardly dare to mention it
without trembling."

"Over the unfortunate William, in the first chamber to the left,
are two men worthy of your pity; one of them is a youthful valet,
whom his master's wife privately indulged with the use of more than
her husband's clothes. One day, however, the husband surprised them
together; when the lady immediately began crying out for help, and
accused the valet of having violated her person. The poor fellow was
arrested, of course; and, according to appearances, will be sacrificed
to his mistress's reputation. His companion, still less guilty than the
valet, is also about to pay the forfeit of his life. He was footman to
a duchess who has been robbed of a valuable diamond, which they accuse
him of having taken. He will be to-morrow put to the torture, until the
rack wrings from him a confession of the theft; and in the meanwhile
the lady's maid, who is the real culprit, and whom no one dares to
suspect, will moralise with the duchess on the depravity of modern
servants."

"Ah! Signor Asmodeus," said Leandro, "let not the wretched footman
perish, I entreat you! His innocence interests me for his life. Save
him, by your power, from the unjust and cruel torture they would
inflict: he deserves----" "You cannot expect it, Signor Student!"
interrupted the demon. "What! do you suppose that I would prevent
injustice?--that I would snatch the guiltless from destruction? As well
might you pray an attorney to desist from the ruin of the widow or the
orphan!"

"Oh! and it please you," added the Devil, "expect not of me that which
is contrary to my interest, unless indeed it be of great advantage
to yourself. Besides, were I willing to deliver yonder prisoner from
bondage, how could I effect it?" "How!" repeated Zambullo, "do you mean
to say that you have not the power so to do?" "Certainly," replied the
Cripple. "Had you read the Enchiridion, or Albertus Magnus, you would
know that neither I, nor any of my brethren, can liberate a prisoner
from his cell: even I, were I so unfortunate as to be within the talons
of the law, could only hope to escape by bribing my jailer, or my
judges.

"In the next room, on the same side, lodges a surgeon convicted of
having, in a fit of jealousy, drained the warm blood which wantoned in
the veins of his handsome wife, after the model of the death of Seneca.
He was yesterday tenderly questioned on the rack; and having confessed
the crime of which he was accused, he let out the secrets of his
profession, by detailing a very novel and interesting mode which he had
especially adopted for increasing his practice. He stated that he had
been in the habit of wounding persons in the street with a bayonet, and
of then lancing himself into his house by a back-door. Of course the
patient used to call out lustily at this unexpected operation; and as
the neighbours flocked around at his cries, the surgeon, mingling with
the crowd, and finding a man bathed in his blood, very charitably had
him carried to his shop, and dressed the wound with the same hand that
had given it.

"Although the rascally practitioner has confessed to this atrocity,
for which a thousand deaths were not one too many, he still hopes that
his life will be spared; and it is not improbable that it may be so,
seeing that he is related to the lady who has the honour of clouting
the little princes of Spain: besides which, he is the inventor of a
marvellous wash, of which the secret would die with him, and which
has the virtues of whitening the skin, and of giving to the wrinkled
front the juvenile appearance of fifteen. Now, as this incomparable
water serves as the fountain of youth to three ladies of the palace,
who have united their efforts to save him, he relies so confidently on
their credit at court, or rather on that of his wash, that he sleeps
tranquilly in the soothing hope that he will awaken to the agreeable
intelligence of his pardon."

"I perceive, upon a bed in the same room," said the Student, "another
man, who appears to me to be sleeping peaceably enough; his business
is not a very bad one, I expect." "It is a very ticklish affair,
though," replied the Demon. "That cavalier is a gentleman of Biscay,
who has enriched himself by the fire of a carbine: I will tell you
how. About a fortnight ago, shooting in a forest with his elder and
only brother, who was in possession of a large estate, he killed him,
by mistake, instead of a partridge." "A very lucky mistake, that,"
cried Don Cleophas, laughing, "for a younger son." "Yes," replied
Asmodeus: "but a collateral branch of the family, the members of which
would have no objection to see the deceased's estate fall within their
line, have disinterestedly prosecuted his murderer on the charge of
having designedly shot him, that he might succeed to his property.
The accused, however, immediately rendered himself into the hands of
justice; and he appears to be so deeply afflicted by the death of his
brother, that they can scarcely imagine him guilty of deliberately
taking his life." "And has he really nothing with which to reproach
himself, beyond his fatal awkwardness?" asked Leandro. "No," replied
Asmodeus; "his design was innocent enough; but when an elder son is
in possession of all the wealth of his family, I should certainly not
advise him to make a shooting-party in company with his younger brother.

"Observe attentively those two youths who, in a retreat near to that
of the fatal shot, are conversing as merrily as though they were at
liberty. They are a pair of veritable _picaros;_ and there is one,
especially, who may some day amuse the public with one of those details
of roguery which never fail to delight it. He is a modern Guzman
d'Alfarache: it is he who wears the brown velvet vest, and has a plume
of feathers in his hat.

"Not three months since, in this very town, he was page to the Count
d'Onato; and he would still have been in the suite of that nobleman
but for a little piece of rascality, which gained for him his present
lodging, and which I will narrate to you.

"One day, this youth, whose name is Domingo, received a hundred
lashes, which the Count's intendant, otherwise governor of the pages,
directed to be bestowed on him as a reward for some trick which
appeared to deserve it. Domingo was, however, impatient under such
a load of obligation; and so, proudly resolved to return it on the
first opportunity. He had remarked more than once that the Signor Don
Como, as the intendant styled himself, delighted to wash his hands
with orange-flower water, and to anoint himself with pastes redolent
of the pink or jessamine; that he was more careful of his person than
an old coquette, and that, in short, he was one of those coxcombs who
imagine that no woman of taste can behold them without loving them.
These observations inspired Domingo with a scheme for revenge, which he
communicated to a young waiting-woman who resided in the neighbourhood,
whose assistance he required for the execution of his project, and in
whose favour he stood so high that she had none left to grant him.

"This damsel, called Floretta, in order to have the pleasure of an
unrestrained intercourse with the page, introduced him as her cousin
into the house of Donna Luziana, her mistress, whose father was at that
time absent from Madrid. The cunning Domingo, after having informed his
pretended relative of her part in his design, going one morning into
the apartment of Don Como, found my gentleman trying on a new dress,
looking with complacency at his figure in a mirror, and evidently by no
means displeased with its reflection. The page affected to be struck
with admiration of this Narcissus, and exclaimed, in well-feigned
transport: 'Upon my honour, Signor Don Como, you have the air of
royalty itself. I see, daily, nobles richly clad; but notwithstanding
the elegance and splendour of their vestments, I discern in none that
dignity of mien which distinguishes you. I will not assert,' added he,
'that with the respect I have for you, I may not regard you with eyes
somewhat prepossessed in your favour; but this I can say, that I know
of no cavalier at court whom you would not totally eclipse.'

"The intendant smiled at this discourse, which offered so agreeable
a tribute to his vanity, and graciously replied:--'You flatter me,
my friend; or rather, as you say, you esteem me so highly, that your
friendship endows me with graces that nature has refused.' 'I cannot
think so,' replied the parasite; 'for there is no one who does not
speak of you in terms which I dare not repeat, lest you should think
I flattered you indeed. I wish you had heard what was said to me
yesterday by one of my cousins, who is in the service of a lady of
quality.'

"Don Como failed not to ask what it was that Domingo's cousin had
said of him. 'Why,' replied the page, 'I ought hardly to tell you; but
she enlarged on the majesty of your figure,--on the charms which are
everywhere visible in your person; and, what is better, she told me, in
confidence, that the greatest delight of Donna Luziana, her mistress,
is to watch for your passing her house, and to feast her eyes with
beholding you.'

[Illustration: The page flattering Don Como]

"'And who is this lady?' said the intendant,--'where does she live?'
'What!' replied Domingo; 'do you not know the only daughter of general
Don Fernando, our neighbour?' 'Ah! to be sure I do,' replied Don Como:
'I remember to have frequently heard of the wealth and surpassing
beauty of this Luziana; she

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