CHAPTER XLII
No matter--as an appendage to seamstressy, the thread-paper might be of some consequence to my mother--of none to my father, as a mark in _Slawkenbergius_. _Slawkenbergius_ in every page of him was a rich treasure of inexhaustible knowledge to my father--he could not open him amiss; and he would often say in closing the book, that if all the arts and sciences in the world, with the books which treated of them, were lost--should the wisdom and policies of governments, he would say, through disuse, ever happen to be forgot, and all that statesmen had wrote or caused to be written, upon the strong or the weak sides of courts and kingdoms, should they be forgot also--and _Slawkenbergius_ only left----there would be enough in him in all conscience, he would say, to set the world a-going again. A treasure therefore was he indeed! an institute of all that was necessary to be known of noses, and everything else--at _matin_, noon, and vespers was _Hafen Slawkenbergius_ his recreation and delight: ’twas for ever in his hands----you would have sworn, Sir, it had been a canon’s prayer-book--so worn, so glazed, so contrited and attrited was it with fingers and with thumbs in all its parts, from one end even unto the other.
I am not such a bigot to _Slawkenbergius_ as my father; ----there is a fund in him, no doubt: but in my opinion, the best, I don’t say the most profitable, but the most amusing part of _Hafen Slawkenbergius_, is his tales------and, considering he was a _German_, many of them told not without fancy: ------these take up his second book, containing nearly one half of his folio, and are comprehended in ten decads, each decad containing ten tales ------Philosophy is not built upon tales; and therefore ’twas certainly wrong in _Slawkenbergius_ to send them into the world by that name! ----there are a few of them in his eighth, ninth, and tenth decads, which I own seem rather playful and sportive, than speculative--but in general they are to be looked upon by the learned as a detail of so many independent facts, all of them turning round somehow or other upon the main hinges of his subject, and collected by him with great fidelity, and added to his work as so many illustrations upon the doctrines of noses.
As we have leisure enough upon our hands----if you give me leave, madam, I’ll tell you the ninth tale of his tenth decad.
[Transcriber’s Note:
Like the Excommunication, the following section was printed on facing pages. For this e-text it is given in consecutive paragraphs, with the Latin text inset.]
## BOOK IV
SLAWKENBERGII FABELLA[4.1]
SLAWKENBERGIUS’S TALE
_Vespera quâdam frigidulâ, posteriori in parte mensis _Augusti_, peregrinus, mulo fusco colore insidens, manticâ a tergo, paucis indusiis, binis calceis, braccisque sericis coccineis repleta, _Argentoratum_ ingressus est._
It was one cool refreshing evening, at the close of a very sultry day, in the latter end of the month of _August_, when a stranger, mounted upon a dark mule, with a small cloak-bag behind him, containing a few shirts, a pair of shoes, and a crimson-sattin pair of breeches, entered the town of _Strasburg_.
_Militi eum percontanti, quum portas intraret dixit, se apud Nasorum promontorium fuisse, Francofurtum proficisci, et Argentoratum, transitu ad fines Sarmatiæ mensis intervallo, reversurum._
He told the centinel, who questioned him as he entered the gates, that he had been at the Promontory of NOSES--was going on to _Frankfort_----and should be back again at _Strasburg_ that day month, in his way to the borders of _Crim Tartary_.
_Miles peregrini in faciem suspexit ----Dî boni, nova forma nasi!_
The centinel looked up into the stranger’s face----he never saw such a Nose in his life!
_At multum mihi profuit, inquit peregrinus, carpum amento extrahens, e quo pependit acinaces: Loculo manum inseruit; et magnâ cum urbanitate, pilei parte anteriore tactâ manu sinistrâ, ut extendit dextram, militi florinum dedit et processit._
--I have made a very good venture of it, quoth the stranger--so slipping his wrist out of the loop of a black ribbon, to which a short scymetar was hung, he put his hand into his pocket, and with great courtesy touching the fore part of his cap with his left hand, as he extended his right----he put a florin into the centinel’s hand, and passed on.
_Dolet mihi, ait miles, tympanistam nanum et valgum alloquens, virum adeo urbanum vaginam perdidisse: itinerari haud poterit nudâ acinaci; neque vaginam toto _Argentorato_, habilem inveniet. ------Nullam unquam habui, respondit peregrinus respiciens------seque comiter inclinans--hoc more gesto, nudam acinacem elevans, mulo lentò progrediente, ut nasum tueri possim._
It grieves me, said the centinel, speaking to a little dwarfish bandy-legg’d drummer, that so courteous a soul should have lost his scabbard------he cannot travel without one to his scymetar, and will not be able to get a scabbard to fit it in all _Strasburg_. ----I never had one, replied the stranger, looking back to the centinel, and putting his hand up to his cap as he spoke ----I carry it, continued he, thus----holding up his naked scymetar, his mule moving on slowly all the time--on purpose to defend my nose.
_Non immerito, benigne peregrine, respondit miles._
It is well worth it, gentle stranger, replied the centinel.
_Nihili æstimo, ait ille tympanista, e pergamenâ factitius est._
----’Tis not worth a single stiver, said the bandy-legg’d drummer----’tis a nose of parchment.
_Prout christianus sum, inquit miles, nasus ille, ni sexties major sit, meo esset conformis._
As I am a true catholic--except that it is six times as big--’tis a nose, said the centinel, like my own.
_Crepitare audivi ait tympanista._
--I heard it crackle, said the drummer.
_Mehercule! sanguinem emisit, respondit miles._
By dunder, said the centinel, I saw it bleed.
_Miseret me, inquit tympanista, qui non ambo tetigimus!_
What a pity, cried the bandy-legg’d drummer, we did not both touch it!
_Eodem temporis puncto, quo hæc res argumentata fuit inter militem et tympanistam, disceptabatur ibidem tubicine et uxore suâ qui tunc accesserunt, et peregrino prætereunte, restiterunt._
At the very time that this dispute was maintaining by the centinel and the drummer--was the same point debating betwixt a trumpeter and a trumpeter’s wife, who were just then coming up, and had stopped to see the stranger pass by.
_Quantus nasus! æque longus est, ait tubicina, ac tuba._
_Benedicity!_ ------What a nose! ’tis as long, said the trumpeter’s wife, as a trumpet.
_Et ex eodem metallo, ait tubicen, velut sternutamento audias._
And of the same metal, said the trumpeter, as you hear by its sneezing.
_Tantum abest, respondit illa, quod fistulam dulcedine vincit._
’Tis as soft as a flute, said she.
_Æneus est, ait tubicen._
--’Tis brass, said the trumpeter.
_Nequaquam, respondit uxor._
--’Tis a pudding’s end, said his wife.
_Rursum affirmo, ait tubicen, quod æneus est._
I tell thee again, said the trumpeter, ’tis a brazen nose.
_Rem penitus explorabo; prius, enim digito tangam, ait uxor, quam dormivero._
I’ll know the bottom of it, said the trumpeter’s wife, for I will touch it with my finger before I sleep.
_Mulus peregrini gradu lento progressus est, ut unumquodque verbum controversiæ, non tantum inter militem et tympanistam, verum etiam inter tubicinem et uxorem ejus, audiret._
The stranger’s mule moved on at so slow a rate, that he heard every word of the dispute, not only betwixt the centinel and the drummer, but betwixt the trumpeter and trumpeter’s wife.
_Nequaquam, ait ille, in muli collum fræna demittens, et manibus ambabus in pectus positis, (mulo lentè progrediente) nequaquam, ait ille respiciens, non necesse est ut res isthæc dilucidata foret. Minime gentium! meus nasus nunquam tangetur, dum spiritus hos reget artus --Ad quid agendum? ait uxor burgomagistri._
No! said he, dropping his reins upon his mule’s neck, and laying both his hands upon his breast, the one over the other, in a saint-like position (his mule going on easily all the time) No! said he, looking up --I am not such a debtor to the world----slandered and disappointed as I have been--as to give it that conviction----no! said he, my nose shall never be touched whilst Heaven gives me strength ----To do what? said a burgomaster’s wife.
_Peregrinus illi non respondit. Votum faciebat tunc temporis sancto Nicolao; quo facto, in sinum dextrum inserens, e quâ negligenter pependit acinaces, lento gradu processit per plateam Argentorati latam quæ ad diversorium templo ex adversum ducit._
The stranger took no notice of the burgomaster’s wife------he was making a vow to _Saint Nicolas_; which done, having uncrossed his arms with the same solemnity with which he crossed them, he took up the reins of his bridle with his left hand, and putting his right hand into his bosom, with his scymetar hanging loosely to the wrist of it, he rode on, as slowly as one foot of the mule could follow another, thro’ the principal streets of _Strasburg_, till chance brought him to the great inn in the market-place over against the church.
_Peregrinus mulo descendens stabulo includi, et manticam inferri jussit: quâ apertâ et coccineis sericis femoralibus extractis cum argenteo laciniato Περιζώματα, his sese induit, statimque, acinaci in manu, ad forum deambulavit._
The moment the stranger alighted, he ordered his mule to be led into the stable, and his cloak-bag to be brought in; then opening, and taking out of it his crimson-sattin breeches, with a silver-fringed--(appendage to them, which I dare not translate)--he put his breeches, with his fringed codpiece on, and forthwith, with his short scymetar in his hand, walked out on to the grand parade.
_Quod ubi peregrinus esset ingressus, uxorem tubicinis obviam euntem aspicit; illico cursum flectit, metuens ne nasus suus exploraretur, atque ad diversorium regressus est--exuit se vestibus; braccas coccineas sericas manticæ imposuit mulumque educi jussit._
The stranger had just taken three turns upon the parade, when he perceived the trumpeter’s wife at the opposite side of it--so turning short, in pain lest his nose should be attempted, he instantly went back to his inn--undressed himself, packed up his crimson-sattin breeches, &c., in his cloak-bag, and called for his mule.
_Francofurtum proficiscor, ait ille, et Argentoratum quatuor abhinc hebdomadis revertar._
I am going forwards, said the stranger, for _Frankfort_----and shall be back at _Strasburg_ this day month.
_Bene curasti hoc jumentum? (ait) muli faciem manu demulcens--me, manticamque mean, plus sexcentis mille passibus portavit._
I hope, continued the stranger, stroking down the face of his mule with his left hand as he was going to mount it, that you have been kind to this faithful slave of mine--it has carried me and my cloak-bag, continued he, tapping the mule’s back, above six hundred leagues.
_Longa via est! respondet hospes, nisi plurimum esset negoti. --Enimvero, ait peregrinus, a Nasorum promontorio redii, et nasum speciosissimum, egregiosissimumque quem unquam quisquam sortitus est, acquisivi._
----’Tis a long journey, Sir, replied the master of the inn----unless a man has great business. ----Tut! tut! said the stranger, I have been at the Promontory of Noses; and have got me one of the goodliest, thank Heaven, that ever fell to a single man’s lot.
_Dum peregrinus hanc miram rationem de seipso reddit, hospes et uxor ejus, oculis intentis, peregrini nasum contemplantur ----Per sanctos sanctasque omnes, ait hospitis uxor, nasis duodecim maximis in toto Argentorato major est! --estne, ait illa mariti in aurem insusurrans, nonne est nasus prægrandis?_
Whilst the stranger was giving this odd account of himself, the master of the inn and his wife kept both their eyes fixed full upon the stranger’s nose ----By saint _Radagunda_, said the inn-keeper’s wife to herself, there is more of it than in any dozen of the largest noses put together in all _Strasburg!_ is it not, said she, whispering her husband in his ear, is it not a noble nose?
_Dolus inest, anime mî, ait hospes--nasus est falsus._
’Tis an imposture, my dear, said the master of the inn----’tis a false nose.
_Verus est, respondit uxor----_
’Tis a true nose, said his wife.
_Ex abiete factus est, ait ille, terebinthinum olet------_
’Tis made of fir-tree, said he, I smell the turpentine.------
_Carbunculus inest, ait uxor._
There’s a pimple on it, said she.
_Mortuus est nasus, respondit hospes._
’Tis a dead nose, replied the inn-keeper.
_Vivus est ait illa, --et si ipsa vivam tangam._
’Tis a live nose, and if I am alive myself, said the inn-keeper’s wife, I will touch it.
_Votum feci sancto Nicolao, ait peregrinus, nasum meum intactum fore usque ad --Quodnam tempus? illico respondit illa._
I have made a vow to saint _Nicolas_ this day, said the stranger, that my nose shall not be touched till --Here the stranger, suspending his voice, looked up. ------Till when? said she hastily.
_Minimo tangetur, inquit ille (manibus in pectus compositis) usque ad illam horam ------Quam horam? ait illa ------Nullam, respondit peregrinus, donec pervenio ad --Quem locum, --obsecro? ait illa ----Peregrinus nil respondens mulo conscenso discessit._
It never shall be touched, said he, clasping his hands and bringing them close to his breast, till that hour --What hour? cried the inn-keeper’s wife. --Never! --never! said the stranger, never till I am got --For Heaven’s sake, into what place? said she ------The stranger rode away without saying a word.
The stranger had not got half a league on his way towards _Frankfort_ before all the city of _Strasburg_ was in an uproar about his nose. The _Compline_ bells were just ringing to call the _Strasburgers_ to their devotions, and shut up the duties of the day in prayer: --no soul in all _Strasburg_ heard ’em--the city was like a swarm of bees------men, women, and children (the _Compline_ bells tinkling all the time) flying here and there--in at one door, out at another----this way and that way--long ways and cross ways--up one street, down another street----in at this alley, out of that------did you see it? did you see it? did you see it? O! did you see it? ------who saw it? who did see it? for mercy’s sake, who saw it?
Alack o’day! I was at vespers! --I was washing, I was starching, I was scouring, I was quilting ----God help me! I never saw it ----I never touch’d it! ----would I had been a centinel, a bandy-legg’d drummer, a trumpeter, a trumpeter’s wife, was the general cry and lamentation in every street and corner of _Strasburg_.
Whilst all this confusion and disorder triumphed throughout the great city of _Strasburg_, was the courteous stranger going on as gently upon his mule in his way to _Frankfort_, as if he had no concern at all in the affair------talking all the way he rode in broken sentences, sometimes to his mule--sometimes to himself--sometimes to his Julia.
O Julia, my lovely Julia! --nay, I cannot stop to let thee bite that thistle----that ever the suspected tongue of a rival should have robbed me of enjoyment when I was upon the point of tasting it.----
----Pugh! --’tis nothing but a thistle--never mind it----thou shalt have a better supper at night.
----Banish’d from my country----my friends----from thee.----
Poor devil, thou’rt sadly tired with thy journey! ----come--get on a little faster--there’s nothing in my cloak-bag but two shirts----a crimson-sattin pair of breeches, and a fringed ----Dear Julia.
----But why to _Frankfort_--is it that there is a hand unfelt, which secretly is conducting me through these meanders and unsuspected tracts?
----Stumbling! by saint _Nicolas!_ every step--why, at this rate we shall be all night in getting in------
----To happiness----or am I to be the sport of fortune and slander-- destined to be driven forth unconvicted----unheard----untouch’d----if so, why did I not stay at _Strasburg_, where justice--but I had sworn! Come, thou shalt drink--to _St. Nicolas_ --O Julia! ------What dost thou prick up thy ears at? ----’tis nothing but a man, &c.
The stranger rode on communing in this manner with his mule and Julia--till he arrived at his inn, where, as soon as he arrived, he alighted------saw his mule, as he had promised it, taken good care of----took off his cloak-bag, with his crimson-sattin breeches, &c., in it--called for an omelet to his supper, went to his bed about twelve o’clock, and in five minutes fell fast asleep.
It was about the same hour when the tumult in _Strasburg_ being abated for that night, --the _Strasburgers_ had all got quietly into their beds--but not like the stranger, for the rest either of their minds or bodies; queen _Mab_, like an elf as she was, had taken the stranger’s nose, and without reduction of its bulk, had that night been at the pains of slitting and dividing it into as many noses of different cuts and fashions, as there were heads in _Strasburg_ to hold them. The abbess of _Quedlingberg_, who with the four great dignitaries of her chapter, the prioress, the deaness, the sub-chantress, and senior canoness, had that week come to _Strasburg_ to consult the university upon a case of conscience relating to their placket-holes------was ill all the night.
The courteous stranger’s nose had got perched upon the top of the pineal gland of her brain, and made such rousing work in the fancies of the four great dignitaries of her chapter, they could not get a wink of sleep the whole night thro’ for it----there was no keeping a limb still amongst them----in short, they got up like so many ghosts.
The penitentiaries of the third order of saint _Francis_----the nuns of mount _Calvary_----the _Præmonstratenses_----the _Clunienses_[4.2] ----the _Carthusians_, and all the severer orders of nuns who lay that night in blankets or hair-cloth, were still in a worse condition than the abbess of _Quedlingberg_--by tumbling and tossing, and tossing and tumbling from one side of their beds to the other the whole night long----the several sisterhoods had scratch’d and maul’d themselves all to death----they got out of their beds almost flay’d alive--everybody thought saint _Antony_ had visited them for probation with his fire---- they had never once, in short, shut their eyes the whole night long from vespers to matins.
The nuns of saint _Ursula_ acted the wisest--they never attempted to go to bed at all.
The dean of _Strasburg_, the prebendaries, the capitulars and domiciliars (capitularly assembled in the morning to consider the case of butter’d buns) all wished they had followed the nuns of saint _Ursula’s_ example.------
In the hurry and confusion everything had been in the night before, the bakers had all forgot to lay their leaven--there were no butter’d buns to be had for breakfast in all _Strasburg_--the whole close of the cathedral was in one eternal commotion----such a cause of restlessness and disquietude, and such a zealous inquiry into the cause of that restlessness, had never happened in _Strasburg_, since _Martin Luther_, with his doctrines, had turned the city upside down.
If the stranger’s nose took this liberty of thrusting himself thus into the dishes[4.3] of religious orders, &c., what a carnival did his nose make of it, in those of the laity! --’tis more than my pen, worn to the stump as it is, has power to describe; tho’ I acknowledge, (_cries _Slawkenbergius_, with more gaiety of thought than I could have expected from him_) that there is many a good simile now subsisting in the world which might give my countrymen some idea of it; but at the close of such a folio as this, wrote for their sakes, and in which I have spent the greatest part of my life----tho’ I own to them the simile is in being, yet would it not be unreasonable in them to expect I should have either time or inclination to search for it? Let it suffice to say, that the riot and disorder it occasioned in the _Strasburgers’_ fantasies was so general--such an overpowering mastership had it got of all the faculties of the _Strasburgers’_ minds--so many strange things, with equal confidence on all sides, and with equal eloquence in all places, were spoken and sworn to concerning it, that turned the whole stream of all discourse and wonder towards it--every soul, good and bad--rich and poor--learned and unlearned----doctor and student----mistress and maid----gentle and simple----nun’s flesh and woman’s flesh, in _Strasburg_ spent their time in hearing tidings about it--every eye in _Strasburg_ languished to see it----every finger----every thumb in _Strasburg_ burned to touch it.
Now what might add, if anything may be thought necessary to add, to so vehement a desire--was this, that the centinel, the bandy-legg’d drummer, the trumpeter, the trumpeter’s wife, the burgomaster’s widow, the master of the inn, and the master of the inn’s wife, how widely soever they all differed every one from another in their testimonies and description of the stranger’s nose--they all agreed together in two points--namely, that he was gone to _Frankfort_, and would not return to _Strasburg_ till that day month; and secondly, whether his nose was true or false, that the stranger himself was one of the most perfect paragons of beauty--the finest-made man--the most genteel! --the most generous of his purse--the most courteous in his carriage that had ever entered the gates of _Strasburg_--that as he rode, with scymetar slung loosely to his wrist, thro’ the streets--and walked with his crimson-sattin breeches across the parade--’twas with so sweet an air of careless modesty, and so manly withal----as would have put the heart in jeopardy (had his nose not stood in his way) of every virgin who had cast her eyes upon him.
I call not upon that heart which is a stranger to the throbs and yearnings of curiosity, so excited, to justify the abbess of _Quedlingberg_, the prioress, the deaness, and sub-chantress, for sending at noon-day for the trumpeter’s wife: she went through the streets of _Strasburg_ with her husband’s trumpet in her hand, ----the best apparatus the straitness of the time would allow her, for the illustration of her theory--she staid no longer than three days.
The centinel and bandy-legg’d drummer! ----nothing on this side of old _Athens_ could equal them! they read their lectures under the city-gates to comers and goers, with all the pomp of a _Chrysippus_ and a _Crantor_ in their porticos.
The master of the inn, with his ostler on his left-hand, read his also in the same stile--under the portico or gateway of his stable-yard--his wife, hers more privately in a back room: all flocked to their lectures; not promiscuously--but to this or that, as is ever the way, as faith and credulity marshal’d them----in a word, each _Strasburger_ came crouding for intelligence----and every _Strasburger_ had the intelligence he wanted.
’Tis worth remarking, for the benefit of all demonstrators in natural philosophy, &c., that as soon as the trumpeter’s wife had finished the abbess of _Quedlingberg’s_ private lecture, and had begun to read in public, which she did upon a stool in the middle of the great parade, ----she incommoded the other demonstrators mainly, by gaining incontinently the most fashionable part of the city of _Strasburg_ for her auditory ----But when a demonstrator in philosophy (cries _Slawkenbergius_) has a _trumpet_ for an apparatus, pray what rival in science can pretend to be heard besides him?
Whilst the unlearned, thro’ these conduits of intelligence, were all busied in getting down to the bottom of the well, where TRUTH keeps her little court------were the learned in their way as busy in pumping her up thro’ the conduits of dialect induction----they concerned themselves not with facts------they reasoned------
Not one profession had thrown more light upon this subject than the Faculty--had not all their disputes about it run into the affair of _Wens_ and œdematous swellings, they could not keep clear of them for their bloods and souls------the stranger’s nose had nothing to do either with wens or œdematous swellings.
It was demonstrated however very satisfactorily, that such a ponderous mass of heterogeneous matter could not be congested and conglomerated to the nose, whilst the infant was _in Utero_, without destroying the statical balance of the fœtus, and throwing it plump upon its head nine months before the time.------
----The opponents granted the theory----they denied the consequences.
And if a suitable provision of veins, arteries, &c., said they, was not laid in, for the due nourishment of such a nose, in the very first stamina and rudiments of its formation, before it came into the world (bating the case of Wens) it could not regularly grow and be sustained afterwards.
This was all answered by a dissertation upon nutriment, and the effect which nutriment had in extending the vessels, and in the increase and prolongation of the muscular parts of the greatest growth and expansion imaginable --In the triumph of which theory, they went so far as to affirm, that there was no cause in nature, why a nose might not grow to the size of the man himself.
The respondents satisfied the world this event could never happen to them so long as a man had but one stomach and one pair of lungs ----For the stomach, said they, being the only organ destined for the reception of food, and turning it into chyle--and the lungs the only engine of sanguification--it could possibly work off no more, than what the appetite brought it: or admitting the possibility of a man’s overloading his stomach, nature had set bounds however to his lungs--the engine was of a determined size and strength, and could elaborate but a certain quantity in a given time------that is, it could produce just as much blood as was sufficient for one single man, and no more; so that, if there was as much nose as man----they proved a mortification must necessarily ensue; and forasmuch as there could not be a support for both, that the nose must either fall off from the man, or the man inevitably fall off from his nose.
Nature accommodates herself to these emergencies, cried the opponents--else what do you say to the case of a whole stomach--a whole pair of lungs, and but _half_ a man, when both his legs have been unfortunately shot off?
He dies of a plethora, said they--or must spit blood, and in a fortnight or three weeks go off in a consumption.------
----It happens otherwise--replied the opponents.----
It ought not, said they.
The more curious and intimate inquirers after nature and her doings, though they went hand in hand a good way together, yet they all divided about the nose at last, almost as much as the Faculty itself.
They amicably laid it down, that there was a just and geometrical arrangement and proportion of the several parts of the human frame to its several destinations, offices, and functions which could not be transgressed but within certain limits--that nature, though she sported----she sported within a certain circle; --and they could not agree about the diameter of it.
The logicians stuck much closer to the point before them than any of the classes of the literati; ------they began and ended with the word Nose; and had it not been for a _petitio principii_, which one of the ablest of them ran his head against in the beginning of the combat, the whole controversy had been settled at once.
A nose, argued the logician, cannot bleed without blood--and not only blood--but blood circulating in it to supply the phænomenon with a succession of drops--(a stream being but a quicker succession of drops, that is included, said he). ----Now death, continued the logician, being nothing but the stagnation of the blood----
I deny the definition ----Death is the separation of the soul from the body, said his antagonist ----Then we don’t agree about our weapons, said the logician --Then there is an end of the dispute, replied the antagonist.
The civilians were still more concise: what they offered being more in the nature of a decree----than a dispute.
Such a monstrous nose, said they, had it been a true nose, could not possibly have been suffered in civil society----and if false--to impose upon society with such false signs and tokens, was a still greater violation of its rights, and must have had still less mercy shewn it.
The only objection to this was, that if it proved anything, it proved the stranger’s nose was neither true nor false.
This left room for the controversy to go on. It was maintained by the advocates of the ecclesiastic court, that there was nothing to inhibit a decree, since the stranger _ex mero motu_ had confessed he had been at the Promontory of Noses, and had got one of the goodliest, &c. &c. ------To this it was answered, it was impossible there should be such a place as the Promontory of Noses, and the learned be ignorant where it lay. The commissary of the bishop of _Strasburg_ undertook the advocates, explained this matter in a treatise upon proverbial phrases, shewing them, that the Promontory of Noses was a mere allegorick expression, importing no more than that nature had given him a long nose: in proof of which, with great learning, he cited the underwritten authorities,[4.4] which had decided the point incontestably, had it not appeared that a dispute about some franchises of dean and chapter-lands had been determined by it nineteen years before.
It happened ----I must not say unluckily for Truth, because they were giving her a lift another way in so doing; that the two universities of _Strasburg_----the _Lutheran_, founded in the year 1538 by _Jacobus Surmis_, counsellor of the senate, ----and the _Popish_, founded by _Leopold_, arch-duke of _Austria_, were, during all this time, employing the whole depth of their knowledge (except just what the affair of the abbess of _Quedlingberg’s_ placket-holes required)----in determining the point of _Martin Luther’s_ damnation.
The _Popish_ doctors had undertaken to demonstrate _à priori_, that from the necessary influence of the planets on the twenty-second day of _October_ 1483------when the moon was in the twelfth house, _Jupiter_, _Mars_, and _Venus_ in the third, the _Sun_, _Saturn_, and _Mercury_, all got together in the fourth--that he must in course, and unavoidably, be a damn’d man--and that his doctrines, by a direct corollary, must be damn’d doctrines too.
By inspection into his horoscope, where five planets were in coition all at once with Scorpio[4.5] (in reading this my father would always shake his head) in the ninth house, which the _Arabians_ allotted to religion--it appeared that _Martin Luther_ did not care one stiver about the matter------and that from the horoscope directed to the conjunction of _Mars_--they made it plain likewise he must die cursing and blaspheming----with the blast of which his soul (being steep’d in guilt) sailed before the wind, in the lake of hell-fire.
The little objection of the _Lutheran_ doctors to this, was, that it must certainly be the soul of another man, born _Oct._ 22, 83, which was forced to sail down before the wind in that manner--inasmuch as it appeared from the register of _Islaben_ in the county of _Mansfelt_, that _Luther_ was not born in the year 1483, but in 84; and not on the 22d day of _October_, but on the 10th of _November_, the eve of _Martinmas_ day, from whence he had the name of _Martin_.
[----I must break off my translation for a moment; for if I did not, I know I should no more be able to shut my eyes in bed, than the abbess of _Quedlingberg_ ----It is to tell the reader, that my father never read this passage of _Slawkenbergius_ to my uncle _Toby_, but with triumph------not over my uncle _Toby_, for he never opposed him in it----but over the whole world.
--Now you see, brother _Toby_, he would say, looking up, “that christian names are not such indifferent things;” ------had _Luther_ here been called by any other name but Martin, he would have been damn’d to all eternity ------Not that I look upon _Martin_, he would add, as a good name----far from it----’tis something better than a neutral, and but a little----yet little as it is, you see it was of some service to him.
My father knew the weakness of this prop to his hypothesis, as well as the best logician could shew him----yet so strange is the weakness of man at the same time, as it fell in his way, he could not for his life but make use of it; and it was certainly for this reason, that though there are many stories in _Hafen Slawkenbergius’s_ Decads full as entertaining as this I am translating, yet there is not one amongst them which my father read over with half the delight------it flattered two of his strangest hypotheses together----his NAMES and his NOSES. ----I will be bold to say, he might have read all the books in the _Alexandrian_ Library, had not fate taken other care of them, and not have met with a book or passage in one, which hit two such nails as these upon the head at one stroke.]
The two universities of _Strasburg_ were hard tugging at this affair of _Luther’s_ navigation. The Protestant doctors had demonstrated, that he had not sailed right before the wind, as the Popish doctors had pretended; and as every one knew there was no sailing full in the teeth of it--they were going to settle, in case he had sailed, how many points he was off; whether _Martin_ had doubled the cape, or had fallen upon a lee-shore; and no doubt, as it was an enquiry of much edification, at least to those who understood this sort of NAVIGATION, they had gone on with it in spite of the size of the stranger’s nose, had not the size of the stranger’s nose drawn off the attention of the world from what they were about----it was their business to follow.
The abbess of _Quedlingberg_ and her four dignitaries was no stop; for the enormity of the stranger’s nose running full as much in their fancies as their case of conscience----the affair of their placket-holes kept cold--in a word, the printers were ordered to distribute their types----all controversies dropp’d.
’Twas a square cap with a silver tassel upon the crown of it--to a nut-shell--to have guessed on which side of the nose the two universities would split.
’Tis above reason, cried the doctors on one side.
’Tis below reason, cried the others.
’Tis faith, cried one.
’Tis a fiddle-stick, said the other.
’Tis possible, cried the one.
’Tis impossible, said the other.
God’s power is infinite, cried the Nosarians, he can do anything.
He can do nothing, replied the Antinosarians, which implies contradictions.
He can make matter think, said the Nosarians.
As certainly as you can make a velvet cap out of a sow’s ear, replied the Antinosarians.
He cannot make two and two five, replied the Popish doctors. ----’Tis false, said their other opponents.----
Infinite power is infinite power, said the doctors who maintained the _reality_ of the nose. --It extends only to all possible things, replied the _Lutherans_.
By God in heaven, cried the Popish doctors, he can make a nose, if he thinks fit, as big as the steeple of _Strasburg_.
Now the steeple of _Strasburg_ being the biggest and the tallest church-steeple to be seen in the whole world, the Antinosarians denied that a nose of 575 geometrical feet in length could be worn, at least by a middle-siz’d man ----The Popish doctors swore it could --The _Lutheran_ doctors said No; --it could not.
This at once started a new dispute, which they pursued a great way, upon the extent and limitation of the moral and natural attributes of God --That controversy led them naturally into _Thomas Aquinas_, and _Thomas Aquinas_ to the devil.
The stranger’s nose was no more heard of in the dispute--it just served as a frigate to launch them into the gulph of school-divinity----and then they all sailed before the wind.
Heat is in proportion to the want of true knowledge.
The controversy about the attributes, &c., instead of cooling, on the contrary had inflamed the _Strasburgers’_ imaginations to a most inordinate degree ----The less they understood of the matter, the greater was their wonder about it--they were left in all the distresses of desire unsatisfied----saw their doctors, the _Parchmentarians_, the _Brassarians_, the _Turpentarians_, on one side--the Popish doctors on the other, like _Pantagruel_ and his companions in quest of the oracle of the bottle, all embarked out of sight.
----The poor _Strasburgers_ left upon the beach!
----What was to be done? --No delay--the uproar increased----every one in disorder----the city gates set open.----
Unfortunate _Strasburgers!_ was there in the storehouse of nature------was there in the lumber-rooms of learning------was there in the great arsenal of chance, one single engine left undrawn forth to torture your curiosities, and stretch your desires, which was not pointed by the hand of Fate to play upon your hearts? ----I dip not my pen into my ink to excuse the surrender of yourselves--’tis to write your panegyrick. Shew me a city so macerated with expectation----who neither eat, or drank, or slept, or prayed, or hearkened to the calls either of religion or nature for seven-and-twenty days together, who could have held out one day longer.
On the twenty-eighth the courteous stranger had promised to return to _Strasburg_.
Seven thousand coaches (_Slawkenbergius_ must certainly have made some mistake in his numerical characters) 7000 coaches----15,000 single-horse chairs--20,000 waggons, crowded as full as they could all hold with senators, counsellors, syndicks--beguines, widows, wives, virgins, canons, concubines, all in their coaches --The abbess of _Quedlingberg_, with the prioress, the deaness and sub-chantress, leading the procession in one coach, and the dean of _Strasburg_, with the four great dignitaries of his chapter, on her left-hand--the rest following higglety-pigglety as they could; some on horseback----some on foot----some led----some driven----some down the _Rhine_----some this way----some that----all set out at sun-rise to meet the courteous stranger on the road.
Haste we now towards the catastrophe of my tale ------I say _Catastrophe_ (cries _Slawkenbergius_) inasmuch as a tale, with parts rightly disposed, not only rejoiceth (_gaudet_) in the _Catastrophe_ and _Peripetia_ of a DRAMA, but rejoiceth moreover in all the essential and integrant parts of it----it has its _Protasis_, _Epitasis_, _Catastasis_, its _Catastrophe_ or _Peripetia_ growing one out of the other in it, in the order _Aristotle_ first planted them----without which a tale had better never be told at all, says _Slawkenbergius_, but be kept to a man’s self.
In all my ten tales, in all my ten decads, have I _Slawkenbergius_ tied down every tale of them as tightly to this rule, as I have done this of the stranger and his nose.
----From his first parley with the sentinel, to his leaving the city of _Strasburg_, after pulling off his crimson-sattin pair of breeches, is the _Protasis_ or first entrance----where the characters of the _Personæ Dramatis_ are just touched in, and the subject slightly begun.
The _Epitasis_, wherein the action is more fully entered upon and heightened, till it arrives at its state or height called the _Catastasis_, and which usually takes up the 2d and 3d act, is included within that busy period of my tale, betwixt the first night’s uproar about the nose, to the conclusion of the trumpeter’s wife’s lectures upon it in the middle of the grand parade: and from the first embarking of the learned in the dispute--to the doctors finally sailing away, and leaving the _Strasburgers_ upon the beach in distress, is the _Catastasis_ or the ripening of the incidents and passions for their bursting forth in the fifth act.
This commences with the setting out of the _Strasburgers_ in the _Frankfort_ road, and terminates in unwinding the labyrinth and bringing the hero out of a state of agitation (as _Aristotle_ calls it) to a state of rest and quietness.
This, says _Hafen Slawkenbergius_, constitutes the _Catastrophe_ or _Peripetia_ of my tale--and that is the part of it I am going to relate.
We left the stranger behind the curtain asleep----he enters now upon the stage.
--What dost thou prick up thy ears at? --’tis nothing but a man upon a horse----was the last word the stranger uttered to his mule. It was not proper then to tell the reader, that the mule took his master’s word for it; and without any more _ifs_ or _ands_, let the traveller and his horse pass by.
The traveller was hastening with all diligence to get to _Strasburg_ that night. What a fool am I, said the traveller to himself, when he had rode about a league farther, to think of getting into _Strasburg_ this night. --_Strasburg!_----the great _Strasburg!_----_Strasburg_, the capital of all _Alsatia!_ _Strasburg_, an imperial city! _Strasburg_, a sovereign state! _Strasburg_, garrisoned with five thousand of the best troops in all the world! --Alas! if I was at the gates of _Strasburg_ this moment, I could not gain admittance into it for a ducat--nay a ducat and half--’tis too much----better go back to the last inn I have passed----than lie I know not where----or give I know not what. The traveller, as he made these reflections in his mind, turned his horse’s head about, and three minutes after the stranger had been conducted into his chamber, he arrived at the same inn.
------We have bacon in the house, said the host, and bread------and till eleven o’clock this night had three eggs in it----but a stranger, who arrived an hour ago, has had them dressed into an omelet, and we have nothing.------
Alas! said the traveller, harassed as I am, I want nothing but a bed. ------I have one as soft as is in _Alsatia_, said the host.
----The stranger, continued he, should have slept in it, for ’tis my best bed, but upon the score of his nose. --------He has got a defluxion, said the traveller. ----Not that I know, cried the host. ----But ’tis a camp-bed, and _Jacinta_, said he, looking towards the maid, imagined there was not room in it to turn his nose in. ------Why so? cried the traveller, starting back. --It is so long a nose, replied the host. ----The traveller fixed his eyes upon _Jacinta_, then upon the ground--kneeled upon his right knee--had just got his hand laid upon his breast ------Trifle not with my anxiety, said he, rising up again. ----’Tis no trifle, said _Jacinta_, ’tis the most glorious nose! ----The traveller fell upon his knee again--laid his hand upon his breast--then, said he, looking up to heaven, thou hast conducted me to the end of my pilgrimage. --’Tis _Diego_.
The traveller was the brother of the _Julia_, so often invoked that night by the stranger as he rode from _Strasburg_ upon his mule; and was come, on her part, in quest of him. He had accompanied his sister from _Valadolid_ across the _Pyrenean_ mountains through _France_, and had many an entangled skein to wind off in pursuit of him through the many meanders and abrupt turnings of a lover’s thorny tracks.
----_Julia_ had sunk under it------and had not been able to go a step farther than to _Lyons_, where, with the many disquietudes of a tender heart, which all talk of----but few feel--she sicken’d, but had just strength to write a letter to _Diego_; and having conjured her brother never to see her face till he had found him out, and put the letter into his hands, _Julia_ took to her bed.
_Fernandez_ (for that was her brother’s name)----tho’ the camp-bed was as soft as any one in _Alsace_, yet he could not shut his eyes in it. ----As soon as it was day he rose, and hearing _Diego_ was risen too, he entered his chamber, and discharged his sister’s commission.
The letter was as follows:
“Seig. DIEGO,
“Whether my suspicions of your nose were justly excited or not------’tis not now to inquire--it is enough I have not had firmness to put them to farther tryal.
“How could I know so little of myself, when I sent my _Duenna_ to forbid your coming more under my lattice? or how could I know so little of you, _Diego_, as to imagine you would not have staid one day in _Valadolid_ to have given ease to my doubts? --Was I to be abandoned, _Diego_, because I was deceived? or was it kind to take me at my word, whether my suspicions were just or no, and leave me, as you did, a prey to much uncertainty and sorrow?
“In what manner _Julia_ has resented this----my brother, when he puts this letter into your hands, will tell you; He will tell you in how few moments she repented of the rash message she had sent you----in what frantic haste she flew to her lattice, and how many days and nights together she leaned immoveably upon her elbow, looking through it towards the way which _Diego_ was wont to come.
“He will tell you, when she heard of your departure--how her spirits deserted her----how her heart sicken’d----how piteously she mourned----how low she hung her head. O _Diego!_ how many weary steps has my brother’s pity led me by the hand languishing to trace out yours; how far has desire carried me beyond strength----and how oft have I fainted by the way, and sunk into his arms, with only power to cry out --O my _Diego!_
“If the gentleness of your carriage has not belied your heart, you will fly to me, almost as fast as you fled from me--haste as you will----you will arrive but to see me expire. ------’Tis a bitter draught, _Diego_, but oh! ’tis embitter’d still more by dying _un_--------”
She could proceed no farther.
_Slawkenbergius_ supposes the word intended was _unconvinced_, but her strength would not enable her to finish her letter.
The heart of the courteous _Diego_ overflowed as he read the letter------he ordered his mule forthwith and _Fernandez’s_ horse to be saddled; and as no vent in prose is equal to that of poetry in such conflicts----chance, which as often directs us to remedies as to _diseases_, having thrown a piece of charcoal into the window----_Diego_ availed himself of it, and whilst the hostler was getting ready his mule, he eased his mind against the wall as follows.
ODE
_Harsh and untuneful are the notes of love, Unless my _Julia_ strikes the key, Her hand alone can touch the part, Whose dulcet move- ment charms the heart, And governs all the man with sympathetick sway._
2d
O Julia!
The lines were very natural----for they were nothing at all to the purpose, says _Slawkenbergius_, and ’tis a pity there were no more of them; but whether it was that Seig. _Diego_ was slow in composing verses--or the hostler quick in saddling mules----is not averred; certain it was, that _Diego’s_ mule and _Fernandez’s_ horse were ready at the door of the inn, before _Diego_ was ready for his second stanza; so without staying to finish his ode, they both mounted, sallied forth, passed the _Rhine_, traversed _Alsace_, shaped their course towards _Lyons_, and before the _Strasburgers_ and the abbess of _Quedlingberg_ had set out on their cavalcade, had _Fernandez_, _Diego_, and his _Julia_, crossed the _Pyrenean_ mountains, and got safe to _Valadolid_.
’Tis needless to inform the geographical reader, that when _Diego_ was in _Spain_, it was not possible to meet the courteous stranger in the _Frankfort_ road; it is enough to say, that of all restless desires, curiosity being the strongest----the _Strasburgers_ felt the full force of it; and that for three days and nights they were tossed to and fro in the _Frankfort_ road, with the tempestuous fury of this passion, before they could submit to return home. ----When alas! an event was prepared for them, of all other, the most grievous that could befal a free people.
As this revolution of the _Strasburgers’_ affairs is often spoken of, and little understood, I will, in ten words, says _Slawkenbergius_, give the world an explanation of it, and with it put an end to my tale.
Every body knows of the grand system of Universal Monarchy, wrote by order of Mons. _Colbert_, and put in manuscript into the hands of _Lewis_ the fourteenth, in the year 1664.
’Tis as well known, that one branch out of many of that system, was the getting possession of _Strasburg_, to favour an entrance at all times into _Suabia_, in order to disturb the quiet of _Germany_----and that in consequence of this plan, _Strasburg_ unhappily fell at length into their hands.
It is the lot of a few to trace out the true springs of this and such like revolutions --The vulgar look too high for them --Statesmen look too low ----Truth (for once) lies in the middle.
What a fatal thing is the popular pride of a free city! cries one historian --The _Strasburgers_ deemed it a diminution of their freedom to receive an imperial garrison----so fell a prey to a _French_ one.
The fate, says another, of the _Strasburgers_, may be a warning to all free people to save their money. ------They anticipated their revenues----brought themselves under taxes, exhausted their strength, and in the end became so weak a people, they had not strength to keep their gates shut, and so the _French_ pushed them open.
Alas! alas! cries _Slawkenbergius_, ’twas not the _French_, ----’twas CURIOSITY pushed them open ------The _French_ indeed, who are ever upon the catch, when they saw the _Strasburgers_, men, women, and children, all marched out to follow the stranger’s nose----each man followed his own, and marched in.
Trade and manufactures have decayed and gradually grown down ever since--but not from any cause which commercial heads have assigned; for it is owing to this only, that Noses have ever so run in their heads, that the _Strasburgers_ could not follow their business.
Alas! alas! cries _Slawkenbergius_, making an exclamation--it is not the first----and I fear will not be the last fortress that has been either won----or lost by NOSES.
The End Of
_Slawkenbergius’s_ TALE
[Footnote 4.1: As _Hafen Slawkenbergius de Nasis_ is extremely scarce, it may not be unacceptable to the learned reader to see the specimen of a few pages of his original; I will make no reflection upon it, but that his story-telling Latin is much more concise than his philosophic--and, I think, has more of Latinity in it.]
[Footnote 4.2: _Hafen Slawkenbergius_ means the Benedictine nuns of _Cluny_, founded in the year 940, by _Odo_, abbé de _Cluny_.]
[Footnote 4.3: Mr. _Shandy’s_ compliments to orators----is very sensible that _Slawkenbergius_ has here changed his metaphor------which he is very guilty of: ----that as a translator, Mr. _Shandy_ has all along done what he could to make him stick to it--but that here ’twas impossible.]
[Footnote 4.4: Nonnulli ex nostratibus eadem loquendi formulâ utun. Quinimo & Logistæ & Canonistæ ----Vid. Parce Barne Jas in d. L. Provincial. Constitut. de conjec. vid. Vol. Lib. 4. Titul. 1. n. 7. quâ etiam in re conspir. Om de Promontorio Nas. Tichmak. ff. d. tit. 3. fol. 189. passim. Vid. Glos. de contrahend. empt, &c. necnon J. Scrudr, in cap. § refut. per totum. Cum his cons. Rever. J. Tubal, Sentent. & Prov. cap. 9. ff. 11, 12. obiter. V. & Librum, cui Tit. de Terris & Phras. Belg. ad finem, cum comment, N. Bardy Belg. Vid. Scrip. Argentotarens. de Antiq. Ecc. in Episc. Archiv. fid coll. per Von Jacobum Koinshoven Folio Argent. 1583. præcip. ad finem. Quibus add. Rebuff in L. obvenire de Signif. Nom. ff. fol. & de jure Gent. & Civil. de protib. aliena feud. per federa, test. Joha. Luxius in prolegom, quem velim videas, de Analy. Cap. 1, 2, 3. Vid. Idea.]
[Footnote 4.5: Hæc mira, satisque horrenda. Planetarum coitio sub Scorpio Asterismo in nona cœli statione, quam Arabes religioni deputabant efficit _Martinum Lutherum_ sacrilegum hereticum, Christianæ religionis hostem acerrimum atque prophanum, ex horoscopi directione ad Martis coitum, religiosissimus obiit, ejus Anima scelestissima ad infernos navigavit--ab Alecto, Tisiphone & Megara flagellis igneis cruciata perenniter.
----Lucas Gaurieus in Tractatu astrologico de præteritis multorum hominum accidentibus per genituras examinatis.]
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