The Project Gutenberg EBook of Candide, by Voltaire
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Title: Candide
Author: Voltaire
Commentator: Philip Littell
Release Date: November 27, 2006 [EBook #19942]
Language: English
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CANDIDE BY VOLTAIRE
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[Illustration: Voltaire.]
CANDIDE
BY VOLTAIRE
INTRODUCTION BY PHILIP LITTELL
BONI AND LIVERIGHT, INC.
PUBLISHERS NEW YORK
Copyright, 1918, by
BONI & LIVERIGHT, INC.
Printed in the United States of America
INTRODUCTION
Ever since 1759, when Voltaire wrote "Candide" in ridicule of the notion
that this is the best of all possible worlds, this world has been a
gayer place for readers. Voltaire wrote it in three days, and five or
six generations have found that its laughter does not grow old.
"Candide" has not aged. Yet how different the book would have looked if
Voltaire had written it a hundred and fifty years later than 1759. It
would have been, among other things, a book of sights and sounds. A
modern writer would have tried to catch and fix in words some of those
Atlantic changes which broke the Atlantic monotony of that voyage from
Cadiz to Buenos Ayres. When Martin and Candide were sailing the length
of the Mediterranean we should have had a contrast between naked scarped
Balearic cliffs and headlands of Calabria in their mists. We should have
had quarter distances, far horizons, the altering silhouettes of an
Ionian island. Colored birds would have filled Paraguay with their
silver or acid cries.
Dr. Pangloss, to prove the existence of design in the universe, says
that noses were made to carry spectacles, and so we have spectacles. A
modern satirist would not try to paint with Voltaire's quick brush the
doctrine that he wanted to expose. And he would choose a more
complicated doctrine than Dr. Pangloss's optimism, would study it more
closely, feel his destructive way about it with a more learned and
caressing malice. His attack, stealthier, more flexible and more patient
than Voltaire's, would call upon us, especially when his learning got a
little out of control, to be more than patient. Now and then he would
bore us. "Candide" never bored anybody except William Wordsworth.
Voltaire's men and women point his case against optimism by starting
high and falling low. A modern could not go about it after this fashion.
He would not plunge his people into an unfamiliar misery. He would just
keep them in the misery they were born to.
But such an account of Voltaire's procedure is as misleading as the
plaster cast of a dance. Look at his procedure again. Mademoiselle
Cunégonde, the illustrious Westphalian, sprung from a family that could
prove seventy-one quarterings, descends and descends until we find her
earning her keep by washing dishes in the Propontis. The aged faithful
attendant, victim of a hundred acts of rape by negro pirates, remembers
that she is the daughter of a pope, and that in honor of her
approaching marriage with a Prince of Massa-Carrara all Italy wrote
sonnets of which not one was passable. We do not need to know French
literature before Voltaire in order to feel, although the lurking parody
may escape us, that he is poking fun at us and at himself. His laughter
at his own methods grows more unmistakable at the last, when he
caricatures them by casually assembling six fallen monarchs in an inn at
Venice.
A modern assailant of optimism would arm himself with social pity. There
is no social pity in "Candide." Voltaire, whose light touch on familiar
institutions opens them and reveals their absurdity, likes to remind us
that the slaughter and pillage and murder which Candide witnessed among
the Bulgarians was perfectly regular, having been conducted according to
the laws and usages of war. Had Voltaire lived to-day he would have done
to poverty what he did to war. Pitying the poor, he would have shown us
poverty as a ridiculous anachronism, and both the ridicule and the pity
would have expressed his indignation.
Almost any modern, essaying a philosophic tale, would make it long.
"Candide" is only a "Hamlet" and a half long. It would hardly have been
shorter if Voltaire had spent three months on it, instead of those three
days. A conciseness to be matched in English by nobody except Pope, who
can say a plagiarizing enemy "steals much, spends little, and has
nothing left," a conciseness which Pope toiled and sweated for, came as
easy as wit to Voltaire. He can afford to be witty, parenthetically, by
the way, prodigally, without saving, because he knows there is more wit
where that came from.
One of Max Beerbohm's cartoons shows us the young Twentieth Century
going at top speed, and watched by two of his predecessors. Underneath
is this legend: "The Grave Misgivings of the Nineteenth Century, and the
Wicked Amusement of the Eighteenth, in Watching the Progress (or
whatever it is) of the Twentieth." This Eighteenth Century snuff-taking
and malicious, is like Voltaire, who nevertheless must know, if he
happens to think of it, that not yet in the Twentieth Century, not for
all its speed mania, has any one come near to equalling the speed of a
prose tale by Voltaire. "Candide" is a full book. It is filled with
mockery, with inventiveness, with things as concrete as things to eat
and coins, it has time for the neatest intellectual clickings, it is
never hurried, and it moves with the most amazing rapidity. It has the
rapidity of high spirits playing a game. The dry high spirits of this
destroyer of optimism make most optimists look damp and depressed.
Contemplation of the stupidity which deems happiness possible almost
made Voltaire happy. His attack on optimism is one of the gayest books
in the world. Gaiety has been scattered everywhere up and down its pages
by Voltaire's lavish hand, by his thin fingers.
Many propagandist satirical books have been written with "Candide" in
mind, but not too many. To-day, especially, when new faiths are changing
the structure of the world, faiths which are still plastic enough to be
deformed by every disciple, each disciple for himself, and which have
not yet received the final deformation known as universal acceptance,
to-day "Candide" is an inspiration to every narrative satirist who hates
one of these new faiths, or hates every interpretation of it but his
own. Either hatred will serve as a motive to satire.
That is why the present is one of the right moments to republish
"Candide." I hope it will inspire younger men and women, the only ones
who can be inspired, to have a try at Theodore, or Militarism; Jane, or
Pacifism; at So-and-So, the Pragmatist or the Freudian. And I hope, too,
that they will without trying hold their pens with an eighteenth century
lightness, not inappropriate to a philosophic tale. In Voltaire's
fingers, as Anatole France has said, the pen runs and laughs. PHILIP
LITTELL.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. How Candide was brought up in a
Magnificent Castle, and how he was
expelled thence 1
II. What became of Candide among the
Bulgarians 5
III. How Candide made his escape from the
Bulgarians, and what afterwards became
of him 9
IV. How Candide found his old Master
Pangloss, and what happened to them 13
V. Tempest, Shipwreck, Earthquake, and
what became of Doctor Pangloss,
Candide, and James the Anabaptist 18
VI. How the Portuguese made a Beautiful
Auto-da-fé, to prevent any further
Earthquakes: and how Candide was
publicly whipped 23
VII. How the Old Woman took care of
Candide, and how he found the Object
he loved 26
VIII. The History of Cunegonde 30
IX. What became of Cunegonde, Candide,
the Grand Inquisitor, and the Jew 35
X. In what distress Candide, Cunegonde,
and the Old Woman arrived at
Cadiz; and of their Embarkation 38
XI. History of the Old Woman 42
XII. The Adventures of the Old Woman
continued 48
XIII. How Candide was forced away from his
fair Cunegonde and the Old Woman 54
XIV. How Candide and Cacambo were received
by the Jesuits of Paraguay 58
XV. How Candide killed the brother of his
dear Cunegonde 64
XVI. Adventures of the Two Travellers,
with Two Girls, Two Monkeys, and
the Savages called Oreillons 68
XVII. Arrival of Candide and his Valet at El
Dorado, and what they saw there 74
XVIII. What they saw in the Country of El
Dorado 80
XIX. What happened to them at Surinam and
how Candide got acquainted with
Martin 89
XX. What happened at Sea to Candide and
Martin 98
XXI. Candide and Martin, reasoning, draw
near the Coast of France 102
XXII. What happened in France to Candide
and Martin 105
XXIII. Candide and Martin touched upon the
Coast of England, and what they saw
there 122
XXIV. Of Paquette and Friar Giroflée 125
XXV. The Visit to Lord Pococurante, a
Noble Venetian 133
XXVI. Of a Supper which Candide and Martin
took with Six Strangers, and who
they were 142
XXVII. Candide's Voyage to Constantinople 148
XXVIII. What happened to Candide, Cunegonde,
Pangloss, Martin, etc. 154
XXIX. How Candide found Cunegonde and
the Old Woman again 159
XXX. The Conclusion 161
[Illustration: VOLTAIRE'S CANDIDE]
CANDIDE
I
HOW CANDIDE WAS BROUGHT UP IN A MAGNIFICENT CASTLE, AND HOW HE WAS
EXPELLED THENCE.
In a castle of Westphalia, belonging to the Baron of
Thunder-ten-Tronckh, lived a youth, whom nature had endowed with the
most gentle manners. His countenance was a true picture of his soul. He
combined a true judgment with simplicity of spirit, which was the
reason, I apprehend, of his being called Candide. The old servants of
the family suspected him to have been the son of the Baron's sister, by
a good, honest gentleman of the neighborhood, whom that young lady would
never marry because he had been able to prove only seventy-one
quarterings, the rest of his genealogical tree having been lost through
the injuries of time.
The Baron was one of the most powerful lords in Westphalia, for his
castle had not only a gate, but windows. His great hall, even, was hung
with tapestry. All the dogs of his farm-yards formed a pack of hounds at
need; his grooms were his huntsmen; and the curate of the village was
his grand almoner. They called him "My Lord," and laughed at all his
stories.
The Baron's lady weighed about three hundred and fifty pounds, and was
therefore a person of great consideration, and she did the honours of
the house with a dignity that commanded still greater respect. Her
daughter Cunegonde was seventeen years of age, fresh-coloured, comely,
plump, and desirable. The Baron's son seemed to be in every respect
worthy of his father. The Preceptor Pangloss[1] was the oracle of the
family, and little Candide heard his lessons with all the good faith of
his age and character.
Pangloss was professor of metaphysico-theologico-cosmolo-nigology. He
proved admirably that there is no effect without a cause, and that, in
this best of all possible worlds, the Baron's castle was the most
magnificent of castles, and his lady the best of all possible
Baronesses.
"It is demonstrable," said he, "that things cannot be otherwise than as
they are; for all being created for an end, all is necessarily for the
best end. Observe, that the nose has been formed to bear
spectacles--thus we have spectacles. Legs are visibly designed for
stockings--and we have stockings. Stones were made to be hewn, and to
construct castles--therefore my lord has a magnificent castle; for the
greatest baron in the province ought to be the best lodged. Pigs were
made to be eaten--therefore we eat pork all the year round. Consequently
they who assert that all is well have said a foolish thing, they should
have said all is for the best."
Candide listened attentively and believed innocently; for he thought
Miss Cunegonde extremely beautiful, though he never had the courage to
tell her so. He concluded that after the happiness of being born of
Baron of Thunder-ten-Tronckh, the second degree of happiness was to be
Miss Cunegonde, the third that of seeing her every day, and the fourth
that of hearing Master Pangloss, the greatest philosopher of the whole
province, and consequently of the whole world.
One day Cunegonde, while walking near the castle, in a little wood which
they called a park, saw between the bushes, Dr. Pangloss giving a lesson
in experimental natural philosophy to her mother's chamber-maid, a
little brown wench, very pretty and very docile. As Miss Cunegonde had a
great disposition for the sciences, she breathlessly observed the
repeated experiments of which she was a witness; she clearly perceived
the force of the Doctor's reasons, the effects, and the causes; she
turned back greatly flurried, quite pensive, and filled with the desire
to be learned; dreaming that she might well be a _sufficient reason_ for
young Candide, and he for her.
She met Candide on reaching the castle and blushed; Candide blushed
also; she wished him good morrow in a faltering tone, and Candide spoke
to her without knowing what he said. The next day after dinner, as they
went from table, Cunegonde and Candide found themselves behind a screen;
Cunegonde let fall her handkerchief, Candide picked it up, she took him
innocently by the hand, the youth as innocently kissed the young lady's
hand with particular vivacity, sensibility, and grace; their lips met,
their eyes sparkled, their knees trembled, their hands strayed. Baron
Thunder-ten-Tronckh passed near the screen and beholding this cause and
effect chased Candide from the castle with great kicks on the backside;
Cunegonde fainted away; she was boxed on the ears by the Baroness, as
soon as she came to herself; and all was consternation in this most
magnificent and most agreeable of all possible castles.
II
WHAT BECAME OF CANDIDE AMONG THE BULGARIANS.
Candide, driven from terrestrial paradise, walked a long while without
knowing where, weeping, raising his eyes to heaven, turning them often
towards the most magnificent of castles which imprisoned the purest of
noble young ladies. He lay down to sleep without supper, in the middle
of a field between two furrows. The snow fell in large flakes. Next day
Candide, all benumbed, dragged himself towards the neighbouring town
which was called Waldberghofftrarbk-dikdorff, having no money, dying of
hunger and fatigue, he stopped sorrowfully at the door of an inn. Two
men dressed in blue observed him.
"Comrade," said one, "here is a well-built young fellow, and of proper
height."
They went up to Candide and very civilly invited him to dinner.
"Gentlemen," replied Candide, with a most engaging modesty, "you do me
great honour, but I have not wherewithal to pay my share."
"Oh, sir," said one of the blues to him, "people of your appearance and
of your merit never pay anything: are you not five feet five inches
high?"
"Yes, sir, that is my height," answered he, making a low bow.
"Come, sir, seat yourself; not only will we pay your reckoning, but we
will never suffer such a man as you to want money; men are only born to
assist one another."
"You are right," said Candide; "this is what I was always taught by Mr.
Pangloss, and I see plainly that all is for the best."
They begged of him to accept a few crowns. He took them, and wished to
give them his note; they refused; they seated themselves at table.
"Love you not deeply?"
"Oh yes," answered he; "I deeply love Miss Cunegonde."
"No," said one of the gentlemen, "we ask you if you do not deeply love
the King of the Bulgarians?"
"Not at all," said he; "for I have never seen him."
"What! he is the best of kings, and we must drink his health."
"Oh! very willingly, gentlemen," and he drank.
"That is enough," they tell him. "Now you are the help, the support,
the defender, the hero of the Bulgarians. Your fortune is made, and your
glory is assured."
Instantly they fettered him, and carried him away to the regiment. There
he was made to wheel about to the right, and to the left, to draw his
rammer, to return his rammer, to present, to fire, to march, and they
gave him thirty blows with a cudgel. The next day he did his exercise a
little less badly, and he received but twenty blows. The day following
they gave him only ten, and he was regarded by his comrades as a
prodigy.
Candide, all stupefied, could not yet very well realise how he was a
hero. He resolved one fine day in spring to go for a walk, marching
straight before him, believing that it was a privilege of the human as
well as of the animal species to make use of their legs as they pleased.
He had advanced two leagues when he was overtaken by four others, heroes
of six feet, who bound him and carried him to a dungeon. He was asked
which he would like the best, to be whipped six-and-thirty times through
all the regiment, or to receive at once twelve balls of lead in his
brain. He vainly said that human will is free, and that he chose neither
the one nor the other. He was forced to make a choice; he determined, in
virtue of that gift of God called liberty, to run the gauntlet
six-and-thirty times. He bore this twice. The regiment was composed of
two thousand men; that composed for him four thousand strokes, which
laid bare all his muscles and nerves, from the nape of his neck quite
down to his rump. As they were going to proceed to a third whipping,
Candide, able to bear no more, begged as a favour that they would be so
good as to shoot him. He obtained this favour; they bandaged his eyes,
and bade him kneel down. The King of the Bulgarians passed at this
moment and ascertained the nature of the crime. As he had great talent,
he understood from all that he learnt of Candide that he was a young
metaphysician, extremely ignorant of the things of this world, and he
accorded him his pardon with a clemency which will bring him praise in
all the journals, and throughout all ages.
An able surgeon cured Candide in three weeks by means of emollients
taught by Dioscorides. He had already a little skin, and was able to
march when the King of the Bulgarians gave battle to the King of the
Abares.[2]
III
HOW CANDIDE MADE HIS ESCAPE FROM THE BULGARIANS, AND WHAT AFTERWARDS
BECAME OF HIM.
There was never anything so gallant, so spruce, so brilliant, and so
well disposed as the two armies. Trumpets, fifes, hautboys, drums, and
cannon made music such as Hell itself had never heard. The cannons first
of all laid flat about six thousand men on each side; the muskets swept
away from this best of worlds nine or ten thousand ruffians who infested
its surface. The bayonet was also a _sufficient reason_ for the death of
several thousands. The whole might amount to thirty thousand souls.
Candide, who trembled like a philosopher, hid himself as well as he
could during this heroic butchery.
At length, while the two kings were causing Te Deum to be sung each in
his own camp, Candide resolved to go and reason elsewhere on effects and
causes. He passed over heaps of dead and dying, and first reached a
neighbouring village; it was in cinders, it was an Abare village which
the Bulgarians had burnt according to the laws of war. Here, old men
covered with wounds, beheld their wives, hugging their children to their
bloody breasts, massacred before their faces; there, their daughters,
disembowelled and breathing their last after having satisfied the
natural wants of Bulgarian heroes; while others, half burnt in the
flames, begged to be despatched. The earth was strewed with brains,
arms, and legs.
Candide fled quickly to another village; it belonged to the Bulgarians;
and the Abarian heroes had treated it in the same way. Candide, walking
always over palpitating limbs or across ruins, arrived at last beyond
the seat of war, with a few provisions in his knapsack, and Miss
Cunegonde always in his heart. His provisions failed him when he arrived
in Holland; but having heard that everybody was rich in that country,
and that they were Christians, he did not doubt but he should meet with
the same treatment from them as he had met with in the Baron's castle,
before Miss Cunegonde's bright eyes were the cause of his expulsion
thence.
He asked alms of several grave-looking people, who all answered him,
that if he continued to follow this trade they would confine him to the
house of correction, where he should be taught to get a living.
The next he addressed was a man who had been haranguing a large assembly
for a whole hour on the subject of charity. But the orator, looking
askew, said:
"What are you doing here? Are you for the good cause?"
"There can be no effect without a cause," modestly answered Candide;
"the whole is necessarily concatenated and arranged for the best. It was
necessary for me to have been banished from the presence of Miss
Cunegonde, to have afterwards run the gauntlet, and now it is necessary
I should beg my bread until I learn to earn it; all this cannot be
otherwise."
"My friend," said the orator to him, "do you believe the Pope to be
Anti-Christ?"
"I have not heard it," answered Candide; "but whether he be, or whether
he be not, I want bread."
"Thou dost not deserve to eat," said the other. "Begone, rogue; begone,
wretch; do not come near me again."
The orator's wife, putting her head out of the window, and spying a man
that doubted whether the Pope was Anti-Christ, poured over him a
full.... Oh, heavens! to what excess does religious zeal carry the
ladies.
A man who had never been christened, a good Anabaptist, named James,
beheld the cruel and ignominious treatment shown to one of his
brethren, an unfeathered biped with a rational soul, he took him home,
cleaned him, gave him bread and beer, presented him with two florins,
and even wished to teach him the manufacture of Persian stuffs which
they make in Holland. Candide, almost prostrating himself before him,
cried:
"Master Pangloss has well said that all is for the best in this world,
for I am infinitely more touched by your extreme generosity than with
the inhumanity of that gentleman in the black coat and his lady."
The next day, as he took a walk, he met a beggar all covered with scabs,
his eyes diseased, the end of his nose eaten away, his mouth distorted,
his teeth black, choking in his throat, tormented with a violent cough,
and spitting out a tooth at each effort.
IV
HOW CANDIDE FOUND HIS OLD MASTER PANGLOSS, AND WHAT HAPPENED TO THEM.
Candide, yet more moved with compassion than with horror, gave to this
shocking beggar the two florins which he had received from the honest
Anabaptist James. The spectre looked at him very earnestly, dropped a
few tears, and fell upon his neck. Candide recoiled in disgust.
"Alas!" said one wretch to the other, "do you no longer know your dear
Pangloss?"
"What do I hear? You, my dear master! you in this terrible plight! What
misfortune has happened to you? Why are you no longer in the most
magnificent of castles? What has become of Miss Cunegonde, the pearl of
girls, and nature's masterpiece?"
"I am so weak that I cannot stand," said Pangloss.
Upon which Candide carried him to the Anabaptist's stable, and gave him
a crust of bread. As soon as Pangloss had refreshed himself a little:
"Well," said Candide, "Cunegonde?"
"She is dead," replied the other.
Candide fainted at this word; his friend recalled his senses with a
little bad vinegar which he found by chance in the stable. Candide
reopened his eyes.
"Cunegonde is dead! Ah, best of worlds, where art thou? But of what
illness did she die? Was it not for grief, upon seeing her father kick
me out of his magnificent castle?"
"No," said Pangloss, "she was ripped open by the Bulgarian soldiers,
after having been violated by many; they broke the Baron's head for
attempting to defend her; my lady, her mother, was cut in pieces; my
poor pupil was served just in the same manner as his sister; and as for
the castle, they have not left one stone upon another, not a barn, nor a
sheep, nor a duck, nor a tree; but we have had our revenge, for the
Abares have done the very same thing to a neighbouring barony, which
belonged to a Bulgarian lord."
At this discourse Candide fainted again; but coming to himself, and
having said all that it became him to say, inquired into the cause and
effect, as well as into the _sufficient reason_ that had reduced
Pangloss to so miserable a plight.
"Alas!" said the other, "it was love; love, the comfort of the human
species, the preserver of the universe, the soul of all sensible beings,
love, tender love."
"Alas!" said Candide, "I know this love, that sovereign of hearts, that
soul of our souls; yet it never cost me more than a kiss and twenty
kicks on the backside. How could this beautiful cause produce in you an
effect so abominable?"
Pangloss made answer in these terms: "Oh, my dear Candide, you remember
Paquette, that pretty wench who waited on our noble Baroness; in her
arms I tasted the delights of paradise, which produced in me those hell
torments with which you see me devoured; she was infected with them, she
is perhaps dead of them. This present Paquette received of a learned
Grey Friar, who had traced it to its source; he had had it of an old
countess, who had received it from a cavalry captain, who owed it to a
marchioness, who took it from a page, who had received it from a Jesuit,
who when a novice had it in a direct line from one of the companions of
Christopher Columbus.[3] For my part I shall give it to nobody, I am
dying."
"Oh, Pangloss!" cried Candide, "what a strange genealogy! Is not the
Devil the original stock of it?"
"Not at all," replied this great man, "it was a thing unavoidable, a
necessary ingredient in the best of worlds; for if Columbus had not in
an island of America caught this disease, which contaminates the source
of life, frequently even hinders generation, and which is evidently
opposed to the great end of nature, we should have neither chocolate nor
cochineal. We are also to observe that upon our continent, this
distemper is like religious controversy, confined to a particular spot.
The Turks, the Indians, the Persians, the Chinese, the Siamese, the
Japanese, know nothing of it; but there is a sufficient reason for
believing that they will know it in their turn in a few centuries. In
the meantime, it has made marvellous progress among us, especially in
those great armies composed of honest well-disciplined hirelings, who
decide the destiny of states; for we may safely affirm that when an army
of thirty thousand men fights another of an equal number, there are
about twenty thousand of them p-x-d on each side."
"Well, this is wonderful!" said Candide, "but you must get cured."
"Alas! how can I?" said Pangloss, "I have not a farthing, my friend, and
all over the globe there is no letting of blood or taking a glister,
without paying, or somebody paying for you."
These last words determined Candide; he went and flung himself at the
feet of the charitable Anabaptist James, and gave him so touching a
picture of the state to which his friend was reduced, that the good man
did not scruple to take Dr. Pangloss into his house, and had him cured
at his expense. In the cure Pangloss lost only an eye and an ear. He
wrote well, and knew arithmetic perfectly. The Anabaptist James made him
his bookkeeper. At the end of two months, being obliged to go to Lisbon
about some mercantile affairs, he took the two philosophers with him in
his ship. Pangloss explained to him how everything was so constituted
that it could not be better. James was not of this opinion.
"It is more likely," said he, "mankind have a little corrupted nature,
for they were not born wolves, and they have become wolves; God has
given them neither cannon of four-and-twenty pounders, nor bayonets; and
yet they have made cannon and bayonets to destroy one another. Into this
account I might throw not only bankrupts, but Justice which seizes on
the effects of bankrupts to cheat the creditors."
"All this was indispensable," replied the one-eyed doctor, "for private
misfortunes make the general good, so that the more private misfortunes
there are the greater is the general good."
While he reasoned, the sky darkened, the winds blew from the four
quarters, and the ship was assailed by a most terrible tempest within
sight of the port of Lisbon.
V
TEMPEST, SHIPWRECK, EARTHQUAKE, AND WHAT BECAME OF DOCTOR PANGLOSS,
CANDIDE, AND JAMES THE ANABAPTIST.
Half dead of that inconceivable anguish which the rolling of a ship
produces, one-half of the passengers were not even sensible of the
danger. The other half shrieked and prayed. The sheets were rent, the
masts broken, the vessel gaped. Work who would, no one heard, no one
commanded. The Anabaptist being upon deck bore a hand; when a brutish
sailor struck him roughly and laid him sprawling; but with the violence
of the blow he himself tumbled head foremost overboard, and stuck upon a
piece of the broken mast. Honest James ran to his assistance, hauled him
up, and from the effort he made was precipitated into the sea in sight
of the sailor, who left him to perish, without deigning to look at him.
Candide drew near and saw his benefactor, who rose above the water one
moment and was then swallowed up for ever. He was just going to jump
after him, but was prevented by the philosopher Pangloss, who
demonstrated to him that the Bay of Lisbon had been made on purpose for
the Anabaptist to be drowned. While he was proving this _à priori_, the
ship foundered; all perished except Pangloss, Candide, and that brutal
sailor who had drowned the good Anabaptist. The villain swam safely to
the shore, while Pangloss and Candide were borne thither upon a plank.
As soon as they recovered themselves a little they walked toward Lisbon.
They had some money left, with which they hoped to save themselves from
starving, after they had escaped drowning. Scarcely had they reached the
city, lamenting the death of their benefactor, when they felt the earth
tremble under their feet. The sea swelled and foamed in the harbour, and
beat to pieces the vessels riding at anchor. Whirlwinds of fire and
ashes covered the streets and public places; houses fell, roofs were
flung upon the pavements, and the pavements were scattered. Thirty
thousand inhabitants of all ages and sexes were crushed under the
ruins.[4] The sailor, whistling and swearing, said there was booty to be
gained here.
"What can be the _sufficient reason_ of this phenomenon?" said Pangloss.
"This is the Last Day!" cried Candide.
The sailor ran among the ruins, facing death to find money; finding it,
he took it, got drunk, and having slept himself sober, purchased the
favours of the first good-natured wench whom he met on the ruins of the
destroyed houses, and in the midst of the dying and the dead. Pangloss
pulled him by the sleeve.
"My friend," said he, "this is not right. You sin against the _universal
reason_; you choose your time badly."
"S'blood and fury!" answered the other; "I am a sailor and born at
Batavia. Four times have I trampled upon the crucifix in four voyages to
Japan[5]; a fig for thy universal reason."
Some falling stones had wounded Candide. He lay stretched in the street
covered with rubbish.
"Alas!" said he to Pangloss, "get me a little wine and oil; I am dying."
"This concussion of the earth is no new thing," answered Pangloss. "The
city of Lima, in America, experienced the same convulsions last year;
the same cause, the same effects; there is certainly a train of sulphur
under ground from Lima to Lisbon."
"Nothing more probable," said Candide; "but for the love of God a little
oil and wine."
"How, probable?" replied the philosopher. "I maintain that the point is
capable of being demonstrated."
Candide fainted away, and Pangloss fetched him some water from a
neighbouring fountain. The following day they rummaged among the ruins
and found provisions, with which they repaired their exhausted strength.
After this they joined with others in relieving those inhabitants who
had escaped death. Some, whom they had succoured, gave them as good a
dinner as they could in such disastrous circumstances; true, the repast
was mournful, and the company moistened their bread with tears; but
Pangloss consoled them, assuring them that things could not be
otherwise.
"For," said he, "all that is is for the best. If there is a volcano at
Lisbon it cannot be elsewhere. It is impossible that things should be
other than they are; for everything is right."
A little man dressed in black, Familiar of the Inquisition, who sat by
him, politely took up his word and said:
"Apparently, then, sir, you do not believe in original sin; for if all
is for the best there has then been neither Fall nor punishment."
"I humbly ask your Excellency's pardon," answered Pangloss, still more
politely; "for the Fall and curse of man necessarily entered into the
system of the best of worlds."
"Sir," said the Familiar, "you do not then believe in liberty?"
"Your Excellency will excuse me," said Pangloss; "liberty is consistent
with absolute necessity, for it was necessary we should be free; for, in
short, the determinate will----"
Pangloss was in the middle of his sentence, when the Familiar beckoned
to his footman, who gave him a glass of wine from Porto or Opporto.
VI
HOW THE PORTUGUESE MADE A BEAUTIFUL AUTO-DA-FÉ, TO PREVENT ANY FURTHER
EARTHQUAKES; AND HOW CANDIDE WAS PUBLICLY WHIPPED.
After the earthquake had destroyed three-fourths of Lisbon, the sages of
that country could think of no means more effectual to prevent utter
ruin than to give the people a beautiful _auto-da-fé_[6]; for it had
been decided by the University of Coimbra, that the burning of a few
people alive by a slow fire, and with great ceremony, is an infallible
secret to hinder the earth from quaking.
In consequence hereof, they had seized on a Biscayner, convicted of
having married his godmother, and on two Portuguese, for rejecting the
bacon which larded a chicken they were eating[7]; after dinner, they
came and secured Dr. Pangloss, and his disciple Candide, the one for
speaking his mind, the other for having listened with an air of
approbation. They were conducted to separate apartments, extremely cold,
as they were never incommoded by the sun. Eight days after they were
dressed in _san-benitos_[8] and their heads ornamented with paper
mitres. The mitre and _san-benito_ belonging to Candide were painted
with reversed flames and with devils that had neither tails nor claws;
but Pangloss's devils had claws and tails and the flames were upright.
They marched in procession thus habited and heard a very pathetic
sermon, followed by fine church music. Candide was whipped in cadence
while they were singing; the Biscayner, and the two men who had refused
to eat bacon, were burnt; and Pangloss was hanged, though that was not
the custom. The same day the earth sustained a most violent concussion.
Candide, terrified, amazed, desperate, all bloody, all palpitating, said
to himself:
"If this is the best of possible worlds, what then are the others? Well,
if I had been only whipped I could put up with it, for I experienced
that among the Bulgarians; but oh, my dear Pangloss! thou greatest of
philosophers, that I should have seen you hanged, without knowing for
what! Oh, my dear Anabaptist, thou best of men, that thou should'st have
been drowned in the very harbour! Oh, Miss Cunegonde, thou pearl of
girls! that thou should'st have had thy belly ripped open!"
Thus he was musing, scarce able to stand, preached at, whipped,
absolved, and blessed, when an old woman accosted him saying:
"My son, take courage and follow me."
VII
HOW THE OLD WOMAN TOOK CARE OF CANDIDE, AND HOW HE FOUND THE OBJECT HE
LOVED.
Candide did not take courage, but followed the old woman to a decayed
house, where she gave him a pot of pomatum to anoint his sores, showed
him a very neat little bed, with a suit of clothes hanging up, and left
him something to eat and drink.
"Eat, drink, sleep," said she, "and may our lady of Atocha,[9] the great
St. Anthony of Padua, and the great St. James of Compostella, receive
you under their protection. I shall be back to-morrow."
Candide, amazed at all he had suffered and still more with the charity
of the old woman, wished to kiss her hand.
"It is not my hand you must kiss," said the old woman; "I shall be back
to-morrow. Anoint yourself with the pomatum, eat and sleep."
Candide, notwithstanding so many disasters, ate and slept. The next
morning the old woman brought him his breakfast, looked at his back, and
rubbed it herself with another ointment: in like manner she brought him
his dinner; and at night she returned with his supper. The day following
she went through the very same ceremonies.
"Who are you?" said Candide; "who has inspired you with so much
goodness? What return can I make you?"
The good woman made no answer; she returned in the evening, but brought
no supper.
"Come with me," she said, "and say nothing."
She took him by the arm, and walked with him about a quarter of a mile
into the country; they arrived at a lonely house, surrounded with
gardens and canals. The old woman knocked at a little door, it opened,
she led Candide up a private staircase into a small apartment richly
furnished. She left him on a brocaded sofa, shut the door and went away.
Candide thought himself in a dream; indeed, that he had been dreaming
unluckily all his life, and that the present moment was the only
agreeable part of it all.
The old woman returned very soon, supporting with difficulty a trembling
woman of a majestic figure, brilliant with jewels, and covered with a
veil.
"Take off that veil," said the old woman to Candide.
The young man approaches, he raises the veil with a timid hand. Oh!
what a moment! what surprise! he believes he beholds Miss Cunegonde? he
really sees her! it is herself! His strength fails him, he cannot utter
a word, but drops at her feet. Cunegonde falls upon the sofa. The old
woman supplies a smelling bottle; they come to themselves and recover
their speech. As they began with broken accents, with questions and
answers interchangeably interrupted with sighs, with tears, and cries.
The old woman desired they would make less noise and then she left them
to themselves.
"What, is it you?" said Candide, "you live? I find you again in
Portugal? then you have not been ravished? then they did not rip open
your belly as Doctor Pangloss informed me?"
"Yes, they did," said the beautiful Cunegonde; "but those two accidents
are not always mortal."
"But were your father and mother killed?"
"It is but too true," answered Cunegonde, in tears.
"And your brother?"
"My brother also was killed."
"And why are you in Portugal? and how did you know of my being here? and
by what strange adventure did you contrive to bring me to this house?"
"I will tell you all that," replied the lady, "but first of all let me
know your history, since the innocent kiss you gave me and the kicks
which you received."
Candide respectfully obeyed her, and though he was still in a surprise,
though his voice was feeble and trembling, though his back still pained
him, yet he gave her a most ingenuous account of everything that had
befallen him since the moment of their separation. Cunegonde lifted up
her eyes to heaven; shed tears upon hearing of the death of the good
Anabaptist and of Pangloss; after which she spoke as follows to Candide,
who did not lose a word and devoured her with his eyes.
VIII
THE HISTORY OF CUNEGONDE.
"I was in bed and fast asleep when it pleased God to send the Bulgarians
to our delightful castle of Thunder-ten-Tronckh; they slew my father and
brother, and cut my mother in pieces. A tall Bulgarian, six feet high,
perceiving that I had fainted away at this sight, began to ravish me;
this made me recover; I regained my senses, I cried, I struggled, I bit,
I scratched, I wanted to tear out the tall Bulgarian's eyes--not knowing
that what happened at my father's house was the usual practice of war.
The brute gave me a cut in the left side with his hanger, and the mark
is still upon me."
"Ah! I hope I shall see it," said honest Candide.
"You shall," said Cunegonde, "but let us continue."
"Do so," replied Candide.
Thus she resumed the thread of her story:
"A Bulgarian captain came in, saw me all bleeding, and the soldier not
in the least disconcerted. The captain flew into a passion at the
disrespectful behaviour of the brute, and slew him on my body. He
ordered my wounds to be dressed, and took me to his quarters as a
prisoner of war. I washed the few shirts that he had, I did his cooking;
he thought me very pretty--he avowed it; on the other hand, I must own
he had a good shape, and a soft and white skin; but he had little or no
mind or philosophy, and you might see plainly that he had never been
instructed by Doctor Pangloss. In three months time, having lost all his
money, and being grown tired of my company, he sold me to a Jew, named
Don Issachar, who traded to Holland and Portugal, and had a strong
passion for women. This Jew was much attached to my person, but could
not triumph over it; I resisted him better than the Bulgarian soldier. A
modest woman may be ravished once, but her virtue is strengthened by it.
In order to render me more tractable, he brought me to this country
house. Hitherto I had imagined that nothing could equal the beauty of
Thunder-ten-Tronckh Castle; but I found I was mistaken.
"The Grand Inquisitor, seeing me one day at Mass, stared long at me, and
sent to tell me that he wished to speak on private matters. I was
conducted to his palace, where I acquainted him with the history of my
family, and he represented to me how much it was beneath my rank to
belong to an Israelite. A proposal was then made to Don Issachar that he
should resign me to my lord. Don Issachar, being the court banker, and a
man of credit, would hear nothing of it. The Inquisitor threatened him
with an _auto-da-fé_. At last my Jew, intimidated, concluded a bargain,
by which the house and myself should belong to both in common; the Jew
should have for himself Monday, Wednesday, and Saturday, and the
Inquisitor should have the rest of the week. It is now six months since
this agreement was made. Quarrels have not been wanting, for they could
not decide whether the night from Saturday to Sunday belonged to the old
law or to the new. For my part, I have so far held out against both, and
I verily believe that this is the reason why I am still beloved.
"At length, to avert the scourge of earthquakes, and to intimidate Don
Issachar, my Lord Inquisitor was pleased to celebrate an _auto-da-fé_.
He did me the honour to invite me to the ceremony. I had a very good
seat, and the ladies were served with refreshments between Mass and the
execution. I was in truth seized with horror at the burning of those two
Jews, and of the honest Biscayner who had married his godmother; but
what was my surprise, my fright, my trouble, when I saw in a
_san-benito_ and mitre a figure which resembled that of Pangloss! I
rubbed my eyes, I looked at him attentively, I saw him hung; I fainted.
Scarcely had I recovered my senses than I saw you stripped, stark naked,
and this was the height of my horror, consternation, grief, and despair.
I tell you, truthfully, that your skin is yet whiter and of a more
perfect colour than that of my Bulgarian captain. This spectacle
redoubled all the feelings which overwhelmed and devoured me. I screamed
out, and would have said, 'Stop, barbarians!' but my voice failed me,
and my cries would have been useless after you had been severely
whipped. How is it possible, said I, that the beloved Candide and the
wise Pangloss should both be at Lisbon, the one to receive a hundred
lashes, and the other to be hanged by the Grand Inquisitor, of whom I am
the well-beloved? Pangloss most cruelly deceived me when he said that
everything in the world is for the best.
"Agitated, lost, sometimes beside myself, and sometimes ready to die of
weakness, my mind was filled with the massacre of my father, mother, and
brother, with the insolence of the ugly Bulgarian soldier, with the stab
that he gave me, with my servitude under the Bulgarian captain, with my
hideous Don Issachar, with my abominable Inquisitor, with the execution
of Doctor Pangloss, with the grand Miserere to which they whipped you,
and especially with the kiss I gave you behind the screen the day that I
had last seen you. I praised God for bringing you back to me after so
many trials, and I charged my old woman to take care of you, and to
conduct you hither as soon as possible. She has executed her commission
perfectly well; I have tasted the inexpressible pleasure of seeing you
again, of hearing you, of speaking with you. But you must be hungry, for
myself, I am famished; let us have supper."
They both sat down to table, and, when supper was over, they placed
themselves once more on the sofa; where they were when Signor Don
Issachar arrived. It was the Jewish Sabbath, and Issachar had come to
enjoy his rights, and to explain his tender love.
IX
WHAT BECAME OF CUNEGONDE, CANDIDE, THE GRAND INQUISITOR, AND THE JEW.
This Issachar was the most choleric Hebrew that had ever been seen in
Israel since the Captivity in Babylon.
"What!" said he, "thou bitch of a Galilean, was not the Inquisitor
enough for thee? Must this rascal also share with me?"
In saying this he drew a long poniard which he always carried about him;
and not imagining that his adversary had any arms he threw himself upon
Candide: but our honest Westphalian had received a handsome sword from
the old woman along with the suit of clothes. He drew his rapier,
despite his gentleness, and laid the Israelite stone dead upon the
cushions at Cunegonde's feet.
"Holy Virgin!" cried she, "what will become of us? A man killed in my
apartment! If the officers of justice come, we are lost!"
"Had not Pangloss been hanged," said Candide, "he would give us good
counsel in this emergency, for he was a profound philosopher. Failing
him let us consult the old woman."
She was very prudent and commenced to give her opinion when suddenly
another little door opened. It was an hour after midnight, it was the
beginning of Sunday. This day belonged to my lord the Inquisitor. He
entered, and saw the whipped Candide, sword in hand, a dead man upon the
floor, Cunegonde aghast, and the old woman giving counsel.
At this moment, the following is what passed in the soul of Candide, and
how he reasoned:
If this holy man call in assistance, he will surely have me burnt; and
Cunegonde will perhaps be served in the same manner; he was the cause of
my being cruelly whipped; he is my rival; and, as I have now begun to
kill, I will kill away, for there is no time to hesitate. This reasoning
was clear and instantaneous; so that without giving time to the
Inquisitor to recover from his surprise, he pierced him through and
through, and cast him beside the Jew.
"Yet again!" said Cunegonde, "now there is no mercy for us, we are
excommunicated, our last hour has come. How could you do it? you,
naturally so gentle, to slay a Jew and a prelate in two minutes!"
"My beautiful young lady," responded Candide, "when one is a lover,
jealous and whipped by the Inquisition, one stops at nothing."
The old woman then put in her word, saying:
"There are three Andalusian horses in the stable with bridles and
saddles, let the brave Candide get them ready; madame has money, jewels;
let us therefore mount quickly on horseback, though I can sit only on
one buttock; let us set out for Cadiz, it is the finest weather in the
world, and there is great pleasure in travelling in the cool of the
night."
Immediately Candide saddled the three horses, and Cunegonde, the old
woman and he, travelled thirty miles at a stretch. While they were
journeying, the Holy Brotherhood entered the house; my lord the
Inquisitor was interred in a handsome church, and Issachar's body was
thrown upon a dunghill.
Candide, Cunegonde, and the old woman, had now reached the little town
of Avacena in the midst of the mountains of the Sierra Morena, and were
speaking as follows in a public inn.
X
IN WHAT DISTRESS CANDIDE, CUNEGONDE, AND THE OLD WOMAN ARRIVED AT CADIZ;
AND OF THEIR EMBARKATION.
"Who was it that robbed me of my money and jewels?" said Cunegonde, all
bathed in tears. "How shall we live? What shall we do? Where find
Inquisitors or Jews who will give me more?"
"Alas!" said the old woman, "I have a shrewd suspicion of a reverend
Grey Friar, who stayed last night in the same inn with us at Badajos.
God preserve me from judging rashly, but he came into our room twice,
and he set out upon his journey long before us."
"Alas!" said Candide, "dear Pangloss has often demonstrated to me that
the goods of this world are common to all men, and that each has an
equal right to them. But according to these principles the Grey Friar
ought to have left us enough to carry us through our journey. Have you
nothing at all left, my dear Cunegonde?"
"Not a farthing," said she.
"What then must we do?" said Candide.
"Sell one of the horses," replied the old woman. "I will ride behind
Miss Cunegonde, though I can hold myself only on one buttock, and we
shall reach Cadiz."
In the same inn there was a Benedictine prior who bought the horse for a
cheap price. Candide, Cunegonde, and the old woman, having passed
through Lucena, Chillas, and Lebrixa, arrived at length at Cadiz. A
fleet was there getting ready, and troops assembling to bring to reason
the reverend Jesuit Fathers of Paraguay, accused of having made one of
the native tribes in the neighborhood of San Sacrament revolt against
the Kings of Spain and Portugal. Candide having been in the Bulgarian
service, performed the military exercise before the general of this
little army with so graceful an address, with so intrepid an air, and
with such agility and expedition, that he was given the command of a
company of foot. Now, he was a captain! He set sail with Miss Cunegonde,
the old woman, two valets, and the two Andalusian horses, which had
belonged to the grand Inquisitor of Portugal.
During their voyage they reasoned a good deal on the philosophy of poor
Pangloss.
"We are going into another world," said Candide; "and surely it must be
there that all is for the best. For I must confess there is reason to
complain a little of what passeth in our world in regard to both
natural and moral philosophy."
"I love you with all my heart," said Cunegonde; "but my soul is still
full of fright at that which I have seen and experienced."
"All will be well," replied Candide; "the sea of this new world is
already better than our European sea; it is calmer, the winds more
regular. It is certainly the New World which is the best of all possible
worlds."
"God grant it," said Cunegonde; "but I have been so horribly unhappy
there that my heart is almost closed to hope."
"You complain," said the old woman; "alas! you have not known such
misfortunes as mine."
Cunegonde almost broke out laughing, finding the good woman very
amusing, for pretending to have been as unfortunate as she.
"Alas!" said Cunegonde, "my good mother, unless you have been ravished
by two Bulgarians, have received two deep wounds in your belly, have had
two castles demolished, have had two mothers cut to pieces before your
eyes, and two of your lovers whipped at an _auto-da-fé_, I do not
conceive how you could be more unfortunate than I. Add that I was born a
baroness of seventy-two quarterings--and have been a cook!"
"Miss," replied the old woman, "you do not know my birth; and were I to
show you my backside, you would not talk in that manner, but would
suspend your judgment."
This speech having raised extreme curiosity in the minds of Cunegonde
and Candide, the old woman spoke to them as follows.
XI
HISTORY OF THE OLD WOMAN.
"I had not always bleared eyes and red eyelids; neither did my nose
always touch my chin; nor was I always a servant. I am the daughter of
Pope Urban X,[10] and of the Princess of Palestrina. Until the age of
fourteen I was brought up in a palace, to which all the castles of your
German barons would scarcely have served for stables; and one of my
robes was worth more than all the magnificence of Westphalia. As I grew
up I improved in beauty, wit, and every graceful accomplishment, in the
midst of pleasures, hopes, and respectful homage. Already I inspired
love. My throat was formed, and such a throat! white, firm, and shaped
like that of the Venus of Medici; and what eyes! what eyelids! what
black eyebrows! such flames darted from my dark pupils that they
eclipsed the scintillation of the stars--as I was told by the poets in
our part of the world. My waiting women, when dressing and undressing
me, used to fall into an ecstasy, whether they viewed me before or
behind; how glad would the gentlemen have been to perform that office
for them!
"I was affianced to the most excellent Prince of Massa Carara. Such a
prince! as handsome as myself, sweet-tempered, agreeable, brilliantly
witty, and sparkling with love. I loved him as one loves for the first
time--with idolatry, with transport. The nuptials were prepared. There
was surprising pomp and magnificence; there were _fêtes_, carousals,
continual _opera bouffe_; and all Italy composed sonnets in my praise,
though not one of them was passable. I was just upon the point of
reaching the summit of bliss, when an old marchioness who had been
mistress to the Prince, my husband, invited him to drink chocolate with
her. He died in less than two hours of most terrible convulsions. But
this is only a bagatelle. My mother, in despair, and scarcely less
afflicted than myself, determined to absent herself for some time from
so fatal a place. She had a very fine estate in the neighbourhood of
Gaeta. We embarked on board a galley of the country which was gilded
like the great altar of St. Peter's at Rome. A Sallee corsair swooped
down and boarded us. Our men defended themselves like the Pope's
soldiers; they flung themselves upon their knees, and threw down their
arms, begging of the corsair an absolution _in articulo mortis_.
"Instantly they were stripped as bare as monkeys; my mother, our maids
of honour, and myself were all served in the same manner. It is amazing
with what expedition those gentry undress people. But what surprised me
most was, that they thrust their fingers into the part of our bodies
which the generality of women suffer no other instrument but--pipes to
enter. It appeared to me a very strange kind of ceremony; but thus one
judges of things when one has not seen the world. I afterwards learnt
that it was to try whether we had concealed any diamonds. This is the
practice established from time immemorial, among civilised nations that
scour the seas. I was informed that the very religious Knights of Malta
never fail to make this search when they take any Turkish prisoners of
either sex. It is a law of nations from which they never deviate.
"I need not tell _you_ how great a hardship it was for a young princess
and her mother to be made slaves and carried to Morocco. You may easily
imagine all we had to suffer on board the pirate vessel. My mother was
still very handsome; our maids of honour, and even our waiting women,
had more charms than are to be found in all Africa. As for myself, I was
ravishing, was exquisite, grace itself, and I was a virgin! I did not
remain so long; this flower, which had been reserved for the handsome
Prince of Massa Carara, was plucked by the corsair captain. He was an
abominable negro, and yet believed that he did me a great deal of
honour. Certainly the Princess of Palestrina and myself must have been
very strong to go through all that we experienced until our arrival at
Morocco. But let us pass on; these are such common things as not to be
worth mentioning.
"Morocco swam in blood when we arrived. Fifty sons of the Emperor
Muley-Ismael[11] had each their adherents; this produced fifty civil
wars, of blacks against blacks, and blacks against tawnies, and tawnies
against tawnies, and mulattoes against mulattoes. In short it was a
continual carnage throughout the empire.
"No sooner were we landed, than the blacks of a contrary faction to that
of my captain attempted to rob him of his booty. Next to jewels and gold
we were the most valuable things he had. I was witness to such a battle
as you have never seen in your European climates. The northern nations
have not that heat in their blood, nor that raging lust for women, so
common in Africa. It seems that you Europeans have only milk in your
veins; but it is vitriol, it is fire which runs in those of the
inhabitants of Mount Atlas and the neighbouring countries. They fought
with the fury of the lions, tigers, and serpents of the country, to see
who should have us. A Moor seized my mother by the right arm, while my
captain's lieutenant held her by the left; a Moorish soldier had hold of
her by one leg, and one of our corsairs held her by the other. Thus
almost all our women were drawn in quarters by four men. My captain
concealed me behind him; and with his drawn scimitar cut and slashed
every one that opposed his fury. At length I saw all our Italian women,
and my mother herself, torn, mangled, massacred, by the monsters who
disputed over them. The slaves, my companions, those who had taken them,
soldiers, sailors, blacks, whites, mulattoes, and at last my captain,
all were killed, and I remained dying on a heap of dead. Such scenes as
this were transacted through an extent of three hundred leagues--and yet
they never missed the five prayers a day ordained by Mahomet.
"With difficulty I disengaged myself from such a heap of slaughtered
bodies, and crawled to a large orange tree on the bank of a neighbouring
rivulet, where I fell, oppressed with fright, fatigue, horror, despair,
and hunger. Immediately after, my senses, overpowered, gave themselves
up to sleep, which was yet more swooning than repose. I was in this
state of weakness and insensibility, between life and death, when I
felt myself pressed by something that moved upon my body. I opened my
eyes, and saw a white man, of good countenance, who sighed, and who said
between his teeth: '_O che sciagura d'essere senza coglioni!_'"[12]
XII
THE ADVENTURES OF THE OLD WOMAN CONTINUED.
"Astonished and delighted to hear my native language, and no less
surprised at what this man said, I made answer that there were much
greater misfortunes than that of which he complained. I told him in a
few words of the horrors which I had endured, and fainted a second time.
He carried me to a neighbouring house, put me to bed, gave me food,
waited upon me, consoled me, flattered me; he told me that he had never
seen any one so beautiful as I, and that he never so much regretted the
loss of what it was impossible to recover.
"'I was born at Naples,' said he, 'there they geld two or three thousand
children every year; some die of the operation, others acquire a voice
more beautiful than that of women, and others are raised to offices of
state.[13] This operation was performed on me with great success and I
was chapel musician to madam, the Princess of Palestrina.'
"'To my mother!' cried I.
"'Your mother!' cried he, weeping. 'What! can you be that young
princess whom I brought up until the age of six years, and who promised
so early to be as beautiful as you?'
"'It is I, indeed; but my mother lies four hundred yards hence, torn in
quarters, under a heap of dead bodies.'
"I told him all my adventures, and he made me acquainted with his;
telling me that he had been sent to the Emperor of Morocco by a
Christian power, to conclude a treaty with that prince, in consequence
of which he was to be furnished with military stores and ships to help
to demolish the commerce of other Christian Governments.
"'My mission is done,' said this honest eunuch; 'I go to embark for
Ceuta, and will take you to Italy. _Ma che sciagura d'essere senza
coglioni!_'
"I thanked him with tears of commiseration; and instead of taking me to
Italy he conducted me to Algiers, where he sold me to the Dey. Scarcely
was I sold, than the plague which had made the tour of Africa, Asia, and
Europe, broke out with great malignancy in Algiers. You have seen
earthquakes; but pray, miss, have you ever had the plague?"
"Never," answered Cunegonde.
"If you had," said the old woman, "you would acknowledge that it is far
more terrible than an earthquake. It is common in Africa, and I caught
it. Imagine to yourself the distressed situation of the daughter of a
Pope, only fifteen years old, who, in less than three months, had felt
the miseries of poverty and slavery, had been ravished almost every day,
had beheld her mother drawn in quarters, had experienced famine and war,
and was dying of the plague in Algiers. I did not die, however, but my
eunuch, and the Dey, and almost the whole seraglio of Algiers perished.
"As soon as the first fury of this terrible pestilence was over, a sale
was made of the Dey's slaves; I was purchased by a merchant, and carried
to Tunis; this man sold me to another merchant, who sold me again to
another at Tripoli; from Tripoli I was sold to Alexandria, from
Alexandria to Smyrna, and from Smyrna to Constantinople. At length I
became the property of an Aga of the Janissaries, who was soon ordered
away to the defence of Azof, then besieged by the Russians.
"The Aga, who was a very gallant man, took his whole seraglio with him,
and lodged us in a small fort on the Palus Méotides, guarded by two
black eunuchs and twenty soldiers. The Turks killed prodigious numbers
of the Russians, but the latter had their revenge. Azof was destroyed by
fire, the inhabitants put to the sword, neither sex nor age was spared;
until there remained only our little fort, and the enemy wanted to
starve us out. The twenty Janissaries had sworn they would never
surrender. The extremities of famine to which they were reduced, obliged
them to eat our two eunuchs, for fear of violating their oath. And at
the end of a few days they resolved also to devour the women.
"We had a very pious and humane Iman, who preached an excellent sermon,
exhorting them not to kill us all at once.
"'Only cut off a buttock of each of those ladies,' said he, 'and you'll
fare extremely well; if you must go to it again, there will be the same
entertainment a few days hence; heaven will accept of so charitable an
action, and send you relief.'
"He had great eloquence; he persuaded them; we underwent this terrible
operation. The Iman applied the same balsam to us, as he does to
children after circumcision; and we all nearly died.
"Scarcely had the Janissaries finished the repast with which we had
furnished them, than the Russians came in flat-bottomed boats; not a
Janissary escaped. The Russians paid no attention to the condition we
were in. There are French surgeons in all parts of the world; one of
them who was very clever took us under his care--he cured us; and as
long as I live I shall remember that as soon as my wounds were healed he
made proposals to me. He bid us all be of good cheer, telling us that
the like had happened in many sieges, and that it was according to the
laws of war.
"As soon as my companions could walk, they were obliged to set out for
Moscow. I fell to the share of a Boyard who made me his gardener, and
gave me twenty lashes a day. But this nobleman having in two years' time
been broke upon the wheel along with thirty more Boyards for some broils
at court, I profited by that event; I fled. I traversed all Russia; I
was a long time an inn-holder's servant at Riga, the same at Rostock, at
Vismar, at Leipzig, at Cassel, at Utrecht, at Leyden, at the Hague, at
Rotterdam. I waxed old in misery and disgrace, having only one-half of
my posteriors, and always remembering I was a Pope's daughter. A hundred
times I was upon the point of killing myself; but still I loved life.
This ridiculous foible is perhaps one of our most fatal characteristics;
for is there anything more absurd than to wish to carry continually a
burden which one can always throw down? to detest existence and yet to
cling to one's existence? in brief, to caress the serpent which devours
us, till he has eaten our very heart?
"In the different countries which it has been my lot to traverse, and
the numerous inns where I have been servant, I have taken notice of a
vast number of people who held their own existence in abhorrence, and
yet I never knew of more than eight who voluntarily put an end to their
misery; three negroes, four Englishmen, and a German professor named
Robek.[14] I ended by being servant to the Jew, Don Issachar, who placed
me near your presence, my fair lady. I am determined to share your fate,
and have been much more affected with your misfortunes than with my own.
I would never even have spoken to you of my misfortunes, had you not
piqued me a little, and if it were not customary to tell stories on
board a ship in order to pass away the time. In short, Miss Cunegonde, I
have had experience, I know the world; therefore I advise you to divert
yourself, and prevail upon each passenger to tell his story; and if
there be one of them all, that has not cursed his life many a time, that
has not frequently looked upon himself as the unhappiest of mortals, I
give you leave to throw me headforemost into the sea."
XIII
HOW CANDIDE WAS FORCED AWAY FROM HIS FAIR CUNEGONDE AND THE OLD WOMAN.
The beautiful Cunegonde having heard the old woman's history, paid her
all the civilities due to a person of her rank and merit. She likewise
accepted her proposal, and engaged all the passengers, one after the
other, to relate their adventures; and then both she and Candide allowed
that the old woman was in the right.
"It is a great pity," said Candide, "that the sage Pangloss was hanged
contrary to custom at an _auto-da-fé_; he would tell us most amazing
things in regard to the physical and moral evils that overspread earth
and sea, and I should be able, with due respect, to make a few
objections."
While each passenger was recounting his story, the ship made her way.
They landed at Buenos Ayres. Cunegonde, Captain Candide, and the old
woman, waited on the Governor, Don Fernando d'Ibaraa, y Figueora, y
Mascarenes, y Lampourdos, y Souza. This nobleman had a stateliness
becoming a person who bore so many names. He spoke to men with so noble
a disdain, carried his nose so loftily, raised his voice so
unmercifully, assumed so imperious an air, and stalked with such
intolerable pride, that those who saluted him were strongly inclined to
give him a good drubbing. Cunegonde appeared to him the most beautiful
he had ever met. The first thing he did was to ask whether she was not
the captain's wife. The manner in which he asked the question alarmed
Candide; he durst not say she was his wife, because indeed she was not;
neither durst he say she was his sister, because it was not so; and
although this obliging lie had been formerly much in favour among the
ancients, and although it could be useful to the moderns, his soul was
too pure to betray the truth.
"Miss Cunegonde," said he, "is to do me the honour to marry me, and we
beseech your excellency to deign to sanction our marriage."
Don Fernando d'Ibaraa, y Figueora, y Mascarenes, y Lampourdos, y Souza,
turning up his moustachios, smiled mockingly, and ordered Captain
Candide to go and review his company. Candide obeyed, and the Governor
remained alone with Miss Cunegonde. He declared his passion, protesting
he would marry her the next day in the face of the church, or otherwise,
just as should be agreeable to herself. Cunegonde asked a quarter of an
hour to consider of it, to consult the old woman, and to take her
resolution.
The old woman spoke thus to Cunegonde:
"Miss, you have seventy-two quarterings, and not a farthing; it is now
in your power to be wife to the greatest lord in South America, who has
very beautiful moustachios. Is it for you to pique yourself upon
inviolable fidelity? You have been ravished by Bulgarians; a Jew and an
Inquisitor have enjoyed your favours. Misfortune gives sufficient
excuse. I own, that if I were in your place, I should have no scruple in
marrying the Governor and in making the fortune of Captain Candide."
While the old woman spoke with all the prudence which age and experience
gave, a small ship entered the port on board of which were an Alcalde
and his alguazils, and this was what had happened.
As the old woman had shrewdly guessed, it was a Grey Friar who stole
Cunegonde's money and jewels in the town of Badajos, when she and
Candide were escaping. The Friar wanted to sell some of the diamonds to
a jeweller; the jeweller knew them to be the Grand Inquisitor's. The
Friar before he was hanged confessed he had stolen them. He described
the persons, and the route they had taken. The flight of Cunegonde and
Candide was already known. They were traced to Cadiz. A vessel was
immediately sent in pursuit of them. The vessel was already in the port
of Buenos Ayres. The report spread that the Alcalde was going to land,
and that he was in pursuit of the murderers of my lord the Grand
Inquisitor. The prudent old woman saw at once what was to be done.
"You cannot run away," said she to Cunegonde, "and you have nothing to
fear, for it was not you that killed my lord; besides the Governor who
loves you will not suffer you to be ill-treated; therefore stay."
She then ran immediately to Candide.
"Fly," said she, "or in an hour you will be burnt."
There was not a moment to lose; but how could he part from Cunegonde,
and where could he flee for shelter?
XIV
HOW CANDIDE AND CACAMBO WERE RECEIVED BY THE JESUITS OF PARAGUAY.
Candide had brought such a valet with him from Cadiz, as one often meets
with on the coasts of Spain and in the American colonies. He was a
quarter Spaniard, born of a mongrel in Tucuman; he had been singing-boy,
sacristan, sailor, monk, pedlar, soldier, and lackey. His name was
Cacambo, and he loved his master, because his master was a very good
man. He quickly saddled the two Andalusian horses.
"Come, master, let us follow the old woman's advice; let us start, and
run without looking behind us."
Candide shed tears.
"Oh! my dear Cunegonde! must I leave you just at a time when the
Governor was going to sanction our nuptials? Cunegonde, brought to such
a distance what will become of you?"
"She will do as well as she can," said Cacambo; "the women are never at
a loss, God provides for them, let us run."
"Whither art thou carrying me? Where shall we go? What shall we do
without Cunegonde?" said Candide.
"By St. James of Compostella," said Cacambo, "you were going to fight
against the Jesuits; let us go to fight for them; I know the road well,
I'll conduct you to their kingdom, where they will be charmed to have a
captain that understands the Bulgarian exercise. You'll make a
prodigious fortune; if we cannot find our account in one world we shall
in another. It is a great pleasure to see and do new things."
"You have before been in Paraguay, then?" said Candide.
"Ay, sure," answered Cacambo, "I was servant in the College of the
Assumption, and am acquainted with the government of the good Fathers as
well as I am with the streets of Cadiz. It is an admirable government.
The kingdom is upwards of three hundred leagues in diameter, and divided
into thirty provinces; there the Fathers possess all, and the people
nothing; it is a masterpiece of reason and justice. For my part I see
nothing so divine as the Fathers who here make war upon the kings of
Spain and Portugal, and in Europe confess those kings; who here kill
Spaniards, and in Madrid send them to heaven; this delights me, let us
push forward. You are going to be the happiest of mortals. What pleasure
will it be to those Fathers to hear that a captain who knows the
Bulgarian exercise has come to them!"
As soon as they reached the first barrier, Cacambo told the advanced
guard that a captain wanted to speak with my lord the Commandant. Notice
was given to the main guard, and immediately a Paraguayan officer ran
and laid himself at the feet of the Commandant, to impart this news to
him. Candide and Cacambo were disarmed, and their two Andalusian horses
seized. The strangers were introduced between two files of musketeers;
the Commandant was at the further end, with the three-cornered cap on
his head, his gown tucked up, a sword by his side, and a spontoon[15] in
his hand. He beckoned, and straightway the new-comers were encompassed
by four-and-twenty soldiers. A sergeant told them they must wait, that
the Commandant could not speak to them, and that the reverend Father
Provincial does not suffer any Spaniard to open his mouth but in his
presence, or to stay above three hours in the province.
"And where is the reverend Father Provincial?" said Cacambo.
"He is upon the parade just after celebrating mass," answered the
sergeant, "and you cannot kiss his spurs till three hours hence."
"However," said Cacambo, "the captain is not a Spaniard, but a German,
he is ready to perish with hunger as well as myself; cannot we have
something for breakfast, while we wait for his reverence?"
The sergeant went immediately to acquaint the Commandant with what he
had heard.
"God be praised!" said the reverend Commandant, "since he is a German, I
may speak to him; take him to my arbour."
Candide was at once conducted to a beautiful summer-house, ornamented
with a very pretty colonnade of green and gold marble, and with
trellises, enclosing parraquets, humming-birds, fly-birds, guinea-hens,
and all other rare birds. An excellent breakfast was provided in vessels
of gold; and while the Paraguayans were eating maize out of wooden
dishes, in the open fields and exposed to the heat of the sun, the
reverend Father Commandant retired to his arbour.
He was a very handsome young man, with a full face, white skin but high
in colour; he had an arched eyebrow, a lively eye, red ears, vermilion
lips, a bold air, but such a boldness as neither belonged to a Spaniard
nor a Jesuit. They returned their arms to Candide and Cacambo, and also
the two Andalusian horses; to whom Cacambo gave some oats to eat just by
the arbour, having an eye upon them all the while for fear of a
surprise.
Candide first kissed the hem of the Commandant's robe, then they sat
down to table.
"You are, then, a German?" said the Jesuit to him in that language.
"Yes, reverend Father," answered Candide.
As they pronounced these words they looked at each other with great
amazement, and with such an emotion as they could not conceal.
"And from what part of Germany do you come?" said the Jesuit.
"I am from the dirty province of Westphalia," answered Candide; "I was
born in the Castle of Thunder-ten-Tronckh."
"Oh! Heavens! is it possible?" cried the Commandant.
"What a miracle!" cried Candide.
"Is it really you?" said the Commandant.
"It is not possible!" said Candide.
They drew back; they embraced; they shed rivulets of tears.
"What, is it you, reverend Father? You, the brother of the fair
Cunegonde! You, that was slain by the Bulgarians! You, the Baron's son!
You, a Jesuit in Paraguay! I must confess this is a strange world that
we live in. Oh, Pangloss! Pangloss! how glad you would be if you had not
been hanged!"
The Commandant sent away the negro slaves and the Paraguayans, who
served them with liquors in goblets of rock-crystal. He thanked God and
St. Ignatius a thousand times; he clasped Candide in his arms; and their
faces were all bathed with tears.
"You will be more surprised, more affected, and transported," said
Candide, "when I tell you that Cunegonde, your sister, whom you believe
to have been ripped open, is in perfect health."
"Where?"
"In your neighbourhood, with the Governor of Buenos Ayres; and I was
going to fight against you."
Every word which they uttered in this long conversation but added wonder
to wonder. Their souls fluttered on their tongues, listened in their
ears, and sparkled in their eyes. As they were Germans, they sat a good
while at table, waiting for the reverend Father Provincial, and the
Commandant spoke to his dear Candide as follows.
XV
HOW CANDIDE KILLED THE BROTHER OF HIS DEAR CUNEGONDE.
"I shall have ever present to my memory the dreadful day, on which I saw
my father and mother killed, and my sister ravished. When the Bulgarians
retired, my dear sister could not be found; but my mother, my father,
and myself, with two maid-servants and three little boys all of whom had
been slain, were put in a hearse, to be conveyed for interment to a
chapel belonging to the Jesuits, within two leagues of our family seat.
A Jesuit sprinkled us with some holy water; it was horribly salt; a few
drops of it fell into my eyes; the father perceived that my eyelids
stirred a little; he put his hand upon my heart and felt it beat. I
received assistance, and at the end of three weeks I recovered. You
know, my dear Candide, I was very pretty; but I grew much prettier, and
the reverend Father Didrie,[16] Superior of that House, conceived the
tenderest friendship for me; he gave me the habit of the order, some
years after I was sent to Rome. The Father-General needed new levies of
young German-Jesuits. The sovereigns of Paraguay admit as few Spanish
Jesuits as possible; they prefer those of other nations as being more
subordinate to their commands. I was judged fit by the reverend
Father-General to go and work in this vineyard. We set out--a Pole, a
Tyrolese, and myself. Upon my arrival I was honoured with a
sub-deaconship and a lieutenancy. I am to-day colonel and priest. We
shall give a warm reception to the King of Spain's troops; I will answer
for it that they shall be excommunicated and well beaten. Providence
sends you here to assist us. But is it, indeed, true that my dear sister
Cunegonde is in the neighbourhood, with the Governor of Buenos Ayres?"
Candide assured him on oath that nothing was more true, and their tears
began afresh.
The Baron could not refrain from embracing Candide; he called him his
brother, his saviour.
"Ah! perhaps," said he, "we shall together, my dear Candide, enter the
town as conquerors, and recover my sister Cunegonde."
"That is all I want," said Candide, "for I intended to marry her, and I
still hope to do so."
"You insolent!" replied the Baron, "would you have the impudence to
marry my sister who has seventy-two quarterings! I find thou hast the
most consummate effrontery to dare to mention so presumptuous a design!"
Candide, petrified at this speech, made answer:
"Reverend Father, all the quarterings in the world signify nothing; I
rescued your sister from the arms of a Jew and of an Inquisitor; she has
great obligations to me, she wishes to marry me; Master Pangloss always
told me that all men are equal, and certainly I will marry her."
"We shall see that, thou scoundrel!" said the Jesuit Baron de
Thunder-ten-Tronckh, and that instant struck him across the face with
the flat of his sword. Candide in an instant drew his rapier, and
plunged it up to the hilt in the Jesuit's belly; but in pulling it out
reeking hot, he burst into tears.
"Good God!" said he, "I have killed my old master, my friend, my
brother-in-law! I am the best-natured creature in the world, and yet I
have already killed three men, and of these three two were priests."
Cacambo, who stood sentry by the door of the arbour, ran to him.
"We have nothing more for it than to sell our lives as dearly as we
can," said his master to him, "without doubt some one will soon enter
the arbour, and we must die sword in hand."
Cacambo, who had been in a great many scrapes in his lifetime, did not
lose his head; he took the Baron's Jesuit habit, put it on Candide, gave
him the square cap, and made him mount on horseback. All this was done
in the twinkling of an eye.
"Let us gallop fast, master, everybody will take you for a Jesuit, going
to give directions to your men, and we shall have passed the frontiers
before they will be able to overtake us."
He flew as he spoke these words, crying out aloud in Spanish:
"Make way, make way, for the reverend Father Colonel."
XVI
ADVENTURES OF THE TWO TRAVELLERS, WITH TWO GIRLS, TWO MONKEYS, AND THE
SAVAGES CALLED OREILLONS.
Candide and his valet had got beyond the barrier, before it was known in
the camp that the German Jesuit was dead. The wary Cacambo had taken
care to fill his wallet with bread, chocolate, bacon, fruit, and a few
bottles of wine. With their Andalusian horses they penetrated into an
unknown country, where they perceived no beaten track. At length they
came to a beautiful meadow intersected with purling rills. Here our two
adventurers fed their horses. Cacambo proposed to his master to take
some food, and he set him an example.
"How can you ask me to eat ham," said Candide, "after killing the
Baron's son, and being doomed never more to see the beautiful Cunegonde?
What will it avail me to spin out my wretched days and drag them far
from her in remorse and despair? And what will the _Journal of
Trevoux_[17] say?"
While he was thus lamenting his fate, he went on eating. The sun went
down. The two wanderers heard some little cries which seemed to be
uttered by women. They did not know whether they were cries of pain or
joy; but they started up precipitately with that inquietude and alarm
which every little thing inspires in an unknown country. The noise was
made by two naked girls, who tripped along the mead, while two monkeys
were pursuing them and biting their buttocks. Candide was moved with
pity; he had learned to fire a gun in the Bulgarian service, and he was
so clever at it, that he could hit a filbert in a hedge without touching
a leaf of the tree. He took up his double-barrelled Spanish fusil, let
it off, and killed the two monkeys.
"God be praised! My dear Cacambo, I have rescued those two poor
creatures from a most perilous situation. If I have committed a sin in
killing an Inquisitor and a Jesuit, I have made ample amends by saving
the lives of these girls. Perhaps they are young ladies of family; and
this adventure may procure us great advantages in this country."
He was continuing, but stopped short when he saw the two girls tenderly
embracing the monkeys, bathing their bodies in tears, and rending the
air with the most dismal lamentations.
"Little did I expect to see such good-nature," said he at length to
Cacambo; who made answer:
"Master, you have done a fine thing now; you have slain the sweethearts
of those two young ladies."
"The sweethearts! Is it possible? You are jesting, Cacambo, I can never
believe it!"
"Dear master," replied Cacambo; "you are surprised at everything. Why
should you think it so strange that in some countries there are monkeys
which insinuate themselves into the good graces of the ladies; they are
a fourth part human, as I am a fourth part Spaniard."
"Alas!" replied Candide, "I remember to have heard Master Pangloss say,
that formerly such accidents used to happen; that these mixtures were
productive of Centaurs, Fauns, and Satyrs; and that many of the ancients
had seen such monsters, but I looked upon the whole as fabulous."
"You ought now to be convinced," said Cacambo, "that it is the truth,
and you see what use is made of those creatures, by persons that have
not had a proper education; all I fear is that those ladies will play us
some ugly trick."
These sound reflections induced Candide to leave the meadow and to
plunge into a wood. He supped there with Cacambo; and after cursing the
Portuguese inquisitor, the Governor of Buenos Ayres, and the Baron, they
fell asleep on moss. On awaking they felt that they could not move; for
during the night the Oreillons, who inhabited that country, and to whom
the ladies had denounced them, had bound them with cords made of the
bark of trees. They were encompassed by fifty naked Oreillons, armed
with bows and arrows, with clubs and flint hatchets. Some were making a
large cauldron boil, others were preparing spits, and all cried:
"A Jesuit! a Jesuit! we shall be revenged, we shall have excellent
cheer, let us eat the Jesuit, let us eat him up!"
"I told you, my dear master," cried Cacambo sadly, "that those two girls
would play us some ugly trick."
Candide seeing the cauldron and the spits, cried:
"We are certainly going to be either roasted or boiled. Ah! what would
Master Pangloss say, were he to see how pure nature is formed?
Everything is right, may be, but I declare it is very hard to have lost
Miss Cunegonde and to be put upon a spit by Oreillons."
Cacambo never lost his head.
"Do not despair," said he to the disconsolate Candide, "I understand a
little of the jargon of these people, I will speak to them."
"Be sure," said Candide, "to represent to them how frightfully inhuman
it is to cook men, and how very un-Christian."
"Gentlemen," said Cacambo, "you reckon you are to-day going to feast
upon a Jesuit. It is all very well, nothing is more unjust than thus to
treat your enemies. Indeed, the law of nature teaches us to kill our
neighbour, and such is the practice all over the world. If we do not
accustom ourselves to eating them, it is because we have better fare.
But you have not the same resources as we; certainly it is much better
to devour your enemies than to resign to the crows and rooks the fruits
of your victory. But, gentlemen, surely you would not choose to eat your
friends. You believe that you are going to spit a Jesuit, and he is your
defender. It is the enemy of your enemies that you are going to roast.
As for myself, I was born in your country; this gentleman is my master,
and, far from being a Jesuit, he has just killed one, whose spoils he
wears; and thence comes your mistake. To convince you of the truth of
what I say, take his habit and carry it to the first barrier of the
Jesuit kingdom, and inform yourselves whether my master did not kill a
Jesuit officer. It will not take you long, and you can always eat us if
you find that I have lied to you. But I have told you the truth. You are
too well acquainted with the principles of public law, humanity, and
justice not to pardon us."
The Oreillons found this speech very reasonable. They deputed two of
their principal people with all expedition to inquire into the truth of
the matter; these executed their commission like men of sense, and soon
returned with good news. The Oreillons untied their prisoners, showed
them all sorts of civilities, offered them girls, gave them refreshment,
and reconducted them to the confines of their territories, proclaiming
with great joy:
"He is no Jesuit! He is no Jesuit!"
Candide could not help being surprised at the cause of his deliverance.
"What people!" said he; "what men! what manners! If I had not been so
lucky as to run Miss Cunegonde's brother through the body, I should have
been devoured without redemption. But, after all, pure nature is good,
since these people, instead of feasting upon my flesh, have shown me a
thousand civilities, when then I was not a Jesuit."
XVII
ARRIVAL OF CANDIDE AND HIS VALET AT EL DORADO, AND WHAT THEY SAW THERE.
"You see," said Cacambo to Candide, as soon as they had reached the
frontiers of the Oreillons, "that this hemisphere is not better than the
others, take my word for it; let us go back to Europe by the shortest
way."
"How go back?" said Candide, "and where shall we go? to my own country?
The Bulgarians and the Abares are slaying all; to Portugal? there I
shall be burnt; and if we abide here we are every moment in danger of
being spitted. But how can I resolve to quit a part of the world where
my dear Cunegonde resides?"
"Let us turn towards Cayenne," said Cacambo, "there we shall find
Frenchmen, who wander all over the world; they may assist us; God will
perhaps have pity on us."
It was not easy to get to Cayenne; they knew vaguely in which direction
to go, but rivers, precipices, robbers, savages, obstructed them all the
way. Their horses died of fatigue. Their provisions were consumed; they
fed a whole month upon wild fruits, and found themselves at last near a
little river bordered with cocoa trees, which sustained their lives and
their hopes.
Cacambo, who was as good a counsellor as the old woman, said to Candide:
"We are able to hold out no longer; we have walked enough. I see an
empty canoe near the river-side; let us fill it with cocoanuts, throw
ourselves into it, and go with the current; a river always leads to some
inhabited spot. If we do not find pleasant things we shall at least find
new things."
"With all my heart," said Candide, "let us recommend ourselves to
Providence."
They rowed a few leagues, between banks, in some places flowery, in
others barren; in some parts smooth, in others rugged. The stream ever
widened, and at length lost itself under an arch of frightful rocks
which reached to the sky. The two travellers had the courage to commit
themselves to the current. The river, suddenly contracting at this
place, whirled them along with a dreadful noise and rapidity. At the end
of four-and-twenty hours they saw daylight again, but their canoe was
dashed to pieces against the rocks. For a league they had to creep from
rock to rock, until at length they discovered an extensive plain,
bounded by inaccessible mountains. The country was cultivated as much
for pleasure as for necessity. On all sides the useful was also the
beautiful. The roads were covered, or rather adorned, with carriages of
a glittering form and substance, in which were men and women of
surprising beauty, drawn by large red sheep which surpassed in fleetness
the finest coursers of Andalusia, Tetuan, and Mequinez.[18]
"Here, however, is a country," said Candide, "which is better than
Westphalia."
He stepped out with Cacambo towards the first village which he saw. Some
children dressed in tattered brocades played at quoits on the outskirts.
Our travellers from the other world amused themselves by looking on. The
quoits were large round pieces, yellow, red, and green, which cast a
singular lustre! The travellers picked a few of them off the ground;
this was of gold, that of emeralds, the other of rubies--the least of
them would have been the greatest ornament on the Mogul's throne.
"Without doubt," said Cacambo, "these children must be the king's sons
that are playing at quoits!"
The village schoolmaster appeared at this moment and called them to
school.
"There," said Candide, "is the preceptor of the royal family."
The little truants immediately quitted their game, leaving the quoits
on the ground with all their other playthings. Candide gathered them up,
ran to the master, and presented them to him in a most humble manner,
giving him to understand by signs that their royal highnesses had
forgotten their gold and jewels. The schoolmaster, smiling, flung them
upon the ground; then, looking at Candide with a good deal of surprise,
went about his business.
The travellers, however, took care to gather up the gold, the rubies,
and the emeralds.
"Where are we?" cried Candide. "The king's children in this country must
be well brought up, since they are taught to despise gold and precious
stones."
Cacambo was as much surprised as Candide. At length they drew near the
first house in the village. It was built like an European palace. A
crowd of people pressed about the door, and there were still more in the
house. They heard most agreeable music, and were aware of a delicious
odour of cooking. Cacambo went up to the door and heard they were
talking Peruvian; it was his mother tongue, for it is well known that
Cacambo was born in Tucuman, in a village where no other language was
spoken.
"I will be your interpreter here," said he to Candide; "let us go in, it
is a public-house."
Immediately two waiters and two girls, dressed in cloth of gold, and
their hair tied up with ribbons, invited them to sit down to table with
the landlord. They served four dishes of soup, each garnished with two
young parrots; a boiled condor[19] which weighed two hundred pounds; two
roasted monkeys, of excellent flavour; three hundred humming-birds in
one dish, and six hundred fly-birds in another; exquisite ragouts;
delicious pastries; the whole served up in dishes of a kind of
rock-crystal. The waiters and girls poured out several liqueurs drawn
from the sugar-cane.
Most of the company were chapmen and waggoners, all extremely polite;
they asked Cacambo a few questions with the greatest circumspection, and
answered his in the most obliging manner.
As soon as dinner was over, Cacambo believed as well as Candide that
they might well pay their reckoning by laying down two of those large
gold pieces which they had picked up. The landlord and landlady shouted
with laughter and held their sides. When the fit was over:
"Gentlemen," said the landlord, "it is plain you are strangers, and such
guests we are not accustomed to see; pardon us therefore for laughing
when you offered us the pebbles from our highroads in payment of your
reckoning. You doubtless have not the money of the country; but it is
not necessary to have any money at all to dine in this house. All
hostelries established for the convenience of commerce are paid by the
government. You have fared but very indifferently because this is a poor
village; but everywhere else, you will be received as you deserve."
Cacambo explained this whole discourse with great astonishment to
Candide, who was as greatly astonished to hear it.
"What sort of a country then is this," said they to one another; "a
country unknown to all the rest of the world, and where nature is of a
kind so different from ours? It is probably the country where all is
well; for there absolutely must be one such place. And, whatever Master
Pangloss might say, I often found that things went very ill in
Westphalia."
XVIII
WHAT THEY SAW IN THE COUNTRY OF EL DORADO.
Cacambo expressed his curiosity to the landlord, who made answer:
"I am very ignorant, but not the worse on that account. However, we have
in this neighbourhood an old man retired from Court who is the most
learned and most communicative person in the kingdom."
At once he took Cacambo to the old man. Candide acted now only a second
character, and accompanied his valet. They entered a very plain house,
for the door was only of silver, and the ceilings were only of gold, but
wrought in so elegant a taste as to vie with the richest. The
antechamber, indeed, was only encrusted with rubies and emeralds, but
the order in which everything was arranged made amends for this great
simplicity.
The old man received the strangers on his sofa, which was stuffed with
humming-birds' feathers, and ordered his servants to present them with
liqueurs in diamond goblets; after which he satisfied their curiosity
in the following terms:
"I am now one hundred and seventy-two years old, and I learnt of my late
father, Master of the Horse to the King, the amazing revolutions of
Peru, of which he had been an eyewitness. The kingdom we now inhabit is
the ancient country of the Incas, who quitted it very imprudently to
conquer another part of the world, and were at length destroyed by the
Spaniards.
"More wise by far were the princes of their family, who remained in
their native country; and they ordained, with the consent of the whole
nation, that none of the inhabitants should ever be permitted to quit
this little kingdom; and this has preserved our innocence and happiness.
The Spaniards have had a confused notion of this country, and have
called it _El Dorado_; and an Englishman, whose name was Sir Walter
Raleigh, came very near it about a hundred years ago; but being
surrounded by inaccessible rocks and precipices, we have hitherto been
sheltered from the rapaciousness of European nations, who have an
inconceivable passion for the pebbles and dirt of our land, for the sake
of which they would murder us to the last man."
The conversation was long: it turned chiefly on their form of
government, their manners, their women, their public entertainments,
and the arts. At length Candide, having always had a taste for
metaphysics, made Cacambo ask whether there was any religion in that
country.
The old man reddened a little.
"How then," said he, "can you doubt it? Do you take us for ungrateful
wretches?"
Cacambo humbly asked, "What was the religion in El Dorado?"
The old man reddened again.
"Can there be two religions?" said he. "We have, I believe, the religion
of all the world: we worship God night and morning."
"Do you worship but one God?" said Cacambo, who still acted as
interpreter in representing Candide's doubts.
"Surely," said the old man, "there are not two, nor three, nor four. I
must confess the people from your side of the world ask very
extraordinary questions."
Candide was not yet tired of interrogating the good old man; he wanted
to know in what manner they prayed to God in El Dorado.
"We do not pray to Him," said the worthy sage; "we have nothing to ask
of Him; He has given us all we need, and we return Him thanks without
ceasing."
Candide having a curiosity to see the priests asked where they were.
The good old man smiled.
"My friend," said he, "we are all priests. The King and all the heads of
families sing solemn canticles of thanksgiving every morning,
accompanied by five or six thousand musicians."
"What! have you no monks who teach, who dispute, who govern, who cabal,
and who burn people that are not of their opinion?"
"We must be mad, indeed, if that were the case," said the old man; "here
we are all of one opinion, and we know not what you mean by monks."
During this whole discourse Candide was in raptures, and he said to
himself:
"This is vastly different from Westphalia and the Baron's castle. Had
our friend Pangloss seen El Dorado he would no longer have said that the
castle of Thunder-ten-Tronckh was the finest upon earth. It is evident
that one must travel."
After this long conversation the old man ordered a coach and six sheep
to be got ready, and twelve of his domestics to conduct the travellers
to Court.
"Excuse me," said he, "if my age deprives me of the honour of
accompanying you. The King will receive you in a manner that cannot
displease you; and no doubt you will make an allowance for the customs
of the country, if some things should not be to your liking."
Candide and Cacambo got into the coach, the six sheep flew, and in less
than four hours they reached the King's palace situated at the extremity
of the capital. The portal was two hundred and twenty feet high, and one
hundred wide; but words are wanting to express the materials of which it
was built. It is plain such materials must have prodigious superiority
over those pebbles and sand which we call gold and precious stones.
Twenty beautiful damsels of the King's guard received Candide and
Cacambo as they alighted from the coach, conducted them to the bath, and
dressed them in robes woven of the down of humming-birds; after which
the great crown officers, of both sexes, led them to the King's
apartment, between two files of musicians, a thousand on each side. When
they drew near to the audience chamber Cacambo asked one of the great
officers in what way he should pay his obeisance to his Majesty; whether
they should throw themselves upon their knees or on their stomachs;
whether they should put their hands upon their heads or behind their
backs; whether they should lick the dust off the floor; in a word, what
was the ceremony?
"The custom," said the great officer, "is to embrace the King, and to
kiss him on each cheek."
Candide and Cacambo threw themselves round his Majesty's neck. He
received them with all the goodness imaginable, and politely invited
them to supper.
While waiting they were shown the city, and saw the public edifices
raised as high as the clouds, the market places ornamented with a
thousand columns, the fountains of spring water, those of rose water,
those of liqueurs drawn from sugar-cane, incessantly flowing into the
great squares, which were paved with a kind of precious stone, which
gave off a delicious fragrancy like that of cloves and cinnamon. Candide
asked to see the court of justice, the parliament. They told him they
had none, and that they were strangers to lawsuits. He asked if they had
any prisons, and they answered no. But what surprised him most and gave
him the greatest pleasure was the palace of sciences, where he saw a
gallery two thousand feet long, and filled with instruments employed in
mathematics and physics.
After rambling about the city the whole afternoon, and seeing but a
thousandth part of it, they were reconducted to the royal palace, where
Candide sat down to table with his Majesty, his valet Cacambo, and
several ladies. Never was there a better entertainment, and never was
more wit shown at a table than that which fell from his Majesty. Cacambo
explained the King's _bon-mots_ to Candide, and notwithstanding they
were translated they still appeared to be _bon-mots_. Of all the things
that surprised Candide this was not the least.
They spent a month in this hospitable place. Candide frequently said to
Cacambo:
"I own, my friend, once more that the castle where I was born is nothing
in comparison with this; but, after all, Miss Cunegonde is not here, and
you have, without doubt, some mistress in Europe. If we abide here we
shall only be upon a footing with the rest, whereas, if we return to our
old world, only with twelve sheep laden with the pebbles of El Dorado,
we shall be richer than all the kings in Europe. We shall have no more
Inquisitors to fear, and we may easily recover Miss Cunegonde."
This speech was agreeable to Cacambo; mankind are so fond of roving, of
making a figure in their own country, and of boasting of what they have
seen in their travels, that the two happy ones resolved to be no longer
so, but to ask his Majesty's leave to quit the country.
"You are foolish," said the King. "I am sensible that my kingdom is but
a small place, but when a person is comfortably settled in any part he
should abide there. I have not the right to detain strangers. It is a
tyranny which neither our manners nor our laws permit. All men are free.
Go when you wish, but the going will be very difficult. It is impossible
to ascend that rapid river on which you came as by a miracle, and which
runs under vaulted rocks. The mountains which surround my kingdom are
ten thousand feet high, and as steep as walls; they are each over ten
leagues in breadth, and there is no other way to descend them than by
precipices. However, since you absolutely wish to depart, I shall give
orders to my engineers to construct a machine that will convey you very
safely. When we have conducted you over the mountains no one can
accompany you further, for my subjects have made a vow never to quit the
kingdom, and they are too wise to break it. Ask me besides anything that
you please."
"We desire nothing of your Majesty," says Candide, "but a few sheep
laden with provisions, pebbles, and the earth of this country."
The King laughed.
"I cannot conceive," said he, "what pleasure you Europeans find in our
yellow clay, but take as much as you like, and great good may it do
you."
At once he gave directions that his engineers should construct a machine
to hoist up these two extraordinary men out of the kingdom. Three
thousand good mathematicians went to work; it was ready in fifteen days,
and did not cost more than twenty million sterling in the specie of that
country. They placed Candide and Cacambo on the machine. There were two
great red sheep saddled and bridled to ride upon as soon as they were
beyond the mountains, twenty pack-sheep laden with provisions, thirty
with presents of the curiosities of the country, and fifty with gold,
diamonds, and precious stones. The King embraced the two wanderers very
tenderly.
Their departure, with the ingenious manner in which they and their sheep
were hoisted over the mountains, was a splendid spectacle. The
mathematicians took their leave after conveying them to a place of
safety, and Candide had no other desire, no other aim, than to present
his sheep to Miss Cunegonde.
"Now," said he, "we are able to pay the Governor of Buenos Ayres if Miss
Cunegonde can be ransomed. Let us journey towards Cayenne. Let us
embark, and we will afterwards see what kingdom we shall be able to
purchase."
XIX
WHAT HAPPENED TO THEM AT SURINAM AND HOW CANDIDE GOT ACQUAINTED WITH
MARTIN.
Our travellers spent the first day very agreeably. They were delighted
with possessing more treasure than all Asia, Europe, and Africa could
scrape together. Candide, in his raptures, cut Cunegonde's name on the
trees. The second day two of their sheep plunged into a morass, where
they and their burdens were lost; two more died of fatigue a few days
after; seven or eight perished with hunger in a desert; and others
subsequently fell down precipices. At length, after travelling a hundred
days, only two sheep remained. Said Candide to Cacambo:
"My friend, you see how perishable are the riches of this world; there
is nothing solid but virtue, and the happiness of seeing Cunegonde once
more."
"I grant all you say," said Cacambo, "but we have still two sheep
remaining, with more treasure than the King of Spain will ever have; and
I see a town which I take to be Surinam, belonging to the Dutch. We are
at the end of all our troubles, and at the beginning of happiness."
As they drew near the town, they saw a negro stretched upon the ground,
with only one moiety of his clothes, that is, of his blue linen drawers;
the poor man had lost his left leg and his right hand.
"Good God!" said Candide in Dutch, "what art thou doing there, friend,
in that shocking condition?"
"I am waiting for my master, Mynheer Vanderdendur, the famous merchant,"
answered the negro.
"Was it Mynheer Vanderdendur," said Candide, "that treated thee thus?"
"Yes, sir," said the negro, "it is the custom. They give us a pair of
linen drawers for our whole garment twice a year. When we work at the
sugar-canes, and the mill snatches hold of a finger, they cut off the
hand; and when we attempt to run away, they cut off the leg; both cases
have happened to me. This is the price at which you eat sugar in Europe.
Yet when my mother sold me for ten patagons[20] on the coast of Guinea,
she said to me: 'My dear child, bless our fetiches, adore them for ever;
they will make thee live happily; thou hast the honour of being the
slave of our lords, the whites, which is making the fortune of thy
father and mother.' Alas! I know not whether I have made their fortunes;
this I know, that they have not made mine. Dogs, monkeys, and parrots
are a thousand times less wretched than I. The Dutch fetiches, who have
converted me, declare every Sunday that we are all of us children of
Adam--blacks as well as whites. I am not a genealogist, but if these
preachers tell truth, we are all second cousins. Now, you must agree,
that it is impossible to treat one's relations in a more barbarous
manner."
"Oh, Pangloss!" cried Candide, "thou hadst not guessed at this
abomination; it is the end. I must at last renounce thy optimism."
"What is this optimism?" said Cacambo.
"Alas!" said Candide, "it is the madness of maintaining that everything
is right when it is wrong."
Looking at the negro, he shed tears, and weeping, he entered Surinam.
The first thing they inquired after was whether there was a vessel in
the harbour which could be sent to Buenos Ayres. The person to whom they
applied was a Spanish sea-captain, who offered to agree with them upon
reasonable terms. He appointed to meet them at a public-house, whither
Candide and the faithful Cacambo went with their two sheep, and awaited
his coming.
Candide, who had his heart upon his lips, told the Spaniard all his
adventures, and avowed that he intended to elope with Miss Cunegonde.
"Then I will take good care not to carry you to Buenos Ayres," said the
seaman. "I should be hanged, and so would you. The fair Cunegonde is my
lord's favourite mistress."
This was a thunderclap for Candide: he wept for a long while. At last he
drew Cacambo aside.
"Here, my dear friend," said he to him, "this thou must do. We have,
each of us in his pocket, five or six millions in diamonds; you are more
clever than I; you must go and bring Miss Cunegonde from Buenos Ayres.
If the Governor makes any difficulty, give him a million; if he will not
relinquish her, give him two; as you have not killed an Inquisitor, they
will have no suspicion of you; I'll get another ship, and go and wait
for you at Venice; that's a free country, where there is no danger
either from Bulgarians, Abares, Jews, or Inquisitors."
Cacambo applauded this wise resolution. He despaired at parting from so
good a master, who had become his intimate friend; but the pleasure of
serving him prevailed over the pain of leaving him. They embraced with
tears; Candide charged him not to forget the good old woman. Cacambo
set out that very same day. This Cacambo was a very honest fellow.
Candide stayed some time longer in Surinam, waiting for another captain
to carry him and the two remaining sheep to Italy. After he had hired
domestics, and purchased everything necessary for a long voyage, Mynheer
Vanderdendur, captain of a large vessel, came and offered his services.
"How much will you charge," said he to this man, "to carry me straight
to Venice--me, my servants, my baggage, and these two sheep?"
The skipper asked ten thousand piastres. Candide did not hesitate.
"Oh! oh!" said the prudent Vanderdendur to himself, "this stranger gives
ten thousand piastres unhesitatingly! He must be very rich."
Returning a little while after, he let him know that upon second
consideration, he could not undertake the voyage for less than twenty
thousand piastres.
"Well, you shall have them," said Candide.
"Ay!" said the skipper to himself, "this man agrees to pay twenty
thousand piastres with as much ease as ten."
He went back to him again, and declared that he could not carry him to
Venice for less than thirty thousand piastres.
"Then you shall have thirty thousand," replied Candide.
"Oh! oh!" said the Dutch skipper once more to himself, "thirty thousand
piastres are a trifle to this man; surely these sheep must be laden with
an immense treasure; let us say no more about it. First of all, let him
pay down the thirty thousand piastres; then we shall see."
Candide sold two small diamonds, the least of which was worth more than
what the skipper asked for his freight. He paid him in advance. The two
sheep were put on board. Candide followed in a little boat to join the
vessel in the roads. The skipper seized his opportunity, set sail, and
put out to sea, the wind favouring him. Candide, dismayed and stupefied,
soon lost sight of the vessel.
"Alas!" said he, "this is a trick worthy of the old world!"
He put back, overwhelmed with sorrow, for indeed he had lost sufficient
to make the fortune of twenty monarchs. He waited upon the Dutch
magistrate, and in his distress he knocked over loudly at the door. He
entered and told his adventure, raising his voice with unnecessary
vehemence. The magistrate began by fining him ten thousand piastres for
making a noise; then he listened patiently, promised to examine into his
affair at the skipper's return, and ordered him to pay ten thousand
piastres for the expense of the hearing.
This drove Candide to despair; he had, indeed, endured misfortunes a
thousand times worse; the coolness of the magistrate and of the skipper
who had robbed him, roused his choler and flung him into a deep
melancholy. The villainy of mankind presented itself before his
imagination in all its deformity, and his mind was filled with gloomy
ideas. At length hearing that a French vessel was ready to set sail for
Bordeaux, as he had no sheep laden with diamonds to take along with him
he hired a cabin at the usual price. He made it known in the town that
he would pay the passage and board and give two thousand piastres to any
honest man who would make the voyage with him, upon condition that this
man was the most dissatisfied with his state, and the most unfortunate
in the whole province.
Such a crowd of candidates presented themselves that a fleet of ships
could hardly have held them. Candide being desirous of selecting from
among the best, marked out about one-twentieth of them who seemed to be
sociable men, and who all pretended to merit his preference. He
assembled them at his inn, and gave them a supper on condition that each
took an oath to relate his history faithfully, promising to choose him
who appeared to be most justly discontented with his state, and to
bestow some presents upon the rest.
They sat until four o'clock in the morning. Candide, in listening to all
their adventures, was reminded of what the old woman had said to him in
their voyage to Buenos Ayres, and of her wager that there was not a
person on board the ship but had met with very great misfortunes. He
dreamed of Pangloss at every adventure told to him.
"This Pangloss," said he, "would be puzzled to demonstrate his system. I
wish that he were here. Certainly, if all things are good, it is in El
Dorado and not in the rest of the world."
At length he made choice of a poor man of letters, who had worked ten
years for the booksellers of Amsterdam. He judged that there was not in
the whole world a trade which could disgust one more.
This philosopher was an honest man; but he had been robbed by his wife,
beaten by his son, and abandoned by his daughter who got a Portuguese to
run away with her. He had just been deprived of a small employment, on
which he subsisted; and he was persecuted by the preachers of Surinam,
who took him for a Socinian. We must allow that the others were at least
as wretched as he; but Candide hoped that the philosopher would
entertain him during the voyage. All the other candidates complained
that Candide had done them great injustice; but he appeased them by
giving one hundred piastres to each.
XX
WHAT HAPPENED AT SEA TO CANDIDE AND MARTIN.
The old philosopher, whose name was Martin, embarked then with Candide
for Bordeaux. They had both seen and suffered a great deal; and if the
vessel had sailed from Surinam to Japan, by the Cape of Good Hope, the
subject of moral and natural evil would have enabled them to entertain
one another during the whole voyage.
Candide, however, had one great advantage over Martin, in that he always
hoped to see Miss Cunegonde; whereas Martin had nothing at all to hope.
Besides, Candide was possessed of money and jewels, and though he had
lost one hundred large red sheep, laden with the greatest treasure upon
earth; though the knavery of the Dutch skipper still sat heavy upon his
mind; yet when he reflected upon what he had still left, and when he
mentioned the name of Cunegonde, especially towards the latter end of a
repast, he inclined to Pangloss's doctrine.
"But you, Mr. Martin," said he to the philosopher, "what do you think
of all this? what are your ideas on moral and natural evil?"
"Sir," answered Martin, "our priests accused me of being a Socinian, but
the real fact is I am a Manichean."[21]
"You jest," said Candide; "there are no longer Manicheans in the world."
"I am one," said Martin. "I cannot help it; I know not how to think
otherwise."
"Surely you must be possessed by the devil," said Candide.
"He is so deeply concerned in the affairs of this world," answered
Martin, "that he may very well be in me, as well as in everybody else;
but I own to you that when I cast an eye on this globe, or rather on
this little ball, I cannot help thinking that God has abandoned it to
some malignant being. I except, always, El Dorado. I scarcely ever knew
a city that did not desire the destruction of a neighbouring city, nor a
family that did not wish to exterminate some other family. Everywhere
the weak execrate the powerful, before whom they cringe; and the
powerful beat them like sheep whose wool and flesh they sell. A million
regimented assassins, from one extremity of Europe to the other, get
their bread by disciplined depredation and murder, for want of more
honest employment. Even in those cities which seem to enjoy peace, and
where the arts flourish, the inhabitants are devoured by more envy,
care, and uneasiness than are experienced by a besieged town. Secret
griefs are more cruel than public calamities. In a word I have seen so
much, and experienced so much that I am a Manichean."
"There are, however, some things good," said Candide.
"That may be," said Martin; "but I know them not."
In the middle of this dispute they heard the report of cannon; it
redoubled every instant. Each took out his glass. They saw two ships in
close fight about three miles off. The wind brought both so near to the
French vessel that our travellers had the pleasure of seeing the fight
at their ease. At length one let off a broadside, so low and so truly
aimed, that the other sank to the bottom. Candide and Martin could
plainly perceive a hundred men on the deck of the sinking vessel; they
raised their hands to heaven and uttered terrible outcries, and the next
moment were swallowed up by the sea.
"Well," said Martin, "this is how men treat one another."
"It is true," said Candide; "there is something diabolical in this
affair."
While speaking, he saw he knew not what, of a shining red, swimming
close to the vessel. They put out the long-boat to see what it could
be: it was one of his sheep! Candide was more rejoiced at the recovery
of this one sheep than he had been grieved at the loss of the hundred
laden with the large diamonds of El Dorado.
The French captain soon saw that the captain of the victorious vessel
was a Spaniard, and that the other was a Dutch pirate, and the very same
one who had robbed Candide. The immense plunder which this villain had
amassed, was buried with him in the sea, and out of the whole only one
sheep was saved.
"You see," said Candide to Martin, "that crime is sometimes punished.
This rogue of a Dutch skipper has met with the fate he deserved."
"Yes," said Martin; "but why should the passengers be doomed also to
destruction? God has punished the knave, and the devil has drowned the
rest."
The French and Spanish ships continued their course, and Candide
continued his conversation with Martin. They disputed fifteen successive
days, and on the last of those fifteen days, they were as far advanced
as on the first. But, however, they chatted, they communicated ideas,
they consoled each other. Candide caressed his sheep.
"Since I have found thee again," said he, "I may likewise chance to find
my Cunegonde."
XXI
CANDIDE AND MARTIN, REASONING, DRAW NEAR THE COAST OF FRANCE.
At length they descried the coast of France.
"Were you ever in France, Mr. Martin?" said Candide.
"Yes," said Martin, "I have been in several provinces. In some one-half
of the people are fools, in others they are too cunning; in some they
are weak and simple, in others they affect to be witty; in all, the
principal occupation is love, the next is slander, and the third is
talking nonsense."
"But, Mr. Martin, have you seen Paris?"
"Yes, I have. All these kinds are found there. It is a chaos--a confused
multitude, where everybody seeks pleasure and scarcely any one finds it,
at least as it appeared to me. I made a short stay there. On my arrival
I was robbed of all I had by pickpockets at the fair of St. Germain. I
myself was taken for a robber and was imprisoned for eight days, after
which I served as corrector of the press to gain the money necessary for
my return to Holland on foot. I knew the whole scribbling rabble, the
party rabble, the fanatic rabble. It is said that there are very polite
people in that city, and I wish to believe it."
"For my part, I have no curiosity to see France," said Candide. "You may
easily imagine that after spending a month at El Dorado I can desire to
behold nothing upon earth but Miss Cunegonde. I go to await her at
Venice. We shall pass through France on our way to Italy. Will you bear
me company?"
"With all my heart," said Martin. "It is said that Venice is fit only
for its own nobility, but that strangers meet with a very good reception
if they have a good deal of money. I have none of it; you have,
therefore I will follow you all over the world."
"But do you believe," said Candide, "that the earth was originally a
sea, as we find it asserted in that large book belonging to the
captain?"
"I do not believe a word of it," said Martin, "any more than I do of the
many ravings which have been published lately."
"But for what end, then, has this world been formed?" said Candide.
"To plague us to death," answered Martin.
"Are you not greatly surprised," continued Candide, "at the love which
these two girls of the Oreillons had for those monkeys, of which I have
already told you?"
"Not at all," said Martin. "I do not see that that passion was strange.
I have seen so many extraordinary things that I have ceased to be
surprised."
"Do you believe," said Candide, "that men have always massacred each
other as they do to-day, that they have always been liars, cheats,
traitors, ingrates, brigands, idiots, thieves, scoundrels, gluttons,
drunkards, misers, envious, ambitious, bloody-minded, calumniators,
debauchees, fanatics, hypocrites, and fools?"
"Do you believe," said Martin, "that hawks have always eaten pigeons
when they have found them?"
"Yes, without doubt," said Candide.
"Well, then," said Martin, "if hawks have always had the same character
why should you imagine that men may have changed theirs?"
"Oh!" said Candide, "there is a vast deal of difference, for free
will----"
And reasoning thus they arrived at Bordeaux.
XXII
WHAT HAPPENED IN FRANCE TO CANDIDE AND MARTIN.
Candide stayed in Bordeaux no longer than was necessary for the selling
of a few of the pebbles of El Dorado, and for hiring a good chaise to
hold two passengers; for he could not travel without his Philosopher
Martin. He was only vexed at parting with his sheep, which he left to
the Bordeaux Academy of Sciences, who set as a subject for that year's
prize, "to find why this sheep's wool was red;" and the prize was
awarded to a learned man of the North, who demonstrated by A plus B
minus C divided by Z, that the sheep must be red, and die of the rot.
Meanwhile, all the travellers whom Candide met in the inns along his
route, said to him, "We go to Paris." This general eagerness at length
gave him, too, a desire to see this capital; and it was not so very
great a _détour_ from the road to Venice.
He entered Paris by the suburb of St. Marceau, and fancied that he was
in the dirtiest village of Westphalia.
Scarcely was Candide arrived at his inn, than he found himself attacked
by a slight illness, caused by fatigue. As he had a very large diamond
on his finger, and the people of the inn had taken notice of a
prodigiously heavy box among his baggage, there were two physicians to
attend him, though he had never sent for them, and two devotees who
warmed his broths.
"I remember," Martin said, "also to have been sick at Paris in my first
voyage; I was very poor, thus I had neither friends, devotees, nor
doctors, and I recovered."
However, what with physic and bleeding, Candide's illness became
serious. A parson of the neighborhood came with great meekness to ask
for a bill for the other world payable to the bearer. Candide would do
nothing for him; but the devotees assured him it was the new fashion. He
answered that he was not a man of fashion. Martin wished to throw the
priest out of the window. The priest swore that they would not bury
Candide. Martin swore that he would bury the priest if he continued to
be troublesome. The quarrel grew heated. Martin took him by the
shoulders and roughly turned him out of doors; which occasioned great
scandal and a law-suit.
Candide got well again, and during his convalescence he had very good
company to sup with him. They played high. Candide wondered why it was
that the ace never came to him; but Martin was not at all astonished.
Among those who did him the honours of the town was a little Abbé of
Perigord, one of those busybodies who are ever alert, officious,
forward, fawning, and complaisant; who watch for strangers in their
passage through the capital, tell them the scandalous history of the
town, and offer them pleasure at all prices. He first took Candide and
Martin to La Comédie, where they played a new tragedy. Candide happened
to be seated near some of the fashionable wits. This did not prevent his
shedding tears at the well-acted scenes. One of these critics at his
side said to him between the acts:
"Your tears are misplaced; that is a shocking actress; the actor who
plays with her is yet worse; and the play is still worse than the
actors. The author does not know a word of Arabic, yet the scene is in
Arabia; moreover he is a man that does not believe in innate ideas; and
I will bring you, to-morrow, twenty pamphlets written against him."[22]
"How many dramas have you in France, sir?" said Candide to the Abbé.
"Five or six thousand."
"What a number!" said Candide. "How many good?"
"Fifteen or sixteen," replied the other.
"What a number!" said Martin.
Candide was very pleased with an actress who played Queen Elizabeth in a
somewhat insipid tragedy[23] sometimes acted.
"That actress," said he to Martin, "pleases me much; she has a likeness
to Miss Cunegonde; I should be very glad to wait upon her."
The Perigordian Abbé offered to introduce him. Candide, brought up in
Germany, asked what was the etiquette, and how they treated queens of
England in France.
"It is necessary to make distinctions," said the Abbé. "In the provinces
one takes them to the inn; in Paris, one respects them when they are
beautiful, and throws them on the highway when they are dead."[24]
"Queens on the highway!" said Candide.
"Yes, truly," said Martin, "the Abbé is right. I was in Paris when Miss
Monime passed, as the saying is, from this life to the other. She was
refused what people call the _honours of sepulture_--that is to say, of
rotting with all the beggars of the neighbourhood in an ugly cemetery;
she was interred all alone by her company at the corner of the Rue de
Bourgogne, which ought to trouble her much, for she thought nobly."
"That was very uncivil," said Candide.
"What would you have?" said Martin; "these people are made thus. Imagine
all contradictions, all possible incompatibilities--you will find them
in the government, in the law-courts, in the churches, in the public
shows of this droll nation."
"Is it true that they always laugh in Paris?" said Candide.
"Yes," said the Abbé, "but it means nothing, for they complain of
everything with great fits of laughter; they even do the most detestable
things while laughing."
"Who," said Candide, "is that great pig who spoke so ill of the piece at
which I wept, and of the actors who gave me so much pleasure?"
"He is a bad character," answered the Abbé, "who gains his livelihood by
saying evil of all plays and of all books. He hates whatever succeeds,
as the eunuchs hate those who enjoy; he is one of the serpents of
literature who nourish themselves on dirt and spite; he is a
_folliculaire_."
"What is a _folliculaire_?" said Candide.
"It is," said the Abbé, "a pamphleteer--a Fréron."[25]
Thus Candide, Martin, and the Perigordian conversed on the staircase,
while watching every one go out after the performance.
"Although I am eager to see Cunegonde again," said Candide, "I should
like to sup with Miss Clairon, for she appears to me admirable."
The Abbé was not the man to approach Miss Clairon, who saw only good
company.
"She is engaged for this evening," he said, "but I shall have the honour
to take you to the house of a lady of quality, and there you will know
Paris as if you had lived in it for years."
Candide, who was naturally curious, let himself be taken to this lady's
house, at the end of the Faubourg St. Honoré. The company was occupied
in playing faro; a dozen melancholy punters held each in his hand a
little pack of cards; a bad record of his misfortunes. Profound silence
reigned; pallor was on the faces of the punters, anxiety on that of the
banker, and the hostess, sitting near the unpitying banker, noticed with
lynx-eyes all the doubled and other increased stakes, as each player
dog's-eared his cards; she made them turn down the edges again with
severe, but polite attention; she showed no vexation for fear of losing
her customers. The lady insisted upon being called the Marchioness of
Parolignac. Her daughter, aged fifteen, was among the punters, and
notified with a covert glance the cheatings of the poor people who
tried to repair the cruelties of fate. The Perigordian Abbé, Candide and
Martin entered; no one rose, no one saluted them, no one looked at them;
all were profoundly occupied with their cards.
"The Baroness of Thunder-ten-Tronckh was more polite," said Candide.
However, the Abbé whispered to the Marchioness, who half rose, honoured
Candide with a gracious smile, and Martin with a condescending nod; she
gave a seat and a pack of cards to Candide, who lost fifty thousand
francs in two deals, after which they supped very gaily, and every one
was astonished that Candide was not moved by his loss; the servants said
among themselves, in the language of servants:--
"Some English lord is here this evening."
The supper passed at first like most Parisian suppers, in silence,
followed by a noise of words which could not be distinguished, then with
pleasantries of which most were insipid, with false news, with bad
reasoning, a little politics, and much evil speaking; they also
discussed new books.
"Have you seen," said the Perigordian Abbé, "the romance of Sieur
Gauchat, doctor of divinity?"[26]
"Yes," answered one of the guests, "but I have not been able to finish
it. We have a crowd of silly writings, but all together do not approach
the impertinence of 'Gauchat, Doctor of Divinity.' I am so satiated with
the great number of detestable books with which we are inundated that I
am reduced to punting at faro."
"And the _Mélanges_ of Archdeacon Trublet,[27] what do you say of that?"
said the Abbé.
"Ah!" said the Marchioness of Parolignac, "the wearisome mortal! How
curiously he repeats to you all that the world knows! How heavily he
discusses that which is not worth the trouble of lightly remarking upon!
How, without wit, he appropriates the wit of others! How he spoils what
he steals! How he disgusts me! But he will disgust me no longer--it is
enough to have read a few of the Archdeacon's pages."
There was at table a wise man of taste, who supported the Marchioness.
They spoke afterwards of tragedies; the lady asked why there were
tragedies which were sometimes played and which could not be read. The
man of taste explained very well how a piece could have some interest,
and have almost no merit; he proved in few words that it was not enough
to introduce one or two of those situations which one finds in all
romances, and which always seduce the spectator, but that it was
necessary to be new without being odd, often sublime and always
natural, to know the human heart and to make it speak; to be a great
poet without allowing any person in the piece to appear to be a poet; to
know language perfectly--to speak it with purity, with continuous
harmony and without rhythm ever taking anything from sense.
"Whoever," added he, "does not observe all these rules can produce one
or two tragedies, applauded at a theatre, but he will never be counted
in the ranks of good writers. There are very few good tragedies; some
are idylls in dialogue, well written and well rhymed, others political
reasonings which lull to sleep, or amplifications which repel; others
demoniac dreams in barbarous style, interrupted in sequence, with long
apostrophes to the gods, because they do not know how to speak to men,
with false maxims, with bombastic commonplaces!"
Candide listened with attention to this discourse, and conceived a great
idea of the speaker, and as the Marchioness had taken care to place him
beside her, he leaned towards her and took the liberty of asking who was
the man who had spoken so well.
"He is a scholar," said the lady, "who does not play, whom the Abbé
sometimes brings to supper; he is perfectly at home among tragedies and
books, and he has written a tragedy which was hissed, and a book of
which nothing has ever been seen outside his bookseller's shop
excepting the copy which he dedicated to me."
"The great man!" said Candide. "He is another Pangloss!"
Then, turning towards him, he said:
"Sir, you think doubtless that all is for the best in the moral and
physical world, and that nothing could be otherwise than it is?"
"I, sir!" answered the scholar, "I know nothing of all that; I find that
all goes awry with me; that no one knows either what is his rank, nor
what is his condition, what he does nor what he ought to do; and that
except supper, which is always gay, and where there appears to be enough
concord, all the rest of the time is passed in impertinent quarrels;
Jansenist against Molinist, Parliament against the Church, men of
letters against men of letters, courtesans against courtesans,
financiers against the people, wives against husbands, relatives against
relatives--it is eternal war."
"I have seen the worst," Candide replied. "But a wise man, who since has
had the misfortune to be hanged, taught me that all is marvellously
well; these are but the shadows on a beautiful picture."
"Your hanged man mocked the world," said Martin. "The shadows are
horrible blots."
"They are men who make the blots," said Candide, "and they cannot be
dispensed with."
"It is not their fault then," said Martin.
Most of the punters, who understood nothing of this language, drank, and
Martin reasoned with the scholar, and Candide related some of his
adventures to his hostess.
After supper the Marchioness took Candide into her boudoir, and made him
sit upon a sofa.
"Ah, well!" said she to him, "you love desperately Miss Cunegonde of
Thunder-ten-Tronckh?"
"Yes, madame," answered Candide.
The Marchioness replied to him with a tender smile:
"You answer me like a young man from Westphalia. A Frenchman would have
said, 'It is true that I have loved Miss Cunegonde, but seeing you,
madame, I think I no longer love her.'"
"Alas! madame," said Candide, "I will answer you as you wish."
"Your passion for her," said the Marchioness, "commenced by picking up
her handkerchief. I wish that you would pick up my garter."
"With all my heart," said Candide. And he picked it up.
"But I wish that you would put it on," said the lady.
And Candide put it on.
"You see," said she, "you are a foreigner. I sometimes make my Parisian
lovers languish for fifteen days, but I give myself to you the first
night because one must do the honours of one's country to a young man
from Westphalia."
The lady having perceived two enormous diamonds upon the hands of the
young foreigner praised them with such good faith that from Candide's
fingers they passed to her own.
Candide, returning with the Perigordian Abbé, felt some remorse in
having been unfaithful to Miss Cunegonde. The Abbé sympathised in his
trouble; he had had but a light part of the fifty thousand francs lost
at play and of the value of the two brilliants, half given, half
extorted. His design was to profit as much as he could by the advantages
which the acquaintance of Candide could procure for him. He spoke much
of Cunegonde, and Candide told him that he should ask forgiveness of
that beautiful one for his infidelity when he should see her in Venice.
The Abbé redoubled his politeness and attentions, and took a tender
interest in all that Candide said, in all that he did, in all that he
wished to do.
"And so, sir, you have a rendezvous at Venice?"
"Yes, monsieur Abbé," answered Candide. "It is absolutely necessary
that I go to meet Miss Cunegonde."
And then the pleasure of talking of that which he loved induced him to
relate, according to his custom, part of his adventures with the fair
Westphalian.
"I believe," said the Abbé, "that Miss Cunegonde has a great deal of
wit, and that she writes charming letters?"
"I have never received any from her," said Candide, "for being expelled
from the castle on her account I had not an opportunity for writing to
her. Soon after that I heard she was dead; then I found her alive; then
I lost her again; and last of all, I sent an express to her two thousand
five hundred leagues from here, and I wait for an answer."
The Abbé listened attentively, and seemed to be in a brown study. He
soon took his leave of the two foreigners after a most tender embrace.
The following day Candide received, on awaking, a letter couched in
these terms:
"My very dear love, for eight days I have been ill in this town. I learn
that you are here. I would fly to your arms if I could but move. I was
informed of your passage at Bordeaux, where I left faithful Cacambo and
the old woman, who are to follow me very soon. The Governor of Buenos
Ayres has taken all, but there remains to me your heart. Come! your
presence will either give me life or kill me with pleasure."
This charming, this unhoped-for letter transported Candide with an
inexpressible joy, and the illness of his dear Cunegonde overwhelmed him
with grief. Divided between those two passions, he took his gold and his
diamonds and hurried away, with Martin, to the hotel where Miss
Cunegonde was lodged. He entered her room trembling, his heart
palpitating, his voice sobbing; he wished to open the curtains of the
bed, and asked for a light.
"Take care what you do," said the servant-maid; "the light hurts her,"
and immediately she drew the curtain again.
"My dear Cunegonde," said Candide, weeping, "how are you? If you cannot
see me, at least speak to me."
"She cannot speak," said the maid.
The lady then put a plump hand out from the bed, and Candide bathed it
with his tears and afterwards filled it with diamonds, leaving a bag of
gold upon the easy chair.
In the midst of these transports in came an officer, followed by the
Abbé and a file of soldiers.
"There," said he, "are the two suspected foreigners," and at the same
time he ordered them to be seized and carried to prison.
"Travellers are not treated thus in El Dorado," said Candide.
"I am more a Manichean now than ever," said Martin.
"But pray, sir, where are you going to carry us?" said Candide.
"To a dungeon," answered the officer.
Martin, having recovered himself a little, judged that the lady who
acted the part of Cunegonde was a cheat, that the Perigordian Abbé was a
knave who had imposed upon the honest simplicity of Candide, and that
the officer was another knave whom they might easily silence.
Candide, advised by Martin and impatient to see the real Cunegonde,
rather than expose himself before a court of justice, proposed to the
officer to give him three small diamonds, each worth about three
thousand pistoles.
"Ah, sir," said the man with the ivory baton, "had you committed all the
imaginable crimes you would be to me the most honest man in the world.
Three diamonds! Each worth three thousand pistoles! Sir, instead of
carrying you to jail I would lose my life to serve you. There are orders
for arresting all foreigners, but leave it to me. I have a brother at
Dieppe in Normandy! I'll conduct you thither, and if you have a diamond
to give him he'll take as much care of you as I would."
"And why," said Candide, "should all foreigners be arrested?"
"It is," the Perigordian Abbé then made answer, "because a poor beggar
of the country of Atrébatie[28] heard some foolish things said. This
induced him to commit a parricide, not such as that of 1610 in the month
of May,[29] but such as that of 1594 in the month of December,[30] and
such as others which have been committed in other years and other months
by other poor devils who had heard nonsense spoken."
The officer then explained what the Abbé meant.
"Ah, the monsters!" cried Candide. "What horrors among a people who
dance and sing! Is there no way of getting quickly out of this country
where monkeys provoke tigers? I have seen no bears in my country, but
_men_ I have beheld nowhere except in El Dorado. In the name of God,
sir, conduct me to Venice, where I am to await Miss Cunegonde."
"I can conduct you no further than lower Normandy," said the officer.
Immediately he ordered his irons to be struck off, acknowledged himself
mistaken, sent away his men, set out with Candide and Martin for Dieppe,
and left them in the care of his brother.
There was then a small Dutch ship in the harbour. The Norman, who by the
virtue of three more diamonds had become the most subservient of men,
put Candide and his attendants on board a vessel that was just ready to
set sail for Portsmouth in England.
This was not the way to Venice, but Candide thought he had made his way
out of hell, and reckoned that he would soon have an opportunity for
resuming his journey.
XXIII
CANDIDE AND MARTIN TOUCHED UPON THE COAST OF ENGLAND, AND WHAT THEY SAW
THERE.
"Ah, Pangloss! Pangloss! Ah, Martin! Martin! Ah, my dear Cunegonde, what
sort of a world is this?" said Candide on board the Dutch ship.
"Something very foolish and abominable," said Martin.
"You know England? Are they as foolish there as in France?"
"It is another kind of folly," said Martin. "You know that these two
nations are at war for a few acres of snow in Canada,[31] and that they
spend over this beautiful war much more than Canada is worth. To tell
you exactly, whether there are more people fit to send to a madhouse in
one country than the other, is what my imperfect intelligence will not
permit. I only know in general that the people we are going to see are
very atrabilious."
Talking thus they arrived at Portsmouth. The coast was lined with crowds
of people, whose eyes were fixed on a fine man kneeling, with his eyes
bandaged, on board one of the men of war in the harbour. Four soldiers
stood opposite to this man; each of them fired three balls at his head,
with all the calmness in the world; and the whole assembly went away
very well satisfied.
"What is all this?" said Candide; "and what demon is it that exercises
his empire in this country?"
He then asked who was that fine man who had been killed with so much
ceremony. They answered, he was an Admiral.[32]
"And why kill this Admiral?"
"It is because he did not kill a sufficient number of men himself. He
gave battle to a French Admiral; and it has been proved that he was not
near enough to him."
"But," replied Candide, "the French Admiral was as far from the English
Admiral."
"There is no doubt of it; but in this country it is found good, from
time to time, to kill one Admiral to encourage the others."
Candide was so shocked and bewildered by what he saw and heard, that he
would not set foot on shore, and he made a bargain with the Dutch
skipper (were he even to rob him like the Surinam captain) to conduct
him without delay to Venice.
The skipper was ready in two days. They coasted France; they passed in
sight of Lisbon, and Candide trembled. They passed through the Straits,
and entered the Mediterranean. At last they landed at Venice.
"God be praised!" said Candide, embracing Martin. "It is here that I
shall see again my beautiful Cunegonde. I trust Cacambo as myself. All
is well, all will be well, all goes as well as possible."
XXIV
OF PAQUETTE AND FRIAR GIROFLÉE.
Upon their arrival at Venice, Candide went to search for Cacambo at
every inn and coffee-house, and among all the ladies of pleasure, but to
no purpose. He sent every day to inquire on all the ships that came in.
But there was no news of Cacambo.
"What!" said he to Martin, "I have had time to voyage from Surinam to
Bordeaux, to go from Bordeaux to Paris, from Paris to Dieppe, from
Dieppe to Portsmouth, to coast along Portugal and Spain, to cross the
whole Mediterranean, to spend some months, and yet the beautiful
Cunegonde has not arrived! Instead of her I have only met a Parisian
wench and a Perigordian Abbé. Cunegonde is dead without doubt, and there
is nothing for me but to die. Alas! how much better it would have been
for me to have remained in the paradise of El Dorado than to come back
to this cursed Europe! You are in the right, my dear Martin: all is
misery and illusion."
He fell into a deep melancholy, and neither went to see the opera, nor
any of the other diversions of the Carnival; nay, he was proof against
the temptations of all the ladies.
"You are in truth very simple," said Martin to him, "if you imagine that
a mongrel valet, who has five or six millions in his pocket, will go to
the other end of the world to seek your mistress and bring her to you to
Venice. If he find her, he will keep her to himself; if he do not find
her he will get another. I advise you to forget your valet Cacambo and
your mistress Cunegonde."
Martin was not consoling. Candide's melancholy increased; and Martin
continued to prove to him that there was very little virtue or happiness
upon earth, except perhaps in El Dorado, where nobody could gain
admittance.
While they were disputing on this important subject and waiting for
Cunegonde, Candide saw a young Theatin friar in St. Mark's Piazza,
holding a girl on his arm. The Theatin looked fresh coloured, plump, and
vigorous; his eyes were sparkling, his air assured, his look lofty, and
his step bold. The girl was very pretty, and sang; she looked amorously
at her Theatin, and from time to time pinched his fat cheeks.
"At least you will allow me," said Candide to Martin, "that these two
are happy. Hitherto I have met with none but unfortunate people in the
whole habitable globe, except in El Dorado; but as to this pair, I would
venture to lay a wager that they are very happy."
"I lay you they are not," said Martin.
"We need only ask them to dine with us," said Candide, "and you will see
whether I am mistaken."
Immediately he accosted them, presented his compliments, and invited
them to his inn to eat some macaroni, with Lombard partridges, and
caviare, and to drink some Montepulciano, Lachrymæ Christi, Cyprus and
Samos wine. The girl blushed, the Theatin accepted the invitation and
she followed him, casting her eyes on Candide with confusion and
surprise, and dropping a few tears. No sooner had she set foot in
Candide's apartment than she cried out:
"Ah! Mr. Candide does not know Paquette again."
Candide had not viewed her as yet with attention, his thoughts being
entirely taken up with Cunegonde; but recollecting her as she spoke.
"Alas!" said he, "my poor child, it is you who reduced Doctor Pangloss
to the beautiful condition in which I saw him?"
"Alas! it was I, sir, indeed," answered Paquette. "I see that you have
heard all. I have been informed of the frightful disasters that befell
the family of my lady Baroness, and the fair Cunegonde. I swear to you
that my fate has been scarcely less sad. I was very innocent when you
knew me. A Grey Friar, who was my confessor, easily seduced me. The
consequences were terrible. I was obliged to quit the castle some time
after the Baron had sent you away with kicks on the backside. If a
famous surgeon had not taken compassion on me, I should have died. For
some time I was this surgeon's mistress, merely out of gratitude. His
wife, who was mad with jealousy, beat me every day unmercifully; she was
a fury. The surgeon was one of the ugliest of men, and I the most
wretched of women, to be continually beaten for a man I did not love.
You know, sir, what a dangerous thing it is for an ill-natured woman to
be married to a doctor. Incensed at the behaviour of his wife, he one
day gave her so effectual a remedy to cure her of a slight cold, that
she died two hours after, in most horrid convulsions. The wife's
relations prosecuted the husband; he took flight, and I was thrown into
jail. My innocence would not have saved me if I had not been
good-looking. The judge set me free, on condition that he succeeded the
surgeon. I was soon supplanted by a rival, turned out of doors quite
destitute, and obliged to continue this abominable trade, which appears
so pleasant to you men, while to us women it is the utmost abyss of
misery. I have come to exercise the profession at Venice. Ah! sir, if
you could only imagine what it is to be obliged to caress indifferently
an old merchant, a lawyer, a monk, a gondolier, an abbé, to be exposed
to abuse and insults; to be often reduced to borrowing a petticoat, only
to go and have it raised by a disagreeable man; to be robbed by one of
what one has earned from another; to be subject to the extortions of the
officers of justice; and to have in prospect only a frightful old age, a
hospital, and a dung-hill; you would conclude that I am one of the most
unhappy creatures in the world."[33]
Paquette thus opened her heart to honest Candide, in the presence of
Martin, who said to his friend:
"You see that already I have won half the wager."
Friar Giroflée stayed in the dining-room, and drank a glass or two of
wine while he was waiting for dinner.
"But," said Candide to Paquette, "you looked so gay and content when I
met you; you sang and you behaved so lovingly to the Theatin, that you
seemed to me as happy as you pretend to be now the reverse."
"Ah! sir," answered Paquette, "this is one of the miseries of the trade.
Yesterday I was robbed and beaten by an officer; yet to-day I must put
on good humour to please a friar."
Candide wanted no more convincing; he owned that Martin was in the
right. They sat down to table with Paquette and the Theatin; the repast
was entertaining; and towards the end they conversed with all
confidence.
"Father," said Candide to the Friar, "you appear to me to enjoy a state
that all the world might envy; the flower of health shines in your face,
your expression makes plain your happiness; you have a very pretty girl
for your recreation, and you seem well satisfied with your state as a
Theatin."
"My faith, sir," said Friar Giroflée, "I wish that all the Theatins were
at the bottom of the sea. I have been tempted a hundred times to set
fire to the convent, and go and become a Turk. My parents forced me at
the age of fifteen to put on this detestable habit, to increase the
fortune of a cursed elder brother, whom God confound. Jealousy, discord,
and fury, dwell in the convent. It is true I have preached a few bad
sermons that have brought me in a little money, of which the prior stole
half, while the rest serves to maintain my girls; but when I return at
night to the monastery, I am ready to dash my head against the walls of
the dormitory; and all my fellows are in the same case."
Martin turned towards Candide with his usual coolness.
"Well," said he, "have I not won the whole wager?"
Candide gave two thousand piastres to Paquette, and one thousand to
Friar Giroflée.
"I'll answer for it," said he, "that with this they will be happy."
"I do not believe it at all," said Martin; "you will, perhaps, with
these piastres only render them the more unhappy."
"Let that be as it may," said Candide, "but one thing consoles me. I see
that we often meet with those whom we expected never to see more; so
that, perhaps, as I have found my red sheep and Paquette, it may well be
that I shall also find Cunegonde."
"I wish," said Martin, "she may one day make you very happy; but I doubt
it very much."
"You are very hard of belief," said Candide.
"I have lived," said Martin.
"You see those gondoliers," said Candide, "are they not perpetually
singing?"
"You do not see them," said Martin, "at home with their wives and brats.
The Doge has his troubles, the gondoliers have theirs. It is true that,
all things considered, the life of a gondolier is preferable to that of
a Doge; but I believe the difference to be so trifling that it is not
worth the trouble of examining."
"People talk," said Candide, "of the Senator Pococurante, who lives in
that fine palace on the Brenta, where he entertains foreigners in the
politest manner. They pretend that this man has never felt any
uneasiness."
"I should be glad to see such a rarity," said Martin.
Candide immediately sent to ask the Lord Pococurante permission to wait
upon him the next day.
XXV
THE VISIT TO LORD POCOCURANTE, A NOBLE VENETIAN.
Candide and Martin went in a gondola on the Brenta, and arrived at the
palace of the noble Signor Pococurante. The gardens, laid out with
taste, were adorned with fine marble statues. The palace was beautifully
built. The master of the house was a man of sixty, and very rich. He
received the two travellers with polite indifference, which put Candide
a little out of countenance, but was not at all disagreeable to Martin.
First, two pretty girls, very neatly dressed, served them with
chocolate, which was frothed exceedingly well. Candide could not refrain
from commending their beauty, grace, and address.
"They are good enough creatures," said the Senator. "I make them lie
with me sometimes, for I am very tired of the ladies of the town, of
their coquetries, of their jealousies, of their quarrels, of their
humours, of their pettinesses, of their prides, of their follies, and of
the sonnets which one must make, or have made, for them. But after all,
these two girls begin to weary me."
After breakfast, Candide walking into a long gallery was surprised by
the beautiful pictures. He asked, by what master were the two first.
"They are by Raphael," said the Senator. "I bought them at a great
price, out of vanity, some years ago. They are said to be the finest
things in Italy, but they do not please me at all. The colours are too
dark, the figures are not sufficiently rounded, nor in good relief; the
draperies in no way resemble stuffs. In a word, whatever may be said, I
do not find there a true imitation of nature. I only care for a picture
when I think I see nature itself; and there are none of this sort. I
have a great many pictures, but I prize them very little."
While they were waiting for dinner Pococurante ordered a concert.
Candide found the music delicious.
"This noise," said the Senator, "may amuse one for half an hour; but if
it were to last longer it would grow tiresome to everybody, though they
durst not own it. Music, to-day, is only the art of executing difficult
things, and that which is only difficult cannot please long. Perhaps I
should be fonder of the opera if they had not found the secret of making
of it a monster which shocks me. Let who will go to see bad tragedies
set to music, where the scenes are contrived for no other end than to
introduce two or three songs ridiculously out of place, to show off an
actress's voice. Let who will, or who can, die away with pleasure at the
sight of an eunuch quavering the _rôle_ of Cæsar, or of Cato, and
strutting awkwardly upon the stage. For my part I have long since
renounced those paltry entertainments which constitute the glory of
modern Italy, and are purchased so dearly by sovereigns."
Candide disputed the point a little, but with discretion. Martin was
entirely of the Senator's opinion.
They sat down to table, and after an excellent dinner they went into the
library. Candide, seeing a Homer magnificently bound, commended the
virtuoso on his good taste.
"There," said he, "is a book that was once the delight of the great
Pangloss, the best philosopher in Germany."
"It is not mine," answered Pococurante coolly. "They used at one time to
make me believe that I took a pleasure in reading him. But that
continual repetition of battles, so extremely like one another; those
gods that are always active without doing anything decisive; that Helen
who is the cause of the war, and who yet scarcely appears in the piece;
that Troy, so long besieged without being taken; all these together
caused me great weariness. I have sometimes asked learned men whether
they were not as weary as I of that work. Those who were sincere have
owned to me that the poem made them fall asleep; yet it was necessary to
have it in their library as a monument of antiquity, or like those rusty
medals which are no longer of use in commerce."
"But your Excellency does not think thus of Virgil?" said Candide.
"I grant," said the Senator, "that the second, fourth, and sixth books
of his _Æneid_ are excellent, but as for his pious Æneas, his strong
Cloanthus, his friend Achates, his little Ascanius, his silly King
Latinus, his bourgeois Amata, his insipid Lavinia, I think there can be
nothing more flat and disagreeable. I prefer Tasso a good deal, or even
the soporific tales of Ariosto."
"May I presume to ask you, sir," said Candide, "whether you do not
receive a great deal of pleasure from reading Horace?"
"There are maxims in this writer," answered Pococurante, "from which a
man of the world may reap great benefit, and being written in energetic
verse they are more easily impressed upon the memory. But I care little
for his journey to Brundusium, and his account of a bad dinner, or of
his low quarrel between one Rupilius whose words he says were full of
poisonous filth, and another whose language was imbued with vinegar. I
have read with much distaste his indelicate verses against old women and
witches; nor do I see any merit in telling his friend Mæcenas that if he
will but rank him in the choir of lyric poets, his lofty head shall
touch the stars. Fools admire everything in an author of reputation. For
my part, I read only to please myself. I like only that which serves my
purpose."
Candide, having been educated never to judge for himself, was much
surprised at what he heard. Martin found there was a good deal of reason
in Pococurante's remarks.
"Oh! here is Cicero," said Candide. "Here is the great man whom I fancy
you are never tired of reading."
"I never read him," replied the Venetian. "What is it to me whether he
pleads for Rabirius or Cluentius? I try causes enough myself; his
philosophical works seem to me better, but when I found that he doubted
of everything, I concluded that I knew as much as he, and that I had no
need of a guide to learn ignorance."
"Ha! here are four-score volumes of the Academy of Sciences," cried
Martin. "Perhaps there is something valuable in this collection."
"There might be," said Pococurante, "if only one of those rakers of
rubbish had shown how to make pins; but in all these volumes there is
nothing but chimerical systems, and not a single useful thing."
"And what dramatic works I see here," said Candide, "in Italian,
Spanish, and French."
"Yes," replied the Senator, "there are three thousand, and not three
dozen of them good for anything. As to those collections of sermons,
which altogether are not worth a single page of Seneca, and those huge
volumes of theology, you may well imagine that neither I nor any one
else ever opens them."
Martin saw some shelves filled with English books.
"I have a notion," said he, "that a Republican must be greatly pleased
with most of these books, which are written with a spirit of freedom."
"Yes," answered Pococurante, "it is noble to write as one thinks; this
is the privilege of humanity. In all our Italy we write only what we do
not think; those who inhabit the country of the Cæsars and the
Antoninuses dare not acquire a single idea without the permission of a
Dominican friar. I should be pleased with the liberty which inspires the
English genius if passion and party spirit did not corrupt all that is
estimable in this precious liberty."
Candide, observing a Milton, asked whether he did not look upon this
author as a great man.
"Who?" said Pococurante, "that barbarian, who writes a long commentary
in ten books of harsh verse on the first chapter of Genesis; that coarse
imitator of the Greeks, who disfigures the Creation, and who, while
Moses represents the Eternal producing the world by a word, makes the
Messiah take a great pair of compasses from the armoury of heaven to
circumscribe His work? How can I have any esteem for a writer who has
spoiled Tasso's hell and the devil, who transforms Lucifer sometimes
into a toad and other times into a pigmy, who makes him repeat the same
things a hundred times, who makes him dispute on theology, who, by a
serious imitation of Ariosto's comic invention of firearms, represents
the devils cannonading in heaven? Neither I nor any man in Italy could
take pleasure in those melancholy extravagances; and the marriage of Sin
and Death, and the snakes brought forth by Sin, are enough to turn the
stomach of any one with the least taste, [and his long description of a
pest-house is good only for a grave-digger]. This obscure, whimsical,
and disagreeable poem was despised upon its first publication, and I
only treat it now as it was treated in its own country by
contemporaries. For the matter of that I say what I think, and I care
very little whether others think as I do."
Candide was grieved at this speech, for he had a respect for Homer and
was fond of Milton.
"Alas!" said he softly to Martin, "I am afraid that this man holds our
German poets in very great contempt."
"There would not be much harm in that," said Martin.
"Oh! what a superior man," said Candide below his breath. "What a great
genius is this Pococurante! Nothing can please him."
After their survey of the library they went down into the garden, where
Candide praised its several beauties.
"I know of nothing in so bad a taste," said the master. "All you see
here is merely trifling. After to-morrow I will have it planted with a
nobler design."
"Well," said Candide to Martin when they had taken their leave, "you
will agree that this is the happiest of mortals, for he is above
everything he possesses."
"But do you not see," answered Martin, "that he is disgusted with all he
possesses? Plato observed a long while ago that those stomachs are not
the best that reject all sorts of food."
"But is there not a pleasure," said Candide, "in criticising
everything, in pointing out faults where others see nothing but
beauties?"
"That is to say," replied Martin, "that there is some pleasure in having
no pleasure."
"Well, well," said Candide, "I find that I shall be the only happy man
when I am blessed with the sight of my dear Cunegonde."
"It is always well to hope," said Martin.
However, the days and the weeks passed. Cacambo did not come, and
Candide was so overwhelmed with grief that he did not even reflect that
Paquette and Friar Giroflée did not return to thank him.
XXVI
OF A SUPPER WHICH CANDIDE AND MARTIN TOOK WITH SIX STRANGERS, AND WHO
THEY WERE.[34]
One evening that Candide and Martin were going to sit down to supper
with some foreigners who lodged in the same inn, a man whose complexion
was as black as soot, came behind Candide, and taking him by the arm,
said:
"Get yourself ready to go along with us; do not fail."
Upon this he turned round and saw--Cacambo! Nothing but the sight of
Cunegonde could have astonished and delighted him more. He was on the
point of going mad with joy. He embraced his dear friend.
"Cunegonde is here, without doubt; where is she? Take me to her that I
may die of joy in her company."
"Cunegonde is not here," said Cacambo, "she is at Constantinople."
"Oh, heavens! at Constantinople! But were she in China I would fly
thither; let us be off."
"We shall set out after supper," replied Cacambo. "I can tell you
nothing more; I am a slave, my master awaits me, I must serve him at
table; speak not a word, eat, and then get ready."
Candide, distracted between joy and grief, delighted at seeing his
faithful agent again, astonished at finding him a slave, filled with the
fresh hope of recovering his mistress, his heart palpitating, his
understanding confused, sat down to table with Martin, who saw all these
scenes quite unconcerned, and with six strangers who had come to spend
the Carnival at Venice.
Cacambo waited at table upon one of the strangers; towards the end of
the entertainment he drew near his master, and whispered in his ear:
"Sire, your Majesty may start when you please, the vessel is ready."
On saying these words he went out. The company in great surprise looked
at one another without speaking a word, when another domestic approached
his master and said to him:
"Sire, your Majesty's chaise is at Padua, and the boat is ready."
The master gave a nod and the servant went away. The company all stared
at one another again, and their surprise redoubled. A third valet came
up to a third stranger, saying:
"Sire, believe me, your Majesty ought not to stay here any longer. I am
going to get everything ready."
And immediately he disappeared. Candide and Martin did not doubt that
this was a masquerade of the Carnival. Then a fourth domestic said to a
fourth master:
"Your Majesty may depart when you please."
Saying this he went away like the rest. The fifth valet said the same
thing to the fifth master. But the sixth valet spoke differently to the
sixth stranger, who sat near Candide. He said to him:
"Faith, Sire, they will no longer give credit to your Majesty nor to me,
and we may perhaps both of us be put in jail this very night. Therefore
I will take care of myself. Adieu."
The servants being all gone, the six strangers, with Candide and Martin,
remained in a profound silence. At length Candide broke it.
"Gentlemen," said he, "this is a very good joke indeed, but why should
you all be kings? For me I own that neither Martin nor I is a king."
Cacambo's master then gravely answered in Italian:
"I am not at all joking. My name is Achmet III. I was Grand Sultan many
years. I dethroned my brother; my nephew dethroned me, my viziers were
beheaded, and I am condemned to end my days in the old Seraglio. My
nephew, the great Sultan Mahmoud, permits me to travel sometimes for my
health, and I am come to spend the Carnival at Venice."
A young man who sat next to Achmet, spoke then as follows:
"My name is Ivan. I was once Emperor of all the Russias, but was
dethroned in my cradle. My parents were confined in prison and I was
educated there; yet I am sometimes allowed to travel in company with
persons who act as guards; and I am come to spend the Carnival at
Venice."
The third said:
"I am Charles Edward, King of England; my father has resigned all his
legal rights to me. I have fought in defence of them; and above eight
hundred of my adherents have been hanged, drawn, and quartered. I have
been confined in prison; I am going to Rome, to pay a visit to the King,
my father, who was dethroned as well as myself and my grandfather, and I
am come to spend the Carnival at Venice."
The fourth spoke thus in his turn:
"I am the King of Poland; the fortune of war has stripped me of my
hereditary dominions; my father underwent the same vicissitudes; I
resign myself to Providence in the same manner as Sultan Achmet, the
Emperor Ivan, and King Charles Edward, whom God long preserve; and I am
come to the Carnival at Venice."
The fifth said:
"I am King of Poland also; I have been twice dethroned; but Providence
has given me another country, where I have done more good than all the
Sarmatian kings were ever capable of doing on the banks of the Vistula;
I resign myself likewise to Providence, and am come to pass the Carnival
at Venice."
It was now the sixth monarch's turn to speak:
"Gentlemen," said he, "I am not so great a prince as any of you;
however, I am a king. I am Theodore, elected King of Corsica; I had the
title of Majesty, and now I am scarcely treated as a gentleman. I have
coined money, and now am not worth a farthing; I have had two
secretaries of state, and now I have scarce a valet; I have seen myself
on a throne, and I have seen myself upon straw in a common jail in
London. I am afraid that I shall meet with the same treatment here
though, like your majesties, I am come to see the Carnival at Venice."
The other five kings listened to this speech with generous compassion.
Each of them gave twenty sequins to King Theodore to buy him clothes and
linen; and Candide made him a present of a diamond worth two thousand
sequins.
"Who can this private person be," said the five kings to one another,
"who is able to give, and really has given, a hundred times as much as
any of us?"
Just as they rose from table, in came four Serene Highnesses, who had
also been stripped of their territories by the fortune of war, and were
come to spend the Carnival at Venice. But Candide paid no regard to
these newcomers, his thoughts were entirely employed on his voyage to
Constantinople, in search of his beloved Cunegonde.
XXVII
CANDIDE'S VOYAGE TO CONSTANTINOPLE.
The faithful Cacambo had already prevailed upon the Turkish skipper, who
was to conduct the Sultan Achmet to Constantinople, to receive Candide
and Martin on his ship. They both embarked after having made their
obeisance to his miserable Highness.
"You see," said Candide to Martin on the way, "we supped with six
dethroned kings, and of those six there was one to whom I gave charity.
Perhaps there are many other princes yet more unfortunate. For my part,
I have only lost a hundred sheep; and now I am flying into Cunegonde's
arms. My dear Martin, yet once more Pangloss was right: all is for the
best."
"I wish it," answered Martin.
"But," said Candide, "it was a very strange adventure we met with at
Venice. It has never before been seen or heard that six dethroned kings
have supped together at a public inn."
"It is not more extraordinary," said Martin, "than most of the things
that have happened to us. It is a very common thing for kings to be
dethroned; and as for the honour we have had of supping in their
company, it is a trifle not worth our attention."
No sooner had Candide got on board the vessel than he flew to his old
valet and friend Cacambo, and tenderly embraced him.
"Well," said he, "what news of Cunegonde? Is she still a prodigy of
beauty? Does she love me still? How is she? Thou hast doubtless bought
her a palace at Constantinople?"
"My dear master," answered Cacambo, "Cunegonde washes dishes on the
banks of the Propontis, in the service of a prince, who has very few
dishes to wash; she is a slave in the family of an ancient sovereign
named Ragotsky,[35] to whom the Grand Turk allows three crowns a day in
his exile. But what is worse still is, that she has lost her beauty and
has become horribly ugly."
"Well, handsome or ugly," replied Candide, "I am a man of honour, and it
is my duty to love her still. But how came she to be reduced to so
abject a state with the five or six millions that you took to her?"
"Ah!" said Cacambo, "was I not to give two millions to Senor Don
Fernando d'Ibaraa, y Figueora, y Mascarenes, y Lampourdos, y Souza,
Governor of Buenos Ayres, for permitting Miss Cunegonde to come away?
And did not a corsair bravely rob us of all the rest? Did not this
corsair carry us to Cape Matapan, to Milo, to Nicaria, to Samos, to
Petra, to the Dardanelles, to Marmora, to Scutari? Cunegonde and the old
woman serve the prince I now mentioned to you, and I am slave to the
dethroned Sultan."
"What a series of shocking calamities!" cried Candide. "But after all, I
have some diamonds left; and I may easily pay Cunegonde's ransom. Yet it
is a pity that she is grown so ugly."
Then, turning towards Martin: "Who do you think," said he, "is most to
be pitied--the Sultan Achmet, the Emperor Ivan, King Charles Edward, or
I?"
"How should I know!" answered Martin. "I must see into your hearts to be
able to tell."
"Ah!" said Candide, "if Pangloss were here, he could tell."
"I know not," said Martin, "in what sort of scales your Pangloss would
weigh the misfortunes of mankind and set a just estimate on their
sorrows. All that I can presume to say is, that there are millions of
people upon earth who have a hundred times more to complain of than King
Charles Edward, the Emperor Ivan, or the Sultan Achmet."
"That may well be," said Candide.
In a few days they reached the Bosphorus, and Candide began by paying a
very high ransom for Cacambo. Then without losing time, he and his
companions went on board a galley, in order to search on the banks of
the Propontis for his Cunegonde, however ugly she might have become.
Among the crew there were two slaves who rowed very badly, and to whose
bare shoulders the Levantine captain would now and then apply blows from
a bull's pizzle. Candide, from a natural impulse, looked at these two
slaves more attentively than at the other oarsmen, and approached them
with pity. Their features though greatly disfigured, had a slight
resemblance to those of Pangloss and the unhappy Jesuit and Westphalian
Baron, brother to Miss Cunegonde. This moved and saddened him. He looked
at them still more attentively.
"Indeed," said he to Cacambo, "if I had not seen Master Pangloss hanged,
and if I had not had the misfortune to kill the Baron, I should think it
was they that were rowing."
At the names of the Baron and of Pangloss, the two galley-slaves uttered
a loud cry, held fast by the seat, and let drop their oars. The captain
ran up to them and redoubled his blows with the bull's pizzle.
"Stop! stop! sir," cried Candide. "I will give you what money you
please."
"What! it is Candide!" said one of the slaves.
"What! it is Candide!" said the other.
"Do I dream?" cried Candide; "am I awake? or am I on board a galley? Is
this the Baron whom I killed? Is this Master Pangloss whom I saw
hanged?"
"It is we! it is we!" answered they.
"Well! is this the great philosopher?" said Martin.
"Ah! captain," said Candide, "what ransom will you take for Monsieur de
Thunder-ten-Tronckh, one of the first barons of the empire, and for
Monsieur Pangloss, the profoundest metaphysician in Germany?"
"Dog of a Christian," answered the Levantine captain, "since these two
dogs of Christian slaves are barons and metaphysicians, which I doubt
not are high dignities in their country, you shall give me fifty
thousand sequins."
"You shall have them, sir. Carry me back at once to Constantinople, and
you shall receive the money directly. But no; carry me first to Miss
Cunegonde."
Upon the first proposal made by Candide, however, the Levantine captain
had already tacked about, and made the crew ply their oars quicker than
a bird cleaves the air.
Candide embraced the Baron and Pangloss a hundred times.
"And how happened it, my dear Baron, that I did not kill you? And, my
dear Pangloss, how came you to life again after being hanged? And why
are you both in a Turkish galley?"
"And it is true that my dear sister is in this country?" said the Baron.
"Yes," answered Cacambo.
"Then I behold, once more, my dear Candide," cried Pangloss.
Candide presented Martin and Cacambo to them; they embraced each other,
and all spoke at once. The galley flew; they were already in the port.
Instantly Candide sent for a Jew, to whom he sold for fifty thousand
sequins a diamond worth a hundred thousand, though the fellow swore to
him by Abraham that he could give him no more. He immediately paid the
ransom for the Baron and Pangloss. The latter threw himself at the feet
of his deliverer, and bathed them with his tears; the former thanked him
with a nod, and promised to return him the money on the first
opportunity.
"But is it indeed possible that my sister can be in Turkey?" said he.
"Nothing is more possible," said Cacambo, "since she scours the dishes
in the service of a Transylvanian prince."
Candide sent directly for two Jews and sold them some more diamonds, and
then they all set out together in another galley to deliver Cunegonde
from slavery.
XXVIII
WHAT HAPPENED TO CANDIDE, CUNEGONDE, PANGLOSS, MARTIN, ETC.
"I ask your pardon once more," said Candide to the Baron, "your pardon,
reverend father, for having run you through the body."
"Say no more about it," answered the Baron. "I was a little too hasty, I
own, but since you wish to know by what fatality I came to be a
galley-slave I will inform you. After I had been cured by the surgeon of
the college of the wound you gave me, I was attacked and carried off by
a party of Spanish troops, who confined me in prison at Buenos Ayres at
the very time my sister was setting out thence. I asked leave to return
to Rome to the General of my Order. I was appointed chaplain to the
French Ambassador at Constantinople. I had not been eight days in this
employment when one evening I met with a young Ichoglan, who was a very
handsome fellow. The weather was warm. The young man wanted to bathe,
and I took this opportunity of bathing also. I did not know that it was
a capital crime for a Christian to be found naked with a young
Mussulman. A cadi ordered me a hundred blows on the soles of the feet,
and condemned me to the galleys. I do not think there ever was a greater
act of injustice. But I should be glad to know how my sister came to be
scullion to a Transylvanian prince who has taken shelter among the
Turks."
"But you, my dear Pangloss," said Candide, "how can it be that I behold
you again?"
"It is true," said Pangloss, "that you saw me hanged. I should have been
burnt, but you may remember it rained exceedingly hard when they were
going to roast me; the storm was so violent that they despaired of
lighting the fire, so I was hanged because they could do no better. A
surgeon purchased my body, carried me home, and dissected me. He began
with making a crucial incision on me from the navel to the clavicula.
One could not have been worse hanged than I was. The executioner of the
Holy Inquisition was a sub-deacon, and knew how to burn people
marvellously well, but he was not accustomed to hanging. The cord was
wet and did not slip properly, and besides it was badly tied; in short,
I still drew my breath, when the crucial incision made me give such a
frightful scream that my surgeon fell flat upon his back, and imagining
that he had been dissecting the devil he ran away, dying with fear, and
fell down the staircase in his flight. His wife, hearing the noise,
flew from the next room. She saw me stretched out upon the table with my
crucial incision. She was seized with yet greater fear than her husband,
fled, and tumbled over him. When they came to themselves a little, I
heard the wife say to her husband: 'My dear, how could you take it into
your head to dissect a heretic? Do you not know that these people always
have the devil in their bodies? I will go and fetch a priest this minute
to exorcise him.' At this proposal I shuddered, and mustering up what
little courage I had still remaining I cried out aloud, 'Have mercy on
me!' At length the Portuguese barber plucked up his spirits. He sewed up
my wounds; his wife even nursed me. I was upon my legs at the end of
fifteen days. The barber found me a place as lackey to a knight of Malta
who was going to Venice, but finding that my master had no money to pay
me my wages I entered the service of a Venetian merchant, and went with
him to Constantinople. One day I took it into my head to step into a
mosque, where I saw an old Iman and a very pretty young devotee who was
saying her paternosters. Her bosom was uncovered, and between her
breasts she had a beautiful bouquet of tulips, roses, anemones,
ranunculus, hyacinths, and auriculas. She dropped her bouquet; I picked
it up, and presented it to her with a profound reverence. I was so long
in delivering it that the Iman began to get angry, and seeing that I was
a Christian he called out for help. They carried me before the cadi, who
ordered me a hundred lashes on the soles of the feet and sent me to the
galleys. I was chained to the very same galley and the same bench as the
young Baron. On board this galley there were four young men from
Marseilles, five Neapolitan priests, and two monks from Corfu, who told
us similar adventures happened daily. The Baron maintained that he had
suffered greater injustice than I, and I insisted that it was far more
innocent to take up a bouquet and place it again on a woman's bosom than
to be found stark naked with an Ichoglan. We were continually disputing,
and received twenty lashes with a bull's pizzle when the concatenation
of universal events brought you to our galley, and you were good enough
to ransom us."
"Well, my dear Pangloss," said Candide to him, "when you had been
hanged, dissected, whipped, and were tugging at the oar, did you always
think that everything happens for the best?"
"I am still of my first opinion," answered Pangloss, "for I am a
philosopher and I cannot retract, especially as Leibnitz could never be
wrong; and besides, the pre-established harmony is the finest thing in
the world, and so is his _plenum_ and _materia subtilis_."
XXIX
HOW CANDIDE FOUND CUNEGONDE AND THE OLD WOMAN AGAIN.
While Candide, the Baron, Pangloss, Martin, and Cacambo were relating
their several adventures, were reasoning on the contingent or
non-contingent events of the universe, disputing on effects and causes,
on moral and physical evil, on liberty and necessity, and on the
consolations a slave may feel even on a Turkish galley, they arrived at
the house of the Transylvanian prince on the banks of the Propontis. The
first objects which met their sight were Cunegonde and the old woman
hanging towels out to dry.
The Baron paled at this sight. The tender, loving Candide, seeing his
beautiful Cunegonde embrowned, with blood-shot eyes, withered neck,
wrinkled cheeks, and rough, red arms, recoiled three paces, seized with
horror, and then advanced out of good manners. She embraced Candide and
her brother; they embraced the old woman, and Candide ransomed them
both.
There was a small farm in the neighbourhood which the old woman
proposed to Candide to make a shift with till the company could be
provided for in a better manner. Cunegonde did not know she had grown
ugly, for nobody had told her of it; and she reminded Candide of his
promise in so positive a tone that the good man durst not refuse her. He
therefore intimated to the Baron that he intended marrying his sister.
"I will not suffer," said the Baron, "such meanness on her part, and
such insolence on yours; I will never be reproached with this scandalous
thing; my sister's children would never be able to enter the church in
Germany. No; my sister shall only marry a baron of the empire."
Cunegonde flung herself at his feet, and bathed them with her tears;
still he was inflexible.
"Thou foolish fellow," said Candide; "I have delivered thee out of the
galleys, I have paid thy ransom, and thy sister's also; she was a
scullion, and is very ugly, yet I am so condescending as to marry her;
and dost thou pretend to oppose the match? I should kill thee again,
were I only to consult my anger."
"Thou mayest kill me again," said the Baron, "but thou shalt not marry
my sister, at least whilst I am living."
XXX
THE CONCLUSION.
At the bottom of his heart Candide had no wish to marry Cunegonde. But
the extreme impertinence of the Baron determined him to conclude the
match, and Cunegonde pressed him so strongly that he could not go from
his word. He consulted Pangloss, Martin, and the faithful Cacambo.
Pangloss drew up an excellent memorial, wherein he proved that the Baron
had no right over his sister, and that according to all the laws of the
empire, she might marry Candide with her left hand. Martin was for
throwing the Baron into the sea; Cacambo decided that it would be better
to deliver him up again to the captain of the galley, after which they
thought to send him back to the General Father of the Order at Rome by
the first ship. This advice was well received, the old woman approved
it; they said not a word to his sister; the thing was executed for a
little money, and they had the double pleasure of entrapping a Jesuit,
and punishing the pride of a German baron.
It is natural to imagine that after so many disasters Candide married,
and living with the philosopher Pangloss, the philosopher Martin, the
prudent Cacambo, and the old woman, having besides brought so many
diamonds from the country of the ancient Incas, must have led a very
happy life. But he was so much imposed upon by the Jews that he had
nothing left except his small farm; his wife became uglier every day,
more peevish and unsupportable; the old woman was infirm and even more
fretful than Cunegonde. Cacambo, who worked in the garden, and took
vegetables for sale to Constantinople, was fatigued with hard work, and
cursed his destiny. Pangloss was in despair at not shining in some
German university. For Martin, he was firmly persuaded that he would be
as badly off elsewhere, and therefore bore things patiently. Candide,
Martin, and Pangloss sometimes disputed about morals and metaphysics.
They often saw passing under the windows of their farm boats full of
Effendis, Pashas, and Cadis, who were going into banishment to Lemnos,
Mitylene, or Erzeroum. And they saw other Cadis, Pashas, and Effendis
coming to supply the place of the exiles, and afterwards exiled in their
turn. They saw heads decently impaled for presentation to the Sublime
Porte. Such spectacles as these increased the number of their
dissertations; and when they did not dispute time hung so heavily upon
their hands, that one day the old woman ventured to say to them:
"I want to know which is worse, to be ravished a hundred times by negro
pirates, to have a buttock cut off, to run the gauntlet among the
Bulgarians, to be whipped and hanged at an _auto-da-fé_, to be
dissected, to row in the galleys--in short, to go through all the
miseries we have undergone, or to stay here and have nothing to do?"
"It is a great question," said Candide.
This discourse gave rise to new reflections, and Martin especially
concluded that man was born to live either in a state of distracting
inquietude or of lethargic disgust. Candide did not quite agree to that,
but he affirmed nothing. Pangloss owned that he had always suffered
horribly, but as he had once asserted that everything went wonderfully
well, he asserted it still, though he no longer believed it.
What helped to confirm Martin in his detestable principles, to stagger
Candide more than ever, and to puzzle Pangloss, was that one day they
saw Paquette and Friar Giroflée land at the farm in extreme misery. They
had soon squandered their three thousand piastres, parted, were
reconciled, quarrelled again, were thrown into gaol, had escaped, and
Friar Giroflée had at length become Turk. Paquette continued her trade
wherever she went, but made nothing of it.
"I foresaw," said Martin to Candide, "that your presents would soon be
dissipated, and only make them the more miserable. You have rolled in
millions of money, you and Cacambo; and yet you are not happier than
Friar Giroflée and Paquette."
"Ha!" said Pangloss to Paquette, "Providence has then brought you
amongst us again, my poor child! Do you know that you cost me the tip of
my nose, an eye, and an ear, as you may see? What a world is this!"
And now this new adventure set them philosophising more than ever.
In the neighbourhood there lived a very famous Dervish who was esteemed
the best philosopher in all Turkey, and they went to consult him.
Pangloss was the speaker.
"Master," said he, "we come to beg you to tell why so strange an animal
as man was made."
"With what meddlest thou?" said the Dervish; "is it thy business?"
"But, reverend father," said Candide, "there is horrible evil in this
world."
"What signifies it," said the Dervish, "whether there be evil or good?
When his highness sends a ship to Egypt, does he trouble his head
whether the mice on board are at their ease or not?"
"What, then, must we do?" said Pangloss.
"Hold your tongue," answered the Dervish.
"I was in hopes," said Pangloss, "that I should reason with you a little
about causes and effects, about the best of possible worlds, the origin
of evil, the nature of the soul, and the pre-established harmony."
At these words, the Dervish shut the door in their faces.
During this conversation, the news was spread that two Viziers and the
Mufti had been strangled at Constantinople, and that several of their
friends had been impaled. This catastrophe made a great noise for some
hours. Pangloss, Candide, and Martin, returning to the little farm, saw
a good old man taking the fresh air at his door under an orange bower.
Pangloss, who was as inquisitive as he was argumentative, asked the old
man what was the name of the strangled Mufti.
"I do not know," answered the worthy man, "and I have not known the name
of any Mufti, nor of any Vizier. I am entirely ignorant of the event you
mention; I presume in general that they who meddle with the
administration of public affairs die sometimes miserably, and that they
deserve it; but I never trouble my head about what is transacting at
Constantinople; I content myself with sending there for sale the fruits
of the garden which I cultivate."
Having said these words, he invited the strangers into his house; his
two sons and two daughters presented them with several sorts of sherbet,
which they made themselves, with Kaimak enriched with the candied-peel
of citrons, with oranges, lemons, pine-apples, pistachio-nuts, and Mocha
coffee unadulterated with the bad coffee of Batavia or the American
islands. After which the two daughters of the honest Mussulman perfumed
the strangers' beards.
"You must have a vast and magnificent estate," said Candide to the Turk.
"I have only twenty acres," replied the old man; "I and my children
cultivate them; our labour preserves us from three great
evils--weariness, vice, and want."
Candide, on his way home, made profound reflections on the old man's
conversation.
"This honest Turk," said he to Pangloss and Martin, "seems to be in a
situation far preferable to that of the six kings with whom we had the
honour of supping."
"Grandeur," said Pangloss, "is extremely dangerous according to the
testimony of philosophers. For, in short, Eglon, King of Moab, was
assassinated by Ehud; Absalom was hung by his hair, and pierced with
three darts; King Nadab, the son of Jeroboam, was killed by Baasa; King
Ela by Zimri; Ahaziah by Jehu; Athaliah by Jehoiada; the Kings
Jehoiakim, Jeconiah, and Zedekiah, were led into captivity. You know how
perished Croesus, Astyages, Darius, Dionysius of Syracuse, Pyrrhus,
Perseus, Hannibal, Jugurtha, Ariovistus, Cæsar, Pompey, Nero, Otho,
Vitellius, Domitian, Richard II. of England, Edward II., Henry VI.,
Richard III., Mary Stuart, Charles I., the three Henrys of France, the
Emperor Henry IV.! You know----"
"I know also," said Candide, "that we must cultivate our garden."
"You are right," said Pangloss, "for when man was first placed in the
Garden of Eden, he was put there _ut operaretur eum_, that he might
cultivate it; which shows that man was not born to be idle."
"Let us work," said Martin, "without disputing; it is the only way to
render life tolerable."
The whole little society entered into this laudable design, according to
their different abilities. Their little plot of land produced plentiful
crops. Cunegonde was, indeed, very ugly, but she became an excellent
pastry cook; Paquette worked at embroidery; the old woman looked after
the linen. They were all, not excepting Friar Giroflée, of some service
or other; for he made a good joiner, and became a very honest man.
Pangloss sometimes said to Candide:
"There is a concatenation of events in this best of all possible worlds:
for if you had not been kicked out of a magnificent castle for love of
Miss Cunegonde: if you had not been put into the Inquisition: if you had
not walked over America: if you had not stabbed the Baron: if you had
not lost all your sheep from the fine country of El Dorado: you would
not be here eating preserved citrons and pistachio-nuts."
"All that is very well," answered Candide, "but let us cultivate our
garden."
FOOTNOTES:
[1] P. 2. The name Pangloss is derived from two Greek words signifying
"all" and "language."
[2] P. 8. The Abares were a tribe of Tartars settled on the shores of
the Danube, who later dwelt in part of Circassia.
[3] P. 15. Venereal disease was said to have been first brought from
Hispaniola, in the West Indies, by some followers of Columbus who were
later employed in the siege of Naples. From this latter circumstance it
was at one time known as the Neapolitan disease.
[4] P. 19. The great earthquake of Lisbon happened on the first of
November, 1755.
[5] P. 20. Such was the aversion of the Japanese to the Christian faith
that they compelled Europeans trading with their islands to trample on
the cross, renounce all marks of Christianity, and swear that it was not
their religion. See chap. xi. of the voyage to Laputa in Swift's
_Gulliver's Travels_.
[6] P. 23. This _auto-da-fé_ actually took place, some months after the
earthquake, on June 20, 1756.
[7] P. 23. The rejection of bacon convicting them, of course, of being
Jews, and therefore fitting victims for an _auto-da-fé_.
[8] P. 24. The _San-benito_ was a kind of loose over-garment painted
with flames, figures of devils, the victim's own portrait, etc., worn by
persons condemned to death by the Inquisition when going to the stake on
the occasion of an _auto-da-fé_. Those who expressed repentance for
their errors wore a garment of the same kind covered with flames
directed downwards, while that worn by Jews, sorcerers, and renegades
bore a St. Andrew's cross before and behind.
[9] P. 26. "This Notre-Dame is of wood; every year she weeps on the day
of her _fête_, and the people weep also. One day the preacher, seeing a
carpenter with dry eyes, asked him how it was that he did not dissolve
in tears when the Holy Virgin wept. 'Ah, my reverend father,' replied
he, 'it is I who refastened her in her niche yesterday. I drove three
great nails through her behind; it is then she would have wept if she
had been able.'"--Voltaire, _Mélanges_.
[10] P. 42. The following posthumous note of Voltaire's was first added
to M. Beuchot's edition of his works issued in 1829; "See the extreme
discretion of the author; there has not been up to the present any Pope
named Urban X.; he feared to give a bastard to a known Pope. What
circumspection! What delicacy of conscience!" The last Pope Urban was
the eighth, and he died in 1644.
[11] P. 45. Muley-Ismael was Emperor of Morocco from 1672 to 1727, and
was a notoriously cruel tyrant.
[12] P. 47. "Oh, what a misfortune to be an eunuch!"
[13] P. 48. Carlo Broschi, called Farinelli, an Italian singer, born at
Naples in 1705, without being exactly Minister, governed Spain under
Ferdinand VI.; he died in 1782. He has been made one of the chief
persons in one of the comic operas of MM. Auber and Scribe.
[14] P. 53. Jean Robeck, a Swede, who was born in 1672, will be found
mentioned in Rousseau's _Nouvelle Héloïse_. He drowned himself in the
Weser at Bremen in 1729, and was the author of a Latin treatise on
voluntary death, first printed in 1735.
[15] P. 60. A spontoon was a kind of half-pike, a military weapon
carried by officers of infantry and used as a medium for signalling
orders to the regiment.
[16] P. 64. Later Voltaire substituted the name of the Father Croust for
that of Didrie. Of Croust he said in the _Dictionnaire Philosophique_
that he was "the most brutal of the Society."
[17] P. 68. By the _Journal of Trevoux_ Voltaire meant a critical
periodical printed by the Jesuits at Trevoux under the title of
_Mémoires pour servir à l'Historie des Sciences et des Beaux-Arts_. It
existed from 1701 until 1767, during which period its title underwent
many changes.
[18] P. 76. It has been suggested that Voltaire, in speaking of red
sheep, referred to the llama, a South American ruminant allied to the
camel. These animals are sometimes of a reddish colour, and were notable
as pack-carriers and for their fleetness.
[19] P. 78. The first English translator curiously gives "a tourene of
bouilli that weighed two hundred pounds," as the equivalent of "_un
contour bouilli qui pesait deux cent livres_." The French editor of the
1869 reprint points out that the South American vulture, or condor, is
meant; the name of this bird, it may be added, is taken from "_cuntur_,"
that given it by the aborigines.
[20] P. 90. Spanish half-crowns.
[21] P. 99. _Socinians_; followers of the teaching of Lalius and Faustus
Socinus (16th century), which denied the doctrine of the Trinity, the
deity of Christ, the personality of the devil, the native and total
depravity of man, the vicarious atonement and eternal punishment. The
Socinians are now represented by the Unitarians. _Manicheans_; followers
of Manes or Manichæus (3rd century), a Persian who maintained that there
are two principles, the one good and the other evil, each equally
powerful in the government of the world.
[22] P. 107. In the 1759 editions, in place of the long passage in
brackets from here to page 215, there was only the following: "'Sir,'
said the Perigordian Abbé to him, 'have you noticed that young person
who has so roguish a face and so fine a figure? You may have her for ten
thousand francs a month, and fifty thousand crowns in diamonds.' 'I have
only a day or two to give her,' answered Candide, 'because I have a
rendezvous at Venice.' In the evening after supper the insinuating
Perigordian redoubled his politeness and attentions."
[23] P. 108. The play referred to is supposed to be "Le Comte d'Essex,"
by Thomas Corneille.
[24] P. 108. In France actors were at one time looked upon as
excommunicated persons, not worthy of burial in holy ground or with
Christian rites. In 1730 the "honours of sepulture" were refused to
Mademoiselle Lecouvreur (doubtless the Miss Monime of this passage).
Voltaire's miscellaneous works contain a paper on the matter.
[25] P. 109. Élie-Catherine Fréron was a French critic (1719-1776) who
incurred the enmity of Voltaire. In 1752 Fréron, in _Lettres sur
quelques écrits du temps_, wrote pointedly of Voltaire as one who chose
to be all things to all men, and Voltaire retaliated by references such
as these in _Candide_.
[26] P. 111. Gabriel Gauchat (1709-1779), French ecclesiastical writer,
was author of a number of works on religious subjects.
[27] P. 112. Nicholas Charles Joseph Trublet (1697-1770) was a French
writer whose criticism of Voltaire was revenged in passages such as this
one in _Candide_, and one in the _Pauvre Diable_ beginning:
L'abbé Trublet avait alors le rage
D'être à Paris un petit personage.
[28] P. 120. Damiens, who attempted the life of Louis XV. in 1757, was
born at Arras, capital of Artois (Atrébatie).
[29] P. 120. On May 14, 1610, Ravaillac assassinated Henry VI.
[30] P. 120. On December 27, 1594, Jean Châtel attempted to assassinate
Henry IV.
[31] P. 122. This same curiously inept criticism of the war which cost
France her American provinces occurs in Voltaire's _Memoirs_, wherein he
says, "In 1756 England made a piratical war upon France for some acres
of snow." See also his _Précis du Siècle de Louis_ XV.
[32] P. 123. Admiral Byng was shot on March 14, 1757.
[33] P. 129. Commenting upon this passage, M. Sarcey says admirably:
"All is there! In those ten lines Voltaire has gathered all the griefs
and all the terrors of these creatures; the picture is admirable for its
truth and power! But do you not feel the pity and sympathy of the
painter? Here irony becomes sad, and in a way an avenger. Voltaire cries
out with horror against the society which throws some of its members
into such an abyss. He has his 'Bartholomew' fever; we tremble with him
through contagion."
[34] P. 142. The following particulars of the six monarchs may prove not
uninteresting. Achmet III. (_b._ 1673, _d._ 1739) was dethroned in 1730.
Ivan VI. (_b._ 1740, _d._ 1762) was dethroned in 1741. Charles Edward
Stuart, the Pretender (_b._ 1720, _d._ 1788). Auguste III. (_b._ 1696,
_d._ 1763). Stanislaus (_b._ 1682, _d._ 1766). Theodore (_b._ 1690, _d._
1755). It will be observed that, although quite impossible for the six
kings ever to have met, five of them might have been made to do so
without any anachronism.
[35] P. 149. François Leopold Ragotsky (1676-1735).
* * * * *
+------------------------------------------------------------+
| Typographical errors corrected in text: |
| |
| Page xiv: Chapter XIII heading in Table of Contents |
| amended to match chapter heading on page 54. |
| Page 2: metaphysicotheo-logico-cosmolo-nigology |
| amended to metaphysico-theologico-cosmolo-nigology. |
| Page 158: Liebnitz amended to Leibnitz. |
| Page 168: perserved amended to preserved. |
| Page 172: rougish amended to roguish; crows amended to |
| crowns. |
| |
| Where there is an equal number of instances of a word |
| being hyphenated and unhyphenated, both versions |
| of the word have been retained: dung-hill/dunghill; |
| and new-comers/newcomers. |
| |
| A single footnote on page 90 has been moved |
| to the endnotes, and the notes numbers re-indexed. A |
| page reference was added to the moved footnote to |
| match the format of other endnotes. |
| |
| Modern Library blurb: "mail complete list of titles" left |
| as is. |
| |
| There are two instances of Massa Carara (pp. 43 and 45) |
| and one instance of Massa-Carrara (page ix). As this |
| latter is in the Introduction, i.e. distinct from the book |
| proper, it has been retained. |
| |
| The different spellings of Cunégonde (which occurs only |
| in the Introduction) and Robeck (which occurs in the |
| Notes [p. 170]; spelt Robek in the text [p. 53]) have |
| been retained for the same reason. |
| |
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