Les Bijoux Indiscrets, or, The Indiscreet Toys

"Mr. Ricaric," replied Selim, "the only consequence that I can draw from your argument is, that as the moderns are in possession of treasures amassed up to their times, they must be richer than the ancients; or, if this comparison displeases you, that as they are raised on the shoulders of those giants, they ought to see farther than them. And in fact, what is their natural philosophy, their astronomy, their navigation, their mechanics, their calculations, in comparison of ours? And why may not our eloquence and poesy have the superiority likewise?"

"Selim," said the Sultana, "Ricaric will, at some proper time, give you the reasons of this difference. He will tell you why our tragedy is inferior to that of the ancients: for my part, I willingly undertake to shew you, that it is so. I will not accuse you," continued she, "of not having read the ancients. Your mind is too well adorned, to be ignorant of their stage. Now, abstracting from certain notions relative to their customs, manners and religion, which shock you purely because circumstances are changed; you will allow that their subjects are noble, well-chosen, and interesting; that the action naturally develops itself; that their dialogue is simple, and very near nature; that the unravelling of their plot is not strained; that the interest is not divided, nor the action overloaded with episodes. Transport yourself in idea to the isle of Alindala; examine every thing that passes there; attend to all that is said, from the moment that young Ibrahim and the crafty Forfanti landed thereon: approach the cave of the wretched Polipsile; lose not a word of her complaints; and then tell me, if any one circumstance draws you out of the illusion. Name me a modern piece that can bear the same examination, and pretend to the same degree of perfection; and I grant you the victory."

"By Brama," cried the Sultan, yawning, "madam has made an academical dissertation."

"I do not understand the rules," continued the favorite; "and much less the learned words, in which they are expressed: but I know that nothing but the True can please and touch. I also know that the perfection of a dramatic piece consists in the exact imitation of an action, so that the spectator, continually deceived, imagines he is present at the very action. Now, pray, is there any thing like this in the tragedies which you extol to us?

"Do you admire the manner in which they are conducted? It is generally so complicated, that it must be a miracle, that so many things should happen in so little time. The ruin or preservation of an empire, the marriage of a princess, the loss of a prince; all this is done with the turn of a hand. Is the subject a conspiracy? It is sketch'd out in the first act; it is connected and strengthened in the second; all the measures are taken, the obstacles removed, the conspirators are quite ready for action in the third; immediately there shall be a revolt, an engagement, perhaps a pitch'd battle; and you will call this conduct, interest, fire, verisimilitude: I can never excuse it, in you especially, who are not ignorant, what it sometimes costs to put an end to a pitiful intrigue; and how much time the smallest political affair absorbs in taking measures, in previous meetings, and in deliberations."

"I grant, madam," answered Selim, "that our pieces are a little overcharged; but it is a necessary evil: without the assistance of episodes, the audience would be chill'd."

"That is to say, that in order to give spirit to the representation of a fact, it must be made such as it neither is, nor ought to be. This is ridiculous in the highest degree; unless it be still more absurd to make the violins play up rigadoons and country-dances, while the audience are in deep concern for a prince, who is on the point of losing his mistress, his throne and his life."

"Madam, you are are in the right," said Mangogul: "the music should be mournful on those occasions; and I go to order you some of that kind." Mangogul rose up, went out, and the conversation was continued between Selim, Ricaric, and the favorite.

"At least, madam," replied Selim, "you will not deny, that if the episodes draw us out of the illusion, the dialogue leads us back into it. I see none who understand it like our tragic writers."

"Then, nobody understands it," resumed Mirzoza. "The emphasis, wit and affected decorations, which predominate in it, are a thousand leagues distant from nature. In vain does the author endeavour to conceal himself, my eyes are penetrating and I discover him incessantly behind the persons of the drama. Cinna, Sertorius, Maximus, and Æmilius, are Corneille's speaking trumpets in almost every page. This is not the way that people converse in our ancient Sarracen authors. Ricaric will, if you desire it, translate you some scenes out of them; and then you will hear pure nature speaking by their mouths. I could willingly say to the moderns: 'Gentlemen, instead of dealing out wit to your personages on every occasion, put them into such circumstances as must inspire them with some.'"

"After what madam has declared on the management and the dialogue of our drama's; there is no great probability," says Selim; "that she will shew indulgence to the plots."

"No certainly," replied the favorite: "there are a hundred bad for one good. This is not brought on properly, that is quite miraculous. Is an author encumbered with a personage, which he has drag'd from scene to scene thro' five acts, he dispatches him with a stab of a ponyard: every body falls to crying, and I burst into laughter. Besides, did mortals ever speak as we declaim? Do kings and princes walk otherwise than a well-bred man? Have they ever gesticulated like persons possessed or raging mad? Do princesses speak in a shrill squeaking tone? It is generally supposed that we have carried tragedy to a high degree of perfection; and I on the contrary think it is next to demonstration, that of all the kinds of literary works, to which the Africans have applied themselves in these latter ages, this is the most imperfect."

The favorite was advanced thus far in her sally against our theatrical pieces, when Mangogul returned. "Madam," said he, "you will oblige me in continuing. You see I have a secret to abridge a poetical subject, when I find it tedious."

"I suppose," continued the favorite, "a person just arrived from Angola, who had never heard a play mentioned, but otherwise does not want good sense and breeding, has some acquaintance with the courts of princes, the intrigues of courtiers, the jealousies of ministers, and the double dealings of women; to whom I say in confidence 'My friend, there are terrible commotions actually in the Seraglio. The prince, dissatisfied with his son, in whom he suspects a passion for the Manimonbanda, is a man capable of taking the most cruel vengeance of them both. This adventure will, in all probability, be attended with dismal consequences. If you choose it, I will make you an eye-witness of all that passes.' He accepts my offer, and I carry him into a box screen'd by a blind, from whence he sees the stage, which he takes for the Sultan's palace, Do you believe, notwithstanding the serious air I put on, that this person's illusion can last a moment? Will you not rather agree with me, that the stiff-affected carriage of the actors, the oddity of their dress, the extravagance of their gestures, the emphasis of a singular language in rhyme and cadence, and a thousand other shocking dissonances, must make him laugh in my face before the first scene is over, and tell me either that I make game of him, or that the prince and all his court are mad."

"I own," said Selim, "that this supposition strikes me: but may I not observe to you, that people go to the play-house, fully perswaded that they are to see the imitation of an event, and not the event itself."

"And ought that perswasion," replied Mirzoza, "to hinder the players from representing the event in the most natural manner?"

"All this means, madam," interrupted Mangogul, "that you put yourself at the head of the censors."

"And if your opinion be received," continued Selim, "the empire is threatened with the decay of good taste; barbarism will revive, and we are in danger of relapsing into the ignorance of the ages of Mamurrha and Orondado."

"My lord, pray have no such apprehensions. I hate peevish humors, and will not add to their number. Besides, I have the glory of his highness too much at heart, to think of ever attempting to tarnish the splendor of his reign. But if credit were given to us, is it not true, Mr. Ricaric, that literature would shine with greater lustre?"

"How," said Mangogul, "have you not a memorial on this subject to present to my Seneschal?"

"No, sir," answered Ricaric; "but after having thanked your highness in behalf of the Literati, for the new inspector, which you have given them; I would most humbly remonstrate to your Seneschal, that the choice of learned men appointed to revise manuscripts is an affair of great nicety: that this trust is committed to persons, who seem to me very much inferior to their employ; and from thence results a crowd of evil effects, such as curtailing good works, cramping the best genius's, who not being at liberty to write in their own way, either write not at all, or send their productions with considerable sums to foreigners; giving a bad opinion of those topicks which are prohibited to be discussed, and a thousand other inconveniencies, which it would be too tedious to mention to your highness. I would advise him to retrench the pensions of certain literary leaches, who are always craving unmercifully; I mean glossators, antiquaries, commentators, and others of this stamp, who would be very useful, if they did their business well; but who are got into the wretched custom of passing over obscure places, and of dwelling upon passages that admit of no difficulty. I would have him be very attentive to suppress almost all posthumous works; and not to suffer the memory of a great author to be tarnished by the covetousness of a bookseller, who collects and publishes, a long time after a man's death, such works as he had condemned to oblivion in his lifetime." "And I," continued the favorite, "would point out to him a small number of men of distinguished merit, such as Mr. Ricaric, on whom he may bestow your benefactions. Is it not somewhat surprising, that the poor man has no provision made for him, while the precious chiromancer of the Manimonbanda receives a thousand sequins a year from your treasury."

"Well, madam,", answered Mangogul, "I assign Mr. Ricaric the like sum on my coffers, in consideration of the wonderful things you tell me of him."

"Mr. Ricaric," said the favorite, "I also must do something for you: in your favor I sacrifice the small resentment of my self-love; and in consideration of the recompence which Mangogul has granted to your merit, I forget the injury he has done me."

"Pray, madam, may I ask you what that injury is?" replied Mangogul.

"You may, Sir, and I will tell you. You yourself make us embark in a conversation on the Belles-Lettres: you begin by a piece of modern eloquence, which is not extraordinary; and when, to oblige you, we prepare to pursue the disagreeable argument which you have started, you are seized with uneasiness and yawning, you teize yourself in your seat, you change your posture a hundred times, without finding one easy one: tired in fine of keeping your countenance, tho' a sad one, you come to a sudden resolution, you get up and disappear: and then, whither do you go? Perhaps to give ear to a Toy!"

"I own the fact, madam, but I see nothing in it that should give offence. If a man happens to be disgusted at fine things, and amuse himself with hearing bad, so much the worse for him. This unjust preference takes nothing from the merit of what he has quitted: he only declares himself a bad judge. To this I could add, madam, that while you were labouring hard at Selim's conversion, I was working with no better success to procure you a castle. In fine, if I must be culpable, since you have pronounc'd me so, I can assure you that you have had your revenge at the very time."

"Pray, how that?" said the favorite. "Thus it is," answered the Sultan. "In order to refresh myself from the fatigue of the academical sitting which I had undergone, I went to examine some Toys." – "Well, prince" – "Well, I never heard such insipid creatures as the two which I light upon." – "This gives me the highest joy," replied the favorite. – They both fell to talking an unintelligible language. I have perfectly well retained every thing they said; but let me die, if I understand a word of it.

CHAP. XXXVI.

Eighteenth and nineteenth trials of the Ring

The flatted Spheroïd, and Girgiro the entangled: catch who can

"That is singular," continued the favorite. "Till this moment, I always imagined, that the chief fault found with Toys, was their speaking too plainly." "Oh! madam," replied Mangogul, "these two are not of that tribe; understand them who can.

"You know that little crumpling of woman, whose head is sunk into her shoulders, whose arms are hardly to be seen, and whose legs are so short, and her belly so lank, that one might mistake her for a hedge-hog, for a clumsy ill-develop'd embryo, who bears the the nick-name of the flatted Spheroïd; who has filled her head with a notion that Brama called her to the study of geometry, because he has given her the figure of a bowl; and who consequently might have chosen the profession of artillery: for considering her make, she must have issued out of nature's bosom, as a bullet out of the mouth of a cannon.

"Willing to receive informations from her Toy, I examined it. But the vorticose creature spoke in terms of such sublime geometry, that I did not understand one word, nor perhaps did it understand its own language. It was nothing but right lines, concave surfaces, given quantities, longitude, latitude, profundity, solids, living forces, dead forces, cone, cylinder, conic sections, curves, elastic curves, curve re-entring into itself, with its point conjugated – "

"I pray your highness to excuse me from the rest," cried the favorite mournfully. "You have a cruel memory, enough to put one to death. It has raised a swimming in my head, which I dare say I shall not get rid of these eight days. But was the other so diverting?"

"You shall be the judge," replied Mangogul. "By Brama's great toe, I have performed a prodigy. I have retain'd its motly gibberish word for word, tho' it be so thoroughly void of sense and perspicuity, that if you give me a subtile and critical explanation of it, madam, you will make me an acceptable present."

"How have you said, prince?" cried Mirzoza. "Let me die, if you have not stolen that phrase from somebody."

"I can't tell how it has happened," replied Mangogul: "for these two Toys are the only persons to whom I have given audience this day. The last, on whom I turned my ring, after a moment's silence, said, as if addressing an audience,

"'Gentlemen,

"'I shall take the liberty to avoid seeking, to the contempt of my own reason, a model of thinking and expressing myself. But yet if I advance any thing new, it shall not be affectation, but the subject shall have furnished me with it: if I repeat what has been already said, it will be my own thought, as well as it has been that of others. Let not irony come to turn this preamble into ridicule, and accuse me of either not having read, or of having read to no purpose. A Toy like me is not made for reading, or profiting by its reading, or foreseeing an objection, or answering it.

"'I shall not debar myself of reflections and ornaments proportioned to my subject; the rather because in this regard it is extremely modest, and will not admit of any great quantity or brilliancy. But I will avoid sinking into those little minute details, which fall to the share of the barren orator. It would be cause of great grief to me to be suspected of this defect.

"'After having informed ye, gentlemen, of what you are to expect from my discoveries and elocution, some few strokes of the pencil will be sufficient, to sketch you out my character.

"'You know, gentlemen, as well as I, that there are two sorts of Toys: proud Toys and modest Toys. The former are haughty, and always expect the place of honour. The latter affect to be courteous, and present themselves with an air of submission. These two intentions appear manifestly in the execution of their projects, and determine both sorts to act according to the genius that guides them.

"'I imagined, thro' attachment to the prejudices of my first education, that I should open to myself a safer, easier, and more agreeable career, if I preferr'd the part of humility to that of pride; and I offered myself with infantile bashfulness and winning supplications to all, whom I had the good fortune to meet.

"'But oh! how unhappy are the times. After ten times more buts and ifs and ands than were sufficient to make the most unemployed Toy lose all patience, my services were accepted. Alas! this job was of short duration. My first possessor giving himself up to the flattering glory of a new conquest, discarded me, and I found myself all at once out of employment.

"'My treasure was gone, and I did not flatter myself that fortune would make me amends for it. In effect the vacant place was occupied, but not filled by a Sexagenarian, to whom good will was less wanting than the means.

"'He laboured with all his might to make me forget my past state. He had for me all that behavior, which is esteemed polite and engaging in the career that I pursued: but his efforts did not conquer my regret.

"'If industry, which is said never to fall short, made him find in the treasures of the natural faculty some abatement to my grief; this compensation to me appeared insufficient, in spite of my imagination, which was daily on the rack to find new resemblances, and even to suppose imaginary ones, but to no purpose.

"'Such is the advantage of primacy, that it seizes the idea, and forms a barrier against every thing that would afterwards present itself under other forms: and such is, shall I say it, to our shame, the ungrateful nature of Toys, that they never take the good-will for the deed.

"'This remark seems to me so natural, that, without being indebted to any body for it, I cannot think that I am the only one who has made it. But if any person before me has been struck with it; at least, gentlemen I am the first who undertake, by demonstrating it, to set its full value in a proper light.

"'I am far from laying the least blame to the charge of those who have raised their voice hitherto, for having let this stroke escape them; my self-love being abundantly satisfied, to be able, after so great a number of orators, to present my observation as something new. – '"

"Ah! prince," cried Mirzoza smartly, "I fancy I hear the chiromancer of the Manimonbanda. Apply to him, and you will have the subtile and critical explanation, of which you would in vain expect the agreeable present from any other person."

The African author says, that Mangogul smiled, and continued. "But I do not intend," says he, "to relate the rest of his discourse. If this beginning has not given as much amusement as the first pages of La Fée Taupe, the sequel would be more tiresome than the last pages of the Fée Moustache."

CHAP. XXXVII.

Mirzoza's dream

By the time that Mangogul had finished the academical discourse of Girgiro the entangled, night came on, and the company went to bed.

That night the favorite might well flatter herself with sleeping soundly: but the evening's conversation ran in her head while asleep: and its ideas mixing with others, produced an odd dream, which she did not fail relating to the Sultan, in these words.

"I was in my first sleep, when I imagined that I was transported into an immense gallery quite full of books. I shall say nothing of their contents: they were to me at that time, what they are to many others, who are not asleep. I did not so much as look at one title-page: a more striking sight attracted my whole attention.

"From space to space between the presses, that contain'd the books, there were pedestals, on which were placed most beautiful busto's of marble and Bronze. The injury of time had spared them; and some little defects excepted, they were entire and perfect. That nobleness and elegance which characterized the works of the ancients, were stamped on them. Most of them had long beards, large foreheads like yours, and engaging countenances.

"I was anxious to learn their names, and know their merit, when a woman came thro' the casement of a window, and accosted me. Her shape was genteel, her gait majestic, and her carriage noble, sweetness and loftiness were blended in her looks, and her voice had some inexpressible charm that delighted. A helmet, a coat of mail, and a flowing petticoat, made up all her attire. 'I know your anxiety,' said she to me, 'and am going to satisfy your curiosity: the men whose busto's have struck you, were my favorites. They consecrated their studies to the perfection of the elegant arts, whereof the invention is due to me. They lived in the most polite countries of the world, and their writings, which were the delight of their contemporaries, are the admiration of the present age. Draw near, and you will see carved on the several pedestals in Basso relievo, some remarkable subjects, which will at least point out to you the character of their writings.'

"The first busto which I examined, was that of a majestic old man, who seem'd to have been blind. In all probability he had sung of battles: for such were the subjects on the sides of his pedestal. The front was all taken up with a single figure, which was that of a young hero. His hand grasped the handle of his cymeter, and a woman's arm appear'd holding him back by the hair of the head, who seem'd to moderate his wrath.

"Opposite to this bust was placed that of a young man: he was the picture of modesty. His looks were turned on the old man with uncommon attention. He had also sung of wars and combats: but these were not the only subjects that employed him: for of the Basso relievo's which surrounded him, the principal one represented on one side husbandmen stooping on their ploughs, and tilling the ground; on the other, shepheards stretched on the grass, and played on their flutes amidst their herds and dogs.

"The busto placed below the old man on the same side, had a wild look. His eye seem'd to pursue some object that was flying from him: and under him were represented a lyre carelessly thrown aside, scattered laurels, broken chariots, and fiery horses running away in a vast plain.

"Fronting this I saw a busto, which made so deep an impression on me, that I fancy I see him still. He had a fine air, an aquiline pointed nose, a steady look, and an arch smile. The Basso relievo's, which adorned his pedestal, were so full of matter, that it would be an endless task to undertake the description of them.

"After examining some others, I began to ask some questions of my guide.

"'Who is that,' said I, 'who bears truth on his lips, and probity on his countenance.' 'He was,' replied she, 'the friend and victim to both. He spent his life in improving his fellow citizens in knowledge and virtue, and these ingrateful citizens put him to death.'

"'And this busto placed below him?' 'Which? That which appears supported by the graces carved on the sides of his pedestal?' 'The same.' – 'He is the disciple and inheriter of the sense and principles of the unfortunate virtuous man above mentioned.'

"'And this lusty jolly fellow, crowned, with vine branches and myrtle, who is he?' – 'A lovely philosopher, who made it his sole business to sing and taste pleasure. He died in the arms of voluptuousness.'

"'And this other blind man?' – 'He is,' said she – But I waited not for her answer. I imagined I was got among my acquaintance, and hurried to a busto placed opposite to him. This was posed on a trophy of different attributes of arts and sciences: Cupids sported among them on one of the sides of the pedestal: on another was a group of the Genii of politics, history, and philosophy. On the third, on one hand appear'd two armies drawn up in battle-array; astonishment and horror dwelt on every countenance, blended with marks of admiration and pity. These passions were probably excited by an object, which was there express'd. It was a young man expiring, and by his side an aged warrior, who pointed his sword to his own breast. These figures were exquisitely beautiful, and nothing could be more artfully touch'd than the despair of the one, and the mortal languor spread throughout the limbs of the other. I drew nearer, and under it I read this inscription in gold letters: Alas! this was his son.