The Manuscript Found in Saragossa

by Jan Potocki

  Pacheco uttered a ghastly howl and continued as follows:

  I was half-dead when I left the gallows. I dragged myself along without knowing where I was going. In the end I met some travellers who took pity on me and brought me back to the Venta Quemada. There I found the innkeeper and my servants, who were deeply worried about me. I asked them whether my father had slept at the farm. They told me that no one had come there.

  I was unable to bring myself to stay longer at the venta and took the road back to Andújar, where I arrived after sunset. The inn was full, so a bed was made up for me in the kitchen, where I lay down; but I was unable to sleep for I could not banish from my mind the horrors of the previous night.

  I had left the candle lit in the chimney of the kitchen. Suddenly it went out and I felt immediately something like a mortal shiver, which froze my blood.

  There was a tug at my blanket and I heard a little voice say, ‘I am Camilla, your stepmother. I am cold, dear heart. Let me join you under your blanket.’

  Then another little voice said, ‘I am Insilla. Let me come into your bed, for I am cold, so cold.’

  Then I felt an icy hand grasp me under the chin. I drew together all of my strength and said aloud, ‘Get thee behind me, Satan.’

  Then the little voices said, ‘Why are you driving us away? Are you not our dear little husband? We are cold and we are going to light a little fire.’

  And indeed a moment later I saw a flame appear in the kitchen hearth. It gradually grew brighter and I was able to make out not Insilla and Camilla but Zoto’s two brothers hanging in the fireplace.

  These apparitions drove me out of my mind. I sprang from my bed, jumped through the window and began to rush about in the open country. For a moment I flattered myself with the hope that I had outrun all these horrors, but then I turned round, only to see that the two hanged men were pursuing me. I broke into a run again and soon saw that I had left Zoto’s brothers behind. But my joy was short-lived. Those foul creatures began to cartwheel towards me and were on me in a flash. I went on running, but in the end all my strength deserted me.

  Then I felt one of the hanged men seize my left ankle. I tried to shake myself free but the other one cut off my escape. He loomed up in front of me, staring at me with terrible eyes and poking out his tongue, which was as red as iron straight from the furnace. I pleaded for mercy but in vain. With one hand he grasped me by the throat, and with the other he tore out my eye, the one that I am now missing. He darted his burning tongue into my eye-socket and licked my brains, which made me bellow with pain.

  Then the other one, who had grasped my left leg, decided to use his claws. First he tickled the sole of the foot he was holding, then that monster tore off my skin, separated out all the sinews, laid them bare and tried to play a tune on them as though on a musical instrument. But as my sinews did not give out a sound which pleased him, he stuck his claw into my calf, pinched the tendons and began to twist them round as one does in order to tune a harp. Eventually he began to play on my leg, which he had turned into a sort of psaltery. I could hear his diabolical laughter. As the pain made me groan horribly the screams of hell chanted in chorus. And as I listened to the wails of the damned it seemed to me that every fibre in my body was being crushed in their teeth. Eventually I lost consciousness.

  The next day a herdsman found me in open countryside and brought me to this hermitage, where I confessed my sins and where I have found some relief from my suffering at the foot of the cross.

  At this point the demoniac uttered a ghastly howl and fell silent.

  Then the hermit spoke and said to me: ‘Young man, you see the power of Satan. Pray and weep. But it is getting late. We must each go his own way. I do not suggest that you should sleep in my cell, for Pacheco’s screams during the night might disturb you. Go and sleep in the chapel. There you will be under the protection of the cross, which triumphs over demons.’

  I replied to the hermit that I would sleep where he wanted me to. We carried a little camp bed to the chapel, where I lay down. The hermit wished me good-night.

  Once alone, Pacheco’s story came back to my mind. In it I found much in common with my own adventures and was still thinking about them when I heard midnight strike. I did not know whether it was the hermit striking midnight or whether I was dealing with ghosts again. Then I heard a scratching at my door. I went to the door and asked who was there.

  A little voice replied to me, ‘We are cold. Open the door for us. We are your little wives.’

  ‘Away with you, damned gallows-birds!’ I replied. ‘Go back to your gibbet and leave me to sleep.’

  Then the little voice said, ‘You are defying us because you are in a chapel. Why don’t you come out here?’

  ‘I shall do that this very moment,’ I replied at once.

  I went to fetch my sword, but when I tried to go outside I found the door locked. I informed the ghosts of this but they did not reply. So I went back to my bed and slept until daybreak.

  The Third Day

  I was roused by the hermit, who seemed delighted to find me safe and sound. He embraced me, bathed my cheeks with his tears and said to me:

  ‘My son, strange things happened last night. Tell me the truth. Did you sleep at the Venta Quemada? Did you fall into the clutches of demons? There is still a remedy. Come with me to the foot of the altar and confess your sins! Repent!’

  The hermit repeated again and again his pious exhortations. Then he fell silent and waited for me to reply.

  ‘Father,’ I said to him, ‘I went to confession before I left Cadiz. Since then I do not believe that I have committed any mortal sin except perhaps in my dreams. It is true that I slept at the Venta Quemada, but if I was witness to anything there I have good reason for not speaking about it.’

  This reply seemed to take the hermit aback. He accused me of being possessed by the demon of pride and tried to persuade me that I should make a confession of all my sins. But on seeing that I was steadfastly opposed to this, he abandoned his apostolic tone and said to me in a much more natural manner:

  ‘Your courage amazes me, my son. Who are you? What sort of upbringing have you had? Do you or do you not believe in ghosts? I beg you not to refuse to satisfy my curiosity.’

  ‘Father,’ I replied, ‘your desire to know more about me can only do me honour. And for this I am grateful to you as is only fitting. Allow me to get up and I shall join you in the hermitage, where I shall tell you all you want to know about me.’

  The hermit embraced me again and left the room.

  Once dressed I went to look for him. He was warming up some goat’s milk which he then gave me, together with some sugar and bread. He himself ate only a few boiled roots.

  When we had broken our fast the hermit turned to the possessed man and said:

  ‘Pacheco, Pacheco, in the name of your Redeemer I command you to lead my goats up the mountain.’

  Pacheco uttered a terrible cry and went out.

  Then I began my story, which I told as follows:

  THE STORY OF ALPHONSE VAN WORDEN

  I am descended from a very ancient family, but one which has achieved very little fame and acquired even less wealth. Our whole patrimony has never consisted of more than Worden, a noble fief which fell within the jurisdiction of Burgundy and is situated in the middle of the Ardennes.

  My father had an elder brother and had to be satisfied with a tiny legacy which, none the less, was enough to support him honourably in the army. He fought throughout the War of the Spanish Succession,1 and when peace came Philip V promoted him to the rank of lieutenant-colonel in the Walloon Guards.

  At that time in the Spanish army there was a strong sense of honour which was sometimes taken to extremes: my father went even further. For which in truth he cannot be blamed, since honour is properly speaking the life and soul of a military man. Not a duel was fought in Madrid whose ceremonial he did not supervise, and once he had said that satisfaction had been obtained, all part
ies declared themselves satisfied. But if by chance someone said that he was not satisfied then he had to contend with my father himself, who never failed to uphold the rightness of his decisions by the point of a sword. Moreover, my father kept a blank book in which he wrote down the history of every duel with all its attendant circumstances. This gave him a great advantage when it came to passing judgement on difficult cases.

  My father was almost completely taken up with this tribunal of blood and had not shown himself to be much susceptible to the charms of love. But in the end even his heart was moved by the beauty of a young lady called Mouraque de Gomelez, who was a daughter of the oidor2 of Granada and the descendant of the ancient rulers of that province. Mutual friends soon brought the interested parties together and the marriage was arranged.

  My father thought it appropriate to invite to his wedding all the men with whom he had fought duels (I only mean those, of course, whom he had not killed). A hundred and twenty-two came to the wedding feast. Thirteen of those absent were away from Madrid, and it had been impossible to trace a further thirty-three whom he had fought while in the army. My mother told me on more than one occasion that the feast had been extraordinarily merry and that there was an atmosphere of great cordiality. I do not find this difficult to believe, for my father had at bottom an excellent heart and was much loved by everyone.

  For his part, my father was deeply attached to Spain and would never have left it, but two months after his marriage he received a letter signed by the magistrates of the town of Bouillon informing him that his brother had died without heirs and that the fief of Worden had reverted to him. This news distressed my father greatly. And my mother has since told me that he was so preoccupied that he could not be brought to speak about it. Eventually he consulted his chronicle of duels, chose twelve men from Madrid who had fought the greatest number, invited them to his house and spoke to them as follows.

  ‘My dear brothers in arms. You know well enough how often I have set your consciences at rest on matters in which honour seemed to have been compromised. Today I find myself constrained to defer to your judgement because I fear that my own judgement may prove to be at fault, or rather that it will be clouded by partiality. Here is the letter written to me by the magistrates of Bouillon, whose testimony is worthy of respect although they are not noblemen. Tell me whether honour requires that I should return to live in my ancestral castle or whether I should continue to serve King Philip, who has overwhelmed me with favours and has just promoted me to the rank of brigadier-general. I shall leave the letter on the table and withdraw. In half an hour I shall come back and hear your decision.’

  Having thus spoken my father did indeed leave the room, and returned in half an hour to hear the verdict. He found that five had voted that he should remain in the army and seven had voted that he should go to live in the Ardennes. Without demur my father accepted the majority verdict.

  My mother would have preferred to stay in Spain, but she was so devoted to her husband that he failed even to notice how averse she was to leaving her native land. At last all that remained to be done was to prepare for the journey and to arrange for the small number of those who were to accompany them to be the representatives of Spain in the Ardennes. Although I had not yet been born my father was sure that I would be, and thought that it was time to arrange for me to have a master-at-arms. His choice fell on Garcías Hierro, the best fencing master in Madrid. This young man, who had had his fill of parrying blows in the Plaza de la Cebada, accepted with alacrity. For her part my mother, not wishing to leave without a chaplain, chose Iñigo Vélez, a theology graduate from Cuenca. He was later to instruct me in the Catholic religion and the Spanish language. All these arrangements for my education were made a year and a half before my birth.

  When my father was ready to depart, he went to take leave of the king and in accordance with Spanish custom he knelt on one knee to kiss his monarch’s hand. But he found this so upsetting that he fainted and had to be carried back to his house. The next day he went to take leave of Don Fernando de Lara, who was then prime minister. This gentleman received him with great respect and informed him that the king had granted him a pension of 12,000 reals and the rank of sargento-general, which is the same as major-general. My father would have given half his life’s blood to satisfy his desire to kneel again before his royal master, but as he had already taken leave, he confined himself to expressing his heartfelt feelings in a letter. Eventually he left Madrid, having shed many a tear.

  My father chose to pass through Catalonia so that he could again visit the lands over which he had fought and bid farewell to some of his former companions in arms who held commands on the frontier. He then entered France by way of Perpignan.

  As far as Lyon his journey was not troubled by any untoward incident. But on leaving that town with his post horses he was overtaken by a chaise which, being lighter, arrived at the post house before him. Reaching there a few minutes later, my father noted that the horses were already being harnessed to the carriage. He at once took up his sword and, going up to the traveller, asked him for the honour of a brief conversation. The traveller, who was a colonel in the French army, saw that my father was wearing the uniform of a general officer and also took up his sword out of respect for his rank. They went into the inn, which was across the road from the post house, and asked for a room.

  When they were alone my father said to the traveller, ‘Señor, your carriage overtook mine and arrived at the post house before me. This act, which does not itself constitute an insult, none the less has something disobliging about it for which I feel obliged to ask you for an explanation.’

  The colonel was very taken aback by this and placed the blame on his postilions, assuring my father that he had no part in it.

  ‘Señor caballero,’ continued my father, ‘I also do not wish to make anything serious of this. And so I shall be satisfied by first blood.’ In saying this he drew his sword.

  ‘One moment,’ said the Frenchman. ‘It seems to me that it was not my postilions who overtook yours but rather yours who by lingering fell behind mine.’

  My father thought about this for a moment and then said to the colonel, ‘Señor, I think you are quite right. If you had made this observation to me earlier, before I had drawn my sword, I think we would not have had to fight each other. But you must realize that now things have gone this far some blood must be drawn.’

  The colonel, who probably thought this last argument good enough, also drew his sword. The duel did not last long. On feeling himself wounded my father at once lowered the point of his sword and apologized to the colonel for the trouble to which he had put him. He replied in turn by offering my father his services and gave an address in Paris where he could be found. Then he stepped back into his chaise and left.

  My father first thought that he was only lightly wounded, but he was so covered with scars that any new cut could not fail to open up an old one. In this case the colonel’s blow had reopened an old musket wound from which the bullet had not been extracted. The lead ball began to work its way to the surface and came out after the wound had been treated for two months. Only then could the journey continue.

  On arriving in Paris my father’s first thought was to present his compliments to the colonel, whose name was the Marquis d’Urfé. He was one of the most respected members of the French court. He received my father with great kindness and offered to introduce him to the minister as well as to the best circles. My father thanked him but asked only to be presented to the Duc de Tavannes, who was then the doyen of the maréchaux, because he wanted to be apprised of all that concerned this tribunal, which he held in the highest regard and about which he had often spoken as a very judicious institution that he would have liked to see introduced into Spain. The duke received my father with great civility and recommended him in turn to the Chevalier de Belièvre, the senior officer of the maréchaux and recorder of their tribunal.

  In the course of his frequent
visits to my father the chevalier came to hear of his chronicle of duels. This work seemed to have no precedent in its kind and he asked permission to show it to the maréchaux who, like their senior officer, thought it unique and asked my father for the favour of a copy that would be kept in the registry of their tribunal. No request could have flattered my father more or given him greater pleasure.

  To my father, such marks of esteem made the stay in Paris highly agreeable, but my mother took a different view of it. She had made it a rule not only not to learn French but also never to listen to it when it was spoken. Her confessor, Iñigo Vélez, repeatedly passed acerbic comments about the freedoms of the Gallican Church and Garcías Hierro ended all conversations by declaring the French to be miserable worms.

  At last they left Paris and after four days’ journey arrived in Bouillon. My father made himself known to the magistrate and went to take possession of his fief.

  On being abandoned by its masters, the ancestral roof had also been abandoned by a fair number of its tiles, so that it rained in the bedrooms as much as in the courtyard, the difference being that the paving stones of the courtyard dried very quickly whereas the water formed puddles in the bedroom that never disappeared. These domestic floods did not displease my father since they reminded him of the siege of Lerida, where he had spent three weeks knee-deep in water.

  His first concern, however, was to put his wife’s bed in a dry place. There was a fireplace in the Flemish style in the state room, around which fifteen people could easily warm themselves. The mantel of the fireplace consisted of a sort of roof supported by two columns on either side. My father had the flue blocked up and my mother’s bed placed in the hearth underneath the mantel, together with her bedside table and a chair. Since the hearth was a foot higher than what surrounded it, it formed a nearly inaccessible island.

  My father settled himself at the other end of the room on two tables linked by planks. A jetty was constructed from his bed to that of my mother, buttressed in the middle by a sort of coffer-dam built from trunks and chests. This construction was completed on the very day they arrived at the castle. Exactly nine months later to the day, I came into the world.