The Manuscript Found in Saragossa

by Jan Potocki

  Aunt Torres remembered that this child was the same muleteer whom the viceroy had proposed condemning to the galleys an hour before, and was at a loss to reply. She drew out her handkerchief and burst into tears.

  ‘Please forgive me,’ said the viceroy. ‘I can see that I have revived some cruel memories. But for me to continue my story I must speak to you of that unfortunate child.

  ‘As you will remember, he was then suffering from smallpox. You showered the tenderest attentions on him and I know that Elvira too would spend days and nights at the bedside of the young patient. I could not resist the pleasure of letting you know that there was another mortal who shared your grief. So every night, close to your windows, I would sing some melancholy romances. Do you remember this, I wonder, Señora de Torres?’

  ‘I remember it very well,’ she replied. ‘Only yesterday I was telling this lady about it.’

  The viceroy then continued.

  The illness of Lonzeto was talked about all over town, for it was the cause of the delay in the festival of bullfighting. The child’s recovery gave rise to universal rejoicing. The festival took place. It did not last long, for Rovellas was severely mauled by the first bull. When I plunged my sword into the animal’s side, I looked up to your box and saw Elvira leaning towards you and speaking about me with an expression on her face which gave me pleasure. Meanwhile I disappeared into the crowd.

  The next day Rovellas had recovered somewhat and asked for Elvira’s hand in marriage. It was said that he had been refused. He averred that he had been accepted. But as I learned that you were preparing to leave for Villaca I myself concluded that he had been refused. I left myself for Villaca, where I took on all the habits of a labrador, driving my cart myself or at least pretending to, for in fact I left all that to my farm-hand.

  After some days, as I was following my oxen home, with my sister, who was taken for my wife, on my arm, I caught sight of you with Elvira and your husband. You were sitting at the front door of your house drinking chocolate. You recognized me, as did your sister, but I did not reveal who I was. But to excite your curiosity I had the cunning idea, as I went into my house, of playing some of the songs which I had played to you during Lonzeto’s illness. I was only waiting to be sure that Elvira had refused Rovellas before declaring my love.

  ‘Ah, Your Excellency,’ said Maria de Torres, ‘it is true that you had succeeded in attracting Elvira’s attention and it is a fact that she had refused Rovellas. If she did in fact marry him afterwards it was perhaps because she believed you to be married.’

  ‘Señora,’ said the viceroy, ‘providence no doubt had other plans for my unworthy person. Indeed, if I had obtained Elvira’s hand in marriage, the Assiniboins and the Chiricahua Apaches would not have been converted to Christianity and the cross, the holy sign of our redemption, would not have been planted three degrees north of the Mar Bermejo.3’

  ‘That may be so,’ said Maria de Torres. ‘But my sister and husband would still be alive. None the less, Excellency, please continue your story.’

  A few days after you came to Villaca, a special messenger from Granada informed me that my mother was dangerously ill. Love gave way to filial affection, so I left with my sister. My mother’s illness lasted two months. She breathed her last in our arms. I mourned her not long enough perhaps and then went back to Segovia, where I learned that Elvira had become the Condesa de Rovellas. I learned at the same time that the count had promised a reward of a hundred pieces of eight to anyone who revealed the identity of his rescuer. I replied by an anonymous letter and left for Madrid, where I sought employment in America. I obtained this and left as soon as I could. My stay in Villaca was a mystery known only to my sister and myself, or so I believed. But our servants are born spies who miss nothing. A valet, who would not follow me to the New World, entered Rovellas’s service and told the whole story of the house at Villaca and my disguise. He confided in the chambermaid of the duenna major of the countess. She in turn told the duenna, and the duenna, to ingratiate herself through her diligence, told the count. He, putting together the disguise, the anonymous letter, my skill in bullfighting and my departure for America, reached the conclusion that I really had been the lover of his wife. In due course I was informed of all these facts, but on my arrival in America I was astonished to receive the following letter:

  Señor Don Sancho de Peña Sombra!

  I have been told of the secret affair you have had with the infamous person whom I no longer recognize as the Condesa de Rovellas. You may, if you think it fitting, send for the child which will be born to her. As for me, I will shortly be following you to America, where I hope that I shall see you for the last time in my life.

  This letter drove me to despair. And my grief could not have been greater when I learned of the death of Elvira, your husband and Rovellas, whom I had hoped to convince of his injustice. Meanwhile I did all that was in my power to refute the calumny and establish the rights of his daughter. I therefore took a solemn oath to marry her as soon as she was old enough to be married. Having fulfilled this duty, I believed myself at liberty to seek the death which my religion did not allow me to inflict on myself.

  A savage people allied to Spain were then at war with their neighbours. I had myself accepted into the tribe. To be admitted, I had to allow a tattoo of a serpent and tortoise to be pricked on to my whole body with a needle. The head of a serpent was drawn on my right shoulder, its body wound round mine sixteen times, with the end of its tail inscribed on the toe of my left foot.

  During the ceremony the savage who does the drawing deliberately pricks the bones of the leg, and other sensitive parts, and the recipient is not allowed to let out the slightest cry. As I was being tortured in this way, the war cries of the savages who were our enemy were already resounding in the plain, and my tribe intoned a chant of death. I tore myself free from the hands of the priests, armed myself with a mace and rushed into battle. We brought back two hundred and thirty scalps and I was chosen to be cacique on the battlefield. Two years later the tribes of the New World had been converted to Christianity and brought under the crown of Spain. You must know more or less the rest of my story. I have reached the highest dignity to which a subject of the King of Spain can be raised. But, dear Elvira, I must tell you that you will never be the wife of a viceroy. It is the policy of the Council of Madrid not to permit a married man to have such great power in the New World. At the moment at which you deign to marry me, I shall cease to be viceroy. All I can lay at your feet is my title of grandee of Spain and a fortune about which I shall give you a few details. It will be held in common.

  When I had conquered the two provinces to the north of New Mexico the king granted me the right to exploit a silver mine of my choosing. I took as my associate a private citizen from Vera Cruz. In the first year we shared a dividend of three million piastres fortes. However, as the grant was in my name I received six hundred thousand piastres more than my associate in the first year.

  The stranger then interrupted. ‘Señor, the share of the viceroy was one million, eight hundred thousand piastres and that of his associate one million, two hundred thousand.’

  ‘That may well be,’ said the gypsy chief.

  ‘That is half the sum plus half the difference,’ the stranger went on. ‘Everyone knows that.’

  ‘Capital!’ said the gypsy chief, and carried on with his story.

  ‘The viceroy, still wanting to tell me about the state of my fortune, said, ‘In the second year we mined deeper into the ground and we had to build galleries, sumps and tunnels. The costs of exploitation, which had been only a quarter, now rose by an eighth and the quantity of ore diminished by a sixth.’

  At this point the geometer4 drew out of his pocket some writing tablets and a pencil, but thinking it was a quill pen he had in his hand he plunged it into the chocolate. Seeing then that the chocolate did not allow him to write as he wanted to, he decided to wipe the pen on his black coat but instead wiped it on Rebe
cca’s skirt. Then he started writing down figures on his tablets. We all smiled at his absent-mindedness. The gypsy chief then went on.

  ‘Our problems grew greater in the third year. We were obliged to bring in miners from Peru, to whom we gave a fifteenth of the profit without counting the expenses, which, that year, increased by two-fifteenths. But the ore increased by ten and a quarter times in respect of what we had obtained in the second year.’

  I was well aware that the gypsy was trying to upset the geometer’s calculations. In fact, pretending to turn his story into a mathematical problem, he continued as follows:

  ‘Since then, Señora, our dividends diminished every year by two-seventeenths. As I obtained interest on the money from the mine, which I compounded with the capital, the result is that I have a fortune of fifty million piastres, which I place at your feet together with my titles, my heart and my hand.’

  At this the stranger rose and, still writing figures on his tablets, took the path by which we had come, but instead of following it he went off on a track used by the gypsy women to fetch water. A moment later we heard him fall into the torrent. I ran to his assistance. I plunged into the water and, having struggled hard against the current, was lucky enough to bring the absent-minded stranger to the bank. We made him regurgitate the water he had swallowed, and lit a great fire; then he said to us, staring at us with eyes which betrayed his enfeebled state:

  ‘Señores, the fact is that the fortune of the viceroy amounted to sixty million, twenty-five thousand and a hundred and sixty-one piastres, on the assumption that the share of the viceroy was to that of his associate as eighteen hundred is to twelve hundred or three is to two.’

  Having uttered these words, the geometer fell into a sort of lethargy from which we were loath to rouse him, since it seemed to us that he now needed sleep. He slept in fact until six o’clock that evening, but he only emerged from his lethargy to lapse into an endless succession of absent-minded remarks.

  First, he asked who had fallen into the water. He was told that he had fallen into the water and that I had dragged him out.

  He then turned to me with great courtesy and friendliness and said, ‘I really didn’t know that I could swim so well. I am delighted that I have saved for the king one of his best officers, for you are a captain in the Walloon Guards. You told me that and I never forget anything.’

  Everyone laughed. But that didn’t put the geometer off. He went on amusing us with his absent-mindedness.

  The cabbalist seemed scarcely less distracted himself. He spoke only of the Wandering Jew, who was to give him information about the two demons called Emina and Zubeida.

  Rebecca took my arm and led me to a place where we could not be overheard. ‘Señor Alphonse,’ she said, ‘I urge you to tell me what you think of all you have heard and seen since you have been in these mountains, and to let me know what your thoughts are on the cursed hanged men who keep playing such nasty tricks on us.’

  ‘Señora,’ I replied, ‘I am much put out by your question. What interests your brother is a secret which is unknown to me. As for myself, I am convinced that I was carried under the gallows after I had been drugged by a sleeping draught. And you it was who told me about the power that the Gomelez secretly exercise in this part of the country.’

  ‘Yes, indeed,’ said Rebecca. ‘I think they want to convert you to Islam. Perhaps it would be a good idea to give in to their desires.’

  ‘What?’ I cried. ‘Are you a party to their plans?’

  ‘No,’ she replied. ‘Perhaps I am following my own. I have already told you that I will never love a man of my religion or a Christian. But let’s rejoin the company. We’ll talk about this another time.’

  Rebecca went to find her brother and I went on my own way, pondering on what I had seen and heard. But the harder I thought about it, the less I could understand it.

  The Nineteenth Day

  The whole company met together early in the cave. But the gypsy chief was not among them. The geometer had recovered very well. He was still convinced that he had pulled me out of the water. He would look at me with that proprietorial air that we reserve for those for whom we have performed important services.

  Rebecca noticed it and thought it very funny. When we had eaten she said, ‘Señores, we are losing a great deal by the chief’s absence, for I am dying to know how he received the offer of the hand and fortune of the viceroy. But we have in our midst a gentleman who could make up for it by telling us his own story, which must be very interesting. He seems to have cultivated sciences which are not unknown to me, and anything about a man like that must please me greatly.’

  ‘Señora,’ the stranger replied, ‘I do not think that you have applied yourself to the same sciences that I have, since most women are incapable of understanding even their rudiments. But since you have received me so hospitably it is my duty to tell you all about myself. So to begin with, I shall tell you that my name is… my name is…’

  ‘What?’ said Rebecca, ‘are you so absent-minded that you can forget your own name?’

  ‘Not at all,’ said the geometer. ‘I am not absent-minded by nature at all. But my father had one great moment of absent-mindedness in his life. He signed his brother’s name in the place of his own and that act of absent-mindedness caused him to lose his wife, his fortune and the reward for his labours at a single stroke. So in order to prevent a similar thing happening to me, I have written my name on my writing-tablets. And when I want to sign it I copy what is written there.’

  ‘But,’ said Rebecca, ‘it’s a matter here of saying your name, not signing it.’

  ‘You are quite right,’ said the stranger. So he put his tablets back in his pocket and began.

  VELÁSQUEZ THE GEOMETER’S STORY

  My name is Don Pedro de Velásquez. I am descended from the famous house of the Marquesses of Velásquez, who, since the invention of gunpowder, have all served in the artillery and have given Spain the finest officers they have ever had in that army. Don Ramiro Velásquez, Grand Master of Artillery to Philip IV,1 was made a grandee by his successor. He had two sons, both of whom married. The older branch retained the family fortune and the title of grandee, but far from giving themselves up to the soft life of court office, the heads of our family always remained devoted to the glorious work to which they owe their reputation. And, what is more, they made it their duty to support and protect the cadet branch.

  This lasted down as far as Don Sancho, fifth Duke of Velásquez, great-grandson of the elder son of Ramiro. This worthy gentleman was, like several of his ancestors, endowed with the office and dignity of grand master of artillery. He was, moreover, the Governor of Galicia and resided in that province. He married a daughter of the Duke of Alba, and this marriage gave him as much happiness as it brought honour to our family through an alliance with the house of Alba. The duchess was not, however, as fertile as her husband had hoped. She had but one child, a daughter named Blanca. The duke intended her to be the wife of a Velásquez of the younger branch, to which she would bring the older branch’s title of grandee and the family fortune.

  My father, whose name was Don Enrique, and his brother, Don Carlos, had just lost their father, who was descended in the same degree as the duke from Don Ramiro. The duke took them both into his household. My father was twelve at the time and his brother eleven. Their characters were very different. My father was earnest, studious, over-sensitive. His brother was frivolous, rash and incapable of applying himself to anything. The duke perceived these contrary dispositions, decided that my father should be his son-in-law and, to prevent Blanca’s heart making a choice different from his own, he sent Don Carlos to Paris to have him educated under the supervision of his relative, the conde de la Hereira, who was then ambassador in France.

  By the excellent qualities of his heart and extraordinary hard work, my father won daily more and more of the goodwill of the duke and of Blanca, who knew that she was intended for him and became more and more
attached to the choice her father had made. She even shared the tastes of her young suitor and followed from afar his career as a scientist. Imagine a young man whose precocious genius encompassed all human knowledge at an age when others were only just acquiring its rudiments. Imagine next that this young man was in love with a young girl of his age, of superior intelligence, eager to understand him and pleased to share as she thought in his success. This will give you some idea of the happiness enjoyed by my father in that short period of his life. How could Blanca not have loved him? He was the pride and joy of the old duke and the darling of the whole province. Before he was twenty years old his reputation began to spread beyond the confines of Spain.

  Blanca loved her betrothed with passion and vanity. But Enrique, who was all heart and soul, loved her only with affection. He loved the duke almost as much as his daughter and often thought of his brother Don Carlos.

  ‘My dear Blanca,’ he would say to his mistress, ‘don’t you think our happiness is incomplete without Carlos? There are many lovely girls here who could settle him down. He is very inconstant. He rarely writes to me, but a sweet, tender wife would cultivate his heart. Dear Blanca, I adore you, I love your father but, since nature has given me a brother, why must we always be apart?’

  One day, the duke summoned my father and said, ‘Don Enrique, I have just received from the king, our master, a letter whose contents I wish to communicate to you. This is what it says:

  Cousin,

  We in our council have resolved to redesign the strongholds which serve to defend our kingdom. We note that Europe is divided between the systems of Vauban and Coehoorn.2 Employ the best minds among our subjects to write on this matter. Send their written proposals to us. If we find one which satisfies us, its author will himself be given the task of executing the design he shall have put forward. And our royal magnificence will reward him accordingly. Whereupon we pray God to keep you under his holy protection.