The Manuscript Found in Saragossa

by Jan Potocki

  Dellius did not neglect either my education or that of young Germanus besides. One or the other of us remained always in his company. The days I was not required, I went to a little Jewish school in the neighbourhood, and the days Germanus was free, he sat at the feet of a priest of Isis called Chaeremon. Subsequently he was made torchbearer during that goddess’s mysteries and he would charm me with his description of the ceremonies.

  As the Wandering Jew reached this point in his story we arrived at our resting-place, and he went off into the mountains. Towards evening, as we were all together and the gypsy chief seemed not to be needed, Rebecca asked him to continue his story, which he did as follows:

  THE GYPSY CHIEF’S STORY CONTINUED

  The Knight of Toledo had obviously allowed a large number of sins to accumulate on his conscience, because he detained his confessor for a very long time. He left him with tears streaming down his face and went out of the church showing all the signs of the most profound contrition. As he crossed the portal he caught sight of me and signalled that I should follow him.

  It was still very early in the morning and the streets were deserted. The knight engaged the first mules for hire we came across and we rode out of the city. I remarked to him that his household would be worried by such a long absence. But he replied, ‘No, they have been forewarned and will not be expecting me back.’

  ‘Señor caballero,’ I said to him, ‘may I be allowed to make an observation? The voice you heard yesterday told you something which you could just as well have found in your catechism. You have gone to confession and doubtless were not refused absolution. By all means amend your ways a bit but don’t upset yourself to this extent.’

  ‘Oh my friend,’ said the knight, ‘once one has heard the voice of the dead, one is not long for this world.’

  I then realized that my young protector thought that he was going to die soon, and this idea had affected him. So I made the decision not to leave him.

  We took a lonely road which crossed a wild stretch of countryside and led us to the doors of a Camaldolese monastery. The knight paid off the muleteers and rang at the door. A monk appeared. The knight made himself known and asked to be allowed to undertake a retreat lasting several weeks. We were led to a hermitage at the bottom of the garden and informed by sign language that a bell would announce the time to go to the refectory. Our cell was furnished with devout literature, which the knight read to the exclusion of all else. As for me, I found a Camaldolese who was sitting fishing with a rod; I joined him and that was the only way I had to amuse myself.

  The silence which is part of the Camaldolese rule did not upset me too much the first day, but it had become unbearable by the third. As for the knight, his melancholy grew daily. Soon he stopped talking altogether.

  We had been at the monastery for a week when I saw one of my comrades from the portal of St Roch arrive. He told us that he had seen us ride away on our hired mules and, having subsequently met the same muleteer, he had learnt from him where our retreat was. He told me at the same time that the sadness of having lost me had caused our little troop to begin to split up; for his part he had placed himself in the service of a Cadiz merchant who needed people to look after him, having suffered multiple fractures to his legs and arms in an unfortunate accident.

  I told him that I couldn’t bear it any longer in the Camaldolese monastery and asked him to take my place with the knight just for a few days.

  He replied that he would willingly do so but that he was afraid of letting down the Cadiz merchant who had taken him into his service; he had been given the job under the portal of St Roch, and to let him down would do no good to those who foregathered there.

  I told him in turn that I could take his place with the merchant. I had, as it happened, managed to impose my authority on my comrades and this one did not think he should refuse to obey me. I led him to the knight, whom I told that important affairs obliged me to return to Madrid for a few days and that during this time I would leave him a comrade whom I would answer for as for myself. The knight, who did not speak, let me know by signs that he agreed to the substitution.

  So I went to Madrid and went at once to the inn which my comrade had indicated to me, but I found that the patient had been transferred to the house of the famous doctor who lived in the Calle St Roch. I had no trouble finding him. I said that I had come in the place of my comrade Chiquito, that I was called Avarito and that I would undertake the same services just as faithfully.

  I was told that my services would be accepted but that I had to go at once to rest, as I would have to sit up with the patient for several consecutive nights. So I slept, and that evening presented myself to take up my duties. I was led to the patient, whom I found stretched out on a bed in a very awkward position, not having the use of any of his limbs except his left hand.

  As it happens, he was a young man with an interesting face. He wasn’t actually ill but, having had his limbs shattered, suffered terrible pain. I tried to make him forget his suffering by amusing and distracting him as best I could. Eventually I managed to get him to agree to tell me his story, which he did as follows:

  LOPE SOAREZ’S STORY

  I am the only son of Gaspar Soarez, the richest merchant in Cadiz. My father, who is of a naturally austere and unbending humour, required me to do nothing else but work at the counter of his business. He refused to let me take part in the amusements in which the sons of the prominent families of Cadiz indulged. Since I wanted to please him in all that I did, I rarely went to the theatre and never took part in those festivities to which people in mercantile towns devote their Sundays.

  Yet because the mind needs relaxation I sought this by reading those enjoyable but dangerous books we know as novels. The taste I had for them predisposed me to love but, as I rarely went out and as no women visited us, I did not have the opportunity of disposing of my heart.

  My father discovered that he had business at court and thought that this would be a good opportunity for me to get to know Madrid, so he told me of his plan to send me there. Far from having any objections, I was delighted at being able to breathe a freer air away from the iron grilles of the counter and the dust of our shops.

  When all the preparations for the journey had been made, my father summoned me to his study and spoke to me as follows:

  ‘My son, you are going to a place where merchants don’t play the leading role as they do in Cadiz. They need to adopt a very grave and modest demeanour in order not to bring into disrepute a profession which confers honour on them since it contributes greatly not only to the prosperity of their country but also to the real power of the monarch. Here are three precepts that you will faithfully observe on pain of incurring my wrath.

  ‘First, I order you to avoid the company of nobles. They think they do us honour when they address words to us. This is an error in which they must not be left, since our reputation is altogether independent of anything they might have to say to us.

  ‘Second, I order you to call yourself just Soarez, not Lope Soarez. Titles do not enhance the reputation of a merchant. That consists entirely in the range of his connections and the wisdom of his ventures.

  ‘Third, I forbid you ever to draw your sword. Since it is the custom, I will allow you to carry one. But you must not forget that the honour of a merchant consists entirely in the scrupulousness with which he fulfils his engagements. This is why I have never wanted you to take a single lesson in the dangerous art of fencing.

  ‘If you contravene any one of these three rules you will incur my wrath. But there is a fourth which you must also obey on pain of incurring not only my wrath but also my solemn curse, my father’s curse and the curse of my grandfather, who is your great-grandfather and the founder of our fortune. The important point is never to enter into any direct or indirect relations with the house of the brothers Moro, the court bankers.

  ‘The brothers Moro rightfully enjoy the reputation of being the most honest people in the world
and this prohibition of mine may justifiably surprise you. But you will no longer be surprised when you learn of the grievances which our house has against theirs. That is why I must briefly tell you our story:

  THE STORY OF THE HOUSE OF SOAREZ

  The founder of our fortune was Iñigo Soarez, who, having spent his childhood sailing the seven seas, bought a sizeable share at the auction2 of the Potosí mines and established a trading house at Cadiz.

  As the gypsy reached this point of the story Velásquez pulled out his tablets and made some notes. The story-teller then turned to him and said, ‘Señor duque perhaps intends to engage in some interesting calculations? My tale might distract him from them.’

  ‘Not at all,’ said Velásquez. ‘It’s your story which I am thinking about. Señor Iñigo Soarez will perhaps meet someone in America who will tell him the story of someone who has also a story to tell. So as not to lose my way, I have thought up a scale of relations which is like the one used for sequences given by recurrence relations, so called because they ultimately depend upon the first terms. Please go on.’

  The gypsy went on as follows:

  Intending to found a house, Iñigo Soarez sought the friendship of the principal merchants of Spain. The Moro brothers had a prominent role already at that time. He told them of his intention of establishing lasting relations with them. He obtained their consent and, to set things in motion, established funds in Antwerp on which he drew in Madrid. But imagine his indignation when he received a bill of exchange together with a legal protest. By the following post he received a letter of apology. Rodrigo Moro wrote to him to say that he had been at San Ildefonso with the minister, that the letter of confirmation from Antwerp had been delayed, that his head clerk had not thought that he should waive the established rule of the house and that meanwhile he would be ready to make any reparation required. But the insult had been delivered. Iñigo Soarez broke off all relations with the Moro brothers and on his deathbed he advised his son never to have any dealings with them.

  My father, Ruiz Soarez, remained obedient to his for a long time, but a great bankruptcy which unexpectedly reduced the number of trading houses forced him, one might say, to have recourse to the Moro brothers. He had every reason to repent of this decision. I have told you that we had taken a great share in the Potosí mines at their auction. This meant that we had many ingots in our possession and it was our practice to settle bills with them, as they were not subject to fluctuations in rates of exchange. To do this we kept chests containing a hundred pounds of silver to a value of two thousand seven hundred and fifty-seven piastres fortes and six reals. These chests, some of which you may have seen, were bound in iron and sealed with lead seals bearing the mark of our house. Every chest had its own number. They went out to the Indies and back to Europe and out to America again without anyone thinking of opening them, and everyone was very happy to take payment in them. They were even well known in Madrid. Yet when someone had to make a payment to the house of Moro and took in four of these chests, not only did the head clerk have them opened but he even had the silver assayed. When the news of this insulting behaviour reached Cadiz my father became very indignant indeed. It is true that he received by the next post a letter full of apology from Antonio Moro, Rodrigo’s son. Antonio wrote that he had been called away to Valladolid, where the court then was, and that on his return he had been furious about the actions of his clerk, who being foreign, did not know Spanish practice.

  My father was not satisfied with this apology. He broke off all relations with the house of Moro and on his deathbed advised me never to have any dealings with them.

  For a long time I remained obedient to my father’s orders and things went well. But eventually a particular set of circumstances put me in contact with the house of Moro. I forgot my father’s dying advice, or rather I did not have it in the forefront of my mind, and you will see what happened to me as a result.

  I was forced by some business at court to go to Madrid. There I made the acquaintance of a certain retired merchant called Livardez, who lived off the income he received from considerable capital sums which had been invested in various places. There was something about this man’s character which I found congenial. Our friendship was already close when I learnt that Livardez was the maternal uncle of Sancho Moro, then the head of the Moro house. I should have broken off all contact with Livardez then, but I did not. On the contrary, my friendship with him became even closer.

  One day Livardez told me that, knowing how much I knew about commerce in the Philippines, he wanted to invest a million in shares in a venture there. I pointed out to him that as he was an uncle of the Moro family he ought really to entrust his money to them.

  ‘No,’ he replied. ‘I do not like to have financial dealings with my close relatives.’ In the end, he succeeded in convincing me to act for him. He was able to do this all the more readily because I was not entering into any relations with the Moro family itself. Once back in Cadiz, I added a ship to the two I sent every year to the Philippines and thought no more about it.

  The following year poor Livardez died and Sancho Moro wrote to me that his uncle had placed a million with me and asked me to send it to him. I should perhaps have informed him of the conditions of the share agreement but I did not want to enter into any contact with the accursed house and so simply returned the million.

  Two years later my ships returned and my capital investment tripled, so two millions were due to the late Livardez. I had therefore to engage in correspondence with the Moro brothers. I wrote to them that I had two millions to hand over to them.

  They replied that the capital had been banked two years before and that they didn’t want to hear any more about the matter. You can well imagine, my son, that I could not fail to be offended by so dreadful an insult. For it amounted to their wanting to make a present of two millions. I spoke about it to several Cadiz merchants, who told me that the Moro brothers were right, and that having banked the capital they no longer had any rights to the profits I had made. I for my part offered to prove by original documents that Livardez’s capital was really on the ships, and that if they had not returned I would have had the right to reclaim the money that I had given to them. But I saw that the name of Moro impressed them too much and that if I had appealed to a commission of merchants, their expert opinion would not have been in my favour.

  I consulted a lawyer, who told me that as the Moro brothers had withdrawn this capital without the permission of their dead uncle and as I had used it in the way the said uncle intended it to be used, the said capital was still really in my hands and that the million banked by the Moro brothers was another million which had nothing to do with the former sum. My lawyer advised me to summon the house of Moro to the court at Seville. This I did and in six years spent one hundred thousand piastres as plaintiff; but in spite of all this I lost my case and still had the two million pounds.

  At first I wanted to use it to set up some pious foundation but I feared that the merit of this would be attributed in part to the cursed Moro brothers. I still do not know what I will do with this money. In the meantime when I draw up my accounts of credit and debit I place on the credit side two million less. So you see, my son, that I have sufficient reason to forbid you to have any contact with the Moro family.

  The gypsy chief was at this point in his story when he was summoned elsewhere and we all went our own ways.

  The Thirty-third Day

  We set off again and were soon joined by the Wandering Jew, who continued his story as follows:

  THE WANDERING JEW’S STORY CONTINUED

  So we grew up under the gaze of good Dellius, who could no longer see but guided us by his prudence and directed us by his good counsel. Eighteen centuries have since passed and my childhood years are the only time of my long life that I recall with some pleasure. I loved Dellius like a father, and was deeply attached to my friend Germanus, but I used to have frequent arguments with him, always on the same subject
, which was religion. Imbued with the intolerant principles of the synagogue, I would repeatedly say to him, ‘Your idols have eyes but they see not; they have ears but they hear not. A goldsmith carves the first and mice make their nest in the second.’ Germanus would always reply that they were not looked on as gods and that I had no idea about the religion of the Egyptians.

  This frequently repeated reply made me curious. I asked Germanus to get Chæremon1 the priest to instruct me himself in his religion, which could only be done in secret, for if it had been known in the synagogue I would have suffered the indignity of being excommunicated. Germanus was much liked by Chæremon, who was happy to agree to my request. And the very next night I made my way to a grove next to the temple of Isis. Germanus introduced me to Chæremon, who, having made me sit down beside him, joined his hands in devout meditation and then uttered the following prayer in the vernacular of Lower Egypt, which I understood perfectly:

  The Egyptian Prayer