Chapter 32
Once more deals with nothing but the orgy of drinking and how to get rid of any priests who are there
After all this had been sorted out I had to carry on waiting at table as before. The pastor was still there and people kept urging him to drink like all the rest. He, however, refused to keep pace with all the toasts, saying he had no intention of swilling his drink like an animal. At that one of the hard drinkers there offered to prove that it was he, the pastor, who was drinking like an animal, whilst the boozer himself and all those around were drinking like human beings.
‘An animal’, he said, ‘only drinks as much as it needs, enough to quench its thirst, because it doesn’t know what is good and doesn’t like wine. We human beings, on the other hand, enjoy having a good drink and letting the noble juice of the vine slip down our throats, as our fathers did before us.’
‘That may well be’, replied the pastor, ‘but it is my duty to avoid excess. One beaker is enough for me.’
‘Let it never be said I stopped a man of honour from doing his duty’, said the other and had a huge bowl filled with wine, which he then proffered to the pastor who, however, got up and walked away, leaving the man clutching his bucket of wine.
Once he was out of the way things started to get out of hand. It began to look as if this banquet was designed as an opportunity for people to have their revenge on others by getting them drunk, bringing shame on them or playing them some trick or other. Whenever one of them, no longer able to sit, stand or walk, had to be carried out, another would shout, ‘That’s quits. You got me liquored up like this before, now you’ve had a taste of your own medicine’, and so on. The one that could hold his drink best boasted about it and thought himself no end of a hero.
Eventually they were all reeling around as if they had eaten henbane seeds; they were like the clowns in the carnival, and yet there was no one who thought it comic apart from me. One was singing, another crying; one was laughing, another groaning; one was cursing, another praying; one was shouting, ‘Don’t give up!’ another was beyond speech; one was quiet and peaceful, another wanted to drive the devil out with his bare fists; one was sleeping silently, another gabbling so that no one else could get a word in; one was telling the story of an affair of the heart, another recounting the bloody deeds he had done in battle; a few were talking about the church and spiritual matters, others of politics, reasons of state and the affairs of the Empire. There were those who could not keep still and ran to and fro, others lay on the floor, incapable of moving a muscle, never mind standing up and walking; some were still eating like ploughmen, as if they had been starving for a week, while others were spewing up everything they had eaten during the day. In a word, everything they did was so comic, foolish and strange, and at the same time sinful and godless, that compared with it the stench I had let out, for which I had been so cruelly beaten, seemed nothing more than a joke.
Eventually some serious fighting started at the bottom of the table. They threw glasses, goblets, bowls and plates at each other and used not only their fists but stools, chair-legs, daggers and anything they could lay their hands on, so that the blood was running down over their ears.
Chapter 33
How the governor shot a most foul cat
My master soon put an end to the fighting, and once peace had been restored the master-drinkers took the musicians and women with them to another building, where there was a large room which was dedicated to another kind of folly. My master was not feeling well, either from anger or overeating, and stretched out on a sofa. I let him lie there where he was so that he could rest and sleep, but hardly had I reached the door than he tried to whistle for me, but nothing came out. Then he called to me, though all he managed to say was ‘Simply’. I ran over to where he was and saw he was rolling his eyes like an animal being slaughtered. I stood there like a dunce, not knowing what needed to be done. The governor pointed to the sideboard and gabbled, ‘Br-bra-bring tha-that, you s-so-son of a bitch, fetch the ba-ba-basin, I have to-to shoo-shoo-shoot a cat.’ I rushed over and brought the wash-basin and by the time I got to him his cheeks were bulging like a trumpeter’s. He quickly grabbed me by the arm and made me stand so I had to hold the basin right in front of his mouth, which suddenly burst open with painful retching, emptying a stream of such foul slimy stuff into the said basin that I almost fainted from the unbearable stench, especially since (if you will forgive my mentioning it) a few gobbets splashed up into my face. I almost followed suit, but when I saw how pale he had gone I was so afraid his soul would depart along with the vomit that my own nausea was forgotten. He broke out into a cold sweat and his face looked like that of a dying man. But he recovered almost immediately and sent me to bring fresh water so he could rinse out his wine-skin of a belly.
After that he ordered me to take the cat away. Lying there in the silver basin, it did not strike me as disgusting; it looked rather like a bowl full of appetisers for four men. I could not bring myself simply to pour it away, especially since I knew my master had not had anything bad in his stomach but exquisite, delicious vol-au-vents and all kinds of roasts – poultry, game other meats – which were all still clearly recognisable in the basin. I hurried off with it, but did not know where to take it or what to do with it. My master was the last person I could ask, so I took this splendid feast to the steward and asked him what I should do with the cat.
‘Take it to the tanner, you fool’, he said, ‘so he can tan its hide.’
When I asked where I could find the tanner, he realised how simple I was and said, ‘No, take it to the doctor so he can examine it and see what our lord’s state of health is like.’
I would have gone on this April-fool’s errand if the steward had not been afraid of the consequences. He told me to take the stuff to the kitchen with orders that the maids should put it on one side and season it well. This I did in all earnestness and was heartily mocked by those hussies for my pains.
Chapter 34
How Simplicius spoilt the dance
By the time I had managed to get rid of my basin my master was just going out. I followed him towards a building where I saw men and women, married and single, jumping about together in a large room so that the whole place was seething. There was such a stamping and caterwauling I thought they had all gone mad, for I could not imagine what the point of all this frantic frenzy was. I found the sight so frightening, so horrifying and terrifying that my hair stood on end. The only explanation I could find was that they had all taken leave of their senses. As we came closer I saw that it was the guests from our banquet, and they had certainly still been in their right minds that morning. ‘My God’, I thought, ‘what do these poor people think they are doing? They must be suffering from an attack of collective insanity.’ Then it occurred to me that it might be some fiendish spirits that had disguised themselves to mock the whole human race with their wild prancing and monkeyish behaviour. They would surely never act in a way so unbecoming of human beings if they had human souls and God’s likeness within them.
As my master went into the house and entered the room the frenzy was just ceasing, apart from a bobbing and bowing of heads and such a scratching and scraping of feet on the floor that I thought they were trying to erase the footmarks they had made during their wild stamping. From the sweat pouring down their faces and their puffing and panting I could tell that it had been hard work. Yet the happy expressions on their faces indicated they did not find the exertion unpleasant.
I dearly wanted to know the reason for all this madness, so I asked my companion and bosom friend, the one who had recently taught me the art of soothsaying, what was the meaning of this frenzy, the purpose of this furious skipping and strutting. He told me the truth of it was that all those present had come to an agreement to demolish the floor by stamping on it.
‘Why do you think’, he said, ‘they’re in such a hurry? Can’t you see they’ve already smashed the windows to amuse themselves? The floor’s
for it next.’
‘Good Lord’, I replied, ‘then we’ll all go down with it and break our necks as we fall!’
‘Yes’, said my companion, ‘that’s what they’re aiming to do, and they couldn’t care less. You’ll see, as soon as it gets really dangerous each one will grab a pretty woman or girl. They say that couples that fall down holding each other don’t get hurt at all.’
I believed this and was seized with such fear I might be killed that I did not know what to do. And when the musicians, whom I had not noticed until then, started playing and the men rushed over to the women, like soldiers dashing to their posts when the drum sounds, and each grabbed one by the hand, I could already see the floor giving way and myself and many others breaking our necks. But when they started jumping up and down, making the whole building shake, because the band had struck up a lively tune, I thought, ‘This is the end’. I assumed the whole building would suddenly collapse and was so terrified I promptly clutched like a bear the arm of a lady of high rank and even higher virtue, with whom my master happened to be conversing, and clung on to her like a burr. When she, not knowing the strange ideas I had in my head, kept trying to pull her arm away, I became desperate and started to scream as if someone were murdering me. As if that were not enough, something slipped out into my trousers which gave off an awful stench, the like of which I had not smelt for a long time.
All at once the music stopped and the dancers and their partners stood still. The noble lady, to whose arm I was clinging, was highly offended because she thought my master had ordered me to do it to make a laughing-stock of her. Therefore the governor ordered me to be beaten and then locked up somewhere, since this was not the first trick I had played on him that day. The orderlies who were to carry out the punishment not only took pity on me, they were unwilling to come too close because of the stench, so that they omitted the beating and shut me up in the goose-coop under the staircase. Since that time I have often reflected on this matter and have come to the conclusion that excrement which is emitted due to fear and terror gives off a much worse smell than the product of a strong laxative.
Book II
Chapter 1
How a goose and a gander mated
While I was penned up in my goose-coop I worked out the things I said about dancing and drunkenness in my book Black and White: The Satirical Pilgrim, published a few years ago, so that it is unnecessary to waste words on them here. I feel I must point out, however, that even at the time I did wonder whether the dancers would really have demolished the floor with their wild stamping or whether I had been the victim of a hoax.
Now I want to continue with my story and tell you how I got out of my goose-jail again. I had been squatting on my heels there for three whole hours, until the praeludium veneris (the decorous dancing, I should have said) was over, when someone crept up and started rattling the bolt. I was listening as carefully as any sow pissing into water, but the fellow at the door not only opened it, he slipped in as quickly as I would have liked to slip out. What is more, he dragged a woman in with him, leading her by the hand, just as I had seen them do when they were dancing. I had no idea what was going to happen, but by then I had had so many strange adventures that day that my simple mind had become accustomed to them and I had decided to bear everything fate would send in uncomplaining silence. Accordingly I pressed up against the door in fear and trembling, expecting the worst.
Immediately a whispering started up between the two. I could understand nothing of what was said except that one party was complaining of the awful smell in the place while the other was trying to make the first forget about it. ‘Be assured, o most beautiful creature’, he said, ‘that it pains me to the heart that a malevolent fate has not granted us a more becoming place to enjoy the fruits of love. But despite that, I can truly say that your sweet presence makes this wretched hole more exquisite than the most delightful paradise.’ After that I heard kissing and observed strange postures, but since I did not know what it all meant, I continued to remain as silent as a mouse. When, however, a funny noise started up and the coop, which only consisted of boards nailed together under the staircase, began to creak and the woman to moan as if she were in pain, I thought that these must be two of the crazy people who had been trying to demolish the floor and had come here to do the same to my prison and kill me. The moment this thought came into my head I opened the door, to escape being killed, and shot out with a fearful yell which was naturally as loud as that which brought me there in the first place. I did, however, have my wits sufficiently about me to lock the door behind me and make for the open door of the house.
That was the first wedding I had ever been present at in my life, though I had not been invited. That meant I did not have to give a present, but later on the bridegroom did present me with a whacking bill, which I paid in full.
I am not telling this story, reader, just to make you laugh, but so that my history will be complete and also that you may consider carefully what the fruits of dancing can be. It is certainly true, I believe, that during the dance many a bargain is struck which will later bring shame on a whole family.
Chapter 2
On the merits of a good bath at the right time
Although I had managed to escape from the goose-coop, I now realised the full extent of my misfortune, for I had shitted my trousers and did not know what to do about it. Everything was quiet and everyone asleep in my master’s lodgings, so that I dared not approach the sentry standing by the door; they refused to let me into the main guard-house because I smelt so awful, and it was too cold for me to stay out in the street. I was at a loss what to do. It was already well past midnight when it occurred to me to seek refuge with the pastor I have mentioned so often. This seeming a good idea, I knocked at the door and kept on for so long that eventually the maid, somewhat annoyed, let me in. When she smelt the load I brought with me (her long nose immediately ferreted out my secret) she became even angrier and started to scold me, which her master, who by this time had more or less slept off the effects of the banquet, soon heard. He called the pair of us to his bedside. His nostrils twitched as he quickly got to the bottom of my problem and said that, despite the calendar, there was never a better time to have a bath than when in the state I was in at the moment. He ordered the maid to get my trousers washed before daybreak and to hang them by the stove in the sitting room. He also told her to find a bed for me, for he could see I was numb with cold.
Hardly was I warmed up than it started to get light and the pastor appeared at my bedside to find out what had happened to me. (My shirt and trousers still being wet, I could hardly get up and go to his room.) I told him everything, beginning with the fine art my fellow page had taught me and how disastrously it had turned out. Next I described how, after he had gone, the guests had taken leave of their senses and (as my comrade also explained to me) had decided to demolish the floor of the building. I told him of the dreadful fear that had seized me, the way I had tried to save myself from being killed and how I had been locked in the goose-coop for it. I also told him everything I had seen and heard of the pair who had set me free and how I had locked them in the coop in my place.
‘Oh Simplicius’, the pastor said, ‘Your prospects are as good as nil. You had a fine situation, but I’m very much afraid you’ve thrown it away. Now out of that bed as quick as you can and get out of my house before they find you here, otherwise I might fall into your master’s disfavour along with you.’
So I had to go off in my wet clothes, having learnt how well regarded by all and sundry a man is when he has his master’s favour and how looked down upon when he has lost it. I went to my master’s quarters, where everyone was still sleeping like a log apart from the cook and a couple of maids. The latter were cleaning up the room where the banquet had been held the previous evening while the former was preparing breakfast or, rather, a cold collation from the left-overs. First I came upon the maids. Parts of the room were covered in broken glass from the go
blets and window-panes, others were full of what the guests had evacuated, both from above and from below, and in some places there were such large pools of spilt wine and beer that the floor was like a map on which you could have drawn various oceans, islands and continents. The stench in the whole room was far worse than in my goose-coop, so I didn’t stay there long. I went to the kitchen to dry off my clothes at the fire while I was still wearing them, waiting, in fear and trembling, to find out what fate would have in store for me once my master had woken up. At the same time I reflected on the folly and senselessness of the world and went over in my mind everything that had happened to me during the previous day and night, as well as the things I had seen and heard. The result was that I came to see the hermit’s life of poverty and indigence as a happy one and wished that both he and I could return to our former situation.
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