The Adventures of Simplicius Simplicissimus

by Hans Jakob Christoffel von Grimmelshausen

  In the meantime, as everyone thought I had gone into hibernation and wouldn’t be stirring anytime soon, I kept abreast of my Werl counterpart’s movements. I discovered that he was not just using my name and aping my outfit but also sneaking out at night to filch whatever he could lay his hands on. I did wake up then (rather abruptly, I have to say) and formed a plan of attack. I’d trained my two servants up as thoroughly as watchdogs, making them so loyal they’d both have walked through fire for me in an emergency; I gave them plenty to eat and drink, you see, and they got masses of loot. So I sent one of them off to my counterpart in Werl, where he told the imposter that his (ex-)boss seemed to have lost his nerve and was swearing never to go out raiding again. Consequently he wanted to switch to serving someone who, like his former master, had adopted hunting dress and was behaving like a proper soldier. I further told the servant to say he knew the district like the back of his hand and could point the Huntsman of Werl in the direction of good booty. The joker (I mean my counterpart) swallowed every word and agreed to take the servant on, including him in the party when he raided a sheepfold one night in search of some fat wethers. Together with my mate Tearaway and my other servant, I was already lying in wait, having bribed the shepherd to tie up his dogs and give the incomers free access to the barn, assuring him that I’d cook their goose (except in this case it was mutton) for them. When they’d made a hole in the wall, the Huntsman of Werl wanted my servant to slip in first. However, the latter objected, ‘No, there might be someone on guard inside, ready to bash me over the head. I can see you don’t know much about mousing. We do a bit of research first.’ Unsheathing his rapier, he hung his hat on the tip and pushed it through the hole several times. ‘See?’ he said. ‘That’s what you must do – find out if there’s anyone at home.’ That done, the Huntsman of Werl was the first to crawl in. Tearaway, waiting inside, promptly grabbed him by his rapier arm and asked if he surrendered. Hearing this, the other man outside turned tail and bolted. I didn’t know which of them was the Huntsman, and anyway I was fast on my feet, so I squeezed out of the hole and gave chase. I caught the man in a few steps. ‘Who do you fight for?’ I asked. ‘The Emperor,’ he answered. I retorted, ‘No, I mean: what’s your regiment? I fight for the Emperor too. But shame on the man who’ll deny his commander!’ To which he replied, ‘We’re dragoons out of Soest and we’re here for some mutton. If we’re brothers-in-arms you won’t stop us, I trust.’ I enquired further, ‘Who are you, then, if you’re from Soest?’ He said, ‘My comrade inside is the Huntsman.’ ‘You’re rogues!’ I retorted. ‘What do you mean by plundering one of your own contributors? The Huntsman of Soest isn’t such a fool as to get nabbed in a sheepfold!’ ‘Silly me!’ the wretch replied. ‘I meant the Huntsman of Werl.’ While we were trading arguments, my servant and Tearaway came up with my counterpart. I turned on the latter: ‘So, damn you, we meet at last! If it weren’t for my respect for the Imperial arms that you too have agreed to bear, I’d be inclined to put a bullet through your head immediately. I’ve been the Huntsman of Soest up to now – and will remain so until you choose one of these rapiers and measure it against the other as a true soldier should!’ Here my servant (who like Tearaway was dressed in a hideous devil costume with enormous goat horns) laid two identical rapiers at our feet that I’d brought with me from Soest for the Huntsman of Werl to choose which he wanted. This gave the poor man such a fright that he reacted as I had in Hanau, when I’d ruined the dance: he honoured his trousers so richly that it was all the rest of us could do to stay near him. Trembling like wet dogs, he and his friend sank to their knees and begged for mercy. But Tearaway, in a voice that sounded as if it was booming from inside a jug, said to the imposter, ‘You’d better fight, otherwise I’ll personally wring your neck!’ ‘But, Mr Devil, sir, I didn’t come here to fight, if sir will spare me that, I’ll do anything else sir wants!’ As he wittered on, my servant placed one rapier in his hand and the other in mine. However, he was trembling so much he couldn’t hold his. There was a very bright moon, so the shepherd and his assistant could see and hear everything from their huts. I wanted a witness to our transactions, so I called the shepherd over. He came all right but, pretending not to see the two wearing devil disguises, he said to me, how come I was having this argy-bargy on his sheep farm; if I had business with those men, would I mind conducting it somewhere else? It was nothing to do with him; he paid his monthly protection money and expected to be left in peace. Turning to the others, he asked why they let me boss them around and didn’t strike back. ‘Idiot!’ I said, ‘these scoundrels were rustling your sheep!’ His reply? ‘If that’s what they were after, they’d have to lick my and the animals’ arses first!’ And off he stomped. I turned back to the Huntsman of Werl, repeated my challenge, but he was in such a funk, poor blighter, he could barely make his legs support him. I began to feel sorry for him; in fact, he and his companion pleaded with me so movingly that I eventually agreed to forgive and forget. However, Tearaway wasn’t having that. He forced the Huntsman to kiss three sheep (the number he’d wanted to steal) on the arse, plus he scratched the man’s face so atrociously that it looked as if he’d supped with cats. With that appalling revenge I confessed myself satisfied. But the Huntsman, for his part, felt so ashamed that he soon disappeared from Werl completely. Meanwhile his mate told anyone who’d listen, underlining his tale with fearful oaths, that I really did have two actual devils who waited on my every word. The result was, not only was I more feared than ever; I became very unpopular.

  Three

  The great god Jupiter is captured, and proclaims the gods’ advice

  I soon became aware of that, which is why I dropped my formerly godless lifestyle and devoted myself wholly to virtue and piety. All right, I still went out on raiding parties, but I treated friend and foe alike with such cordiality and discretion that all who had dealings with me got a different impression than the one they’d formed from hearsay. I also ceased my unnecessary extravagance and started putting together a fine collection of ducats and odd items of jewellery. These I sometimes hid in hollow trees in the countryside around Soest – for two reasons: (a) the famous soothsayer of Soest said I should do so, and (b) I’d more hostiles in the town and in my own regiment than outside and in enemy garrisons, all after my money. Moreover, since there was the occasional rumour that the ‘Huntsman’ had fled, I made sure that anyone who found the rumour attractive got a sudden shock, and that, even before one town learnt that I’d raided another, it made its own discovery that I was still around. I tore through the district like a whirlwind, hitting now this settlement, now that. In fact, I was more talked about than ever. There was always someone posing as me.

  On one occasion I and twenty-five guns lay in hiding near Dorsten, waiting to ambush a convoy of carts that we’d been told was approaching the town. I was on sentry duty myself (I made a habit of that when we were so close to an enemy stronghold), when along came a lone individual, very respectably dressed and with a cane in his hand that he was using to fight a curious duel. All I could gather from his muttering was that he was out to punish everyone for refusing to accept what he called his ‘divine authority’. I thought this might be some powerful ruler going around in disguise to spy on his subjects’ behaviour; perhaps, finding this unsatisfactory, he’d now decided to deal with the offenders accordingly. I concluded, ‘If this man belongs to the other side, he’ll fetch a fine ransom; if not, and if you show him courtesy and win his favour, it’ll stand you in good stead your whole life long.’ So out I jumped, shouldering my gun with hammer cocked, and said, ‘Right! The gentleman will kindly march in front of me into the undergrowth if he has no wish to be shot as an enemy.’ He said very earnestly, ‘Persons like myself are unaccustomed to being treated in this manner.’ However, prodding him forwards as politely as I could, I replied, ‘The gentleman will be so good as to agree to get a move on.’ When I came to the place where my men were waiting in the bushes, and when I’d posted another
sentry, I enquired of my prisoner who he was. In return he enquired, not ungrandly, whether it would have been of any concern to me to know he was a great god! I thought he might have heard of me. Possibly he was some local toff and was saying this just to tease me. Soest folk are always being teased themselves about their own ‘great God’ and his gold cache-sexe. However, I soon realized I’d caught not a toff (even a high-up of some kind) but a nutcase – someone who had too much book learning and had lost his footing in the poetic arts. Later, in fact, as he began to warm to me, he told me he was the god Jupiter.

  I was beginning to wish I’d not made the capture. However, having taken the fool into custody, I had to look after him until we’d completed the sortie. So to pass the time I decided to humour the fellow and take advantage of his gifts. ‘Well then, my dear Jupiter,’ I said to him, ‘what brings your Almightiness to quit his celestial throne and come down to us on Earth? Excuse the question, your lordship (which may strike you as barefaced cheek), but we’re not unrelated to the gods of heaven, albeit mere wood spirits, born of nymphs and fauns, and we’ve every right, surely, to this disclosure?’ Jupiter replied, ‘I swear by the Styx that ordinarily you’d learn nothing in this connection were it not for the striking resemblance you bear to my cupbearer Ganymede. I’d make no such disclosure even if you were born of Pan himself, but for Ganymede’s sake let me inform you that a great outcry against the world’s wickedness reached me through the clouds, the subject was discussed in the council of the gods, and I was given leave once again to cleanse the Earth with water, as in Lycaon’s day. However, since I’ve a special liking for the human race and anyway have always preferred to rule with kindness than with severity, here I am on Earth to see for myself what men are up to. And despite finding everything worse than I thought, I’m still not minded to eliminate the whole of mankind indiscriminately but to punish only those who deserve it and subsequently inculcate in the rest a desire to obey my will.’

  I had to laugh. However, I stifled this as much as I could while assuring the fellow, ‘Ah, Jupiter, your efforts will be wasted if you don’t once again, like last time, flood the world or even destroy it by fire. If you send war, it will benefit only the villains, whose one desire is to torment the pious peace-lovers. If you send inflation, you’ll be playing into the hands of the profiteers, whose corn will then be worth more. If you send a plague, the skinflints and survivors will be laughing, because they’ll inherit millions. No, you’ll have to destroy the whole shebang, root and branch, if it’s punishment you’re after.’

  Four

  Tells of the German hero who will conquer the world and bring peace to all nations

  Jupiter replied, ‘You speak of these matters like an ordinary mortal. Don’t you realize that we gods can arrange things so that only the wicked are punished and the good preserved? I want to raise up a German hero who’ll accomplish everything by the power of the sword, striking dead the ungodly and preserving and exalting the pious.’ I said, ‘A hero like that also needs soldiers, and where you’ve got soldiers you’ve also got war, and in war the innocent cop it as much as the guilty!’ ‘You mean, you earthly gods are of the same mind as earthly humans?’ said Jupiter, hearing this. ‘Do you understand nothing? Any hero I send won’t need soldiers; he’ll reshape the whole world by his own efforts! I’ll see that he’s born with a body as powerful and well formed as Hercules had and is equipped with greater foresight, greater wisdom, and greater understanding than he’ll ever have need of. Moreover, Venus shall give him a lovelier countenance than even Narcissus, Adonis, or my own Ganymede possesses and enhance all his virtues with a delicacy and charm that shall make him universally adored. For I myself shall ensure that, to this end, at the moment of his birth, I bestow on the goddess a glance of especial devotion. For his part, Mercury shall endow that hero with exceptional good sense, and the inconstant moon shall do him no harm but instil only benefit in the form of inconceivable speed. Pallas shall oversee his upbringing on Parnassus, and Vulcan shall forge his weapons under the sign of Mars, notably a sword with which he shall conquer the whole world and cut down all the ungodly, without the assistance of a single human being – without a single soldier, for instance, providing back-up. Every city will tremble at his approach; every fortress, no matter how “impregnable”, will bow to his command in the first quarter-hour. Ultimately, my hero will have the world’s greatest potentates answering his beck and call; he will establish the governance of land and sea in so excellent a manner that gods and men alike will delight in the result.’

  I said, ‘How can all the ungodly be cut down without blood being spilt? How can command over the whole wide world be achieved and exercised without strong-arm tactics, not to say violence on an enormous scale? That’s more than mortal man can understand, Jupiter, I have to say.’ Jupiter replied, ‘I’m not surprised, given your ignorance of the sheer might of my hero’s sword. Vulcan is going to manufacture it from the same materials as he uses for my thunderbolt. Its virtues will be such that my hero need only draw it and swish it through the air for a whole host of warriors, even hiding behind a hill a great distance from where he’s standing, to have their heads sliced off, causing them to keel over and lie there headless, poor devils, before realizing what has happened. If he then, launching his progress, arrives before some town or citadel, he’ll adopt Tamburlaine’s custom of hoisting a white flag to show that he comes in peace and for the benefit of all. If the people inside then emerge and accept his terms, fine. If not, he’ll let rip with the sword I keep mentioning and behead all the wizards and witches in the place, afterwards raising a red flag. If still no one emerges he’ll dispatch all the murderers, profiteers, thieves, thugs, adulterers, whores and rogues in the same way and raise a black flag. And if those left inside don’t immediately come out and make obeisance he’ll condemn the entire town and all its inhabitants for their stubborn disobedience while actually executing only those who, by preventing others from giving themselves up, were partly to blame for the populace not surrendering sooner. He’ll proceed in this way from town to town, assigning to each its surrounding portion of countryside to govern in peace, and from each and every town in Germany he’ll select two of the shrewdest and most knowledgeable men to form a parliament, unite those conurbations for all time, abolish villeinage as well as all tolls, taxes, interest payments, leases and contributions throughout the land, and establish such institutions as shall soon render socage, sentry duty, paying protection, local uprisings, even major wars all things of the past. Folk will have happier lives than the inhabitants of the Elysian Fields. And I shall often (Jupiter went on) lead the whole choir of the gods down to where the German folk live; I shall delight in their vineyards and fig trees; I shall set Mount Helicon within their borders and transplant the Muses; I shall endow Germany with more plenty than blessed Arabia, Mesopotamia and the regions around Damascus; forswearing Greek, I shall speak only German; in a nutshell, I’ll manifest so wholly German a bearing that in the end, like the Romans before them, they shall have dominion over the whole world.’ ‘But, great Jupiter,’ I said, ‘what are its princes and rulers going to say when the future hero sets about so unjustly depriving them of all that is theirs and bringing the country’s towns to heel? Won’t they protest violently, or at least mount some objection before the gods or their fellow men?’ To which Jupiter replied, ‘That won’t bother my hero much. He’ll divide the high-ups into three groups. Those who set a bad example by living ugly lives he’ll punish like commoners. No earthly violence can match the power of his sword, you see. The rest have a choice: put up or shut up and scram. Those who remain because they love their country will have to live like ordinary folk, but of course the personal lives of Germans then will be far happier and more agreeable than the lifestyle and standing of a king are now. The Germans, in fact, will then all resemble that Fabricius who declined to share King Pyrrhus’ kingdom with him because, as well as honour and virtue, he loved his fatherland so much. They’re t
he second group. The third is different: rulers who want to go on ruling he’ll lead through Hungary and Italy to Moldavia, Wallachia, on through Macedonia, Thrace and Greece – even across the Hellespont into Asia. He’ll conquer those countries for them, throw in the mercenaries currently serving throughout Germany, and set the latter up as kings all over the place. He’ll then take Constantinople in the space of a day, and he’ll round up any Turks who don’t either convert or submit and chop off their heads. Then, having set up a new Roman emperor in Constantinople, he’ll return to Germany, where he and his parliamentarians (chosen two by two, as I said, from each town in Germany to be the leaders and progenitors of his German fatherland) will build a city in the middle of Germany. The city will be larger than Manoah in the Americas and incorporate more gold than Solomon’s Jerusalem; its walls shall be as formidable as the Tyrolean mountains and its moats wider than the ocean separating Spain and Africa. Within the city he’ll erect a temple – all diamonds, rubies, emeralds and sapphires; and the art museum he’s going to build will house all the world’s rarities, chosen from among the sumptuous gifts sent to him by the rulers in China and Persia, the Great Mogul in the Oriental Indies, the mighty Tatar-Khan, Africa’s Prester John, and the Supreme Tsar of Moscow. The Sultan of Turkey would have been even more generous if said hero hadn’t filched his empire and lent it to the Roman emperor.’