“Good God! how do you manage?”
Here the Arabesque lamp commenced swinging with redoubled violence, and the stranger half started from his seat; however, with a slight sigh, he recovered his composure; merely saying to our hero, in a low tone: — “I tell you what, Pedro Garcia, once for all, we must have no more swearing.”
Pedro swallowed another bumper, and his visitor continued.
“Why there are several ways of managing. — The most of us starve. Some put up with the pickle. For my part, I purchase my spirits vivente corpore, in which case I find they keep very well.”
“But the body, my dear sir, the body!” vociferated the philosopher, for the wine had gotten a little into his head. Here he reached another bottle of Sauterne.
“The body! — well, what of the body? oh! ah! I perceive — why the body is not all affected by the transaction. I have made innumerable purchases of the kind in my day, and the parties never experience any inconvenience. There was Cain, and Nimrod, and Nero, and Caligula, and Dionysius, and Pisistratus, and — and the Jew — and — and a thousand others, all very good men in their way, who never knew what a soul was during the latter part of their lives. Yet these men adorned society. Why isn’t there V——, now? — whom you know as well as I — is he not in full possession of his faculties, mental and corporeal? Who writes a keener epigram? Who reasons more wittily? Who —— but I have his agreement in my pocket book.” Thus saying, he drew, from the luminous bag, a book with clasps of cornelian, and, from the book, a bundle of papers, upon some of which Pedro caught a glimpse of the letters MACHIA, MAZA, RICHEL, and the words DOMITIAN and ELIZABETH. From these papers he selected a narrow slip of parchment, and, from it, read aloud the following words: —
In consideration of certain mental endowments, which it would be unnecessary to specify, and in farther consideration of the sum of one thousand Louis d’or, I, being aged one year and one month, do, hereby, from this date, make over, to the bearer of this bond, all my right, title, and appurtenance in the shadow called ‘my soul.’
Done at Paris, this — day of —, in the year of our Lord —, FRANCOIS MARIE AROUET.
“A clever fellow that,” resumed the stranger, “but he was wrong about the shadow — the soul a shadow! — no such nonsense, Signor Pedro. — Only think of a fricaseed shadow!”
“Only think of a fricaseed s — h — a — d — o — w!” echoed our hero, whose faculties were becoming gloriously illuminated, “now, damme,” continued he, “Mr. — humph! — damme! (hiccup) if I would have been such a nincompoop. My soul, Mr. — humph! — yes, sir, my soul.”
“Your soul, Signor Pedro?”
“Yes, sir, my soul is — is — is — no shadow, damme!”
“I should be sorry to suppose, Signor Pedro —”
“Yes, sir, my soul is peculiarly calculated for — for — a stew, damme!”
“Ha!”
“A ragout —”
“Eh?”
“A fricasee —”
“Ah!”
“Or (hiccup) a cotelette — and I’ll let you have it a bargain.”
“Couldn’t think of such a thing,” said the stranger, calmly, at the same time arising from his seat.
Pedro stared.
“Am supplied at present —”
“Eh?”
“Have no cash on hand —”
“What?”
“Very ungentlemanly in me —”
“Humph!”
“To take advantage of —”
“Sir!”
“Your peculiar situation.”
Here the stranger bowed and withdrew, in what manner our philosopher could not exactly ascertain; but, in a well concerted effort to discharge a bottle at the scoundrel, the slender chain was severed that hung from the ceiling, and the metaphysician prostrated by the downfall of the lamp.
The End
Loss of Breath (1831)
O Breathe not, etc. Moore’s Melodies
THE MOST notorious ill-fortune must in the end yield to the untiring courage of philosophy–as the most stubborn city to the ceaseless vigilance of an enemy. Shalmanezer, as we have it in holy writings, lay three years before Samaria; yet it fell. Sardanapalus–see Diodorus–maintained himself seven in Nineveh; but to no purpose. Troy expired at the close of the second lustrum; and Azoth, as Aristaeus declares upon his honour as a gentleman, opened at last her gates to Psammetichus, after having barred them for the fifth part of a century….
“Thou wretch!–thou vixen!–thou shrew!” said I to my wife on the morning after our wedding; “thou witch!–thou hag!–thou whippersnapper–thou sink of iniquity!–thou fiery-faced quintessence of all that is abominable!–thou–thou-” here standing upon tiptoe, seizing her by the throat, and placing my mouth close to her ear, I was preparing to launch forth a new and more decided epithet of opprobrium, which should not fail, if ejaculated, to convince her of her insignificance, when to my extreme horror and astonishment I discovered that I had lost my breath.
The phrases “I am out of breath,” “I have lost my breath,” etc., are often enough repeated in common conversation; but it had never occurred to me that the terrible accident of which I speak could bona fide and actually happen! Imagine–that is if you have a fanciful turn–imagine, I say, my wonder–my consternation–my despair!
There is a good genius, however, which has never entirely deserted me. In my most ungovernable moods I still retain a sense of propriety, et le chemin des passions me conduit–as Lord Edouard in the “Julie” says it did him–a la philosophie veritable.
Although I could not at first precisely ascertain to what degree the occurence had affected me, I determined at all events to conceal the matter from my wife, until further experience should discover to me the extent of this my unheard of calamity. Altering my countenance, therefore, in a moment, from its bepuffed and distorted appearance, to an expression of arch and coquettish benignity, I gave my lady a pat on the one cheek, and a kiss on the other, and without saying one syllable (Furies! I could not), left her astonished at my drollery, as I pirouetted out of the room in a Pas de Zephyr.
Behold me then safely ensconced in my private boudoir, a fearful instance of the ill consequences attending upon irascibility–alive, with the qualifications of the dead–dead, with the propensities of the living–an anomaly on the face of the earth–being very calm, yet breathless.
Yes! breathless. I am serious in asserting that my breath was entirely gone. I could not have stirred with it a feather if my life had been at issue, or sullied even the delicacy of a mirror. Hard fate!–yet there was some alleviation to the first overwhelming paroxysm of my sorrow. I found, upon trial, that the powers of utterance which, upon my inability to proceed in the conversation with my wife, I then concluded to be totally destroyed, were in fact only partially impeded, and I discovered that had I, at that interesting crisis, dropped my voice to a singularly deep guttural, I might