the host, “give me the angles, and my wife will roast them in a trice, though they are a sort of birds I never heard the names of before.” “They are no birds,” replied the other; and turning to me, added, “Pray, sir, do but observe the effects of ignorance. Let me have the spits, for I want them only to fence with, and perhaps you will see me do that today which may be worth more to you than all you have got in your life.” In fine, the spits were in use, and we were fain to take up with two long ladles. Never was anything so ridiculous seen in this world. He gave a skip, and said, “This sally gains me more ground, and puts by my adversary’s sword; now I make my advantage of the remiss motion to kill in the natural way; this should be a cut, and this a thrust.” He came not within a mile of me, but danced round with his ladle; now I standing still all the while, all his motions looked as if he were fencing with a pot that is boiling over the fire. Then he went on, saying, “In short, this is the true art, not like the drunken follies of fencing-masters, who understand nothing but drinking.” The words were scarce out of his mouth before a great he-mulatto stepped out of the next room, with a pair of whiskers like two brushes, a hat as big as an umbrella, a buff-doublet under a loose coat, bandy-legged, hook-nosed, and with two or three signs of the cross on his face, a dagger that might have served Goliath, and a hanging look, and said, “I am an approved master, and have my certificate about me, and by this light I’ll make an example of any man that dare presume to reflect upon so many brave fellows as profess the noble science.”
14 Seeing we were likely to be in a broil, I stepped in, and said, “He had not spoken to him, and therefore he had no occasion to be affronted.” “Draw your sword, if you have ever a one,” added he, “and let us try who has most skill, without playing the fool with ladles.” My poor wretched companion opened his book, and cried aloud, “Here it is, as I say, in the book, and it is printed by authority; and I’ll maintain with the ladle that all it contains is true; or else without the ladle, either here, or upon any other ground; and if anybody does not believe it, let us measure it.” This said, he pulled out his compasses, and went on, “This is an obtuse angle.” The fencing-master drew his dagger, and replied, “I neither know who is angle, nor who is obtuse; nor did I ever hear such words before; but I’ll cut you in pieces with this dagger in my hand.” He ran at the poor devil, who fled from him amain, skipping about the house, and crying, “He cannot hurt me, for I have gained upon his sword.” The landlord and I parted them, with the help of other people that came in, though I was scarce able to stand for laughing. The honest madman was put into his chamber, and I with him. We supped, and all the house went to bed. About two of the clock he got up in his shirt, and began to ramble about the room, skipping and sputtering a deal of nonsense in mathematical terms. He waked me, and not satisfied with this, went down to the landlord to give him a light, saying he had found a fixed object for the cross pass upon the bow. The landlord wished him at the devil for waking him; but still the other tormented him, till he called him a madman, and then he came up and told me, if I would rise I should see the curious fence he had found out against the Turks and their scimitars, and added, he would go show it to the king immediately, because it was very advantageous to Christendom. By this time it was day, we all got up and paid our shot. We reconciled the madman and the fencing-master, who went away, saying, “That what my companion alleged was good in itself, but it made more men mad than skilful at their weapon, because not one in a hundred understood the least part of it.”
I held on my journey to Madrid, and my mad companion went off to go another road; when he had gone a little way he turned back very hastily, and calling on me as loud as he could, though we were in the open where none could hear us, he whispered in my ear, “Pray, sir, let me conjure you, as you hope to live, not to discover any of the mighty secrets I have acquainted you with, relating to the art of fencing, but keep them to yourself, since you are a man of sound judgment.” I promised so to do; he went his way again, and I fell a-laughing at the comical secret. I travelled about a league without meeting anybody, and was considering with myself how difficult a matter it was for me to tread the paths of virtue and honour, since it was requisite, in the first place, that I should hide the scandal of my parents, and then have so much worth myself as to conceal me from their shame. These thoughts seemed to me so honourable, that I congratulated myself on them, and said, “It will be much more honourable in me, who had none to learn virtue from, than in those who had it hereditary from their predecessors.” My head was full of these ideas, when I overtook a very old clergyman riding on a mule towards Madrid.
