“Prince,” answered Mirzoza, “Selim has too great obligations to our sex, to tear them in pieces without mercy.”
“Madam,” said Selim, “his highness, who could not possibly meet with cruel women, ought naturally to think of the sex as he does: and you, who have the good nature to judge of others by yourself, can hardly have any other sentiments than those which you defend. I will own however, that I am apt to believe there are women of sense, to whom the benefits of virtue are known by experience, and whom a serious reflection has convinced of the ill consequences of an irregular life; women happily born, well educated, who have learn’d to feel their duty, who love it, and will never swerve from it.”
“And not to lose ourselves in speculative reasoning,” added the favorite, “is not Egle, with all her sprightliness and charms, a model of virtue? Prince, you cannot doubt it, and all Banza knows it from your mouth: now, if there be one virtuous woman, there may be a thousand.”
“Oh! as to the possibility,” said Mangogul, “I dispute it not.”
“But if you allow it possible,” replied Mirzoza, “who has revealed to you, that they do not actually exist?”
“Nothing but their Toys,” answered the Sultan. “And yet I grant that this evidence does not come up to the strength of your argument. May I be transform’d into a mole, if you have not borrowed it from some Bramin. Order the Manimonbanda’s chaplain to be called, and he will tell you that you have proved the existence of virtuous women, much as he demonstrates that of Brama, in Braminology. Apropos, have you not taken a course in that sublime school, before you entered the Seraglio?”
“No ill-natured jokes,” replied Mirzoza. “I do not draw my conclusion from possibility: I ground it on a fact, on an experiment.”
“Yes,” continued Mangogul, “on a lame fact, on a single experiment; while, to your certain knowledge, I have a multitude of trials for my opinion: but I will not sour your temper by farther contradictions.”
“It is a favor,” said Mirzoza, “that after two hours teasing, you cease to persecute me.”
“If I have committed the fault,” answered Mangogul, “I will endeavour to make amends for it. Madam, I give up all my past advantages; and if, in the trials which I shall hereafter make, I light on a single woman really and constantly virtuous.”
“What will you do?” interrupted Mirzoza smartly.
“I will declare to the world, if you require it, that I am charmed with your reasoning on the possibility of virtuous women; I will support the reputation of your logic with all my might; and will give you my castle of Amara, with all the Saxon Porcelains which adorn it; even without excepting the little Sapajou, or red-faced monkey in Enamel, and the other valuable knickknacks, which I had out of the cabinet of Madame de Verue.”
“Prince,” says Mirzoza, “I will be content with the Porcelains of the castle, and the little monkey.”
“A bargain,” replies the Sultan, “Selim shall be our judge. I only desire a little respite before I examine Egle’s Toy. The court air, and her husband’s jealousy, must be allowed time to operate.”
Mirzoza granted a month to Mangogul; which was double the time he required: and they parted equally filled with hope.
The city of Banza also would have been full of wagers on either side, if the Sultan’s promise had been divulged. But Selim kept the secret, and Mangogul clandestinely prepared for winning or losing. As he was quitting the favorite’s apartment, he heard her call out to him from her closet: “Prince, and the little monkey.”
“And the little monkey,” answered Mangogul, and went out. He was going directly to the private lodge of a senator, whither we will attend him.
XXXII
The Fifteenth Trial of the Ring
Alphana
The Sultan was not ignorant, that the young lords of the court had private lodges; but he was lately informed, that those retreats were likewise used by some senators. He was much surprised at this. “What do they do there?” said he to himself. (For in this volume he will keep up the custom of monology, which he contracted in the first.)1 “I should think, that a man, whom I have entrusted with the tranquillity, fortune, liberty, and lives of my people, ought not to have a private lodge. But perhaps a senator’s private lodge is quite different from that of a Petit-Maître. Can a magistrate, before whom the interests of the greatest of my subjects are discussed, who holds the fatal urn, out of which he is to draw the widow’s lot, can he, I say, forget the dignity of his state, and the importance of his duty; and while Cochin fatigues his lungs in vain by carrying the cries of the orphan to his ear, can he be studying subjects of gallantry, which are to be ornaments over the door of a place of secret debauchery? That cannot be.—However, let us see.”
He said, and departed for Alcanto, where the senator Hippomanes has his private lodge. He enters, walks round the apartments, and examines the furniture. Everything has a gay appearance.
