The Sultan levelled his ring at her. A loud burst of laughter, which seized Alcina at some comical saying of her husband, was suddenly cut short by the operation of the ring; and immediately a murmuring noise was heard under her petticoats. “Well, now I am titled. Truly I am glad on’t. Nothing like having a rank. If my first advices had been heeded, I should have been provided with something better than an Emir: but yet an Emir is better than nothing.” At these words all the ladies quitted the game, to seek from what quarter the voice issued. This movement made a great noise.
“Silence,” says Mangogul, “this deserves attention.” They obeyed, and the Toy continued.
“One would be apt to think, that a husband is a guest of great importance, by the precautions which are taken to receive him. What preparatives! What profusion of myrtle water! Another fortnight of this regimen would have demolished me. I had disappear’d, and the Emir might have sought lodgings elsewhere, or have shipped me off for the island Jonquille.” Here my author says, that all the ladies grew pale, look’d at each other in deep silence, and grew vastly serious; which he ascribes to their fear, lest the conversation should grow warm, and become general. “Yet,” continued Alcina’s Toy, “in my opinion the Emir did neither require nor stand in need of so many formalities: but I must still acknowledge the prudence of my mistress. She guarded against the worst, and I was treated for the great lord as for his little page.”
The Toy was on the point of continuing its extravagant harangue, when the Sultan, observing that this strange scene shock’d the modest Manimonbanda, interrupted the orator by turning off the ring. The Emir had vanish’d at the first words of his wife’s Toy. Alcina, without being disconcerted, pretended to take a nap: meanwhile the ladies whispered that she had the vapours. “Yes,” says a Petit-maître, “Vapours: Ch⸺y calls them hysterics, as much as to say, things which come from the lower region. For this case he has a divine elixir; it is a principle, principiating, principiated, which revives—which—I will propose it to the lady.” The company laugh’d at this gibberish, and our Cynic resumed. “Nothing more true, ladies: I, who speak, have used it for a deperdition of substance.”
“A deperdition of substance, good marquiss,” said a young person, “pray what is that?”
“Madam,” replied the marquiss, “it is one of those casual accidents which happen—but everybody knows it.”
By this time the pretended drowsiness went off. Alcina sat down to play with as much intrepidity as if her Toy either had not spoken a word, or had made the finest speech in the world. Nay, she was the only lady that play’d without distraction. This sitting was worth a considerable sum to her. The rest did not know what they were about, could not count the dots on the cards, forgot their reckonings, neglected their good luck, dealt wrong, and committed a hundred other mistakes, of which Alcina took the advantage. Infine, they broke up play, and everyone withdrew.
This adventure made great noise not only at court and in town, but all over Congo. Epigrams were handed about on it. The discourse of Alcina’s Toy was published, revised, corrected, enlarged and commented by the Agreeables of the court. The Emir was lampoon’d, and his wife immortalized. She was pointed at in the playhouse, and followed in the public walks. People flock’d about her, and she heard them buzzing: “Yes, ’tis she: her Toy made a discourse two hours long.” Alcina bore her new reputation with admirable tranquillity. She listened to these expressions, and many more, with a serenity, which the rest of the women could not show. They were every moment under apprehensions of some indiscretions being committed by their Toys: but the adventure of the following chapter completed their confusion.
As soon as the company had broke up, Mangogul gave his hand to the favorite, and conduced her to her apartment. She was far from having that lively cheerful air, which seldom quitted her. She had lost considerably at play, and the effect of the dreadful ring had plunged her into a pensiveness, out of which she was not yet thoroughly recovered. She knew the Sultan’s curiosity, and she had not sufficient confidence in the promises of a man less amorous than despotic, to be free from uneasiness. “What ails you, my soul’s delight?” said Mangogul. “You are pensive.”
“I played with bad luck without example,” answered Mirzoza. “I lost the possibility. I had twelve tableaux, and I don’t think I mark’d three times.”
“That is vexatious,” replied Mangogul; “but what think you of my secret?”
“Prince,” said the favorite, “I persist in deeming it diabolical. Doubtless it will amuse you, but that amusement will be attended with dismal consequences. You are going to spread discord in every family, undeceive husbands, throw lovers into despair, ruin wives, dishonour daughters, and raise a thousand other hurly-burlys. Ah! Prince, I conjure you.”
“By the light,” said Mangogul, “you moralize like Nicole! I would be glad to know why the concern for your neighbour touches you so to the quick. No, no, madam; I will keep my ring. And what do I matter those husbands undeceived, those lovers thrown into despair, those wives ruined, those daughters dishonoured, provided I amuse myself. Am I then a Sultan for nothing? Good night, madam, we must hope that future scenes will be more comic than the first, and that you will take more pleasure in them by degrees.”
“I do not believe it, sir,” replied Mirzoza. “And for my part, I promise you, that you will find pleasant Toys, nay, so pleasant, that you cannot refuse giving them audience. And what would you do, if I sent them to you in quality of ambassadors? I will if you desire it, spare you the trouble of their harangues; but as to the recital of their adventures, you shall hear
