“Then you have loved once in your life,” interrupted the favorite.
“Oh! yes, madam,” replied Selim, “as people love at eighteen years of age, with extreme impatience to conclude an affair just broach’d. I had not a wink of sleep all that night, and at dawn of day I set about composing a most gallant letter to my Belle. I sent it, received an answer, and obtained a meeting. Neither the style of the answer, nor the yielding temper of the lady, did undeceive me; and I flew to the place of assignation, strongly persuaded that I was going to enjoy the wife or daughter of a prime minister. My goddess was waiting for me on a grand couch: I threw myself at her feet, took her hand, kissed it with uncommon eagerness, and felicitated myself on the favor which she condescended to grant me. ‘Is it true,’ said I, ‘that you permit Selim to love you, and to tell you so; and that he may, without offending you, flatter himself with the sweetest hope?’
“On ending these words, I snatch’d a kiss from her neck; and as she was recumbent I was preparing to support the attack with vigor, when she stop’d me, and said: ‘Hold, my friend, you are a pretty lad, you have wit at will, you talk like an angel; but I must have four Louis d’or’s.’
“ ‘What do you say,’ interrupted I.
“ ‘I tell you,’ replied she, ‘there is nothing to be done, if you have not brought four Louis.’
“ ‘How, miss,’ said I quite amazed, ‘is that your full value? It was well worth my while, to be sure, to come from Congo for such a trifle.’ And in a moment I put myself in order, hurried downstairs, and left her.
“I began, madam, as you see, to mistake actresses for princesses.”
“I am quite astonished at it,” replied Mirzoza, “surely the difference is very great.”
“I doubt not,” said Selim, “but they were guilty of a hundred impertinences. But what then? A young man, and a stranger too, is not so nice an observer. And I had heard so many bad stories in Congo, on the liberties taken by the European women.”
Here Mangogul awak’d, and yawning and rubbing his eyes, said: “By the L—d, he is still at Paris. Might one ask you, good Mr. Storyteller, when you expect to be return’d to Banza, and how long I am doomed to sleep: for ’tis proper you should know, my friend, that it is not possible to broach an account of travels without throwing me into yawnings. It is a bad habit, which I contracted in reading Tavernier and other travellers.”
“Prince,” answered Selim, “it is above an hour since I am come back to Banza.”
“I congratulate you thereupon,” replied the Sultan; and then turning to the Sultana, “Madam,” said he, “the hour appointed for the masquerade is come: we will set out, if the fatigue of the journey permits you.”
“Prince,” answered Mirzoza, “I am ready.” Mangogul and Selim slipped on their Domino’s, and the favorite took hers likewise: the Sultan handed her to the ballroom where they separated, in order to mix in the crowd. Selim followed them, “and so did I,” says the African author; “though I had a stronger inclination to take a nap than to see the dancing.”
XLII
Twenty-Fourth and Twenty-Fifth Trial of the Ring
Masquerade, and Sequel of the Masquerade
The most extravagant Toys of Banza did not fail flocking whither pleasure called them. Some came in city-coaches, some in public vehicles, and some few on foot. “I should never finish,” says the African author, whose trainbearer I have the honour to be, “if I enter’d into a detail of the tricks which Mangogul play’d on them.” He gave more exercise to his ring that night alone, than it ever had had, since the Genius presented him with it. He turn’d it sometimes on one, sometimes on another, and frequently on twenty together; and then it was, that the noise they made was ravishing; One cried out with a squeaking voice, “Violins, pray give us le Carillon de Dunkerque;” another in a hoarse voice, “I will have the Sautriots;” “and I the Tricotets,” said a third: and a multitude at once call’d for old country-dances, such as la Bourée, les quatre faces, la Calotine, la Chaine, le Pistolet, la Mariée, le Pistolet, le Pistolet, le Pistolet. All these cries were interlarded with a million of extravagances. On one side was heard: Plague take the noodle, let him be sent to school. On another, Must I return then without my earnest? Here, who pays my coach? There, he has slipt away from me, but I’ll hunt him till I find him. And again, till tomorrow; but twenty Louis’s at least, or there’s nothing to be done. And everywhere in short, speeches, which expressed desires or exploits.
In the crowd, a citizen’s daughter, young and pretty, singled out Mangogul, pursued him, and provoked him so, that he turned his ring on her. Then was her Toy heard to cry out: “Why do you fly me? Stop, charming mask, be not insensible to the ardor of a Toy, which burns for you.” The Sultan shock’d at this rash declaration, was determined to punish the forward creature. He disappear’d, and sought among his guards someone who was pretty much of his make, gave him his mask and Domino, and abandoned him to the pursuits of the little female cit; who being still deceived by appearances, continued to say a thousand ridiculous things to him, whom she took for Mangogul.
The sham Sultan
