“But at length,” said the favorite, “you comforted yourself?”
“Alas! madam,” replied Selim, “I thought I never should; but this one thing I have learnt by it, that there is no grief eternal.”
“Well,” said Mirzoza, “let me hear no more of the men: there they are all. That is to say, Signor Selim, that this poor Cydalisa, whose history has moved us to compassion, and whom you have so much regretted, was a great fool to rely on your oath; and that, while Brama perhaps chastises her severely for her credulity, you pass your time pleasantly enough in the arms of another.”
“Pray, madam,” replied the Sultan, “calm yourself: Selim loves again, Cydalisa will be revenged.”
“Sir,” answered Selim, “your highness may possibly be misinformed. Ought I not to have learnt, once for my whole life, by my adventure with Cydalisa, that true love was too prejudicial to happiness?”
“Without doubt,” interrupted Mirzoza, “and yet I would lay a wager, notwithstanding your philosophical reflections, that you actually love another more ardently than—”
“More ardently,” replied Selim, “I dare not assert: these five years past I am attached, but attached from my heart to a charming woman. It was not without difficulty, that I made her listen to me, for she had always been of a virtue!”
“Virtue!” cried the Sultan; “courage, my friend, I am charmed, when one talks to me of the virtue of a court lady.”
“Selim,” said the favorite, “continue your story.”
“And always believe, as a good mussulman, in the fidelity of your mistress,” added the Sultan.
“Ah! prince,” replied Selim with vivacity, “Fulvia is faithful to me.”
“Faithful, or not,” answered Mangogul, “what is that to your happiness? You believe it, and that is sufficient?”
“Oh then! ’tis Fulvia that you are now in love with,” said the favorite.
“Yes, madam,” answered Selim.
“So much the worse, my friend,” added Mangogul: “I have not a grain of faith in her. She is perpetually beset by Bramins, and these Bramins are terrible fellows: besides, I find she has little Chinese eyes, with a turn’d up nose; and an air thoroughly inclining to the side of pleasure. Between us, is this true?”
“Prince,” answered Selim, “I believe she has no aversion to it.”
“Well,” replied the Sultan, “everything gives way to that charm: which you ought to know better than I, or you are not—”
“You are mistaken,” replied the favorite, “a man may have all the sense in the world, and not know that. I wager—”
“Always wagers,” interrupted Mangogul: “I am out of all patience; those women are incorrigible. Pray, madam, win your castle, and lay wagers afterward.”
“Madam,” says Selim to the favorite, “might not Fulvia be of use to you in some station or other?”
“As how?” ask’d Mirzoza.
“I have observed,” answered the courtier, “that the Toys have seldom or never spoke, but in presence of his highness; and I have fancied, that the Genius Cucufa, who has done so many surprising things in favour of Kanaglou the Sultan’s grandfather, might have endowed his grandson with the gift of making them speak. But Fulvia’s Toy has not as yet opened its mouth, as far as I could ever learn: might it not be possible to interrogate it, in order to procure you the castle, and to convince me of the fidelity of my mistress?”
“Doubtless,” replied the Sultan; “what is your opinion, madam?”
“Oh! I shall not meddle in so ticklish an affair. Selim is too much my friend, to expose him, for the sake of a castle; to the risk of being made unhappy the rest of his days.”
“But you do not consider,” replied the Sultan: “Fulvia is virtuous: Selim would run his hand into the fire to prove it. He has said it, and he is not a man to flinch from his word.”
“No, Prince,” answered Selim, “and if your highness will give me a meeting at Fulvia’s house, I will certainly be there before you.”
“Be cautious of what you propose,” replied the favorite. “Selim, my poor Selim, you go very fast, and how worthy soever you are of being beloved—”
“Fear not, madam; since the die is cast, I will hear Fulvia: the worst that can befall me, is to lose a faithless woman.”
“And to die of regret,” added the Sultana, “for having lost her.”
“What a romance,” says Mangogul. “You believe then that Selim is become very weak. He has lost the lovely Cydalisa, and yet there he is full of life; and you pretend, that if he happened to find Fulvia unfaithful to him, it would kill him. I’ll insure him to you as immortal, if he is never demolished but by that stroke. Selim, tomorrow at Fulvia’s, do you hear? you will have notice of the hour.” Selim bow’d, Mangogul quitted the company: the favorite continued to remonstrate to the old courtier, that he play’d a high game. Selim thank’d her for her tokens of good will, and each retired in expectation of the great event.
XLVI
Twenty-Seventh Trial of the Ring
Fulvia
The African author, who had promised to bring Selim’s character into some part of his book, has thought fit to place it here: and I have too much esteem for the works of antiquity, to assert that it would come in better somewhere else. “There are,” says he, “some men, whose merit gives them access everywhere, who by their graceful person, and free easy wit, are in their youth the darlings of many women; and whose gray hairs are respected, because having known how to reconcile their duties with their pleasures, they have rendered their middle stage of life illustrious, by services done for the state: in a word, men, who at all times are the
