Candide (16 page)

“Oh, here is a copy of Cicero!
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” said Candide; “this great man, I assume, you are never tired of reading.” “Indeed, I never read him at all,” replied Pococuranté. “What do I care whether he pleads for Rabirius or Cluentius? As a judge, I have enough trials. I might like his philosophical works better; but when I realized that he had doubts about everything, I figured I knew as much as himself, and had no need of a guide to learn ignorance.”

“Ha!” cried Martin, “here are eighty volumes of the Memoirs of the Academy of Sciences; perhaps there may be something curious and valuable in this collection.” “Yes,” answered Pococuranté. “so there might, if any one of the authors of this rubbish had only invented the art of pin-making. But all these volumes are filled with empty systems, without one single useful thing.”

“I see a lot of plays,” said Candide, “in Italian, Spanish and French.” “Yes,” replied the Venetian; “there are I think three thousand, and not three dozen of them good for anything. As to those huge volumes of divinity, and those enormous collections of sermons, altogether they are not worth one single page of Seneca;
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and I’m sure you will readily believe that neither myself nor anyone else ever opens them.”

Martin, seeing some shelves filled with English books, said to the senator: “I suppose that a republican must be delighted with the majority of those books written in a land of liberty.” “It is noble to write as we think,” said Pococuranté; “it is the privilege of humanity. Throughout Italy we write only what we do not think; and the present inhabitants of the country of the Caesars and Antoninuses
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dare not acquire a single idea without the permission of a Father Dominican.
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I would be enamoured of the freedom inspired by English genius if passion and partisan spirit did not corrupt all that is estimable in this precious liberty.”

Candide, seeing an edition of a Milton,
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asked the senator if he did not consider that author a great man. “Who?” said Pococuranté sharply. “That barbarian, who writes a tedious commentary, in ten books of rambling verse, on the first chapter of Genesis! That slovenly imitator of the Greeks, who disfigures creation by making the Messiah take a pair of compasses from Heaven’s cupboard in order to plan the world while Moses represents the Deity as creating the world with a word! You expect me to admire a writer who has spoiled Tasso’s hell and devil; who transforms Lucifer, sometimes into a toad, and at other times into a pigmy; who makes him say the same thing a hundred times over; who makes him argue theology : and who, by an absurdly serious imitation of Ariosto’s comic invention of fire-arms, has the devils firing cannon in heaven! Neither I, nor any other Italian, can possibly take pleasure in such melancholy reveries. But the marriage of sin and death, and snakes that sin gives birth to, are enough to make any person sick whose taste is at all refined. This obscene, whimsical, and disagreeable poem met with the disdain that it deserved at its first publication; and I only treat the author now as he was treated in his own country by his contemporaries.”

Candide was grieved at this speech, as he had a great respect for Homer and was very fond of Milton. “Alas!” said he very softly to Martin, “I am afraid this man holds our German poets in great contempt.” “There would be no great harm in that,” said Martin. “Oh, what a surprising man!” said Candide to himself; “what a great genius this Pococuranté must be! Nothing can please him.”

After finishing their survey of the library, they went down into the garden, and Candide praised its beauties. “I know nothing on earth laid out in such bad taste,” said Pococuranté, “everything about it is childish and trifling; but I will have another laid out tomorrow on a nobler plan.”

As soon as our travellers had taken leave of his excellency, “Well,” said Candide to Martin, “I hope you will own that this man is the happiest of all mortals, for he is above everything he possesses.” “But don’t you see,” answered Martin, “that he dislikes everything he possesses? Plato said a long time ago that the best stomachs are not those which refuse all food.” “True,” said Candide, “but still there must certainly be a pleasure in criticising everything, and in seeing faults where others think they see beauties.” “That is,” replied Martin, “there is a pleasure in having no pleasure.” “Well, well,” said Candide, “I find that I will be the only happy man at last, when I am blessed with the sight of my dear Cunégonde.” “It is good to hope,” said Martin.

In the meantime, days and weeks passed away, and no news of Cacambo. Candide was so overwhelmed with grief that he did not notice that Pacquette and Friar Giroflée had never returned and thanked him.

O
ne evening when Candide and Martin were going to sit down to supper with some foreigners who lodged at the same inn where they were staying, a man, with a face the colour of soot, came behind him, and taking him by the arm, said “Be ready to leave with us; don’t miss this.” He turned around and saw Cacambo. Nothing but the sight of Miss Cunégonde could have given him greater joy and surprise. He was almost beside himself. After embracing this dear friend, “Cunégonde!” he said, “Cunégonde has come with you, no doubt! Where, where is she? Take me to her this instant so that I may die of joy in her presence.” “Cunégonde is not here,” answered Cacambo, “she is at Constantinople.” “Good heavens, at Constantinople! But no matter if she were in China, I would fly there. Quick, quick, dear Cacambo, let’s go.” “We will leave after eating,” said Cacambo. “I cannot at present say anything more to you. I am a slave, and my master waits for me: I must go and wait on him at table. But mum! say not a word; only get your supper, and be ready.”

Candide, divided between joy and grief, charmed to have thus met his faithful agent again, and surprised to hear he was a slave, his heart palpitating, his senses confused, but full of the hopes of recovering his dear Cunégonde, sat down to eat with Martin, who watched all these scenes cooly, and with six strangers, who had come to spend the Carnival at Venice.

Cacambo, who was pouring a drink for one of these strangers, drew near to his master when the meal was nearly over, and whispered to him in the ear, “Sire, your majesty may go when you please; the ship is ready”; and so saying, he left the room. The guests, surprised at what they had heard, looked at each other without speaking a word, when another servant drawing near to his master, in like manner said, “Sire, your majesty’s post-chaise is at Padua, and the bark is ready.” The master made a sign and the servant instantly withdrew. The diners all stared at each other again, and the general astonishment was increased. A third servant then approached another of the strangers, and said, “Sire, believe me, your Majesty should not stay here any longer; I will go and get everything ready,” and instantly disappeared.

Candide and Martin had no doubt now that this was some of the diversions of the Carnival, and that these were characters in masquerade. Then a fourth domestic said to the fourth stranger, “Your majesty may set off when you please”; saying this, he went away like the rest. A fifth valet said the same to a fifth master. But the sixth domestic spoke in a different style to the person on whom he waited, and who sat near to Candide. “My word, sir,” said he, “they will give no more credit to your majesty or to me, and we could both wind up in jail this very night; and therefore I’ve got to take care of myself, and so adieu.” With the servants all gone, the six strangers, with Candide and Martin, remained in a profound silence. Finally Candide broke it by saying, “Gentlemen, this is a very singular joke, upon my word; why, how came you all to be kings? For my part I assure you that neither my friend Martin here nor myself have any claim to royalty.”

Cacambo’s master then began, with great gravity, to speak in Italian: “I am not joking in the least. My name is Achmet III.
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I was grand seignor for many years; I dethroned my brother, my nephew dethroned me, my viziers lost their heads, and I am condemned to end my days in the old seraglio. My nephew, the Grand Sultan Mahomet, gives me permission to travel sometimes for my health, and I am here to spend the Carnival at Venice.”

A young man who sat by Achmet spoke next, and said: “My name is Ivan.
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I was once Emperor of all the Russias, but was dethroned while still in my cradle. My parents were locked up, and I was brought up in a prison; yet I am sometimes allowed to travel, though always with persons to keep a guard over me, and I am here to spend the Carnival at Venice.”

The third said: “I am Charles-Edward, King of England;
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my father ceded his royal rights to me. I have fought in defence of my rights, and near a thousand of my friends have had their hearts taken out of their bodies alive, and thrown into their faces. I have myself been confined in a prison. I am going to Rome to visit the king my father, who was dethroned as well as myself and my grandfather; and I am here to spend the Carnival at Venice.”

The fourth spoke thus: “I am the King of Poland;
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the fortune of war has stripped me of my hereditary dominions. My father experienced the same vicissitudes of fate. I resign myself to the will of Providence, in the same manner as Sultan Achmet, the Emperor Ivan, and King Charles Edward, to whom, I hope, God gives long lives; and I am here to spend the Carnival at Venice.”

The fifth said: “I am King of Poland also.
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I have twice lost my kingdom; but Providence has given me other dominions, where I have done more good than all the Sarmatian kings put together ever managed to do on the banks of the Vistula. I resign myself likewise to Providence; and am here to spend the Carnival at Venice.”

It now came to the sixth monarch’s turn to speak. “Gentlemen,” said he, “I am not so great a prince as the rest of you, it is true, but I am, however, a crowned head. I am Theodore, elected king of Corsica.
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I have had the title of majesty, and am now barely treated with common civility. I have coined money and am not now worth a single ducat. I have had two secretaries, and am now without a valet. I was once seated on a throne, and since then have lain upon a truss of straw in a common jail in London, and I very much fear I shall meet with the same fate here in Venice, where I’ve come, like your majesties, to divert myself at the Carnival.”

The other five kings listened to this speech with great attention; it excited their compassion; each of them made the unhappy Theodore a present of twenty sequins, and Candide gave him a diamond worth just a hundred times that sum. “Who can this private person be?” said the five princes to one another, “who is able to give, and has actually given, an hundred times as much as any of us?”

Just as they rose from the table, in came four serene highnesses, who had also been stripped of their territories by the fortunes of war, and who had come to spend the remainder of the Carnival at Venice. Candide took no manner of notice of them; he was concerned only with his voyage to Constantinople, where he intended to go in search of his lovely Miss Cunégonde.

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he trusty Cacambo had already made arrangements with the captain of the Turkish ship that was to carry Sultan Achmet back to Constantinople, to take Candide and Martin on board. Accordingly, they both boarded ship, after paying their respects to his miserable highness. As they were going on board, Candide said to Martin: “You see we ate in company with six dethroned kings, and to one of them I gave charity. Perhaps there may be a great many other princes still more unfortunate. For my part, I have lost only a hundred sheep, and am now going to fly to the arms of my charming Miss Cunégonde. My dear Martin, I must insist on it that Pangloss was right. All is for the best.” “I hope so,” said Martin. “But this was an odd adventure that we met with in Venice. I do not think there has ever before been an instance of six dethroned monarchs eating together at a public inn.” “This is not more extraordinary,” said Martin, “than most of what has happened to us. It is a very common thing for kings to be dethroned; and as for our having the honour to eat with six of them, it is a mere accident which doesn’t deserve our attention.”