Part 4
The old woman had very rightly guessed that it was a cordelier with the wide sleeve who stole the money and jewels of Cunégonde in the city of Badajos, when she was fleeing in haste with Candide. This monk wished to sell some of the gems to a jeweler. The merchant recognized them as those of the grand inquisitor. The cordelier, before being hanged, confessed that he had stolen them: he indicated the persons, and the route they were taking. The flight of Cunégonde and Candide was already known. They were followed to Cadiz: they sent, without losing time, a vessel in pursuit of them. The vessel was already in the port of Buenos Aires. The rumor spread that an alcalde was about to land, and that they were pursuing the murderers of my lord the grand inquisitor. The prudent old woman saw in an instant all that was to be done. You cannot flee, she said to Cunégonde, and you have nothing to fear; it is not you who killed my lord, and besides the governor, who loves you, will not suffer you to be ill-treated; stay. She runs at once to Candide: Flee, she said, or within an hour you will be burned. There was not a moment to lose; but how to part from Cunégonde, and where to take refuge?
CHAPTER XIV. How Candide and Cacambo were received by the Jesuits of Paraguay.
Candide had brought from Cadiz a valet such as one finds many of on the coasts of Spain and in the colonies. He was a quarter Spanish, born of a half-breed in Tucuman; he had been a choirboy, sacristan, sailor, monk, peddler, soldier, lackey. He was called Cacambo, and loved his master greatly, because his master was a very good man. He saddled with all speed the two Andalusian horses. Come, my master, let us follow the old woman's advice, let us depart, and run without looking behind us. Candide shed tears: O my dear Cunégonde! must I abandon you at the very time when the governor is to celebrate our nuptials! Cunégonde brought from so far, what will become of you? She will become what she can, said Cacambo; women are never at a loss for themselves; God provides for that; let us run. Where are you taking me? where are we going? what shall we do without Cunégonde? said Candide. By Saint James of Compostela, said Cacambo, you were going to make war on the Jesuits, let us go make it for them; I know the roads well enough, I will lead you into their kingdom, they will be charmed to have a captain who drills in the Bulgarian manner; you will make a prodigious fortune; when one has not one's fill in one world, one finds it in another. It is a very great pleasure to see and do new things.
Have you then been already in Paraguay? said Candide. Why truly yes! said Cacambo; I was a servitor in the college of the Assumption, and I know the government of the fathers as well as I know the streets of Cadiz. It is an admirable thing, that government. The kingdom is already more than three hundred leagues in diameter; it is divided into thirty provinces. The fathers have everything there, and the people nothing; it is the masterpiece of reason and of justice. For my part, I see nothing so divine as the fathers, who make war here upon the king of Spain and the king of Portugal, and who in Europe confess those kings; who kill Spaniards here, and who in Madrid send them to heaven; that delights me; let us advance: you will be the happiest of all men. What pleasure the fathers will have, when they know that there comes to them a captain who knows the Bulgarian drill!
As soon as they arrived at the first barrier, Cacambo said to the advance guard that a captain asked to speak to my lord the commandant. They went to warn the main guard. A Paraguayan officer ran to the feet of the commandant to give him notice of the news. Candide and Cacambo were first disarmed; they seized their two Andalusian horses. The two strangers are introduced in the midst of two files of soldiers; the commandant was at the end, with the three-cornered cap on his head, his robe tucked up, the sword at his side, the half-pike in his hand. He made a sign; immediately twenty-four soldiers surround the two newcomers. A sergeant tells them they must wait, that the commandant cannot speak to them, that the reverend father provincial does not permit any Spaniard to open his mouth save in his presence, and to remain more than three hours in the country. And where is the reverend father provincial? said Cacambo. He is at parade after saying his mass, answered the sergeant, and you will not be able to kiss his spurs until three hours hence. But, said Cacambo, the captain, who is dying of hunger as much as I, is no Spaniard, he is German; could we not breakfast while waiting for his reverence?
The sergeant went at once to report this speech to the commandant. God be praised! said that lord, since he is German, I may speak to him; let him be taken to my arbor. Immediately they conduct Candide into a green cabinet, adorned with a very pretty colonnade of green and gold marble, and with trellises enclosing parrots, hummingbirds, sunbirds, pintados, and all the rarest birds. An excellent breakfast was prepared in vessels of gold; and while the Paraguayans ate maize from wooden bowls, in the open field, in the heat of the sun, the reverend father commandant entered the arbor.
He was a very handsome young man, the face full, rather white, high-colored, the eyebrow raised, the eye lively, the ear red, the lips vermilion, the air proud, but with a pride that was neither that of a Spaniard nor that of a Jesuit. They returned to Candide and Cacambo their arms, which had been seized, as well as the two Andalusian horses; Cacambo made them eat oats near the arbor, ever keeping his eye on them, for fear of surprise.
Candide first kissed the hem of the commandant's robe, then they sat down to table. You are then German? said the Jesuit to him in that language. Yes, my reverend father, said Candide. The one and the other, in pronouncing these words, looked at each other with extreme surprise, and an emotion they were not masters of. And from what country of Germany are you? said the Jesuit. From the dirty province of Westphalia, said Candide: I was born in the castle of Thunder-ten-tronckh. O heaven! is it possible! cried the commandant. What a miracle! cried Candide. Would it be you? said the commandant. That is not possible, said Candide. They both let themselves fall backward, they embrace, they shed streams of tears. What! would it be you, my reverend father? you, the brother of the fair Cunégonde! you who were killed by the Bulgarians! you the son of my lord the baron! you a Jesuit in Paraguay! One must confess that this world is a strange thing. O Pangloss! Pangloss! how glad you would be if you had not been hanged!
The commandant had the negro slaves and the Paraguayans who served drink in vessels of rock crystal withdraw. He thanked God and Saint Ignatius a thousand times; he pressed Candide in his arms, their faces were bathed in tears. You would be even more astonished, more moved, more beside yourself, said Candide, if I told you that Miss Cunégonde, your sister, whom you believed disemboweled, is in full health.—Where?—In your neighborhood, at the house of the governor of Buenos Aires; and I was coming to make war upon you. Each word they pronounced in this long conversation heaped prodigy upon prodigy. Their whole soul flew upon their tongue, was attentive in their ears, and sparkled in their eyes. As they were Germans, they kept table a long time, awaiting the reverend father provincial; and the commandant spoke thus to his dear Candide.
CHAPTER XV. How Candide killed the brother of his dear Cunégonde.
I shall have present to my memory all my life the horrible day when I saw my father and mother killed, and my sister violated. When the Bulgarians had withdrawn, that adorable sister was not found, and they put into a cart my mother, my father, and myself, two serving-women and three little boys slaughtered, to go bury us in a Jesuit chapel, two leagues from the castle of my fathers. A Jesuit threw holy water upon us; it was horribly salt; a few drops entered my eyes: the father noticed that my eyelid made a small movement: he put his hand on my heart, and felt it beat; I was succored, and at the end of three weeks there was no sign of it. You know, my dear Candide, that I was very pretty; I became even prettier; so the reverend father Croust[1], superior of the house, took for me the tenderest friendship: he gave me the novice's habit: some time after I was sent to Rome. The father general had need of a recruit of young German Jesuits. The sovereigns of Paraguay receive as few Spanish Jesuits as they can; they prefer foreigners, of whom they think themselves more masters. I was judged fit by the reverend father general to go labor in that vineyard. We set out, a Pole, a Tyrolean, and I. I was honored, on arriving, with the subdiaconate and a lieutenancy: I am today colonel and priest. We shall receive vigorously the troops of the king of Spain; I assure you they will be excommunicated and beaten. Providence sends you here to second us. But is it quite true that my dear sister Cunégonde is in the neighborhood, at the governor's of Buenos Aires? Candide assured him by oath that nothing was more true. Their tears began to flow again.
[1] In the first editions, instead of Croust, one reads: Didrie. But the edition forming part of the volume entitled: Second Suite des Mélanges, 1761, already bears Croust. Mention is made of the reverend Father Croust, the most brutal of the society, in volume XXX, page 429. B.
The baron could not weary of embracing Candide; he called him his brother, his savior. Ah! perhaps, said he to him, we may together, my dear Candide, enter the city as victors, and recover my sister Cunégonde. That is all I wish, said Candide; for I meant to marry her, and I still hope to. You, insolent! answered the baron, would you have the impudence to marry my sister who has seventy-two quarterings! I find you brazen indeed to dare speak to me of so rash a design! Candide, petrified by such discourse, answered him: My reverend father, all the quarterings in the world change nothing; I drew your sister from the arms of a Jew and an inquisitor; she is sufficiently obliged to me, she wishes to marry me. Master Pangloss always told me that men are equal; and assuredly I shall marry her. That we shall see, scoundrel! said the Jesuit baron of Thunder-ten-tronckh; and at the same time he gave him a great blow with the flat of his sword upon the face. Candide in an instant draws his, and thrusts it to the guard into the belly of the Jesuit baron; but in withdrawing it all smoking, he began to weep: Alas! my God! said he, I have killed my former master, my friend, my brother-in-law; I am the best man in the world, and behold already three men that I have killed; and among these three there are two priests.
Cacambo, who was sentinel at the door of the arbor, ran up. We have nothing left but to sell our lives dearly, said his master to him; they will no doubt enter the arbor; we must die with arms in hand. Cacambo, who had seen many such things, lost not his head; he took the Jesuit robe worn by the baron, put it on Candide's body, gave him the square cap of the dead man, and made him mount on horseback. All this was done in the twinkling of an eye. Let us gallop, my master; everyone will take you for a Jesuit who goes to give orders; and we shall have passed the frontiers before they can run after us. He was already flying in pronouncing these words, and crying in Spanish: Make way, make way for the reverend father colonel!
CHAPTER XVI. What befell the two travelers with two girls, two monkeys, and the savages named Oreillons.
Candide and his valet were beyond the barriers, and no one yet knew in the camp the death of the German Jesuit. The vigilant Cacambo had taken care to fill his valise with bread, chocolate, ham, fruit, and some measures of wine. They plunged with their Andalusian horses into an unknown country where they discovered no road. At last a beautiful meadow intersected by brooks presented itself before them. Our two travelers let their mounts graze. Cacambo proposes to his master to eat, and sets him the example. How can you wish, said Candide, that I eat ham, when I have killed the son of my lord the baron, and when I see myself condemned never to see the fair Cunégonde again in my life? what good is it to prolong my miserable days, since I must drag them far from her in remorse and despair? and what will the Journal de Trévoux[1] say?
[1] The work cited under the title of Journal de Trévoux, from the name of the town where it was printed, is entitled: Mémoires pour servir à l'histoire des sciences et des beaux-arts. This title has undergone several changes. B.
In speaking thus, he did not fail to eat. The sun was setting. The two wanderers heard some small cries that seemed uttered by women. They knew not if these cries were of pain or of joy; but they rose precipitately with that uneasiness and alarm that everything inspires in an unknown country. These clamors came from two girls quite naked who ran lightly to the edge of the meadow, while two monkeys followed them biting their buttocks. Candide was touched with pity; he had learned to shoot among the Bulgarians, and he would have brought down a hazelnut in a bush without touching the leaves. He takes his double-barreled Spanish gun, fires, and kills the two monkeys. God be praised, my dear Cacambo! I have delivered from great peril these two poor creatures: if I committed a sin in killing an inquisitor and a Jesuit, I have well repaired it in saving the lives of two girls. They are perhaps two young ladies of quality, and this adventure may procure us very great advantages in the country.
He was about to continue, but his tongue became paralyzed when he saw those two girls tenderly embrace the two monkeys, melt in tears over their bodies, and fill the air with the most dolorous cries. I did not expect so much goodness of soul, said he at last to Cacambo; who replied to him: You have done a fine piece of work there, my master; you have killed the two lovers of those young ladies. Their lovers! would it be possible? you mock me, Cacambo; how can one believe you? My dear master, rejoined Cacambo, you are always astonished at everything; why do you find it so strange that in some countries there are monkeys who obtain the good graces of the ladies? they are quarter-men, as I am a quarter-Spaniard. Alas! said Candide, I remember having heard master Pangloss say that formerly like accidents had happened, and that these mixtures had produced aegipans, fauns, satyrs; that several great personages of antiquity had seen them; but I took that for fables. You must be convinced now, said Cacambo, that it is a truth, and you see how persons who have not received a certain education behave; all I fear is that these ladies may do us some mischief.
These solid reflections induced Candide to leave the meadow, and to plunge into a wood. There he supped with Cacambo; and both, after cursing the inquisitor of Portugal, the governor of Buenos Aires, and the baron, fell asleep on some moss. On awakening, they felt they could not move; the reason was that during the night the Oreillons, inhabitants of the country, to whom the two ladies had denounced them, had bound them with cords of tree bark.
They were surrounded by some fifty Oreillons quite naked, armed with arrows, clubs, and flint axes: some were boiling a great cauldron; others prepared spits, and all cried: It is a Jesuit, it is a Jesuit! we shall be avenged, and we shall eat well; let us eat the Jesuit, let us eat the Jesuit!
I told you so, my dear master, cried sadly Cacambo, that those two girls would play us a bad trick. Candide, perceiving the cauldron and the spits, cried: We are certainly going to be roasted or boiled. Ah! what would master Pangloss say, if he saw how pure nature is made? All is well; be it so, but I confess it is very cruel, to have lost Miss Cunégonde, and to be put on the spit by Oreillons. Cacambo never lost his head. Despair of nothing, said he to the afflicted Candide; I understand a little of the jargon of these peoples, I will speak to them. Fail not, said Candide, to represent to them what is the frightful inhumanity of cooking men, and how little Christian that is.
Gentlemen, said Cacambo, you mean then to eat today a Jesuit? that is very well done; nothing is more just than to treat one's enemies thus. Indeed natural right teaches us to kill our neighbor, and that is how it is done throughout the earth. If we do not use the right to eat him, it is because we have otherwise wherewith to eat well; but you have not the same resources as we: certainly it is better to eat one's enemies than to abandon to the crows and the jackdaws the fruit of one's victory. But, gentlemen, you would not wish to eat your friends. You think you are going to put a Jesuit on the spit, and it is your defender, it is the enemy of your enemies that you are about to roast. For me, I was born in your country; the gentleman you see is my master, and far from being a Jesuit, he has just killed a Jesuit, he wears his spoils; that is the cause of your mistake. To verify what I tell you, take his robe, carry it to the first barrier of the kingdom of the fathers; inquire whether my master did not kill a Jesuit officer. It will take you little time; you can always eat us, if you find that I have lied to you. But, if I have told you the truth, you know too well the principles of public right, manners, and laws, not to grant us our lives.
The Oreillons found this discourse very reasonable; they deputed two notables to go in diligence to inquire the truth; the two deputies acquitted themselves of their commission like men of sense, and soon returned bringing good news. The Oreillons unbound their two prisoners, made them all sorts of civilities, offered them girls, gave them refreshments, and reconducted them to the confines of their states, crying with gladness: He is no Jesuit, he is no Jesuit!
Candide could not weary of admiring the cause of his deliverance. What a people! said he, what men! what manners! if I had not had the happiness of giving a great sword-thrust through the body of the brother of Miss Cunégonde, I was eaten without remission. But, after all, pure nature is good, since these people, instead of eating me, have done me a thousand courtesies, as soon as they knew I was no Jesuit.
CHAPTER XVII. Arrival of Candide and his valet in the land of Eldorado, and what they saw there.
When they were at the borders of the Oreillons: You see, said Cacambo to Candide, that this hemisphere here is no better than the other; believe me, let us return to Europe by the shortest way. How return there, said Candide, and where go? If I go into my country, the Bulgarians and the Abares there slaughter everyone; if I return to Portugal, I am burned there; if we remain in this country, we risk at every moment being put on the spit. But how to resolve to leave the part of the world that Miss Cunégonde inhabits?
—Let us turn toward Cayenne, said Cacambo, we shall find Frenchmen there who go all over the world; they may help us. God will perhaps take pity on us.
It was not easy to go to Cayenne: they knew well enough roughly which way they must march; but mountains, rivers, precipices, brigands, savages, were everywhere terrible obstacles. Their horses died of fatigue; their provisions were consumed; they fed a whole month on wild fruit, and found themselves at last near a little river bordered with coconut trees which sustained their life and their hopes.
Cacambo, who always gave as good counsel as the old woman, said to Candide: We can do no more, we have marched enough; I perceive an empty canoe on the shore, let us fill it with coconuts, throw ourselves into this little bark, let us abandon ourselves to the current; a river always leads to some inhabited place. If we find not agreeable things, we shall at least find new things. Come, said Candide, let us commend ourselves to Providence.
They sailed some leagues between banks, sometimes flowered, sometimes arid, sometimes level, sometimes steep. The river ever widened; at last it lost itself under a vault of frightful rocks which rose to the sky. The two travelers had the boldness to abandon themselves to the waves under this vault. The river, narrowed at this place, bore them with a horrible rapidity and noise. At the end of twenty-four hours they saw daylight again; but their canoe was shattered against the reefs; they had to drag themselves from rock to rock for a whole league; at last they discovered an immense horizon, bordered with inaccessible mountains. The country was cultivated for pleasure as for need; everywhere the useful was agreeable[1]: the roads were covered or rather adorned with carriages of a brilliant form and material, bearing men and women of singular beauty, drawn rapidly by great red sheep which surpassed in speed the finest horses of Andalusia, of Tetuan, and of Meknes.
[1] Such is the text of all the editions given in the author's lifetime, and even of the Kehl editions. Some recent editors have put: the useful was joined to the agreeable. B.
This, however, said Candide, is a country that is worth more than Westphalia. He alighted with Cacambo near the first village they met. Some children of the village, covered with torn gold brocade, played at quoits at the entrance of the borough; our two men from the other world amused themselves looking at them: their quoits were rather broad round pieces, yellow, red, green, which cast a singular lustre. The travelers took a fancy to pick up some of them; it was gold, it was emeralds, rubies, of which the least would have been the greatest ornament of the throne of the Mogul. No doubt, said Cacambo, these children are the sons of the king of the country who play at little quoits. The schoolmaster of the village appeared at that moment to make them go in to school. There, said Candide, is the tutor of the royal family.
The little ragamuffins immediately left the game, leaving on the ground their quoits, and all that had served their diversions. Candide picks them up, runs to the tutor and presents them to him humbly, making him understand by signs that their royal highnesses had forgotten their gold and their precious stones. The schoolmaster of the village, smiling, threw them on the ground, looked a moment at Candide's face with much surprise, and continued his way.
“Stories of the world, in your language.”