The Adventures of Gil Blas of Santillane, Alain René le Sage [most read books .txt] 📗

entitled and called — The Amusements

of Muley Bugentuf, King of Morocco. It will be played to

perfection, for my pupils declaim like the players of Madrid.

They are lads of family at Penafiel and Segovia, boarders with

me. They know how to touch the passions! To be sure they have

rehearsed under my tuition; their emphasis will seem as if struck

in the mint of their master — ut ita dicam. With respect to the

piece I shall not say a word about it, you shall be taken by

surprise. I shall simply state that it must produce a deep

impression on the audience. It is one of those tragic subjects

which harrow up the soul, by images of death presented to the

senses in all their fearful forms. I am of Aristotle’s mind,

terror is a principal engine. Oh! if I had written for the stage,

I would have introduced none but bloody tyrants, and death-dispensing heroes. Not all the perfumes of Arabia should have

sweetened this blood-polluted hand, I would have been up to my

elbows in gore. There would have been tragedy with a vengeance;

principal characters! ay, guards and attendants, should all have

been sprawling together. I would have butchered every man of

them, and the prompter into the bargain. In a word, I refine upon

Aristotle, and border on the horrible, that is my taste. These

plays to tear a cat in, are the only things for popularity; the

actors live merrily on their own dying speeches, and the authors

roll in luxury on the devastation of mankind.

 

Just as this harangue was over, we saw a great crowd of both

sexes coming out of town into the plain. Who should it be but the

new-married couple, attended by their families and friends, with

ten or twelve musicians in the van, producing a most obstreperous

din of harmony. We went up to them, and Diego introduced himself.

Peals of congratulation were immediately rung through the

assembly, and every one was eager to shake him by the hand. He

had enough upon his shoulders to receive all their fraternal

embraces. Relations and strangers all were for having a pull at

him. At length his father said — You are welcome, Diego. You

find your kinsmen living upon the fat of the land, my friend. I

shall say no more at present, a nod is as good as a wink.

Meanwhile the company went forward upon the plain, took their

stations under the tents, and sat down to table. I kept close to

my companion, and we both dined with the happy couple, who

appeared to be suitably matched. The meal was not soon over, for

the schoolmaster had the vanity to give three courses, for the

purpose of cutting out his brothers, who had not been so

magnificent in their hospitalities.

 

After the banquet, all the guests expressed their longing to see

Signor Thomas’s play, not doubting but the performance of so

extraordinary a genius would deserve all their ears. We came in

front of the stage; the musicians had taken possession of the

orchestra, for the overture and act-tunes. While every one was

waiting in profound silence for the rising of the curtain, the

actors appeared on the boards; and the author, with the piece in

his hand, sat down at the wing, in the prompter’s place. Well

might he call it a tragedy, for in the first act the King of

Morocco, by way of diversion, shot an hundred Moorish slaves with

arrows; in the second he beheaded thirty Portuguese officers,

taken prisoners by one of his captains: and in the third and

last, this monarch, surfeited with long-indulged libertinism, set

fire with his own hands to the seraglio where his wives were

confined, and reduced it to ashes with its inhabitants. The

Moorish slaves, as well as the Portuguese officers, were puppets

on a very curious construction; and the palace, built of

pasteboard, looked very naturally in flames by means of an

artificial firework. This conflagration, accompanied by a

thousand piercing cries, issuing from the ruins, concluded the

piece, and the curtain dropped upon this amiable entertainment.

The whole plain resounded with the applause of this fine tragedy;

which spoke for the good taste of the poet, and proved that he

knew where to look out for a subject.

 

I did not suppose there was anything more to be seen after The

Amusements of Muley Bugentuf, but I was mistaken. Kettle-drums

and trumpets announced a new exhibition — the distribution of

prizes — for Thomas de la Fuenta, to give additional solemnity

to his olympics, had made all his boys, as well dayscholars as

boarders, write exercises; and on this occasion he was to give to

those who had succeeded best, books bought at Segovia out of his

own pocket. All at once were brought upon the stage two long

forms out of the school, with a press full of old worm-eaten

books in fine new bindings. At this signal all the actors

returned upon the stage, and took their places round Signor

Thomas, who looked as big as the head of a college. He had a

sheet of paper in his band, with the names of the successful

candidates. This he gave to the King of Morocco, who began

calling over the list with an authoritative voice. Each scholar,

answering to his name, went humbly to receive a book from the

hands of the bum-jerker; after this he was crowned with laurel,

and seated on one of the two benches to be exposed to the gaze of

the admiring company. Yet, desirous as the schoolmaster might be

to send the spectators away in good humour, he brought his eggs

to a bad market; for, having distributed almost all the prizes to

the boarders, according to the usual etiquette of pedagogues,

that those who pay most must necessarily be the cleverest

fellows, the mammas of certain dayscholars caught fire at this

instance of partiality, and fell foul of the disciplinarian

thereupon: so that the festival, hitherto so much to the glory of

the donor, seemed likely to have ended to the same tune as the

carousal of the Lapithae.