Pablo de Segovia, the Spanish Sharper - Francisco de Quevedo (good summer reads .TXT) 📗

glimpse of the gold, took me aside, and I went on, “I beseech you, sir, take pity of an unfortunate man.” Then I took him lovingly by the hand, and clapped in the piece, which he greedily grasped, being used to such ceremonies, and answered, “I will examine into your disorder, and if it is dangerous, you shall not go down into the hole.” I understood him, and submitted myself humbly, so that he left me out, and turned down my companions. I will not take up time by relating what sport we made in the prison and as we went along the streets; for being pushed and dragged along, bound, some of us without cloaks, and others with them, it was comical to see such a parcel of ragamuffins, all patches, and particoloured black and white, like magpies. The officers knew not how to take fast hold of them, they were all in such tatters; some they thought to grasp by the flesh, and finding none, for it was all starved away, they feared to be answerable for disjointing the bones. Others lost their coats and breeches by the rough handling of those unmerciful fellows. When they unbound the rope, as they led them all in, the rags and clouts dropped off with it. At night I was carried to the common side, where I had a little bed allotted me. It was odd to see some lie down in their whole case, without taking of the least rag they wore in the day. Others at one motion put off all the clothes they had; others played; but at last we were made fast, and the light put out. We all forgot our irons, and took our rest very favourably.

The gaoler then fancying I would drop him another pistole rather than be let down into the hole, ordered me to be buried among the rest, which I resolved to endure rather than break bulk any more. I was conveyed down, where my old friends received me with a great shout and much satisfaction. That night I lay cool, without anything to cover me; when it was day, we all came out of the dungeon, saw one another’s faces, and presently our companions demanded the usual garnish-money, on pain of a good liquoring. I presently disbursed six reals; but my companions having nothing to give, the matter was left over till night. Among the rest in the dungeon, was a tall one-eyed young fellow, with a great pair of whiskers, a sour look, round shouldered, and those well flogged. He had a whole smith’s forge upon him, double fetters on his legs, and a great chain hanging from his neck; they called him the Giant; and he said of himself that he was in prison for petty trifles, which I concluded to be some mere larceny; and if anybody asked him whether that was the crime, he answered in the negative, but that it was for backward sins. When the gaoler reproved him for his tricks, he would call him the hangman’s pantryman, and general storekeeper of sin. At other times he would cry, “You are a fool to contend with one that will vanish in smoke; by the Lord I will stifle you as I go off.” This he had said, expecting to be burnt alive. He contracted friendship with another they called Robledo, and by a nickname the Tumbler, who said he was in prison for his dexterity, which consisted in making everything vanish he laid his hands on. He had been lashed by all the beadles and hangmen in Spain; his face was all over cuts and scars; his ears were at a great distance, for he carried but one about him, having left the other behind him in his travels; his nose was soldered together, having been cleft with a cut of a sword. Four other rampant fellows, like lions in heraldry, herded with those two, all of them loaded with chains, and condemned to thrash the sea, that is, to the galleys. These said they might boast, in a short time, that they had served the king both by sea and land; and a man would not believe how impatiently they expected their commission. These people taking it ill that my comrades had not discharged the duty of garnish, contrived to give them a sound lashing at night, with a curious rope’s end, provided for that purpose. When night came we were put into the dismal vault, they put out the light, and I presently secured myself under my bed; two of them began to whistle, and a third to lay about him with the rope’s end. The sparks perceiving it was like to go ill with them, crowded themselves up so close together, all the flesh of their bones being before devoured by the mange and lice, that they found room enough in a cranny between the boards, lying like so many fleas in a seam, or bugs in a bedstead. The lashes sounded on the boards, but the bodies they were designed for lay close without speaking a word. The whipsters observing they did not complain, laid aside their discipline, and began to pelt them with stones, bricks, and rubbish, they had gathered to that effect. This project succeeded better, for a stone hit Don Toribio on the neck, and raised a bunch as thick as his fist. He cried out “Murder!” and the knaves, that he might not be heard, fell a-singing all together, and rattled their chains. Don Toribio struggled with his companions to get undermost, and in the scuffle, their bones rattled like castanets, their coats fell all in tatters, and not a rag was left upon them. The stones flew about so thick, that in a short space poor Don Toribio had as many knobs on his head as there are on a pineapple. Finding there was no manner of protection against that dreadful shower of hail that fell