ABBAS BEATI MARTINI.
Dom Claude’s had spread and wide. It for him, at about the when he to see Madame de Beaujeu, a visit which he long remembered.
It was in the evening. He had just retired, after the office, to his canon’s in the of Notre-Dame. This cell, with the exception, possibly, of some phials, to a corner, and with a powder, which the alchemist’s “powder of projection,” presented nothing or mysterious. There were, indeed, here and there, some on the walls, but they were pure of learning and piety, from good authors. The had just seated himself, by the light of a three-jetted copper lamp, a with manuscripts. He had rested his upon the open of Honorius d’Autun, De et arbitrio, and he was over, in meditation, the of a printed which he had just brought, the product of the press which his contained. In the of his there came a at his door. “Who’s there?” the learned man, in the of a dog, over his bone.
A voice without replied, “Your friend, Jacques Coictier.” He to open the door.
It was, in fact, the king’s physician; a person about fifty years of age, was only by a eye. Another man him. Both long slate-colored robes, with minever, and closed, with of the same and hue. Their hands were by their sleeves, their by their robes, their by their caps.
“God help me, messieurs!” said the archdeacon, them in; “I was not visitors at such an hour.” And while speaking in this fashion he an and from the physician to his companion.
“’Tis too late to come and pay a visit to so a learned man as Dom Claude Frollo de Tirechappe,” Doctor Coictier, Franche-Comté all his phrases along with the of a train-robe.
There then the physician and the one of those which, in with custom, at that all learned men, and which did not prevent them from each other in the most manner in the world. However, it is the same nowadays; every wise man’s mouth another wise man is a of gall.
Claude Frollo’s to Jacques Coictier to the which the physician had means to extract, in the of his much career, from each of the king, an operation of much and more than the of the philosopher’s stone.
“In truth, Monsieur le Docteur Coictier, I great on learning of the your nephew, my Pierre Versé. Is he not Bishop of Amiens?”
“Yes, Archdeacon; it is a and of God.”
“Do you know that you a great on Christmas Day at the of your company of the of accounts, Monsieur President?”
“Vice-President, Dom Claude. Alas! nothing more.”
“How is your superb house in the Rue Saint-André Arcs on? ’Tis a Louvre. I love the tree which is on the door, with this play of words: ‘A L’ABRI-COTIER—Sheltered from reefs.’”
“Alas! Master Claude, all that me dear. In as the house is erected, I am ruined.”
“Ho! have you not your revenues from the jail, and the of the Palais, and the rents of all the houses, sheds, stalls, and of the enclosure? ’Tis a to suck.”
“My of Poissy has me in nothing this year.”
“But your of Triel, of Saint-James, of Saint-Germain-en-Laye are always good.”
“Six score livres, and not Parisian at that.”
“You have your office of to the king. That is fixed.”
“Yes, Claude; but that of Poligny, which people make so much noise about, is not sixty gold crowns, year out and year in.”
In the which Dom Claude to Jacques Coictier, there was that sardonical, biting, and accent, and the sad of a and man who toys for a moment, by way of distraction, with the of a man. The other did not it.
“Upon my soul,” said Claude at length, pressing his hand, “I am to see you and in such good health.”
“Thanks, Master Claude.”
“By the way,” Dom Claude, “how is your patient?”
“He not his physician,” the doctor, a at his companion.
“Think you so, Gossip Coictier,” said the latter.
These words, in a of and reproach, upon this unknown the attention of the which, to tell the truth, had not been from him a single moment since the had set across the of his cell. It had all the thousand which he had for Doctor Jacques Coictier, the all-powerful physician of King Louis XI., to him to the thus accompanied. Hence, there was nothing very in his manner when Jacques Coictier said to him,—
“By the way, Dom Claude, I you a who has to see you on account of your reputation.”
“Monsieur to science?” asked the archdeacon, his upon Coictier’s companion. He the of the a no less or less than his own.
He was, so as the light of the lamp permitted one to judge, an old man about sixty years of age and of medium stature, who appeared and in health. His profile, although of a very ordinary outline, had something powerful and about it; his a very arch, like a light in the of a cave; and his cap which was well and upon his nose, one the of a of genius.
He took it upon himself to reply to the archdeacon’s question,—
“Reverend master,” he said in a tone, “your has my ears, and I wish to you. I am but a gentleman, who his shoes entering the of the learned. You must know my name. I am called Gossip Tourangeau.”
“Strange name for a gentleman,” said the to himself.
Nevertheless, he had a that he was in the presence of a and character. The of his own him an no less under Gossip Tourangeau’s cap, and as he at the face, the which Jacques Coictier’s presence called on his face, as on the of night. Stern and silent, he had his seat in his great armchair; his rested as usual, on the table, and his on his hand. After a moments of reflection, he his visitors to be seated, and, to Gossip Tourangeau he said,—
“You come to me, master, and upon what science?”
“Your reverence,” Tourangeau, “I am ill, very ill. You are said to be great Æsculapius, and I am come to ask your in medicine.”
“Medicine!” said the archdeacon, his head. He to for a moment, and then resumed: “Gossip Tourangeau, since that is your name, turn your head, you will my reply already on the wall.”
Gossip Tourangeau obeyed, and read this above his head: “Medicine is the of dreams.—JAMBLIQUE.”
Meanwhile, Doctor Jacques Coictier had his companion’s question with a which Dom Claude’s response had but redoubled. He to the ear of Gossip Tourangeau, and said to him, not to be by the archdeacon: “I you that he was mad. You on him.”
“’Tis very possible that he is right, as he is, Doctor Jacques,” his in the same low tone, and with a smile.
“As you please,” Coictier dryly. Then, the archdeacon: “You are at your trade, Dom Claude, and you are no more at a over Hippocrates than a monkey is over a nut. Medicine a dream! I that the and the master physicians would upon you if they were here. So you the of upon the blood, and on the skin! You that of flowers and metals, which is called the world, for that called man!”
“I deny,” said Dom Claude coldly, “neither the invalid. I reject the physician.”
“Then it is not true,” Coictier hotly, “that is an eruption; that a by is to be by the of a mouse roasted; that blood, properly injected, to veins; it is not true that two and two make four, and that opistathonos.”
The without perturbation: “There are of which I think in a fashion.”
Coictier with anger.
“There, there, my good Coictier, let us not angry,” said Gossip Tourangeau. “Monsieur the is our friend.”
Coictier down, in a low tone,—
“After all, he’s mad.”
“Pasque-dieu, Master Claude,” Gossip Tourangeau, after a silence, “You me greatly. I had two to you upon, one my health and the other my star.”
“Monsieur,” returned the archdeacon, “if that be your motive, you would have done as well not to put out of my staircase. I do not in Medicine. I do not in Astrology.”
“Indeed!” said the man, with surprise.
Coictier gave a laugh.
“You see that he is mad,” he said, in a low tone, to Gossip Tourangeau. “He not in astrology.”
“The idea of imagining,” Dom Claude, “that every of a star is a which is to the of a man!”
“And what then, do you in?” Gossip Tourangeau.
The for a moment, then he allowed a to escape, which to give the to his response: “Credo in Deum.”
“Dominum nostrum,” added Gossip Tourangeau, making the of the cross.
“Amen,” said Coictier.
“Reverend master,” Tourangeau, “I am in to see you in such a religious of mind. But have you the point, great as you are, of no longer in science?”
“No,” said the archdeacon, the arm of Gossip Tourangeau, and a of up his eyes, “no, I do not reject science. I have not so long, on my belly, with my in the earth, through the of its caverns, without in of me, at the end of the gallery, a light, a flame, a something, the reflection, no doubt, of the laboratory where the patient and the wise have out God.”
“And in short,” Tourangeau, “what do you to be true and certain?”
“Alchemy.”
Coictier exclaimed, “Pardieu, Dom Claude, has its use, no doubt, but why medicine and astrology?”
“Naught is your science of man, is your science of the stars,” said the archdeacon, commandingly.
“That’s Epidaurus and Chaldea very fast,” the physician with a grin.
“Listen, Messire Jacques. This is said in good faith. I am not the king’s physician, and his has not me the Garden of Dædalus in which to the constellations. Don’t angry, but to me. What truth have you deduced, I will not say from medicine, which is too a thing, but from astrology? Cite to me the of the boustrophedon, the of the number and those of the number zephirod!”
“Will you deny,” said Coictier, “the of the bone, and the which are from it?”
“An error, Messire Jacques! None of your end in reality. Alchemy on the other hand has its discoveries. Will you results like this? Ice the earth for a thousand years is into crystals. Lead is the of all metals. For gold is not a metal, gold is light. Lead only four of two hundred years each, to pass in from the of lead, to the of red arsenic, from red to tin, from to silver. Are not these facts? But to in the bone, in the full line and in the stars, is as as to with the of Grand-Cathay that the into a mole, and that of turn into fish of the species.”
“I have science!” Coictier, “and I affirm—”
The did not allow him to finish: “And I have medicine, astrology, and hermetics. Here alone is the truth.” (As he spoke thus, he took from the top of the a with the which we have mentioned above), “here alone is light! Hippocrates is a dream; Urania is a dream; Hermes, a thought. Gold is the sun; to make gold is to be God. Herein the one and only science. I have the of medicine and astrology, I tell you! Naught, nothingness! The body, shadows! the planets, shadows!”
And he in his in a and attitude. Gossip Touraugeau him in silence. Coictier to grin, his imperceptibly, and in a low voice,—
“A madman!”
“And,” said Tourangeau suddenly, “the result,—have you it, have you gold?”
“If I had it,” the archdeacon, his slowly, like a man who is reflecting, “the king of France would be named Claude and not Louis.”
The frowned.
“What am I saying?” Dom Claude, with a of disdain. “What would the of France be to me when I the of the Orient?”
“Very good!” said the stranger.
“Oh, the fool!” Coictier.
The on, appearing to reply now only to his thoughts,—
“But no, I am still crawling; I am my and against the of the pathway. I catch a glimpse, I do not contemplate! I do not read, I spell out!”
“And when you know how to read!” the stranger, “will you make gold?”
“Who it?” said the archdeacon.
“In that case Our Lady that I am in need of money, and I should much to read in your books. Tell me, master, is your science or to Our Lady?”
“Whose I am?” Dom Claude himself with replying, with hauteur.
“That is true, my master. Well! will it you to me? Let me spell with you.”
Claude the and of a Samuel.
“Old man, it longer years than to you, to this across things. Your is very gray! One comes from the only with white hair, but only those with dark enter it. Science alone well how to hollow, wither, and up faces; she needs not to have old age her already furrowed. Nevertheless, if the you of under at your age, and of the of the sages, come to me; ’tis well, I will make the effort. I will not tell you, old man, to go and visit the of the pyramids, of which Herodotus speaks, the tower of Babylon, the white marble of the Indian temple of Eklinga. I, no more than yourself, have the Chaldean according to the of the Sikra, the temple of Solomon, which is destroyed, the doors of the of the kings of Israel, which are broken. We will ourselves with the of the book of Hermes which we have here. I will to you the of Saint Christopher, the symbol of the sower, and that of the two which are on the of the Sainte-Chapelle, and one of which in his hands a vase, the other, a cloud—”
Here Jacques Coictier, who had been by the archdeacon’s replies, his saddle, and him with the of one learned man another,—“Erras Claudi. The symbol is not the number. You take Orpheus for Hermes.”
“’Tis you who are in error,” the archdeacon, gravely. “Dædalus is the base; Orpheus is the wall; Hermes is the edifice,—that is all. You shall come when you will,” he continued, to Tourangeau, “I will you the little of gold which at the of Nicholas Flamel’s alembic, and you shall them with the gold of Guillaume de Paris. I will teach you the of the Greek word, peristera. But, of all, I will make you read, one after the other, the marble of the alphabet, the pages of the book. We shall go to the portal of Bishop Guillaume and of Saint-Jean le Rond at the Sainte-Chapelle, then to the house of Nicholas Flamel, Rue Manvault, to his tomb, which is at the Saints-Innocents, to his two hospitals, Rue de Montmorency. I will make you read the which the four great iron on the portal of the hospital Saint-Gervais, and of the Rue de la Ferronnerie. We will spell out in company, also, the façade of Saint-Côme, of Sainte-Geneviève-des-Ardents, of Saint Martin, of Saint-Jacques de la Boucherie—.”
For a long time, Gossip Tourangeau, as was his glance, had appeared not to Dom Claude. He interrupted.
“Pasque-dieu! what are your books, then?”
“Here is one of them,” said the archdeacon.
And opening the window of his he pointed out with his the church of Notre-Dame, which, against the sky the black of its two towers, its flanks, its haunches, an two-headed sphinx, seated in the middle of the city.
The at the for some time in silence, then his right hand, with a sigh, the printed book which open on the table, and his left Notre-Dame, and a sad from the book to the church,—“Alas,” he said, “this will kill that.”
Coictier, who had approached the book, not an exclamation. “Hé, but now, what is there so in this: ‘GLOSSA IN EPISTOLAS D. PAULI, Norimbergæ, Antonius Koburger, 1474.’ This is not new. ’Tis a book of Pierre Lombard, the Master of Sentences. Is it it is printed?”
“You have said it,” Claude, who in a meditation, and resting, his on the which had come from the famous press of Nuremberg. Then he added these words: “Alas! alas! small come at the end of great things; a tooth over a mass. The Nile kills the crocodile, the kills the whale, the book will kill the edifice.”
The of the at the moment when Master Jacques was to his in low tones, his refrain, “He is mad!” To which his this time replied, “I that he is.”
It was the hour when no in the cloister. The two visitors withdrew. “Master,” said Gossip Tourangeau, as he took of the archdeacon, “I love wise men and great minds, and I you in esteem. Come to-morrow to the Palace Tournelles, and for the Abbé de Sainte-Martin, of Tours.”
The returned to his dumbfounded, at last who Gossip Tourangeau was, and that passage of the register of Sainte-Martin, of Tours:—Abbas Martini, SCILICET REX FRANCIÆ, de et præbendam Venantius, et in thesaurarii.
It is that after that the had with Louis XI., when his came to Paris, and that Dom Claude’s that of Olivier le Daim and Jacques Coictier, who, as was his habit, took the king to on that account.
