en were seated opposite to each other in the tap-room, the
fencing-master pushed his moustache away from his lips, and began: "How
long ago is it-? We'll say fifteen years, since I was riding to Haarlem
with the innkeeper Aquarius, who as you know, is a learned man and has
all sorts of old stuff and Latin manuscripts. He talks well, and when
the conversation turned upon our meeting with many things in life
that we fancy we have already seen, remarked that this could be easily
explained, for the human soul was an indestructible thing, a bird that
never dies. So long as we live it remains with us, and when we die flies
away and is rewarded or punished according to its deserts; but after
centuries, which are no more to the Lord than the minutes in which I
empty this fresh mug--one more, bar-maid--the merciful Father releases
it again, and it nestles in some new born child. This made me laugh;
but he was not at all disturbed and told the story of an old Pagan, a
wonderfully wise chap, who knew positively that his soul had formerly
lodged in the body of a mighty hero. This same hero also remembered
exactly where, during his former life, he had hung his shield, and told
his associates. They searched and found the piece of armor, with
the initials of the Christian and surname which had belonged to the
philosopher in his life as a soldier, centuries before. This puzzled me,
for you see--now don't laugh--something had formerly happened to me very
much like the Pagan's experience. I don't care much for books, and
from a child have always read the same one. I inherited it from my dead
father and the work is not printed, but written. I'll show it to you
some time--it contains the history of the brave Roland. Often, when
absorbed in these beautiful and true stories, my cheeks have grown
as red as fire, and I'll confess to you, as I did to my
travelling-companion: If I'm not mistaken, I've sat with King Charles
at the board, or I've worn Roland's chain armor in battle and in the
tourney. I believe I have seen the Moorish king, Marsilia, and once
when reading how the dying Roland wound his horn in the valley of the
Roncesvalles, I felt such a pain in my throat, that it seemed as if it
would burst, and fancied I had felt the same pain before. When I frankly
acknowledged all this, my companion exclaimed that there was no doubt
my soul had once inhabited Roland's body, or in other words, that in a
former life I had been the Knight Roland."