s to give us enigmas, as in the East."

"The East? that is it," said the prisoner. "A Spaniard is a man from the
East; he is a Catholic Turk; his blood either flags or boils; he is lazy
or indefatigable; indolence makes him a slave, ardor a tyrant; immovable
in his ignorance, ingenious in his superstition, he needs only a
religious book and a tyrannical master; he obeys the law of the pyre; he
commands by that of the poniard. At night he falls asleep in his
bloodthirsty misery, nurses fanaticism, and awakes to crime. Who is this
gentleman? Is it the Spaniard or the Turk? Guess! Ah! you seem to think
that I have wit, because I light upon analogy."

"Truly, gentlemen, you do me honor; and yet the idea may be carried much
further, if desired. If I pass to the physical order, for example, may I
not say to you, This man has long and serious features, a black and
almond-shaped eye, rugged brows, a sad and mobile mouth, tawny, meagre,
and wrinkled cheeks; his head is shaved, and he covers it with a black
handkerchief in the form of a turban; he passes the whole day lying or
standing under a burning sun, without motion, without utterance, smoking
a pipe that intoxicates him. Is this a Turk or a Spaniard? Are you
satisfied, gentlemen? Truly, it would seem so; you laugh, and at what do
you laugh? I, who have presented this idea to you--I have not laughed;
see, my countenance is sad. Ah! perhaps it is because the gloomy prisoner
has suddenly become a gossip, and talks rapidly. That is nothing! I might
tell you other things, and render you some service, my worthy friends.

"If I should relate anecdotes, for example; if I told you I knew a priest
who ordered the death of some heretics before saying mass, and who,
furious at being interrupted at the altar during the holy sacrifice,
cried to those who asked for his orders, 'Kill them all! kill them
all!'--should you all laugh, gentlemen? No, not all! This gentleman here,
for instance, would bite his lips and his beard. Oh! it is true he might
answer that he did wisely, and that they were wrong to interrupt his
unsullied prayer. But if I added that he concealed himself for an hour
behind the curtain of your tent, Monsieur de Cinq-Mars, to listen while
you talked, and that he came to betray you, and not to get me, what would
he say? Now, gentlemen, are you satisfied? May I retire after this
display?"

The prisoner had uttered this with the rapidity of a quack vending his
wares, and i