roleplaying:munchausen:chapter_ix
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+ | ====== TRAVELS OF BARON MUNCHAUSEN ====== | ||
+ | ===== CHAPTER IX ===== | ||
+ | // | ||
+ | over Constantinople; | ||
+ | experimental philosopher suspended from it--Goes on an embassy to | ||
+ | Grand Cairo, and returns upon the Nile, where he is thrown into an | ||
+ | unexpected situation, and detained six weeks.// | ||
+ | |||
+ | When I was in the service of the Turks I frequently amused myself in a | ||
+ | pleasure-barge on the Marmora, which commands a view of the whole city | ||
+ | of Constantinople, | ||
+ | morning, as I was admiring the beauty and serenity of the sky, I | ||
+ | observed a globular substance in the air, which appeared to be about | ||
+ | the size of a twelve-inch globe, with somewhat suspended from it. I | ||
+ | immediately took up my largest and longest barrel fowling-piece, | ||
+ | I never travel or make even an excursion without, if I can help it; I | ||
+ | charged with a ball, and fired at the globe, but to no purpose, the | ||
+ | object being at too great a distance. I then put in a double quantity | ||
+ | of powder, and five or six balls: this second attempt succeeded; all | ||
+ | the balls took effect, and tore one side open, and brought it down. | ||
+ | Judge my surprise when a most elegant gilt car, with a man in it, and | ||
+ | part of a sheep which seemed to have been roasted, fell within two | ||
+ | yards of me. When my astonishment had in some degree subsided, I | ||
+ | ordered my people to row close to this strange aërial traveller. | ||
+ | |||
+ | I took him on board my barge (he was a native of France): he was much | ||
+ | indisposed from his sudden fall into the sea, and incapable of | ||
+ | speaking; after some time, however, he recovered, and gave the | ||
+ | following account of himself, viz.: "About seven or eight days since, | ||
+ | I cannot tell which, for I have lost my reckoning, having been most of | ||
+ | the time where the sun never sets, I ascended from the Land's End in | ||
+ | Cornwall, in the island of Great Britain, in the car from which I have | ||
+ | been just taken, suspended from a very large balloon, and took a sheep | ||
+ | with me to try atmospheric experiments upon: unfortunately, | ||
+ | changed within ten minutes after my ascent, and instead of driving | ||
+ | towards Exeter, where I intended to land, I was driven towards the | ||
+ | sea, over which I suppose I have continued ever since, but much too | ||
+ | high to make observations. | ||
+ | |||
+ | "The calls of hunger were so pressing, that the intended experiments | ||
+ | upon heat and respiration gave way to them. I was obliged, on the | ||
+ | third day, to kill the sheep for food; and being at that time | ||
+ | infinitely above the moon, and for upwards of sixteen hours after so | ||
+ | very near the sun that it scorched my eyebrows, I placed the carcase, | ||
+ | taking care to skin it first, in that part of the car where the sun | ||
+ | had sufficient power, or, in other words, where the balloon did not | ||
+ | shade it from the sun, by which method it was well roasted in about | ||
+ | two hours. This has been my food ever since." | ||
+ | seemed lost in viewing the objects about him. When I told him the | ||
+ | buildings before us were the Grand Seignior' | ||
+ | Constantinople, | ||
+ | himself in a very different situation. "The cause," | ||
+ | long flight, was owing to the failure of a string which was fixed to a | ||
+ | valve in the balloon, intended to let out the inflammable air; and if | ||
+ | it had not been fired at, and rent in the manner before mentioned, I | ||
+ | might, like Mahomet, have been suspended between heaven and earth till | ||
+ | doomsday." | ||
+ | |||
+ | The Grand Seignior, to whom I was introduced by the Imperial, Russian, | ||
+ | and French ambassadors, | ||
+ | importance at Grand Cairo, and which was of such a nature that it must | ||
+ | ever remain a secret. | ||
+ | |||
+ | I went there in great state by land; where, having completed the | ||
+ | business, I dismissed almost all my attendants, and returned like a | ||
+ | private gentleman; the weather was delightful, and that famous river | ||
+ | the Nile was beautiful beyond all description; | ||
+ | to hire a barge to descend by water to Alexandria. On the third day of | ||
+ | my voyage the river began to rise most amazingly (you have all heard, | ||
+ | I presume, of the annual overflowing of the Nile), and on the next day | ||
+ | it spread the whole country for many leagues on each side! On the | ||
+ | fifth, at sunrise, my barge became entangled with what I at first took | ||
+ | for shrubs, but as the light became stronger I found myself surrounded | ||
+ | by almonds, which were perfectly ripe, and in the highest perfection. | ||
+ | Upon plumbing with a line my people found we were at least sixty feet | ||
+ | from the ground, and unable to advance or retreat. At about eight or | ||
+ | nine o' | ||
+ | wind rose suddenly, and canted our barge on one side: here she filled, | ||
+ | and I saw no more of her for some time. Fortunately we all saved | ||
+ | ourselves (six men and two boys) by clinging to the tree, the boughs | ||
+ | of which were equal to our weight, though not to that of the barge: in | ||
+ | this situation we continued six weeks and three days, living upon the | ||
+ | almonds; I need not inform you we had plenty of water. On the forty- | ||
+ | second day of our distress the water fell as rapidly as it had risen, | ||
+ | and on the forty-sixth we were able to venture down upon //terra | ||
+ | firma//. Our barge was the first pleasing object we saw, about two | ||
+ | hundred yards from the spot where she sunk. After drying everything | ||
+ | that was useful by the heat of the sun, and loading ourselves with | ||
+ | necessaries from the stores on board, we set out to recover our lost | ||
+ | ground, and found, by the nearest calculation, | ||
+ | over garden-walls, | ||
+ | fifty miles. In four days, after a very tiresome journey on foot, with | ||
+ | thin shoes, we reached the river, which was now confined to its banks, | ||
+ | related our adventures to a boy, who kindly accommodated all our | ||
+ | wants, and sent us forward in a barge of his own. In six days more we | ||
+ | arrived at Alexandria, where we took shipping for Constantinople. I | ||
+ | was received kindly by the Grand Seignior, and had the honour of | ||
+ | seeing the Seraglio, to which his highness introduced me himself. | ||
+ | ---- | ||
+ | Go to [[CHAPTER X]] |
roleplaying/munchausen/chapter_ix.txt · Last modified: 2005/11/22 17:59 by 127.0.0.1