that I saw among these
players, and two other companies to which I belonged; but I must leave
them for another day, for it would be impossible to compress them within
moderate limits. All you have heard is nothing to what I could relate to
you about these people and their ways, their work and their idleness,
their ignorance and their cleverness, and other matters without end,
which might serve to disenchant many who idolise these fictitious
divinities.

_Scip._ I see clearly, Berganza, that the field is large; but leave it
now, and go on.

_Berg._ I arrived with a company of players in this city of Valladolid,
where they gave me a wound in an interlude that was near being the death
of me. I could not revenge myself then, because I was muzzled, and I had
no mind to do so afterwards in cold blood; for deliberate vengeance
argues a cruel and malicious disposition. I grew weary of this
employment, not because it was laborious, but because I saw in it many
things which called for amendment and castigation; and, as it was not in
my power to remedy them, I resolved to see them no more, but to take
refuge in an abode of holiness, as those do who forsake their vices when
they can no longer practise them; but better late than never. Well,
then, seeing you one night carrying the lantern with that good Christian
Mahudes, I noticed how contented you were, how righteous and holy was
your occupation. Filled with honest emulation, I longed to follow your
steps; and, with that laudable intention, I placed myself before
Mahudes, who immediately elected me your companion, and brought me to
this hospital. What has occurred to me since I have been here would take
some time to relate. I will just mention a conversation I heard between
four invalids, who lay in four beds next each other. It will not take
long to tell, and it fits in here quite pat.

_Scip._ Very well; but be quick, for, to the best of my belief, it
cannot be far from daylight.

_Berg._ The four beds were at the end of the infirmary, and in them lay
an alchemist, a poet, a mathematician, and one of those persons who are
called projectors.

_Scip._ I recollect these good people well.

_Berg._ One afternoon, last summer, the windows being closed, I lay
panting under one of their beds, when the poet began piteously to
bewail his ill fortune. The mathematician asked him what he complained
of.

"Have I not good cause for complaint?" he replied. "I have strictly
observed