, let her drive, and let us
drink, I say, of the best and most cheering; d'ye hear, steward? produce,
exhibit; for, d'ye see this, and all the rest will as well go to the devil
out of hand. A pox on that wind-broker Aeolus, with his fluster-blusters.
Sirrah, page, bring me here my drawer (for so he called his breviary); stay
a little here; haul, friend, thus. Odzoons, here is a deal of hail and
thunder to no purpose. Hold fast above, I pray you. When have we
All-saints day? I believe it is the unholy holiday of all the devil's crew.
Alas! said Panurge, Friar John damns himself here as black as buttermilk
for the nonce. Oh, what a good friend I lose in him. Alas, alas! this is
another gats-bout than last year's. We are falling out of Scylla into
Charybdis. Oho! I drown. Confiteor; one poor word or two by way of
testament, Friar John, my ghostly father; good Mr. Abstractor, my crony,
my Achates, Xenomanes, my all. Alas! I drown; two words of testament here
upon this ladder.

Chapter 4.XXI.

A continuation of the storm, with a short discourse on the subject of
making testaments at sea.

To make one's last will, said Epistemon, at this time that we ought to
bestir ourselves and help our seamen, on the penalty of being drowned,
seems to me as idle and ridiculous a maggot as that of some of Caesar's
men, who, at their coming into the Gauls, were mightily busied in making
wills and codicils; bemoaned their fortune and the absence of their spouses
and friends at Rome, when it was absolutely necessary for them to run to
their arms and use their utmost strength against Ariovistus their enemy.

This also is to be as silly as that jolt-headed loblolly of a carter, who,
having laid his waggon fast in a slough, down on his marrow-bones was
calling on the strong-backed deity, Hercules, might and main, to help him
at a dead lift, but all the while forgot to goad on his oxen and lay his
shoulder to the wheels, as it behoved him; as if a Lord have mercy upon us
alone would have got his cart out of the mire.

What will it signify to make your will now? for either we shall come off or
drown for it. If we 'scape, it will not signify a straw to us; for
testaments are of no value or authority but by the death of the testators.
If we are drowned, will it not be drowned too? Prithee, who will transmit
it to the executors? Some kind wave will throw it ashore, like Ulysses,
replied Panurge; and some king's daughter, going to