,
Bow virtue to the gate?
Let Cupid not ensnare you--
His cunning wiles beware you,
The sweets of sin soon vanish--
Its pains, ah! who can banish."

This letter I sent to the lady, and it had the effect that I expected;
her love was changed to the bitterest hatred:--

In vain her glowing tongue would vie,
To tell her frightful agony.
Despairing shame her accents clip;--
They freeze upon her snowy lip.
No tears did flow; _such_ pain oft dries
The blessed current of the eyes:
Fell vengeance from her black orbs glanced,
While like a fury, she advanced.

Nevertheless, she restrained her fury, until she recovered the
love-letter she had written to me. As soon as she had secured it, she
hired some persons to testify by oath, that, in the absence of his
Excellency, I had attempted to violate her. This fable was represented
with so much art and speciousness, that the president did not doubt its
truth, and I was ordered to be put in prison. In this, my despairing
condition, I saw no other means of deliverance than to confess the
crime, with which I had been charged, and supplicate the president for
mercy: which being done, my life was conceded, but I was doomed to
perpetual imprisonment. My charter of nobility was immediately taken
from me, and I was sent to the galleys as a slave. My destination was to
one of the ships belonging to the republic, which then lay ready to sail
for _Mezendares_, or the Land-of-wonders. Thence were brought the wares
that Martinia cannot produce. This ship, on board of which my evil
fortune had now cast me, was propelled both by sails and oars; at each
oar two slaves were chained: consequently I was attached to another
unfortunate. I was consoled, however, by the prospect of a voyage,
during which I hoped to find new food and nourishment for my insatiable
inquisitiveness, although I did not believe all that the seamen told of
the curious things I should see. Several interpreters accompanied us;
these being made use of by the Mezendaric merchants in the course of
their commercial negotiations.

[Illustration]

CHAPTER XI.

THE VOYAGE TO THE LAND-OF-WONDERS.

Before I proceed to the description of this sea-voyage, I must first
caution all severe and unmerciful critics not to frown too much at the
narration of things, which seem to war against nature, and even surpass
the faculties of faith in the most credulous man. I relat