rochole, "will extend
mercy to him." "Very well," said they, "on condition that he
is baptized. And then you will assault the kingdoms of
Tunis, of Hippo,[96] of Argier, of Bona, of Corona--to cut
it short, all Barbary. Going further,[97] you will keep in
your hands Majorca, Minorca, Sardinia, Corsica, and the
other islands of the Ligurian and Balearic sea. Coasting to
the left[98] you will dominate all Narbonese Gaul, Provence,
the Allobroges, Genoa, Florence, Lucca, and, begad! Rome.
Poor master Pope is already dying for fear of you." "I will
never kiss his slipper," said Picrochole.

"Italy being taken, behold Naples, Calabria, Apulia, and
Sicily all at your mercy, and Malta into the bargain. I
should like to see those funny knights, formerly of Rhodes,
resist you! if it were only to examine their water." "I
should like," said Picrochole, "to go to Loretto." "No, no,"
said they, "that will be on the way back. Thence we shall
take Candia, Cyprus, Rhodes, and the Cyclades, and make a
set at Morea. We shall get it at once. By St. Treignan, God
keep Jerusalem! for the soldan is nothing in power to you."
"Shall I," said he, "then rebuild the Temple of Solomon?"
"Not yet," said they, "wait a little. Be not so hasty in
your enterprises."

And so with the most meticulous exactness (Rabelais' geography is
irreproachable, and he carefully avoids the cheap expedient of making
Spadassin and Merdaille blunder) and the sagest citations of _Festina
lente_, they take him through Asia Minor to the Euphrates and Arabia,
while the other army (that which has annihilated Grandgousier) comes
round by the northern route, sweeping all Europe from Brittany and the
British Isles to Constantinople, where the great rendezvous is made and
the universal empire established, Picrochole graciously giving his
advisers Syria and Palestine as their fiefs.

"Pretty much like our own days," said Mr. Rigmarole. Have we not heard
something very like this lately, as "Berlin to Baghdad," if not "Calais
to Calcutta"? And even if we had not, would not the sense and the satire
of it be delectable? A great deal has been left out: the chapter is, for
Rabelais, rather a long one. The momentary doubt of the usually
undoubting Picrochole as to what they shall drink in the desert, allayed
at once by a beautiful scheme of commissariat camels and