ry of the Seigneur of Basche
too well--and the remarkable difference between the feudatory and his
superior on the subject of debt, serve but as a whet to the project of
matrimony which the debtor conceives. Of course, Panurge is the very
last man whom a superficial observer of humanity--the very first whom a
somewhat profounder student thereof--would take as a marrying one. He is
"a little failed"; he thinks to rest himself while not foregoing his
former delights, and he shuts eyes and ears to the proverb, as old as
Greek in words and as old as the world in fact, that "the doer shall
suffer." That he should consult Pantagruel is in the circumstances
almost a necessity, and Pantagruel's conduct is exactly what one would
expect from that good-natured, learned, admirable, but rather enigmatic
personage. Merely "aleatory" decision--by actual use of dice--he rejects
as illicit, though towards the close of the book one of its most
delectable episodes ends in his excusing Mr. Justice Bridoye for
settling law cases in that way. But he recommends the _sortes
Virgilianae_, and he, others, and Panurge himself add the experiment of
dreams, and the successive consultation of the Sibyl of Panzoust, the
dumb Nazdecabre, the poet Raminagrobis, Epistemon, "Her Trippa," Friar
John himself, the theologian Hippothadee, the doctor Rondibilis, the
philosopher Trouillogan, and the professional fool Triboulet. No reader
of the most moderate intelligence can need to be told that the
counsellors opine all in the same sense (unfavourable), though with more
or less ambiguity, and that Panurge, with equal obstinacy and ingenuity,
invariably twists the oracles according to his own wishes. But what no
reader, who came fresh to Rabelais and fasting from criticism on him,
could anticipate, is the astonishing spontaneity of the various dealings
with the same problem, the zest and vividness of the whole thing, and
the unceasing shower of satire on everything human--general,
professional, and individual--which is kept up throughout. There is less
pure extravagance, less mere farce, and (despite the subject) even less
"sculduddery" than in any other Book; but also in no other does Rabelais
"keep up with humanity" (somewhat, indeed, in the fashion in which a
carter keeps up with his animal, running and lashing at the same time)
so triumphantly.

In no book, moreover, are the curious intervals--or, as it were, prose
choric odes--of interruption more remarka