.
"But is it indeed possible that my sister can be in Turkey?" said he.
"Nothing is more possible," said Cacambo, "since she scours the dishes
in the service of a Transylvanian prince."
Candide sent directly for two Jews and sold them some more diamonds, and
then they all set out together in another galley to deliver Cunegonde
from slavery.
XXVIII
WHAT HAPPENED TO CANDIDE, CUNEGONDE, PANGLOSS, MARTIN, ETC.
"I ask your pardon once more," said Candide to the Baron, "your pardon,
reverend father, for having run you through the body."
"Say no more about it," answered the Baron. "I was a little too hasty, I
own, but since you wish to know by what fatality I came to be a
galley-slave I will inform you. After I had been cured by the surgeon of
the college of the wound you gave me, I was attacked and carried off by
a party of Spanish troops, who confined me in prison at Buenos Ayres at
the very time my sister was setting out thence. I asked leave to return
to Rome to the General of my Order. I was appointed chaplain to the
French Ambassador at Constantinople. I had not been eight days in this
employment when one evening I met with a young Ichoglan, who was a very
handsome fellow. The weather was warm. The young man wanted to bathe,
and I took this opportunity of bathing also. I did not know that it was
a capital crime for a Christian to be found naked with a young
Mussulman. A cadi ordered me a hundred blows on the soles of the feet,
and condemned me to the galleys. I do not think there ever was a greater
act of injustice. But I should be glad to know how my sister came to be
scullion to a Transylvanian prince who has taken shelter among the
Turks."
"But you, my dear Pangloss," said Candide, "how can it be that I behold
you again?"
"It is true," said Pangloss, "that you saw me hanged. I should have been
burnt, but you may remember it rained exceedingly hard when they were
going to roast me; the storm was so violent that they despaired of
lighting the fire, so I was hanged because they could do no better. A
surgeon purchased my body, carried me home, and dissected me. He began
with making a crucial incision on me from the navel to the clavicula.
One could not have been worse hanged than I was. The executioner of the
Holy Inquisition was a sub-deacon, and knew how to burn people
marvellously well, but he was not accustomed to hanging. The cord was
wet and did not slip properly, and besides it was badly
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