The Manuscript Found in Saragossa by Jan Potocki

fair number of its tiles, so that it rained in the bedrooms as much as in the courtyard, the difference being that the paving stones of the courtyard dried very quickly whereas the water formed puddles in the bedroom that never disappeared. These domestic floods did not displease my father since they reminded him of the siege of Lerida, where he had spent three weeks knee-deep in water.
    His first concern, however, was to put his wife’s bed in a dry place. There was a fireplace in the Flemish style in the state room, around which fifteen people could easily warm themselves. The mantel of the fireplace consisted of a sort of roof supported by two columns on either side. My father had the flue blocked up and my mother’s bed placed in the hearth underneath the mantel, together with her bedside table and a chair. Since the hearth was a foot higher than what surrounded it, it formed a nearly inaccessible island.
    My father settled himself at the other end of the room on two tables linked by planks. A jetty was constructed from his bed to that of my mother, buttressed in the middle by a sort of coffer-dam built from trunks and chests. This construction was completed on the very day they arrived at the castle. Exactly nine months later to the day, I came into the world.
    While work on the most urgent repairs was proceeding at a feverish pace, my father received a letter which filled him with joy. It was signed by the Maréchal de Tavannes, and in it this gentleman asked his opinion on a point of honour which was then occupying the tribunal. This genuine sign of favour seemed so important to my father that he resolved to celebrate it by giving a feast to the whole neighbourhood. But as we had no neighbours the revels were restricted to a fandango performed by the fencing master and Señora Frasca, who was my mother’s first chambermaid.
    In his reply to the maréchal my father asked if he could be permitted to see in due course the résumé of the tribunal’s deliberations on matters placed before it. This favour was granted him, and on the first day of every month he received a dispatch which provided thesubject-matter for four weeks’ conversation and small talk. In winter this took place around the great fireplace and in summer on two seats placed in front of the castle door.
    Throughout my mother’s pregnancy my father spoke to her about the son she would have and thought about the choice of godfather. My mother suggested the Maréchal de Tavannes or the Marquis d’Urfé. My father agreed that such a choice would do us great honour. But he was afraid that these great noblemen might consider that they were doing him too great an honour, and decided with thoughtfulness and tact to ask the Chevalier de Belièvre, who for his part was honoured and grateful to accept.
    At last I was born. At the age of three years I could already hold a little foil, and at six I was able to discharge a pistol without blinking. I was about seven when my godfather visited me. This gentleman had married at Tournai, where he occupied the post of lieutenant to the high constable and recorder of the tribunal which settled matters of honour. Both posts go back to the time of trial by champions. Later they were transferred to the tribunal of maréchaux.
    Madame de Belièvre was of delicate health and her husband used to accompany her to Spa for the waters. Both took me to their hearts and, not having children themselves, they implored my father to entrust them with my education, which could not have been properly attended to in as remote a place as the castle of Worden. My father agreed, persuaded above all by the office of recorder of the tribunal settling matters of honour, which ensured that in his house I could not fail to be imbued at an early age with the principles that should govern my conduct when I grew up.
    At first there was talk of Garcías Hierro accompanying me, because my father considered