"Do I need to tell you, lord canon," pursued the doctor, "that without colonies, we would have no merchant service, and without a merchant service, no navy for war, since the navy is recruited from the seamen in the merchant service? Well, if the lovers of good eating did not consume all the delicacies which you see exhibited here in small samples,—sugar, coffee, vanilla, cloves, cinnamon, ginger, rice, pistachios, Cayenne pepper, nutmeg, liquors from the islands, hachars from the Indies, what, I ask you, would become of our colonies, that is to say, our maritime power?"
"I am amazed," cried the canon, "I am dizzy; at each step I feel myself expand a hundred cubits."
"And, zounds! you are right, lord Dom Diégo," said the doctor, "for indeed, when, after having tasted at dessert a cheese frozen with vanilla, to which will succeed a glass of wine from Constance or the Cape, you take a cup of coffee, and conclude of course with one or two little glasses of liquor from the islands, flavoured with cloves or cinnamon, ah, well, you will further heroically the maritime power of France, and do in your sphere as much for the navy as the sailor or the captain. And speaking of captains, lord canon," added the doctor, sadly, "I wish you to observe that among all the shops we have seen, this one alone is empty, because the captain of the ship which has brought all these choice provisions from the Indies and the colonies dares not show himself, while he is under the cloud of your vengeance. I mean, canon, my poor nephew, Captain Horace. He alone has failed to come, to-day, to this family feast."
"Ah, the accursed serpent!" muttered the abbé, "how adroitly he goes to his aim; how well he knows how to wind this miserable brute, Dom Diégo, around his finger."
At the name of Captain Horace, the canon started, then relapsed into thoughtful silence.
CHAPTER XIV.
Canon Dom Diégo, after a few moments' silence, extended his fat hand to Doctor Gasterini, and, trembling with emotion, said:
"Doctor, Captain Horace cost me my appetite; you have restored it to me, I hope, for the remainder of my life; and much more, you have, according to your promise, proven to me, not by specious reasoning, but by facts and figures, that the gourmand, as you have declared with so much wisdom, accomplishes a high social and political mission in the civilised world; you have delivered me from the pangs of remorse by giving me a knowledge of the noble task that my epicureanism may perform, and in this sacred duty, doctor, I will not fail. So, in gratitude to you, in appreciation of you, I hope to acquit myself modestly by declaring to you that, not only shall I refuse to enter a complaint against your nephew, Captain Horace, but I cordially bestow upon him the hand of my niece in marriage."
"As I told you, canon," said the abbé, "I was very sure that once this diabolical doctor had you in his clutches, he would do with you all that he desired. Where now are the beautiful resolutions you made this morning?"
"Abbé," replied Dom Diégo, in a self-sufficient tone, "I am not a child; I shall know how to stand at the height of the rôle the doctor has marked out for me."