During this harangue the sovereign pontiff considered within himself how to dispose of his preceptor. He reflected he was no longer necessary; that he already knew as much of magic as was sufficient for a pope. After weighing every circumstance, his holiness concluded that don Torribio was not only an useless, but a troublesome pedant; and this point determined, he replied in the following words:
“We have learned, with concern, that under the pretext of cultivating the occult sciences, you maintain a horrible intercourse with the spirit of darkness and deceit; we therefore exhort you, as a father, to expiate your crime by a repentance proportionable to its enormity. Moreover, we enjoin you to depart from the territories of the church within three days, under penalty of being delivered over to the secular arm, and its merciless flames.”
Don Torribio, without being alarmed, immediately repeated the three mysterious words which the reader was desired to remember; and going to a window, cried out with all his force, “Jacintha, you need spit but one partridge; for my friend, the dean, will not sup here to-night.”
This was a thunderbolt to the imaginary pope. He immediately recovered from the trance, into which he had been thrown by the three mysterious words. He perceived that, instead of being in the vatican, he was still at Toledo, in the closet of don Torribio; and he saw, by the clock, it was not a complete hour since he entered that fatal cabinet, where he had been entertained by such pleasant dreams.
In that short time the dean of Badajos had imagined himself a magician, a bishop, a cardinal, and a pope; and he found at last that he was only a dupe and a knave. All was illusion, except the proofs he had given of his deceitful and evil heart. He instantly departed, without speaking a single word, and finding his mule where he had left her, returned to Badajos.
Phrenology.
For the Table Book.
“You look but on the outside of affairs.”
King John.