Libelant

“ She sprang, full-grown, from the head of Satan.
Woman to the waist, and fair,
But ending foul in many a scaly fold
Voluminous and vast, a serpent armed
With mortal sting.
Milton, Paradise Lost, ii. (1665) .
Sin ́adone (The lady of) , metamorphosed by enchantment into a serpent. Sir Lybius (one of Arthur’s knights) slew the enchantress, and the serpent, coiling about his neck, kissed him; whereupon the spell was broken, the serpent became a lovely princess, and Sir Lybius made her his wife.—Libeaux (a romance) .
Sindbad, a merchant of Bagdad, who acquired great wealth by merchandise. ”

“ But, if no thunderbolt falls on Lord Lilburne's head—if he is fated still to eat, and drink, and to die on his bed, he may yet taste the ashes of the Dead Sea fruit which his hands have culled. He is grown old. ”

“ After we had pretty well stayed our stomachs with some tight snatches, Friar John said to Aedituus, For aught I see, you have none but a parcel of birds and cages in this island of yours, and the devil a bit of one of them all that sets his hand to the plough, or tills the land whose fat he devours; their whole business is to be frolic, to chirp it, to whistle it, to warble it, tossing it, and roar it merrily night and day. ”

“ Then Gymnast, spying his advantage, alighted from his horse, drew his sword, and laid on great blows upon the thickset and highest crested among them, and overthrew them in great heaps, hurt, wounded, and bruised, being resisted by nobody, they thinking he had been a starved devil, as well in regard of his wonderful feats in vaulting, which they had seen, as for the talk Tripet had with him, calling him poor devil. ”

“ A thousand devils seize the cuckoldy cow-hearted mongrel, cried Friar John. Ods-belly, art thou talking here of making thy will now we are in danger, and it behoveth us to bestir our stumps lustily, or never? Wilt thou come, ho devil? Midshipman, my friend; O the rare lieutenant; here Gymnast, here on the poop. We are, by the mass, all beshit now; our light is out. This is hastening to the devil as fast as it can. Alas, bou, bou, bou, bou, bou, alas, alas, alas, alas! said Panurge; was it here we were born to perish? Oh! ho! good people, I drown, I die. ”

“ One day, said Friar John, at Seuille, I had applied to my posteriors, by way of hind-towel, a leaf of an old Clementinae which our rent-gatherer, John Guimard, had thrown out into the green of our cloister. Now the devil broil me like a black pudding, if I wasn't so abominably plagued with chaps, chawns, and piles at the fundament, that the orifice of my poor nockandroe was in a most woeful pickle for I don't know how long. ”

“ I pleasur'd my doxies with fifty rare things,
⁠for which I am got into Limbo.
But as I lay sleeping one day in the straw,
⁠bewailing my woful condition,
Being ready with hunger my fingers to gnaw,
⁠I sigh'd and brought forth this expression:
If I could but get the young whores to my hand,
To argue the case very long I'd not stand,
But grind the young bitches as small as the sand,
⁠I'd teach them to leave me in Limbo. ”

“ Thus I set you at nought, scorning you, as well as hating you, feeling as much disgust as horror at your conduct. Let me tell you more, Count Lieberg, that, were there no other man on earth, I would regard you with the same contempt that I do now ”

“ I will drive my knife into her!"
"Here, take her," cried Lieberg. "We shall have to fight them.--Call up some of the men from behind.--Tie her, and keep her here; they cannot be so many as we are. We will soon disperse them.--Here come three, right down upon us--call up some of the men from behind, I say!" ”

“ By the virtue of God, why do not you sing, Panniers, farewell, vintage is done? The devil snatch me, if they be not already within the middle of our close, and cut so well both vines and grapes, that, by Cod's body, there will not be found for these four years to come so much as a gleaning in it. By the belly of Sanct James, what shall we poor devils drink the while? ”

“ The devil be damned! cried Friar John; do you call these same folks illiterate lobcocks and duncical doddipolls? May I be broiled like a red herring if I do not think they are wise enough to skin a flint and draw oil out of a brick wall. So they are, said Double-fee; for they sometimes put castles, parks, and forests into the press, and out of them all extract aurum potabile. You mean portabile, I suppose, cried Epistemon, such as may be borne. I mean as I said, replied Double-fee, potabile, such as may be drunk; for it makes them drink many a good bottle more than otherwise they should. ”

“ If he be such a fool, quoth Carpalin, as to be won with apples, there is no more wit in his pate than in the head of an ordinary cabbage. Triboulet girded the sword and scrip to his side, took the bladder in his hand, ate some few of the apples, and drunk up all the wine. Panurge very wistly and heedfully looking upon him said, I never yet saw a fool, and I have seen ten thousand francs worth of that kind of cattle, who did not love to drink heartily, and by good long draughts. ”

“ The whole body trembled in impotent anger and outraged self-respect. Upon the face of the small man was suddenly written the implacable defiance which one sees in carnivora when wounded and cornered—intensified as an expression can only be intensified upon a human face—as, almost unconsciously, he returned to the hollow he had left, and fairly thrust his tousled head into the kindly earth. ”

“ In the meantime the old hag came down and roared out for help, crying out murder to set all the neighbourhood in an uproar. Yet she also fell to gathering the feathers that flew up and down in the air, being scattered by the wind. Friar John let her bawl on, and, without any further ado, marched off with the blanket, quilt, and both the sheets, which he brought aboard undiscovered, for the air was darkened with the feathers, as it uses sometimes to be with snow. ”

“ This mightily frightened us, and not without cause; since we could see nothing, yet heard such various sounds and voices of men, women, children, horses, &c., insomuch that Panurge cried out, Cods-belly, there is no fooling with the devil; we are all beshit, let’s fly. There is some ambuscado hereabouts. Friar John, art thou here my love? I pray thee, stay by me, old boy. Hast thou got thy swindging tool? See that it do not stick in thy scabbard; thou never scourest it half as it should be. We are undone. ”

“ Have him found! . . . A brown suit. . . . A pointed beard. . . . Oh, the villain, to think what he's robbed us of! . . . Fifty thousand francs! . . . Why . . . why, Dugrival, what are you doing?"
With one bound, she flung herself upon her husband. Too late! He had pressed the barrel of a revolver against his temple. A shot rang out. Dugrival fell. He was dead.
. . . . . . . . . .
The reader cannot have forgotten the commotion made by the newspapers in connection with this case, nor how they jumped at the opportunity once more to accuse the police of carelessness and blundering. ”

“ His foot touched the snow. For the first time a faint realization of the thing he was choosing came to him. The vicious bite of the frost upon the bare skin was not a possibility of the future, but a condition of the immediate now; and he weakened. But in the moment of his indecision, the wave of stubbornness and of blinding hate again flooded him, and a rush of hot curses left his lips. ”

“ Every atom of the long youth's fighting blood was raised to boiling pitch. On the instant, the all but superhuman strength at which we marvel in the insane was his. Like flails, his doubled fists shot out in every direction, meeting resistance at each blow. By the dim light he caught the answering glint on sheath knives, but he took no notice. ”

“ Ha, ha, ha! quoth Carpalin, laughing; this is a remedy yet more apt and proper than Hans Carvel’s ring. The devil take me if I do not believe it! The humour, inclination, and nature of women is like the thunder, whose force in its bolt or otherwise burneth, bruiseth, and breaketh only hard, massive, and resisting objects, without staying or stopping at soft, empty, and yielding matters. For it pasheth into pieces the steel sword without doing any hurt to the velvet scabbard which ensheatheth it. ”

“ After this the devil a word could we get out of him but of birds and cages.
The cages were spacious, costly, magnificent, and of an admirable architecture. The birds were large, fine, and neat accordingly, looking as like the men in my country as one pea does like another; for they ate and drank like men, muted like men, endued or digested like men, farted like men, but stunk like devils; slept, billed, and trod their females like men, but somewhat oftener: in short, had you seen and examined them from top to toe, you would have laid your head to a turnip that they had been mere men. ”

“ I die of what he has done me. How, cried the devil, what is it? I’ll tickle him off for you by-and-by. Alas! cried the old dissembler, he told me, the butcher, the tyrant, the tearer of devils told me that he had made a match to scratch with you this day, and to try his claws he did but just touch me with his little finger here betwixt the legs, and has spoiled me for ever. Oh! I am a dead woman; I shall never be myself again; do but see! Nay, and besides, he talked of going to the smith’s to have his pounces sharpened and pointed. Alas! you are undone, Mr. Devil ”

“ Erect as a maize plant, dressed once more in the flannels and corduroys of his station, as tall and graceful, he merely stood there with folded arms, looking down on the girl. More maddening than an execration, than physical menace itself, was that passionless, ignoring isolation to the other man. Answering, the hot blood flooded his blonde face, swelled the arteries of his throat until his collar choked him. ”

“ Here, here, on this side, said Friar John, in the devil’s name. Let her drive, for the Lord’s sake unhang the rudder; hoh, let her drive, let her drive, and let us drink, I say, of the best and most cheering; d’ye hear, steward? produce, exhibit; for, d’ye see this, and all the rest will as well go to the devil out of hand. A pox on that wind-broker Aeolus, with his fluster-blusters. Sirrah, page, bring me here my drawer (for so he called his breviary) ; stay a little here; haul, friend, thus. Odzoons, here is a deal of hail and thunder to no purpose. Hold fast above, I pray you. ”

“ I am, said Gymnast, a poor devil (pauvre diable) . Ha, said Tripet, seeing thou art a poor devil, it is reason that thou shouldst be permitted to go whithersoever thou wilt, for all poor devils pass everywhere without toll or tax. But it is not the custom of poor devils to be so well mounted; therefore, sir devil, come down, and let me have your horse, and if he do not carry me well, you, master devil, must do it: for I love a life that such a devil as you should carry me away.
Chapter 1.XXXV.—How Gymnast very souply and cunningly killed Captain Tripet and others of Picrochole’s men. ”

“ You have a new suit, pretty sir;--and you a new gown, sweet mistress;--God give you joy of it, and maintain you in all prosperity! And with this would lay his hand upon their shoulder, at which touch such a villainous spot was left behind, so enormously engraven to perpetuity in the very soul, body, and reputation, that the devil himself could never have taken it away. ”

“ Another case out of hundreds is the loose extension of the idea of libel. Libel cases bear no more trace of the old and just anger against the man who bore false witness against his neighbour than "cruelty" cases do of the old and just horror of the parents that hated their own flesh. A libel case has become one of the sports of the less athletic rich --- a variation on baccarat, a game of chance. ”

“ As for you, little envious prigs, snarling bastards, puny critics, you'll soon have railed your last; go hang yourselves, and choose you out some well-spread oak, under whose shade you may swing in state, to the admiration of the gaping mob; you shall never want rope enough. ”

“ When the Massorets and Cabalists are asked why it is that none of all the devils do at any time enter into the terrestrial paradise? their answer hath been, is, and will be still, that there is a cherubin standing at the gate thereof with a flame-like glistering sword in his hand. ”

“ Then, in Rabelais you have another symbolism of ecstasy—the shape of gauloiserie, of gross, exuberant gaiety, expressing itself by outrageous tales, outrageous words, by a very cataract of obscenity, if you please, if only you will notice how the obscenity of Rabelais transcends the obscenity of common life; how grossness is poured out in a sort of mad torrent, in a frenzy, a very passion of the unspeakable. ”

“ That night Lord Lilburne again received his friends, and amongst his guests came Vaudemont. Lilburne was one who liked the study of character, especially the character of men wrestling against the world. Wholly free from every species of ambition, he seemed to reconcile himself to his apathy by examining into the disquietude, the mortification, the heart's wear and tear, which are the lot of the ambitious. Like the spider in his hole, he watched with hungry pleasure the flies struggling in the web ”

“ And it so chanced that he had a quarrel with his wife, in the course of which she said to him, in the hearing of the guard, 'If our gracious lord the Elector only knew what a villain you are, and what atrocities you manage to commit by the help of that magic book of yours, you'd be in your coffin long ago.' This was reported to the Elector, who had careful search made in Lippold's house. The magic book was found, and, when it was examined by those who understood it, Lippold's guilt was clearly established. ”