CHAPTER XXXVIII.
HOW PANTAGRUEL CAME TO THE ISLANDS OF TOHU AND BOHTJ. THE STRANGE DEATH OF WIDENOSTRILS, THE SWALLOWER OF WINDMILLS.
ANTAGRUEL stopped at two islands named Tohu and Bohu, which lay very close together. There had always seemed to be a somebody, or a something, very wonderful in the islands he had already passed ; but there happened to be a more wonderful somebody in Tohu and Bohu than he had seen or heard of in any other place. When Panta-gruel landed with his friends at the quay of the principal town, where the chief men came to see him, he called for dinner ; but behold ! there was no dinner to be had. Why? Why, there was nothing to cook the dinner in ! " How is that, my friend?" Pantagruel asked the chief man. " Because, " he answered, " Your Highness has not brought your frying-pan along with you."
"My frying-pan along with me! Why, what do you mean? What has rny frying-pan to do with the dinner you are to serve me ? " "A great deal, Your Highness, since we have no pans of our own." " Did you ever have any ? "
"Any number, Your Highness, any number; but Widenostrils has just eaten our last one. "
"Has just eaten your last one, you say? Pray who is this Widenostrils who has a fancy for gobbling frying-pans?"
"A wicked giant, almost as tall as Your Highness, who has swallowed all our windmills."
"But windmills are not frying-pans, friend?"
" No, Your Highness is quite right there ; but I was just about to say that, when there were no more windmills to swallow, this wicked giant took to shovelling every skillet, kettle, frying-pan, dripping-pan, and brass and iron pot in the land down his big throat, and all for want of windmills, which were his daily food. That made him very sick. It almost killed him. "We hoped it had killed him outright; but it didn't. But he is dying, now, sure enough."
" Dying of what ? " asked Pantagruel; " of eating frying-pans and skillets?"
" I wish it was ! Some people do say so; but others, who are fishermen, and who live on the coast, and know everything that happens, declare that our giant went, a month ago, to another island, where he has been going for years, to swallow windmills, and vex the poor people there, and that he took in, with his last batch of windmills, I don't know how many cocks and hens. Now that I remember, I did hear that his own doctor made the choking worse by making him eat a big lump of fresh butter too near a hot oven. All this is very strange, though — I can't quite make it out myself."
" Where is that great Widenostrils? I should like to see him."
"In yonder meadow. Your Highness will find him very sick."
Pantagruel and his friends crossed over to the meadow, and there found, under the blazing sun, an enormous giant stretched along the ground, breathing heavily through the most awful nostrils human eyes had ever seen; and every time he breathed through his nostrils they flapped with a loud noise, like a sail when the wind shifts. The giant looked, as he lay there, very tough and wooden-like, as though the thousands of windmills he had gulped down in his time had gradually turned his body into wood. When they came near him, WMenostrils opened his eyes for a moment, first lazily, as he saw Panurge and the other little men about him, then wildly rolling them around, in fearful efforts to see the whole of the Giant, whose legs he had first caught sight of. It was only for a moment though ; for Widenostrils was dying. He half-rose on his elbows, quivering through all his big body, his nostrils all drooping and shutting close for want of air, yet found strength enough to yell out, "Magic, magic! Protect me, brother Giant! Cocks and hens are fluttering inside of me ! Cocks
GIANT WIDENOSTKILS, THE SWALLOWER OF WINDMILLS.
and hens are crowing and cackling within !P^. me ! I am be ! " He was going to say beivitched, but he fell back with a thump, which shook the two islands to their centre, deep under the sea, and made the people in distant lands swear, ever after, that there had been a terrible earthquake on that day.
When Panurge saw Widenostrils fall back dead, — but not until then, —he went to the body, and, scrambling on its stomach, with the aid of Gymnaste, listened carefully for a few moments. Then, jumping down, he said to Pantagrueclass="underline" —
" My Lord, this Widenostrils ; this fine swallower of windmills; this eater of pans, and glutton of pots, is really dead ! But I can swear that there are some things much like crowing cocks and cackling hens rummaging inside of his big body. Once I heard something very much like a quick yelp followed by a sharp screech."
Pantagruel seemed not to hear Panurge, for he stood a long time looking down at the body of a giant, who, when living, must have been nearly as tall as himself. On turning away, he said : —
"I wonder where this wicked man, who loved windmills, and died from skillets, ever swallowed those fowls he talked about."
He did not leave the island until he had ordered the dead giant honorable burial in the meadow where he had died. But he did not wait for the funeral. If Widenostrils had been a good giant, he would have acted as chief mourner; but he had a fixed rule which he expressed by saying : —
"Giants should always be brotherly with Giants, but only with good Giants."
CHAPTER XXXIX.
A GREAT STORM, IN WHICH PANURGE PLAYS THE COWARD.
next morning the fleet started from Tohu and Bonn, cheered by the people, who were all in the best humor, because Pantagruel had left among them a new stock of frying-pans and skillets, so shining that they could see their faces in them. The sky was bright; the wind was fair; the very sea seemed to laugh, — all the fleet was happy. But Pantagruel sat on deck, looking very sad.
Friar John was the first to notice how still Pantagruel was. On seeing his Prince so glum, the good Friar, who was always a comforting kind of man, was just about asking him the reason, when James Brayer, the pilot, after cocking one eye at the sea, and the other at the sky, and then turning both eyes up towards the flag drooping on the poop, as though it would never wave again, knew that a storm was coming on, and, therefore, bid the boatswain pipe all hands on deck, and even summon the passengers.
" In with your top-sails ! " he shouted. 'Take in your spritsail! lower your foresail ! lash your guns fast!" —all of which was done as quick as hands could do it.
Of a sudden, as though a great hand from above had swept down to stir the waters and make them mad, the sea began to swell, and moan and roar, and rise up into mountains, and sink into valleys. An awful north-west wind had got caught in with a hurricane, — so James Brayer said, — and the two together whistled through the yards, and shrieked through the shrouds. The sky itself seemed to be splitting open, and dropping down thunder, lightning, rain, and hail. In broad daylight it grew all dark, and the water rose to mountains, and sank to the depths in perfect blackness, save for the great flashes of lightning that showed the white faces of men, and the whiter foam of the sea.
It looked as though the end of the world had come, and that those on the sea had been the first to know it.
James Brayer soon had every one about him busy at the work of saving the flag-ship. Even Pantagruel was pressed into service. It
A STORM COMES ON.
was no tune for ceremony ; the danger was too great for that. James Brayer bawled through his trumpet: —
"My Lord, I must ask you to stand amidship. Your Highness is so heavy that, in a sea like this, whichever side of the ship you may be on is bound to keel over. The sea is mad, —I have never seen it so mad before ! "