The Impostures of Scapin | Page 2

about that?
OCT. Alas! you don't know what cause I have to be anxious.
SCA. No; but it only depends on you that I should soon know; and I am
a man of consolation, a man who can interest himself in the troubles of
young people.
OCT. Ah! Scapin, if you could find some scheme, invent some plot, to
get me out of the trouble I am in, I should think myself indebted to you
for more than life.
SCA. To tell you the truth, there are few things impossible to me when
I once set about them. Heaven has bestowed on me a fair enough share
of genius for the making up of all those neat strokes of mother wit, for
all those ingenious gallantries to which the ignorant and vulgar give the
name of impostures; and I can boast, without vanity, that there have

been very few men more skilful than I in expedients and intrigues, and
who have acquired a greater reputation in the noble profession. But, to
tell the truth, merit is too ill rewarded nowadays, and I have given up
everything of the kind since the trouble I had through a certain affair
which happened to me.
OCT. How? What affair, Scapin?
SCA. An adventure in which justice and I fell out.
OCT. Justice and you?
SCA. Yes; we had a trifling quarrel.
SIL. You and justice?
SCA. Yes. She used me very badly; and I felt so enraged against the
ingratitude of our age that I determined never to do anything for
anybody. But never mind; tell me about yourself all the same.
OCT. You know, Scapin, that two months ago Mr. Géronte and my
father set out together on a voyage, about a certain business in which
they are both interested.
SCA. Yes, I know that.
OCT. And that both Léandre and I were left by our respective fathers, I
under the management of Silvestre, and Léandre under your
management.
SCA. Yes; I have acquitted myself very well of my charge.
OCT. Some time afterwards Léandre met with a young gipsy girl, with
whom he fell in love.
SCA. I know that too.
OCT. As we are great friends, he told me at once of his love, and took
me to see this young girl, whom I thought good-looking, it is true, but
not so beautiful as he would have had me believe. He never spoke of
anything but her; at every opportunity he exaggerated her grace and her
beauty, extolled her intelligence, spoke to me with transport of the
charms of her conversation, and related to me her most insignificant
saying, which he always wanted me to think the cleverest thing in the
world. He often found fault with me for not thinking as highly as he
imagined I ought to do of the things he related to me, and blamed me
again and again for being so insensible to the power of love.
SCA. I do not see what you are aiming at in all this.
OCT. One day, as I was going with him to the people who have charge
of the girl with whom he is in love, we heard in a small house on a

by-street, lamentations mixed with a good deal of sobbing. We inquired
what it was, and were told by a woman that we might see there a most
piteous sight, in the persons of two strangers, and that unless we were
quite insensible to pity, we should be sure to be touched with it.
SCA. Where will this lead to?
OCT. Curiosity made me urge Léandre to come in with me. We went
into a low room, where we saw an old woman dying, and with her a
servant who was uttering lamentations, and a young girl dissolved in
tears, the most beautiful, the most touching sight that you ever saw.
SCA. Oh! oh!
OCT. Any other person would have seemed frightful in the condition
she was in, for all the dress she had on was a scanty old petticoat, with
a night jacket of plain fustian, and turned back at the top of her head a
yellow cap, which let her hair fall in disorder on her shoulders; and yet
dressed even thus she shone with a thousand attractions, and all her
person was most charming and pleasant.
SCA. I begin to understand.
OCT. Had you but seen her, Scapin, as I did, you would have thought
her admirable.
SCA. Oh! I have no doubt about it; and without seeing her, I plainly
perceive that she must have been altogether charming.
OCT. Her tears were none of those unpleasant tears which spoil the
face; she had a most touching grace in weeping, and her sorrow was a
most beautiful thing to witness.
SCA. I can