Page:Man Who Laughs (Estes and Lauriat 1869) v2.djvu/52

32 "I may speak, but I must be silent. How complicated!" He was much alarmed.

The same functionary continued: "You say things which do not sound right. You insult religion. You deny the most evident truths. You propagate revolting errors. For instance, you have said that the fact of virginity excludes the possibility of maternity."

Ursus lifted his eyes meekly: "I did not say that. I said that the fact of maternity excludes the possibility of virginity."

Minos was thoughtful, and mumbled, "True, that is the contrary."

It was really the same thing. But Ursus had parried the first blow.

Minos, meditating on the answer just given by Ursus, sank into the depths of his own imbecility, and kept silent.

The overseer of history, or, as Ursus called him, Rhadamanthus, covered the retreat of Minos by this interpolation: "Accused! your audacity and your errors are of two sorts. You have denied that the battle of Pharsalia was lost because Brutus and Cassius had met a negro."

"I said," murmured Ursus, "that there was something in the fact that Cæsar was the better captain."

The man of history passed, without transition, to mythology. "You have excused the infamous acts of Actæon."

"I think," said Ursus, insinuatingly, "that a man is not dishonoured by having seen a naked woman."

"Then you are wrong," said the judge, severely.

Rhadamanthus returned to history. "Apropos of the accidents which happened to the cavalry of Mithridates, you have denied the virtues of herbs and plants. You have denied that an herb like the securiduca could make the shoes of horses fall off."