[Transcriber's note: the illustrations in the source volumeswere uncaptioned. The captions I've added are my best guessas to what is going on in the illustrations.]
Gil Blas being presented to royalty
ALAIN RENÉ LE SAGE
THE ADVENTURES
OF
GIL BLAS
OF SANTILLANE
TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH BY TOBIAS SMOLLETT
PRECEDED BY
A BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL NOTICE OF LE SAGE
BY GEORGE SAINTSBURY
With Twelve Original Etchings by R. de Los Rios
IN THREE VOLUMES—VOL. I.
LONDON
J. C. NIMMO AND BAIN
14, KING WILLIAM STREET, STRAND, W.C.
NEW YORK: SCRIBNER, WELFORD & CO.
1881
THE AUTHOR'S DECLARATION.
There are some people in the world so mischievousas not to read a work without applying thevicious or ridiculous characters it may happen tocontain to eminent or popular individuals. Iprotest publicly against the pretended discovery of anysuch likenesses. My purpose was to represent humanlife historically as it exists: God forbid I shouldhold myself out as a portrait-painter. Let not thereader then take to himself public property; for ifhe does, he may chance to throw an unlucky lighton his own character: as Phædrus expresses it,Stulte nudabit animi conscientiam.
Certain physicians of Castille, as well as of France,are sometimes a little too fond of trying the bleedingand lowering system on their patients. Vices, theirpatrons, and their dupes, are of every day'soccurrence. To be sure, I have not always adoptedSpanish manners with scrupulous exactness; and in theinstance of the players at Madrid, those who knowtheir disorderly modes of living may reproach mewith softening down their coarser traits: but this Ihave been induced to do from a sense of delicacy,and in conformity with the manners of my owncountry.
GIL BLAS TO THE READER
Reader! hark you, my friend! Do not beginthe story of my life till I have told you a short tale.
Two students travelled together from Penafiel toSalamanca. Finding themselves tired and thirsty,they stopped by the side of a spring on the road.While they were resting there, after having quenchedtheir thirst, by chance they espied on a stone nearthem, even with the ground, part of an inscription,in some degree effaced by time, and by the tread offlocks in the habit of watering at that spring.Having washed the stone, they were able to trace thesewords in the dialect of Castille: Aqui està encerradael alma del licenciado Pedro Garcias. "Here liesinterred the soul of the licentiate Peter Garcias."
Hey-day! roars out the younger, a lively, heedlessfellow, who could not get on with his decipheringfor laughter: This is a good joke indeed: "Herelies interred the soul." ... A soul interred! ... Ishould like to know the whimsical author of thisludicrous epitaph. With this sneer he got up to goaway. His companion, who had more sense, saidwithin himself: Underneath this stone lies somemystery; I will stay, and see the end of it.Accordingly, he let his comrade depart, and withoutloss of time began digging round about the stonewith his knife till he got it up. Under it h