of the streamers and pendants; and having fastened them to good tacklings and our ship’s head to the stern of theirs, with cables fastened to the bits abaft the manger in the ship’s loof, they towed us off ground at one pull so easily and pleasantly that you’d have wondered at it had you been there.  For the dub-a-dub rattling of the drums, with the soft noise of the gravel which murmuring disputed us our way, and the merry cheers and huzzas of the sailors, made an harmony almost as good as that of the heavenly bodies when they roll and are whirled round their spheres, which rattling of the celestial wheels Plato said he heard some nights in his sleep.

We scorned to be behindhand with ’em in civility, and gratefully gave ’em store of our sausages and chitterlings, with which we filled their drums; and we were just a-hoisting two-and-sixty hogsheads of wine out of the hold, when two huge whirlpools with great fury made towards their ship, spouting more water than is in the river Vienne (Vigenne) from Chinon to Saumur; to make short, all their drums, all their sails, their concerns, and themselves were soused, and their very hose were watered by the collar.

Panurge was so overjoyed, seeing this, and laughed so heartily, that he was forced to hold his sides, and it set him into a fit of the colic for two hours and more.  I had a mind, quoth he, to make the dogs drink, and those honest whirlpools, egad, have saved me that labour and that cost.  There’s sauce for them; ariston men udor.  Water is good, saith a poet; let ’em Pindarize upon’t.  They never cared for fresh water but to wash their hands or their glasses.  This good salt water will stand ’em in good stead for want of sal ammoniac and nitre in Geber’s kitchen.

We could not hold any further discourse with ’em; for the former whirlwind hindered our ship from feeling the helm.  The pilot advised us henceforwards to let her run adrift and follow the stream, not busying ourselves with anything, but making much of our carcasses.  For our only way to arrive safe at the queendom of Whims was to trust to the whirlwind and be led by the current.

Chapter 5.XIX.

How we arrived at the queendom of Whims or Entelechy.

We did as he directed us for about twelve hours, and on the third day the sky seemed to us somewhat clearer, and we happily arrived at the port of Mateotechny, not far distant from Queen Whims, alias the Quintessence.

We met full butt on the quay a great number of guards and other military men that garrisoned the arsenal, and we were somewhat frighted at first because they made us all lay down our arms, and in a haughty manner asked us whence we came.

Cousin, quoth Panurge to him that asked the question, we are of Touraine, and come from France, being ambitious of paying our respects to the Lady Quintessence and visit this famous realm of Entelechy.