The Spanish officer in charge of the prisoners was induced to connive at the escape of Arago and M. Berthemie (an aide-de-camp of Napoleon); and on the 28th of July, 1808, they stole away from the coast of Spain in a small boat with three sailors, and arrived at Algiers on the 3d of August.  Here the French consul procured them two false passports, which transformed the Frenchmen into strolling merchants from Schwekat and Leoben.  They boarded an Algerian vessel and set off.  Let Arago describe the crew and cargo:—­

“The vessel belonged to the Emir of Seca.  The commander was a Greek captain named Spiro Calligero.  Among the passengers were five members of the family superseded by the Bakri as kings of the Jews; two Maroccan ostrich-feather merchants; Captain Krog from Bergen in Norway; two lions sent by the Dey of Algiers as presents to the Emperor Napoleon; and a great number of monkeys.”

As they entered the Golfe du Lion their ship was captured by a Spanish corsair and taken to Rosas.  Worst of all, a former Spanish servant of Arago’s—­Pablo—­was a sailor in the corsair’s crew!  At Rosas the prisoners were brought before an officer for interrogation.  It was now Arago’s turn.  The officer begins:—­

“‘Who are you?’

“‘A poor traveling merchant.’

“‘From whence do you come?’

“‘From a country where you certainly have never been.’

“‘Well—­from what country?’

“I feared to answer; for the passports (steeped in vinegar to prevent infection) were in the officer’s hands, and I had entirely forgotten whether I was from Schwekat or from Leoben.  Finally I answered at a chance, ‘I am from Schwekat;’ fortunately this answer agreed with the passport.

“‘You’re from Schwekat about as much as I am,’ said the officer:  ’you’re a Spaniard, and a Spaniard from Valencia to boot, as I can tell by your accent.’

“’Sir, you are inclined to punish me simply because I have by nature the gift of languages.  I readily learn the dialects of the various countries where I carry on my trade.  For example, I know the dialect of Iviza.’

“’Well, I will take you at your word.  Here is a soldier who comes from Iviza.  Talk to him.’

“‘Very well; I will even sing the goat-song.’

“The verses of this song (if one may call them verses) are separated by the imitated bleatings of the goat.  I began at once, with an audacity which even now astonishes me, to intone the song which all the shepherds in Iviza sing:—­

Ah graciada Senora,
Una canzo bouil canta,
Be be be be. 
No sera gaiva pulida,
Nose si vos agradara,
Be be be be.

“Upon which my Ivizan avouches, in tears, that I am certainly from Iviza.  The song had affected him as a Switzer is affected by the ’Ranz des Vaches.’  I then said to the officer that if he would bring to me a person who could speak French, he would find the same embarrassment in this case also.  An emigre of the Bourbon regiment comes forward for the new experiment, and after a few phrases affirms without hesitation that I am surely a Frenchman.  The officer begins to be impatient.