Scip. What I have heard highly extolled is our strong memory, our gratitude, and great fidelity; so that it is usual to depict us as symbols of friendship.  Thus you will have seen (if it has ever come under your notice) that, on the alabaster tombs, on which are represented the figures of those interred in them, when they are husband and wife, a figure of a dog is placed between the pair at their feet, in token that in life their affection and fidelity to each other was inviolable,

Berg. I know that there have been grateful dogs who have cast themselves into the same grave with the bodies of their deceased masters; others have stood over the graves in which their lords were buried without quitting them or taking food till they died.  I know, likewise, that next to the elephant the dog holds the first place in the way of appearing to possess understanding, then the horse, and last the ape.

Scip. True; but you will surely confess that you never saw or heard tell of any elephant, dog, horse, or monkey having talked:  hence I infer, that this fact of our coming by the gift of speech so unexpectedly falls within the list of those things which are called portents, the appearance of which indicates, as experience testifies, that some great calamity threatens the nations.

Berg. That being so I can readily enough set down as a portentous token what I heard a student say the other day as I passed through Alcala de Henares.

Scip. What was that?

Berg. That of five thousand students this year attending the university—­two thousand are studying medicine.

Scip. And what do you infer from that?

Berg. I infer either that those two thousand doctors will have patients to treat, and that would be a woful thing, or that they must die of hunger.

Scip. Be that as it may, let us talk, portent or no portent; for what heaven has ordained to happen, no human diligence or wit can prevent.  Nor is it needful that we should fall to disputing as to the how or the why we talk.  Better will it be to make the best of this good clay or good night at home; and since we enjoy it so much on these mats, and know not how long this good fortune of ours may last, let us take advantage of it and talk all night, without suffering sleep to deprive us of a pleasure which I, for my part, have so long desired.

Berg. And I, too; for ever since I had strength enough to gnaw a bone I have longed for the power of speech, that I might utter a multitude of things I had laid up in my memory, and which lay there so long that they were growing musty or almost forgotten.  Now, however, that I see myself so unexpectedly enriched with this divine gift of speech, I intend to enjoy it and avail myself of it as much as I can, taking pains to say everything I can recollect, though it be confusedly and helter-skelter, not knowing when this blessing, which I regard as a loan, shall be reclaimed from me.