Jean-Marie Blas De Robles - Where Tigers Are at Home

The night of Christmas & the mysteries of the camera obscura

IT OCCURRED TO me that it wasn’t just the Prince’s mind that was wandering but his wife’s as well & I convinced myself that she had merely claimed she had this harpsichord in her stomach in memory of her cousin & as a metaphor, so to speak, of the sufferings she had to bear.

Kircher & the Prince came back to join me with the satisfied expressions of men who have made great plans. Our host having taken his leave, we retired for a siesta.

“Everything is going as planned, Caspar,” Athanasius said when we were safely in our room. “The Prince & I understand each other perfectly; our agreement should have consequences the scope of which you cannot imagine.”

I felt I had the right to tell him what the Princess had revealed to me a few minutes previously. Kircher seemed not in the least surprised & merely calmed me with a smile. Then, placing a hand on my shoulder, he said, “It would be a good idea, I think, if you reread your Ignatius …”

Accepting his advice, I immersed myself in the Exercises for several hours. It made me regard the Prince slightly more indulgently, without freeing me from a certain hostility toward him. Furious with myself, I tied a hair shirt tightly around my torso, chastising my bodily appetites; this persistent pain finally released my mind & I managed to pray & thank Heaven for all its goodness.

On the evening of that December 18, 1637 we met in the same room for dinner. My master, who was always the center of the conversation, was in sparkling form. Abandoning his usual humility, he seemed to take pleasure in parading his knowledge & surprising our hosts with many curious facts and delightful anecdotes that the vagaries of the conversation brought to mind.

He assured us he had himself generated frogs from a little dust taken from the ditches, as he had scorpions by mixing some powder from that insect in a decoction of basil. Similarly, quoting Paracelsus, he said it was possible to resuscitate a plant from its own ashes, although that was much more difficult. From there we came to talk about the strangest animals nature had ever produced, that is, dragons, the progeny of the eagle & the she-wolf. He spoke of the small specimen that could be seen in the Aldrovandi Museum in Rome & of the one he had caught a glimpse of in 1619, flying out of a cave on Mount Pilatus near Lucerne, but also of all sorts of unthinkable animals that proved the infinite capacity of divine creation. Thus Kircher reminded us of the cock with a snake’s tail or with a crest of plumes, one of the curiosities of the Boboli Gardens in Florence, which was the fruit of a chance mixture of sperm; the ostrich or “strontocamelo,” whose name & appearance prove that it comes from the coupling of a camel with a fowl; the rhinobatos, the offspring of the ray & the angelfish mentioned by Aristotle; & numerous other exotic animals of which his correspondents in the Indies or in America sent him detailed descriptions.

Then the Prince, who was very much interested in the sciences, brought the discussion around to astronomy & questioned Kircher so passionately about the conflicting theories that were current at the time that they were soon at it hammer and tongs. Seeing that the Princess was enjoying these difficult subjects less, I decided to make conversation with her. Since I knew, from what she had told me before, that she liked music, I talked about the musicians who were all the rage in Rome, in particular Girolamo Frescobaldi, whom my master and I regularly went to hear in the Lateran church. She had a high opinion of all of them, she said, but she preferred the more spiritual compositions of Monteverdi, William Byrd & above all of Gesualdo, whose name she spoke in a murmur & with a quick glance at her husband. I nodded, to indicate that I had understood her allusion & fully approved of & shared her tastes. She seemed delighted by this accord &, with shining eyes & flushed cheeks, she drank in every word I said, so much so that I had to rub my back against the chair to make the prickles of my hair shirt work more effectively & call my flesh to order. I decided it was time to return to subjects more appropriate to my calling.

“How do you imagine God?” I asked her without further ado.

She gave me an affectionate smile, obviously unsurprised by the point-blank nature of my question, as if she clearly understood its motivation. “I cannot imagine Him,” she replied almost immediately, “that is to say I cannot visualize Him as similar to men or to anything human. I believe there is a God because I cannot think that I or all the things around me are the product of chance or of some creature. Also, since the direction of my affairs is not a result of my own wisdom & since success rarely comes by the means I have chosen, Divine Providence must be involved in the matter …”

I was very pleased with this reply & admired her for not saying, as most women did, that she imagined God as a venerable old man.

“And since it has so happened that I am talking to you about myself in a way I have never before talked to anyone, I can admit that, were it not for the sacred bonds tying me to my husband, I would joyfully place my life under the yoke of Jesus Christ. Not in a convent, where the cross is too easy a burden, but in a hospital that accepts patients with all kinds of ailments, wherever they come from and whatever their religion, to serve them all without distinction &, following the example of the only husband worthy of the name, to take their infirmities upon myself. I know that my eyes are able to bear the most horrible sights, my ears the oaths and cries of the sick & my sense of smell the stench of all the infections of the human body. I would take Jesus from bed to bed to these wretched people, I would encourage them, not by empty words but by the example of my own patience & charity, & I would do so much that God would have mercy on them …”

The tears were welling up in the Princess’s eyes at the evocation of her secret desire. Of perfect beauty, she seemed great & noble, free and majestic in her bearing, honest in her demeanor, with the soft, pliant voice of a saint. This young woman was admirable in every respect & her husband the most abominable—

“Extraordinary!” the Prince suddenly exclaimed, turning to me. “Caspar, I envy you: your master the most considerable is of scholars! We together realize soon great things …”

I blushed at this, as if I had been caught in the act & the Prince had been able to read my thoughts.

“You exaggerate,” said Kircher, “knowledge alone is magnificent & that alone deserves your compliments. But you must excuse me, my lady, for having monopolized your husband for so long; I seem to have forgotten that our conversation was hardly of a nature to enthrall you.”

“Do not worry, Father. We conversed on religious matters with Father Schott & it is I who have forgotten my duty as hostess. I have to admit that I didn’t hear a single word of your discussion & I am sorry about that, even though I doubtless would not have understood much of it.”

Kircher politely assured her she was mistaken in that & then, as if on a sudden inspiration, offered to divert us: “As we have finished this excellent dinner, it seems a suitable moment to follow it with an amusing experiment. What do you think, are we lighter before or after we’ve eaten?”

“Good, good, good,” said the Prince, rubbing his hands in satisfaction. “I take up challenge! We must have method, always method, as say Monsieur Descartes. After meal I feel me more light, although I swallow at least four pound of food. This idea clear & distinct in my intellectus , therefore true: inside force of body transform chicken, fish and other nourishments in heat; heat produce intimate vapor, & vapor lightness … We eat too much we fly away, no?” he added with a laugh.