HARLEQUIN
“Sirs, I was born in Bergamo, but so long ago that I remember nothing of it. I was called in those days—— Ah, but wait!... I can no longer remember my name, by Bacchus! Forgive me if I appeal to Bacchus, but he is the only god whom I ever take to witness.
“Sirs, I was well acquainted of old with one Maccus, whose temper was not always amiable, and it also happened that I had more wit than that coarse brute. Later I was lackey to a doctor who in reality was but an apothecary, and so miserly that for clothes he gave me no more than such old rags of his own as could no longer be employed to repair less seedy ones. I endured a noble poverty, and for long. You are looking at my hat! It is almost new. It was given to me by Henry III. He did not care about hats; he gave me one that proved too small for his monkish head. This rabbit’s tail is the emblem of his courage and of mine; not the courage of the lamb, but the courage of the hare, to run quickly and long.
“I was very naïve, not to say stupid, my masters; but with age, experience and wit came to my assistance, and to-day I have all that I need and some to spare. I said to myself at first, when I left my old apothecary, that I should be well advised to imitate my brother Brighella—that is to say, to find myself a situation where one may eat well. Therefore I chose hostelries. But, alas! if shoemakers are the worst shod,[58] eating-house lackeys are the worst nourished. I abandoned that profession and became a soldier; a poor condition, believe me; later I turned comedian, tumbler, dancer, merry-andrew and mountebank at one and the same time. But, perceiving that my rags did not make a good impression at Court, I bought new cloth of all colours, red, yellow, blue, to replace the tattered pieces of my little garment, the like of which is not to be seen at present within a thousand leagues. On Sundays and holidays I put on my satin clothes; but they wear out too quickly and are too dear. And the fact is—must I confess it sirs?—I never have a halfpenny. That, however, does not prevent me from being gay, or from being pleasing to beauty; upon waiting-maids, now, I exert a peculiar attraction. I understand perfectly how to contrive certain delicate love affairs into which fathers, husbands and guardians have no business to be thrusting their noses. I am, for the moment, a lackey of condition to some young people, whose purse is not always quite as empty as their brains. In short, whilst waiting to transact my own affairs I transact those of others, and I will say with my old friend Polichinelle: ‘I am as good as many another!’
“I contrive so well that I now go to Court; I am the Marquis of Sbruffadeli; I overlook the waiting-maids; I court their mistresses, and I aspire to the hand of Isabella....
“But what is that? Who strikes me? Ah me! Where shall I hide myself? I cry you mercy, my master! I will restore you your garments. Do not beat me to death; let me die of old age! I resume my rags, my bat and my mask; I return to Columbine, and I shall avenge myself upon Pierrot.”
The Greeks represented and put upon the stage all the inhabitants of the earth then known to them, and the members of all classes of society: Greek citizens, merchants of Tyre, Persian wizards and sorcerers, foreign doctors, Egyptian priests, Chaldean astronomers, Macedonian soldiers, Scythian barbers; pedants, parasites, matrons, young girls, courtesans of Lesbos or of Athens, peasants and Asiatic or African slaves. Among these last we find an actor dressed now in the skin of a goat, now in the skin of a tiger, variegated in colour, which clung tightly to his body, armed with only a wooden staff, his head shaved, and covered by a white hat, his face by a brown mask; he was called by the vulgar the young satyr. Could this be the first Harlequin?
In an article on Harlequin, Marmontel writes, in 1776:
“This is at one and the same time the most bizarre and the most amusing character in the theatre. A Bergamese negro is an absurdity. It is probable that an African negro was the first model of the character.”
The Sycionians, with whom the mimes were as ancient as with the Athenians, preserved the name of phallophores for their public phallic singers. These Sycionian phallophores wore no mask, they besmeared their countenances with soot, fuligine faciem obductam, or covered their faces with papyrus bark—that is to say, with a paper mask—to represent foreign slaves. They advanced rhythmically, from the side or back of the theatre, and their first words were always:
“Bacchus! Bacchus! Bacchus! It is to thee, Bacchus, that we consecrate these airs. We shall adorn their simple[60] rhythm by varied songs which were not made for virgins. We do not repeat old songs; the hymn which we address to thee has never yet been sung.”
In Rome these same phallophores take the name of planipes. This name comes to them from the fact that having no need for the high tragic buskin to increase their size—since they performed quite close to the public on the thymele in the orchestra itself—they played, as it were, flat-footed. These actors performed only little pieces and improvisations of the Atellane farces.
“Quid enim si choragium thymelicum possiderem? num ex eo argumentare etiam uti me consuesse trageodi syrmate, histrionis crocata, mimi centunculo,” says Apuleius in his apology.
Mimi centunculo indicates the garb of Harlequin, composed as it is of an infinity of pieces of various colours. His black mask is described by fuligine faciem obductam, and his shaven head, according to Vossius, by Sanniones mimum agebant rasis capitibus (the buffoons performed in their pantomimes with shaven heads).
Harlequin and Brighella are called in Italy zanni, zani or sanni, from the Latin sannio, a buffoon, a mocker; sannium, sanna, mockery, raillery, grimace.
“I have sought,” says Riccoboni (in his History of the Italian Theatre), “the origin of this name of zanni, and I think that it is a change in the first letter that has given rise to doubt. We see that our predecessors very often used Z in the place of S. All the most approved Italian authors have said zambuco for sambuco, zampogna for sampogna, zanna for sanna.
“‘Quid enim potest tam ridiculum quam sannio esse? qui[61] ore, vultu, imitandis motibus, voce, denique corpore ridetur ipso?’ (Cicero, De Oratore, lib. ii.)
“‘Planipes graece dicitur mimus, ideo autem latine planipes quod actores planis pedibus, id est, nudi proscenium introirent’ (Diomed. lib. iii.)
“Is not the footgear of Harlequin indicated there? His foot is simply enveloped in a piece of leather without a heel. From top to toe, then, the dress of Harlequin is precisely that of the Latin mime. I have found a book which, whilst not being as ancient as I might have desired, yet contains enough to show the difference between the costume in those days and the present one.
“... In the time of Henry IV. a troupe of Italian comedians came to Paris. The Harlequin of this troupe sought to induce the king to present him with a gold chain and a medal. He conceived the notion of writing a book, of printing it, and addressing it to the king. On the front page there is a figure of Harlequin of the height of some three inches.”
The costume of this Harlequin which Riccoboni has engraved consists of a jacket open in front, and laced with shabby ribbons, and skin-tight trousers, covered with pieces of cloth of various colours, placed haphazard. The jacket is similarly patched. He wears a stiff black beard, a black half mask, a slashed cap, in the fashion of the time of François I. and no linen; he is equipped with a girdle, a pouch and a wooden sword; his feet are shod in very small slippers, covered at the ankle by the trouser, which acts as a gaiter.
As for the mask with which Harlequin appeared in France, and which he wears still to-day, it is said that it was Michel-Angelo[62] who restored it him, copying it from the mask of an ancient satyr. His costume in the seventeenth century, like his character, underwent a metamorphosis; we still find him arrayed in the same pieces of cloth of different colours, but henceforward they are symmetrically placed.
From the time of Domenico, who was the transformer of this type, the costume has changed but very little. The jacket has grown, little by little, whilst the trousers have shrunk, returning to their primitive form. Lozenges of different colours have lengthened; but the mask, the chin-piece, the black head, the rabbit tail—emblem of poltroonery—the bat and the girdle, have remained such as they always were.
That rabbit’s tail which adorns the head of Harlequin is a further tradition of antiquity. It was the custom to attach the tail of a fox or the ears of a hare to those upon whom it was sought to draw ridicule.
An innovation lies in the spangles which render the modern Harlequin a sort of streaming fish in gold and silver scales.
In the first Italian troupes of the sixteenth century—nomad troupes which derived as much from the Bohemians and the mountebanks as from the comedians—we find Trivelino, Mestolino, Zaccagnino, Truffaldino, Guazeto and Bagatino, who are of the same type under various names, and often under the same costume. It was not until Henry III. that a zany of this type appeared in Paris.
It has been pretended that as this zany was without doubt protected by the first president of Parliament, Achille de Harlay, his comrades came to call him Harlequino, meaning thereby the little protégé of Harlay. This name remained to him and to his successors in the type. But its etymology is[63] victoriously refuted in an interesting passage of the learned commentators of Rabelais, Johanneau and Esmangard:
“Donat informs us that the procurers (lenones) in the ancient comedies were dressed in variegated costumes, no doubt after the manner of Mercury their patron, which persuades us that that character in comedy which we call Harlequin, is none other than Mercury, this being the reason why he is given a variegated costume, made up of pieces of different colours. Harlequin is a diminutive of harle, or herle, the name of an aquatic bird, and not a derivative of that of M. de Harlay or of Hercules. In Italy he is called Harlequino; in the anti-chopin he is called Harlequinus, and in a letter of Raulin in 1521 Herlequinus.”
“Harlequin’s performance down to the seventeenth century” (says Riccoboni) “consisted of just a series of extravagant capers, of violent movements and of outrageous blackguardisms. He was at once insolent, mocking, clownish and, above all, obscene. I think that with all this he mingled an agility of body which made him appear to be always in the air, and I might add with assurance that he was an acrobat.”
Our modern Harlequin is, above all, a dancer and a tumbler, in which he is in affinity with the most ancient type.
In the background of some of his drawings Callot shows us several Harlequins who are leaping and dancing and turning backward somersaults. So that in Callot’s day Harlequin was still a dancer.
Nevertheless, from 1560 onwards, we see Harlequin, the native of Bergamo, shedding some of the stupidity that had[64] characterised him until then. He still remains a glutton, and he is always a poltroon, but he is no longer that type of farm servant from the neighbourhood of Bergamo, seeking everywhere for the donkey upon which he was mounted.
“His character,” says Marmontel, “presents a mixture of ignorance, naïveté, stupidity and grace. He is like a mere sketch of a man, a great child visited by flashes of reason and intelligence, in all of whose capers and awkwardnesses there is something sharp and interesting. The model Harlequin is all suppleness and agility, with the grace of a young cat, yet equipped with a superficial coarseness that renders his performances more amusing; the rôle is that of a lackey, patient, faithful, credulous, gluttonous, always in love, always in difficulties either on his master’s account or on his own, afflicting himself and consoling himself again with the readiness of a child, one whose sorrows are as amusing as his joys. Such a part demands a great deal of naturalness and of wit, and a great deal of physical grace and suppleness.”
At the time that the zany Arlecchino was a fool, Brighella, the other Bergamese, was sly and astute. Harlequin and Brighella are both from the town of Bergamo. This town is built like an amphitheatre on the hills between the Brembo and the Serio in their courses from the Valtelline hills. It is said that the inhabitants of the upper and lower town are entirely different in character. Those of the upper town, personified in the character of Brighella, are lively, witty and active; those of the lower town are idle, ignorant and almost entirely stupid, like Harlequin. I crave the pardon of the inhabitants of the lower town for this statement, made upon the[65] assumption that, like Harlequin himself, they also have become, since the sixteenth century, as lively and as witty as their compatriots of the upper town. It is said in the north of Italy that Harlequin the imbecile had over his left eye a wart which covered the half of his cheek, and that it was for this reason that he assumed the mask, which he has retained ever since.
But it was in the seventeenth century that the rôle of Harlequin was completely transformed by Domenico Biancolelli, a man of merit, well informed, and the friend of literary men, who bestowed his own wit upon the character. Thus Harlequin became witty, astute, an utterer of quips and something of a philosopher. Even in the Italian troupes the actors who played the part under the names of Zaccagnino and of Truffaldino modelled their performances upon those of Domenico.
ii
Giuseppe-Domenico Biancolelli was born in Bologna in 1640. His father and mother were comedians in a company established in that city, and from his earliest infancy Biancolelli played with them in comedy, and made such rapid progress that at the age at which men are usually considering a career he was already counted amongst the good actors of Italy.
In 1659 Cardinal Mazarin, desiring to increase his Italian company, sent for several actors, including Biancolelli, who was then performing at Vienna in the troupe of Tabarini. This Tabarini had already been in France during the reign of Louis XIII. and the minority of Louis XIV. In response to the cardinal’s summons, then, young Biancolelli went to France in the following year, together with Eularia, Diamantina and Ottavio.
At the time an actor named Locatelli was playing the rôles of Trivelino, a sort of Harlequin, in the company which Biancolelli went to recruit. This, however, did not hinder Biancolelli from playing Harlequin, as second comic, alongside of Trivelino, until the death of the latter in 1671. From that moment the stage was dominated by Domenico, as he was generally known. He acquired the reputation of being the greatest actor of his century, and rendered popular the name of Arlecchino. He died at forty-eight of pneumonia contracted whilst dancing before Louis XIV.
“The Sieur Beauchamp, dancing master to Louis XIV. and composer of his ballet, had performed before his Majesty a very singular and greatly applauded dance in a divertissement which the Italian comedians had attached to one of their pieces. Domenico, who danced very well, gave forthwith an extremely comical imitation of Beauchamp’s dance. The king manifested so much delight in these parodying capers that Domenico persisted in them for as long as it was physically possible to him. He was so overheated that, being unable to change his linen upon leaving the stage (because he had to return to it immediately in his own rôle), he caught a severe[67] chill which ended in pneumonia. He lay ill for only eight days, when, after having renounced the theatre, he died on Monday the 2nd of August, 1688, at six o’clock in the evening, and was buried at Saint-Eustache, behind the choir, opposite to the chapel of the Virgin. He dwelt in the Rue Montmartre near the old Hôtel Charôt.”
The loss of Domenico was a shattering thunderbolt upon the Italian comedy. His comrades closed the theatre for a month, and when they reopened it they put up the following announcement:—
“We have long marked our sorrow by our silence, and we should prolong it further if the apprehension of displeasing you did not influence us more profoundly than our legitimate pain. We shall reopen our theatre on Wednesday next, the 1st of September 1688. In the impossibility of repairing the loss we have sustained, we offer you of the best that our application and our care is able to supply. Bear us a little indulgence, and be assured that we shall omit nothing that will contribute to your pleasure.”
Domenico had married in Paris, in 1662, Orsola Corteze, who played under the name of Eularia. She bore him twelve children, five of whom survived him. They were:
Françoise Biancolelli, born in 1664, who played the rôles of Isabella;
Catherine Biancolelli, born in 1665, who played the rôles of Columbine;
Louis Biancolelli, knight of Saint-Louis, captain of the royal[68] regiment of marines, military engineer, and director of the forts of Provence, who died at Toulon in 1729; he was a godson of Louis XIV., and the author of several pieces played at the Comédie-Italienne, and included in Gherardi’s collection;
Philippe Biancolelli de Bois-Morand, born in 1672, king’s councillor, elder councillor to Saint-Domingue, and marine commissioner;
Pierre-François Biancolelli, born in 1681, who, under the name of Dominique, played Trivelino parts at the Comédie-Italienne, and in forain theatres, and who died in 1734.
Anecdotes abound concerning the famous Domenico. It is related of him that being present one night at a royal supper he fixed his eyes upon a certain dish of partridges. Louis XIV., observing this glance of his, said to a lackey:
“Let this dish be given to Domenico.”
“And the partridges also?” inquired Domenico.
“And the partridges also,” replied the king, appreciating this readiness of wit. The dish was of gold.
Louis XIV. returning one day from a hunting expedition went incognito to attend the performance of an Italian piece that was being given at Versailles.
“That is a bad piece,” he said to Domenico, as he was leaving.
“Whisper it,” replied Arlecchino, “because if the king were to hear you he would dismiss me together with my troupe.”
Domenico was of short stature and comely face, but some ten years before his death he had become rather too stout for the part of Harlequin. At the foot of his portrait painted[69] by Ferdinand, and engraved by Hubert, the following quatrain is to be read:—
After Domenico’s death a book was published by Florentin Delaulne bearing the following title:—Arlequiniana, or the Quips and Pleasant and Amusing Stories culled from the Conversations of Harlequin, 1694.
The work begins thus:
“On Saturday last, the 30th of the month, as I was leaving my room on the stroke of midnight, Harlequin appeared before me. He was wearing his little hat, his mask and the coat in which he performed. At first I was surprised to see him; but I was at once reassured, being persuaded that I had nothing to fear from a man for whom my affections had survived his death.
“‘Do not be apprehensive,’ he said to me; ‘I am charmed to see you.’
“Thereupon I ran to embrace him.
“‘No, not that,’ he said, ‘my body is now no more than abstract matter, ill calculated to receive such marks of your friendship. What folly induced you to publish things uttered between us when I was alive? Do you think to gladden the world with my stories? Was I so well known that my name should not yet be forgotten?’ etc.”
The author answers him that his name is immortal, that his person is beloved and esteemed throughout Europe; that in[70] the rôles which he undertook he never played other than with justice and honesty.
“When you portrayed the knaveries of the practitioners, the distortions of women, the trickiness of bankrupts, or the impertinences of the bourgeois, do you think to have done them any harm?”
The conversation continues thus between the author and the deceased Domenico throughout the volume. Into this conversation are brought amusing stories, scandalous anecdotes of the time, quips, facetiæ, moralisings, philosophic dissertations, etc. It is a pot-pourri on the subject of Domenico.
In one of the comedies played by Domenico Harlequin seeks to sell his house. Having found a buyer, he protests that as he does not wish him to buy a pig in a poke he will show him a sample of the goods, and he produces from under his jacket a large piece of plaster.
In another scene Harlequin appears as a beggar. Ottavio questions him upon various matters; amongst other things he asks him how many fathers he possesses.
“I have only one,” replies Harlequin.
“But how does it happen that you have only one father?” demands Ottavio, losing patience.
“What would you?” is the answer. “I am but a poor man, and I have no means of affording more.”
Elsewhere Pasquariello seeks to lead Harlequin to a tavern; but in this piece Harlequin is of sober habits, and replies: “The glass is Pandora’s box; out of it come all the evils.”
Let us cite a few further traits of the character drawn by Domenico in the various Harlequins performed by him.
Mezzetin promises Harlequin that he shall wed Columbine if he will second him in a fresh piece of knavery. Whilst Mezzetin is considering his project, Harlequin counts the buttons of his doublet, and at each button says: “I shall have Columbine, I shall not have her; I shall have her, I shall not have her; I shall have her, I shall not have her; I shall have her, I shall not have her; I shall have her, I shall not have her; (he bursts into tears) I shall not have her!”
Mezzetin. What ails you? Why are you crying?
Harlequin (weeping). I shall not have Columbine! hi! hi! hi!
Mezzetin. Who has said so?
Harlequin (indicating his buttons). Buttonomancy!
In L’Homme à Bonnes Fortunes, Harlequin, disguised as a marquis, is the recipient of many presents from women whom he has contrived to please. He has already received and donned two dressing-gowns, when a third one is brought to him on behalf of a widow who comes to judge for herself of the effect produced by her present. There is a knock at the door. It is she. Harlequin has no more than time to slip this third gown over the other two, whereby he is given the appearance of an elephant. The widow enters, notwithstanding that admission has been refused her.
Harlequin (angrily). Morbleu, madam! Did I not bid them tell you that I was not visible to-day?
The Widow. To find you, sir, it is necessary to come upon you as you leave your bed; throughout the remainder of the day you are unapproachable.
Harlequin. It is true that I have not an hour to myself. I am so exhausted by these adventures which the vulgar call bonnes fortunes that my superfluity would be enough for twenty idlers of the Court.
The Widow. But, sir, I find you very fat. What is the matter with you?
Harlequin. Nothing, merely that I overate last night at supper.
The Widow. There must be some other reason; are you perhaps dropsical?
Harlequin. Indeed no!
The Widow. Let us see. (She pulls off his dressing-gowns, one after the other.)
Harlequin (defending himself). Fie, madam! What are you about? This isn’t decent!
The Widow. One, two, three dressing-gowns! That is to say, three mistresses! Ah! Traitor! It is thus, then, that you betray me! And you say that you love none but me!
Harlequin (attempting to seek refuge in the wardrobe). Madam, I can bear no more!
The Widow. Now I know the worth of your oaths.
Harlequin. Madam, I must go.... If I don’t——
The Widow. Rascal!
Harlequin. Madam, I can no longer answer for the discretion of——
The Widow. Are you shameless? I will have no more to do with you. Return me the dressing-gown. (She attempts to drag her dressing-gown from him; they fight, Harlequin knocks off her headdress, she loses one of her petticoats, and departs.)
On the subject of the etymology of the name of Harlequin, it is explained thus by Domenico:
Cinthio (to his lackey, Harlequin). By the way, since you have been in my employ it has never occurred to me to inquire your name?
Harlequin. I am called Arlecchino Sbrufadelli.
(At the name of Sbrufadelli Cinthio bursts into laughter.)
Harlequin. Do not presume to mock me. All my ancestors were people of consequence. Sbroufadel, the first of the name, was a pork butcher, but so superior in his profession that Nero would eat no sausages but those which he made. Of Sbroufadel was born Fregocola, a great captain; he married Mademoiselle Castagna, who was of so lively a temperament that she gave birth to me two days after the wedding. My father was delighted, but his joy was cut short by certain pettifoggeries on the part of the police. Whenever my father met an honest man on the highway he never failed to take off his hat, and if it happened to be night, he would take off his cloak as well. The police sought to curb this excess of civility and ordered his arrest. My father did not wait for it. He took me in my swaddling clothes, and, having thrust me into a cauldron, and the rest of his movables into a basket, he left the city, driving before him the donkey that bore his house and his heir. He frequently struck the beast to cries of “Ar! Ar!” which in the asinine language means “Get on! get on!” Whilst proceeding thus, he perceived that a man was following him. This man, observing that my father was considering him attentively, hid himself, crouching (se messe chin) behind a bush. My father, who took him for the officer sent to arrest him, conceiving that he assumed this position the better to surprise him, beat his donkey more severely than ever, crying Ar! le chin, that is to say: Get on, he is crouching. So that, as I was still without a name, my father, remembering the fright which he had received, and the words Ar! le chin, Ar! le chin, which he had repeated so often, called me Arlechino.
In another Italian scene we see Pasquariello giving advice to Harlequin, who is in difficulties on the subject of finding a good profession.
Pasquariello. Set up as a doctor. If fortune smiles on you you’ll soon be rich. Consider how much the doctor has earned[74] since he has been in fashion to treat gout. He has amassed more than two hundred thousand francs, and he knows no more about the gout than you do.
Harlequin. Then of necessity he must know very little, for I know nothing.
Pasquariello. That should not hinder you from being a clever doctor.
Harlequin. Parbleu, you mock me! I can neither read nor write.
Pasquariello. No matter, I say. It is not knowledge that makes the successful doctor, it is impudence and wordiness.
Harlequin. But how, then, do they manage with their patients?
Pasquariello. I will tell you. You begin by having a mule and promenading through Paris on it. First comes a man who says: “Sir doctor, I beg of you to come and see my parent who is ill.” “Willingly, sir.” The man goes ahead and the doctor follows on his mule. (Here Pasquariello imitates the man who walks; he turns round and says to Harlequin who follows him trotting): What are you playing at?
Harlequin. I am playing the mule.
Pasquariello. You arrive at the house of the sick man. Your guide knocks, the door is opened, the doctor alights from his mule and together they ascend the staircase.
Harlequin. And the mule? Does the mule also ascend the staircase?
Pasquariello. No, no, the mule remains at the door, it is the man and the doctor who ascend the staircase. Behold them now in the patient’s antechamber. The man says to the doctor, “Follow me, sir, I am going to see if my parent sleeps.”
(Here Pasquariello walks on tiptoe, stretches out his arms, and pretends to draw aside the curtains of a bed.)
Harlequin. Why do you step so softly?
Pasquariello. On account of the sick man. We are now in his chamber, beside the bed. “Sir, the patient is not asleep, you may approach.” Immediately the doctor takes the arm-chair by the bedside, and says to the patient: “Show me your[75] tongue.” (Pasquariello puts out an enormous tongue and, imitating the patient, says:) “Oh, sir, I am very ill!”
Harlequin (considering Pasquariello’s tongue). Eh! what an ugly illness!
Pasquariello. That tongue is very dry and very heated.
Harlequin. It must be put on ice.
Pasquariello. Let us feel the pulse. (He pretends to feel the pulse of the sick man.) Now here is a pulse that goes devilishly quick! Let us feel the stomach. Now here is a stomach that is very hard.
Harlequin. Perhaps he has swallowed iron.
Pasquariello. Let me have paper, pen and ink. (He pretends to write.) Recipe: this evening a lavement, to-morrow morning a blood-letting, and to-morrow evening a medicine. (All this is mimed by Pasquariello as if he were administering a lavement, or a blood-letting, or swallowing a medicine.) Then you take your leave of the patient, and you depart saying, “Sir, to-morrow I shall come at the same hour, and I hope in a short time to restore you completely to health.” Then the man who has introduced you reconducts you again, and slips a golden half-louis into your hand; you mount your mule once more and depart.
Harlequin. But how may I be able to guess whether he has the fever or not?
Pasquariello. I will show you. When the pulse is equal, that is to say when it goes tac, tac, tac, there is no fever, but when it is intermittent, and when it goes quickly, ti, ta, ta; ti, ta, ta; ti, ta, ta, there is fever.
Harlequin. Now that is quite simple: tac, tac, tac, no fever; ti, ta, ta; ti, ta, ta; ti, ta, ta, fever.
Pasquariello. There you are, as learned as the doctors; let us go.
Harlequin. Ti, ta, ta; ti, ta, ta; I am all for ti, ta, ta.
Harlequin, having become a doctor, prescribes as follows for the Captain, who has asked him for a remedy for toothache. “Take,” says Harlequin, “some pepper, garlick and vinegar,[76] and rub your back with them; that will make you forget your pain.”
As the Captain is about to depart, Harlequin calls him back. “Sir, sir,” says he, “I was forgetting the best; take an apple, cut it into four equal parts, put one of these in your mouth, and then thrust your head into an oven until the apple is baked, and I will answer for it that your toothache will be entirely cured.”
In the very curious pictures possessed by the Théâtre-Français, bearing the inscription in gold letters: “Farceurs françois et italiens, depuis soixante ans,” we find Domenico in his costume of Harlequin together with several other Italian types—Brighella, Scaramouche, the Doctor, Pantaloon, Mezzetin, Matamoros—mingling with the French types: Turlupin, Gros-Guillaume, Gaultier-Garguille, Guillot-Gorju, Jodelet, Gros-René and Molière.
