He gave Tressilian a scroll of parchment, bearing at top and bottom, and
down the margin, the signs of the seven planets, curiously intermingled
with talismanical characters and scraps of Greek and Hebrew. In the
midst were some Latin verses from a cabalistical author, written out so
fairly, that even the gloom of the place did not prevent Tressilian from
reading them. The tenor of the original ran as follows:-"Si fixum solvas, faciasque volare solutum,
Et volucrem figas, facient te vivere tutum;
Si pariat ventum, valet auri pondere centum;
Ventus ubi vult spirat--Capiat qui capere potest."
"I protest to you," said Tressilian, "all I understand of this jargon is
that the last words seem to mean 'Catch who catch can.'"
"That," said the smith, "is the very principle that my worthy friend and
master, Doctor Doboobie, always acted upon; until, being besotted with
his own imaginations, and conceited of his high chemical skill, he
began to spend, in cheating himself, the money which he had acquired
in cheating others, and either discovered or built for himself, I could
never know which, this secret elaboratory, in which he used to seclude
himself both from patients and disciples, who doubtless thought his
long and mysterious absences from his ordinary residence in the town of
Farringdon were occasioned by his progress in the mystic sciences, and
his intercourse with the invisible world. Me also he tried to deceive;
but though I contradicted him not, he saw that I knew too much of his
secrets to be any longer a safe companion. Meanwhile, his name waxed
famous--or rather infamous, and many of those who resorted to him did so
under persuasion that he was a sorcerer. And yet his supposed advance in
the occult sciences drew to him the secret resort of men too powerful
to be named, for purposes too dangerous to be mentioned. Men cursed
and threatened him, and bestowed on me, the innocent assistant of his
studies, the nickname of the Devil's foot-post, which procured me a
volley of stones as soon as ever I ventured to show my face in the
street of the village. At length my master suddenly disappeared,
pretending to me that he was about to visit his elaboratory in this
place, and forbidding me to disturb him till two days were past. When
this period had elapsed, I became anxious, and resorted to this vault,
where I found the fires extinguished and the utensils in confusion,
with a note from the learned Doboobius, as he was wont to style himself,
acquainting me that we should never meet again, bequeathing me his
chemical apparatus, and the parchment which I have just put into your
hands, advising me strongly to prosecute the secret which it
contained, which would infallibly lead me to the discovery of the grand
magisterium."