[Gargantua and Pantagruel<br> Book IV. by Francois Rabelais]@TWC D-Link book
Gargantua and Pantagruel
Book IV.

CHAPTER 4
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Poor Panurge having with the full contents of the inside of his doublet plentifully fed the fish, greedy enough of such odious fare, sat on the deck all in a heap, with his nose and arse together, most sadly cast down, moping and half dead; invoked and called to his assistance all the blessed he- and she-saints he could muster up; swore and vowed to confess in time and place convenient, and then bawled out frightfully, Steward, maitre d'hotel, see ho! my friend, my father, my uncle, prithee let us have a piece of powdered beef or pork; we shall drink but too much anon, for aught I see.

Eat little and drink the more will hereafter be my motto, I fear.

Would to our dear Lord, and to our blessed, worthy, and sacred Lady, I were now, I say, this very minute of an hour, well on shore, on terra firma, hale and easy.

O twice and thrice happy those that plant cabbages! O destinies, why did you not spin me for a cabbage-planter?
O how few are there to whom Jupiter hath been so favourable as to predestinate them to plant cabbages! They have always one foot on the ground, and the other not far from it.

Dispute who will of felicity and summum bonum, for my part whosoever plants cabbages is now, by my decree, proclaimed most happy; for as good a reason as the philosopher Pyrrho, being in the same danger, and seeing a hog near the shore eating some scattered oats, declared it happy in two respects; first, because it had plenty of oats, and besides that, was on shore.


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