ANS now for _Lippius_’s clock! said I, with the air of a man, who had
got thro’ all his difficulties——nothing can prevent us seeing that, and
the _Chinese_ history, &c. except the time, said _François_——for ’tis
almost eleven—then we must speed the faster, said I, striding it away
to the cathedral.
I cannot say, in my heart, that it gave me any concern in being told by
one of the minor canons, as I was entering the west door,—That
_Lippius_’s great clock was all out of joints, and had not gone for
some years——It will give me the more time, thought I, to peruse the
_Chinese_ history; and besides I shall be able to give the world a
better account of the clock in its decay, than I could have done in its
flourishing condition——
——And so away I posted to the college of the Jesuits.
Now it is with the project of getting a peep at the history of _China_
in _Chinese_ characters—as with many others I could mention, which
strike the fancy only at a distance; for as I came nearer and nearer to
the point—my blood cool’d—the freak gradually went off, till at length
I would not have given a cherry-stone to have it gratified——The truth
was, my time was short, and my heart was at the Tomb of the Lovers——I
wish to God, said I, as I got the rapper in my hand, that the key of
the library may be but lost; it fell out as well——
_For all the_ JESUITS _had got the cholic_—and to that degree, as never
was known in the memory of the oldest practitioner.