"Eh!" says Jurgen. He did not like this priest. "Now I will wager, sirs," Jurgen continued, a trifle patronizingly, "that you gentlemen have not read Gowlais, or even Stevegonius, in the light of Vossler's commentaries. And that is why you underrate them." "I at least have read every word that was ever written by any of these three," replied the priest of Sesphra--"and with, as I need hardly say, the liveliest abhorrence. And this Gowlais in particular, as I hasten to agree with my learned confrère, is a most notorious heretic--" "Oh, sir," said Jurgen, horrified, "whatever are you telling me about Gowlais!" "I tell you that I have been roused to indignation by his _Historia de Bello Veneris_--" "You surprise me: still--" "--Shocked by his _Pornoboscodidascolo_--" "I can hardly believe it: even so, you must grant--" "--And horrified by his _Liber de immortalitate Mentulæ_--" "Well, conceding you that earlier work, sir, yet, at the same time--" "--And have been disgusted by his _De modo coeundi_--" "Ah, but, none the less--" "--And have shuddered over the unspeakable enormities of his _Erotopægnion!_ of his _Cinædica!_ and especially of his _Epipedesis_, that most pestilential and abominable book, _quem sine horrore nemo potest legere_--" "Still, you cannot deny--" "--And have read also all the confutations of this detestable Gowlais: as those of Zanchius, Faventinus, Lelius Vincentius, Lagalla, Thomas Giaminus, and eight other admirable commentators--" "You are very exact, sir: but--" "--And that, in short, I have read every book you can imagine," says the priest of Sesphra. The shoulders of Jurgen rose to his ears, and Jurgen silently flung out his hands, palms upward. "For, I perceive," says Jurgen, to himself, "that this Realist is too circumstantial for me. None the less, he invents his facts: it is by citing books which never existed that he publicly confutes the Gowlais whom I invented privately: and that is not fair. Now there remains only one chance for Jurgen; but luckily that chance is sure." "Why are you fumbling in your pocket?" asks the old priest of Ageus, fidgeting and peering. "Aha, you may well ask!" cried Jurgen. He unfolded the cantrap which had been given him by the Master Philologist, and which Jurgen had treasured against the time when more was needed than a glib tongue. "O most unrighteous judges," says Jurgen, sternly, "now hear and tremble! 'At the death of Adrian the Fifth, Pedro Juliani, who should be named John the Twentieth, was through an error in the reckoning elevated to the papal chair as John the Twenty-first!'" "Hah, and what have we to do with that?" inquired the priest of Vel-Tyno, with raised eyebrows. "Why are you telling us of these irrelevant matters?" "Because I thought it would interest you," said Jurgen. "It was a fact that appeared to me rather amusing. So I thought I would mention it."