--I have made a very good venture of it, quoth the stranger--so slipping his wrist out of the loop of a black ribbon, to which a short scymetar was hung, he put his hand into his pocket, and with great courtesy touching the fore part of his cap with his left hand, as he extended his right----he put a florin into the centinel’s hand, and passed on. _Dolet mihi, ait miles, tympanistam nanum et valgum alloquens, virum adeo urbanum vaginam perdidisse: itinerari haud poterit nudâ acinaci; neque vaginam toto _Argentorato_, habilem inveniet. ------Nullam unquam habui, respondit peregrinus respiciens------seque comiter inclinans--hoc more gesto, nudam acinacem elevans, mulo lentò progrediente, ut nasum tueri possim._ It grieves me, said the centinel, speaking to a little dwarfish bandy-legg’d drummer, that so courteous a soul should have lost his scabbard------he cannot travel without one to his scymetar, and will not be able to get a scabbard to fit it in all _Strasburg_. ----I never had one, replied the stranger, looking back to the centinel, and putting his hand up to his cap as he spoke ----I carry it, continued he, thus----holding up his naked scymetar, his mule moving on slowly all the time--on purpose to defend my nose. _Non immerito, benigne peregrine, respondit miles._ It is well worth it, gentle stranger, replied the centinel. _Nihili æstimo, ait ille tympanista, e pergamenâ factitius est._ ----’Tis not worth a single stiver, said the bandy-legg’d drummer----’tis a nose of parchment. _Prout christianus sum, inquit miles, nasus ille, ni sexties major sit, meo esset conformis._ As I am a true catholic--except that it is six times as big--’tis a nose, said the centinel, like my own. _Crepitare audivi ait tympanista._ --I heard it crackle, said the drummer. _Mehercule! sanguinem emisit, respondit miles._ By dunder, said the centinel, I saw it bleed. _Miseret me, inquit tympanista, qui non ambo tetigimus!_ What a pity, cried the bandy-legg’d drummer, we did not both touch it! _Eodem temporis puncto, quo hæc res argumentata fuit inter militem et tympanistam, disceptabatur ibidem tubicine et uxore suâ qui tunc accesserunt, et peregrino prætereunte, restiterunt._ At the very time that this dispute was maintaining by the centinel and the drummer--was the same point debating betwixt a trumpeter and a trumpeter’s wife, who were just then coming up, and had stopped to see the stranger pass by. _Quantus nasus! æque longus est, ait tubicina, ac tuba._ _Benedicity!_ ------What a nose! ’tis as long, said the trumpeter’s wife, as a trumpet. _Et ex eodem metallo, ait tubicen, velut sternutamento audias._ And of the same metal, said the trumpeter, as you hear by its sneezing. _Tantum abest, respondit illa, quod fistulam dulcedine vincit._ ’Tis as soft as a flute, said she. _Æneus est, ait tubicen._ --’Tis brass, said the trumpeter. _Nequaquam, respondit uxor._