ASMODEUS;
OR,
The Devil on Two Sticks.
By ALAIN RENÉ LE SAGE.
WITH A BIOGRAPHICAL NOTICE OF THE AUTHOR,
By JULES JANIN.
Illustrated by TONY JOHANNOT.
[Translated by Joseph Thomas.]
GEORGE ROUTLEDGE AND SONS,
LONDON: BROADWAY, LUDGATE HILL.
NEW YORK: 416 BROOME STREET.
1879.
TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE.
When I first determined on the publicationof a new edition of "The Devil on TwoSticks," I had certainly no idea of engagingin a new translation. I had not read an English versionsince my boyhood, and naturally conceived thatthe one which had passed current for upwards of acentury must possess sufficient merit to render anythingbeyond a careful revision, before passing it againthrough the press, unnecessary. However, on readinga few pages, and on comparing them with the much-lovedoriginal, I no longer wondered, as I had sooften done, why Le Diable Boiteux was so little[Pg viii]esteemed by those who had only known him in hisEnglish dress, while Gil Blas was as great a favouritewith the British public as any of its own heroes of story.To account for this, I will not dwell on the want ofliteral fidelity in the old version, although in someinstances that is amusing enough; but the total absenceof style, and that too in the translation of a work byone of the greatest masters of verbal melody that everexisted, was so striking as to induce me, rashly perhaps,to endeavour more worthily to interpret the witty andsatirical Asmodeus for the benefit of those who havenot the inestimable pleasure of comprehending him inhis native tongue—for, as Jules Janin observes, he is aDevil truly French.
In the translation which I here present, I do notmyself pretend, at all times, to have rendered the wordsof the 'graceful Cupid' with strict exactness, but I havestriven to convey to my reader the ideas which thosewords import. Whether I have succeeded in so doingis for others to determine; but, if I have not, I shall atall events have the satisfaction of failing in company,—which,I am told, however, is only an Old Bailey sort offeeling after all.
I have not thought it necessary to attempt the Life ofthe Author; it will be enough to me, for fame, not tohave murdered one of his children. I have thereforeadopted the life, character, and behaviour of Le Sagefrom one of the most talented of modern French writers,and my readers will doubtless congratulate themselveson my resolve. Neither have I deemed it needful toenter into the controversy as to the originality of thiswork, except by a note in page 162: and this I shouldprobably not have appended, had I, while hunting overthe early editions t