48. The Passport. Versailles

THERE is not a more perplexing affair in life to me, than to set about telling any one who I am-for there is scarce anybody I cannot give a better account of than of myself; and I have often wish'd I could do it in a single word-and have an end of it. It was the only time and occasion in my life I could accomplish this to any purpose-for Shakspere lying upon the table, and recollecting I was in his books, I took up Hamlet, and turning immediately to the grave-diggers scene in the fifth act, I laid my finger upon YORICK, and advancing the book to the Count, with my finger all the way over the name-Me voici! said I.

Now whether the idea of poor Yorick's skull was put out of the Count's mind by the reality of my own, or by what magic he could drop a period of seven or eight hundred years, makes nothing in this account-'t is certain the French conceive better than they combine-I wonder at nothing in this world, and the less at this; inasmuch as one of the first of our own church, for whose candor and paternal sentiments I have the highest veneration, fell into the same mistake in the very same case.-"He could not bear," he said, "to look into sermons wrote by the king of Denmark's jester."-Good my lord! said I-but there are two Yoricks. The Yorick your lordship thinks of has been dead and buried eight hundred years ago; he flourish'd in Horwendillus's court-the other Yorick is myself, who have flourish'd, my lord, in no court.-He shook his head.-Good God! said I, you might as well confound Alexander the Great with Alexander the Coppersmith, my lord-'T was all one, he replied.-

-If Alexander king of Macedon could have translated your lordship, said I-I'm sure your lordship would not have said so.

The poor Count de B-- fell but into the same error-Et, Monsieur, est il Yorick? cried the Count.-Je le suis, said I.-Vous?-Moi-moi qui ai l'honneur de vous parler, Monsieur le Comte.-Mon Dieu! said he, embracing me-Vous êtes Yorick!

The Count instantly put the Shakspere into his pocket-and left me alone in his room.