Dappa cleared his throat irritably and continued, " ‘thus did this Man, whom many styl’d a Vagabond, vanish from Christendom’s ken, swamped by Mortality’s Tide; and if rumors echoed up from Barbary, years later, to the effect that a Man answering to his Description had been witness’d there, it signified Nothing more than when a Sparend or Mast-head breaketh the Surface of some stagnant Cove at low Tide and reminds us that, once, a Ship was wrack’d in that Place. But all that was rumor’d concerning this Man was in an Instant over-turn’d when tidings were delivered to France of a bataille rangée in the streets of Grand Caire, whose Reverberations seem’d to echo back and forth ’tween the rugged Pyramids and the Barock Monuments of Versailles, as when a Thunderbolt splits the Air ’tween two very Mountains. For the Tides of Fortune had turn’d, even as those of us, who should’ve known better, had turn’d our backs to advert on inward and inland Matters. Nor was this the only such occasion, for in later Years came news of a Battle won through Alchemical cozening in Hindoostan, and other Ebbings and Flowings I’ll not tediously enumerate, as you are their Author.’ "