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This will be the last of my entries because I find this to be idle work and in light of recent events, from when we last spoke, I try to shy away from idling.
When Martin and I met with Signor Pococuranté, I was sadly mistaken in thinking he was happy. The whole night he showed us all his worldly possessions that would have made any man jealous, but to him they were nothing. I reasoned still that he was happy because he was a man who was above all that he owned, but Martin saw that he really detested all that he owned. A few evenings after our dinner with Signor, Martin and I had another interesting supper encounter.
As we sat down to eat at the public inn, so did 6 strangers. After a parade of servants baring odd messages, we came to know the names of these strangers and their stories. All six men had been rulers of their kingdoms at one point, but were all poor and powerless, after a series of calamities. During this meeting, my faithful servant, Cacambo, found me and told me the happenings of Cungondé and himself. She was the slave of an exiled prince in Constantinople and had become very ugly, while he was the servant of one of the six strangers.
I boarded a boat head of Constantinople, with Martin at my side, and found that Cacambo was on the same boat. After I bought his freedom and we landed in Constantinople, I set out to find my dear Cungondé. When I took a galley up the river that Cungondé washed her master's plates in, I was more surprised than when I was confronted by Cacambo. On the boat, working in servitude was the Baron and Pangloss, both of whom I thought had died. It turns out that my wounding of the Baron was not fatal and Pangloss was not hung properly. I bought both their freedom and once we found Cungondé and the old woman I bought their freedom as well.
Having little money, and getting rid of the Baron so that I could marry Cungondé, the 6 of us purchased a farm and, after talking to an old man who taught us that work kept us from evil, live there now, doing our daily work, until we can no longer carry on.
Every now and again, Pangloss, Martin, Cacambo and I discuss the issues of the theory of life and Pangloss still hangs onto his original belief, but I must say that I have strayed from his ideas of the "best possible end."

Favorite Quotations:
"Our labour keeps us from three great evils-- boredom, vice and want," (Ch. 30, p. 129).

When I last updated my travels I was in the wondrous city of El Dorado and that's were Cacambo and I stayed for a month or so, until we saw that there was no diversity in the people. Everybody talked about the same things, had the same opinions, but nobody was ever killed because of their differences. Cacambo and I decided that we would rather risk being in the other world than to become one of the El Doradoians. At the expense of those in El Dorado, we left with 100 red sheep caring food, goods and especially the precious stones of the land, but by the time we had made it over the treacherous mountains and into a city. all but six of the sheep had died.
Because I could not go to Buenos Ayres myself, I sent Cacambo there and told him I would meet him in Venice in a month or two with Cunégonde. On my first attempt to get to Venice I was robbed before I even got onto the ship, but on the second I boarded the ship with my newly acquired friend Martin. While at sea, Martin and I came upon two ships fighting and when one was sunk, one of my red sheep came back to me. With this new optimism, if I could be reunited with my sheep then I would be reunited with Cunégonde.
On the last leg of my journey to Venice, the ship landed in Bordeaux where I became sick for a while. When I got better Martin and I went to see many great plays, meeting the Abbé of Perigord, and eventually ending up at a party, where I shamefully admit I was unfaithful to Cunégonde.
When I heard word that Cunégonde was in Bordeaux and that she was sick, I went to her side, but was arrested for being a foreigner. It was all a clever plan to rob me, but when i bribed the arresting officer, he told me he had a brother in Lower Normandy and that he would take care of me if I paid him. I went to find the officers brother, and when I did I boarded a ship, the next day, headed to England with Martin, in hopes that I would find a different boat headed for Venice.
When we landed in England, we saw the most abominable act. An admiral was shot by 4 people, three times each, because he had not killed enough French and that was the custom of the land. I refused to be in a place where these were the customs and in two days, after negotiations with the captain, the boat to England was off again to Venice. The trip was safe, but when we arrived and for the next few days I heard no news of Cacambo or Cunégonde. I dropped into despair, Martin told me that nothing was for the best possible end, but everything was destined for the worst end. We went on a search for somebody who was truly happy and when we saw a young lady and a friar, I figured that they were happy and invited them to dinner. It was then that I found Paquette, the maid of Cunégonde's family, working as a prostitute and the friar her client. I learned that even those who appear to be happy are not, and my only hope to find somebody who is truly happy lay in Signor Pococuranté's hands. But still I remain optimistic.

Favorite Quotation:
"You see, my dear friend, how fleeting the riches of this world are; there is nothing solid but virtue," (Ch. 19, p. 76)
"Do you believe... that hawks have always eating pigeons when they could get them?... If hawks have always had the same nature, why do you suppose that mankind has changed?" (Ch. 21, pg. 84)

When I last left you I was the captain of a company in the Bulgarian Army and was onboard a ship headed for Buenos Ayres. Upon my arrival in Buenos Ayres, I asked the Governor to wed Cunégonde and I, but I was forced to leave her when a ship arrived which carried the men who were sent from Spain to arrest me.
With my new friend, Cacambo, who I met as he was one of my footmen, we set off for Paraguay, hoping to enlist with the government of Los Padres. When we came to Paraguay we were treated like the enemy, of which we once were, until Cacambo made it clear that I was German not Spanish. When I was allowed to met the reverend commandant, who I found out was the long last brother of Cunégonde. I thought he would save me from my peril, but when i mentioned my intentions to marry his sister, he attempted to kill me, but it was I who killed him.
Forced to run away again Cacambo and I fled into the hills and stopped to eat in the forest. While in the forest, we heard womanish screams and when we went to investigate we found two naked young ladies being chased by two monkeys. Thinking that I would save the women by shooting the monkeys dead, I was utterly wrong and, as Cacambo told me to late, the monkeys were actually the girl's lovers. Fearing they would get us in trouble, we hid in some bushes and fell asleep. When we awoke we were tied up and being prepared to be eaten, but Cacambo saved me, once again, by telling the Oreillons, our captures, that I was not Jesuit, who they hated. When they found out that I was, indeed, not a Jesuit, they released us and we left.
Cacambo and I decided to go Cayenne and fall into the hands of some Frenchmen, but that wasn't how it happened. While traveling down the river, our canoe became destroyed, but we were lucky enough to travel long enough to stubble across a great city where the food was free and children played with the rarest of stones and diamonds. I believe Cacambo and I will be staying in this great place for a long while.

Favorite Quotation
"Indeed, the law of nature teaches us to kill our neighbour; and that's why we find this practised all over the world..." (Ch. 16, p. 63)

When I last spoke to you I was at the saddest moment of my life, I had just witnessed the death of my dear Pangloss and was left alone in the world... or so I thought! As I stood in my dreary state an old woman told me to follow her and she lead me to a house where I ate, slept and she attended my wounds. After a few days I was then lead to a castle and up backstairs to a small room, until she returned with a veiled woman. When I unmasked the girl I was astonished to find my lovely Cunégonde, alive and well.
We caught up on our mishappenings since I was expelled from the castle for kissing her and her story was worse than mine. She had been ravished, but saved, put into servitude by a Bulgarian captain, put into slavery by a Jew, Don Issachar, and then into slavery by the Grand Inquisator. When she was finished, we were about to have dinner, until Don Issachar returned and I was forced to kill him. I thought that was the worst of my day, but I was proved wrong when the Grand Inquistador returned to find Issachar slain by my sword and I was forced to kill him, too.
As Cunégonde, the old woman and I escaped to Cadiz, we learned the story of the old woman, whose story was even worse than Cunégonde's. The old lady was the daughter of Pope Urban X and had once been the most beautiful woman in her land, until poor fate fell upon her. She was put into slavery upon a Moor's pirate ship, was raped alongside her mother, and witnessed her mother quartered with all her maidservants. Then she was left to die among all the dead in Spain, but survived, only to be put back into slavery. She caught the plague, again survived and was then sold multiple times until she found herself the possession of Don Issachar. Both Cunégonde and I learned today that though we may be going through hard times, everybody goes through them and some worse than ours.

Favorite Quotes:
"What can be more absurd than choosing to carry a burden that one really wants to throw to the ground? To detest, and yet strive to perserve our existance? To caress the serpent that devours us, and hug him close to our bosoms till he has gnawed into our hearts?" (Ch. 12, p. 50)

In the past few weeks many troubles have befallen upon me. I was cast out of the baron's castle for kissing my beloved Cunégonde and was made to wander aimlessly into the next town without a penny to my name and starving to death. I was befriended by two men recruiters for the Bulgarian army and then tricked after declaring my love for the King of the Bulgarians. As they forced me to serve in the army, I got myself into trouble and was given the choice of either being flogged by the whole regiment or being shot in the head 12 times, I chose the former. When I was saved by the King of the Bulgarians, I was forced to continue serving in the army and fight in the war against the King of Arabes. That was when I made my escape, traveling through the town littered with the dead and dying.
When I reached the next town I found it easy to get food from the Christain inhabitants until I came across Protestant minister who denounced me for questioning the popes being the AntiChrist and his wife who emptied their chamber-pot on me. But all was for the best because that was when I found a new friend James the Anabaptist, and later my great friend Pangloss, who had been infected with syphillis. When I asked Pangloss what had happened to my dear Cunégonde, he told me she had been raped by the Bulgarian Army as they made their way into Thunder-ten-tronckh. After Pangloss treatement, paid for by the ever charitable James, we three boarded a ship to Lisbon. That was when we were again sticken with grave calamity, during a storm our ship was sunk, and everybody died, save Pangloss, the killer of James and myself.
When we found our way onto the island of Lisbon, again a great disaster fell upon us in the form of an earthquake which trapped me under debris while Pangloss lectured me on how the earthquake was the best possible end. After the earthquake Pangloss and I found ourselves eating dinner with a man who was associated with the Inquisition. The next morning the people of Lisbon sought to appease the earth to prevent more earthquakes and thats when I witnessed the hanging of Pangloss, my last dear friend.
How can this all be for the best possible world, if my dear friend Pangloss is dead, my beloved Cunégonde riped open, and me left without money or a person to confide in?

Quotation of the past chapters:
"Mankind must in some things have deviated from their original innocence; for they were not born wolves, and yet they worry one another like those beasts of prey." (Ch. 4, p. 23)