"Sir," replied the prince, "I have infinite obligations to your majesty for the honour you design me, and the great goodness you shew to a stranger; but I desire your majesty to believe I would not have come from so remote a country as I have done, the name of which perhaps may be unknown in your dominions, if I had not been certain of the cure I propose. What would not the world say of my fickleness, if, after such great fatigues and so many dangers as I have undergone in the pursuit, I should abandon this generous enterprise? Even your majesty would lose that esteem you have conceived for me. If I perish, I shall die with the satisfaction of not having forfeited your good opinion. I beseech your majesty therefore to keep me no longer from displaying the certainty of my art, by the proof I am ready to afford."