The Cloister and the Hearth
by Charles Reade
Hypertext Meanings and Commentaries
from the Encyclopedia of the Self
by Mark Zimmerman
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"Why, 'tis a lass of marble. How long do you count to be like
that, mistress?"

"Till I am in my grave, sweet Peggy."

"Who knows? maybe in ten minutes you will be altogether as hot."

She ran into the shop, but speedily returned to the mayor and
said, "Good news! He fancies her and more than a little. Now how
is't to be? Will you marry your child, or bury her, for there is
no third way, for shame and love they do rend her virgin heart to
death."

The dignitary decided for the more cheerful rite, but not without
a struggle; and with its marks on his face he accompanied Margaret
to his daughter. But as men are seldom in a hurry to drink their
wormwood, he stood silent. So Doctor Margaret said cheerfully,
"Mistress, your lock is gone; I have sold it."

"And who was so mad as to buy such a thing?" inquired the young
lady scornfully.

"Oh, a black-haired laddie wi' white teeth. They call him Ulrich."

The pale face reddened directly, brow and all.

"Says he, 'Oh, sweet mistress, give it me.' I had told them all
whose 'twas. 'Nay,' said I, 'selling is my livelihood, not
giving.' So he offered me this, he offered me that, but nought
less would I take than his next quarter's wages.

"Cruel," murmured the girl, scarce audibly.

"Why, you are in one tale with your father. Says he to me when I
told him, 'Oh, an he loves her hair so well, 'tis odd but he loves
the rest of her. Well,' quoth he, ''tis an honest lad, and a shall
have her, gien she will but leave her sulks and consent.' So, what
say ye, mistress, will you be married to Ulrich, or buried i' the
kirkyard?"

"Father! father!"

"'Tis so, girl, speak thy mind."

"I will obey my father - in all things," stammered the poor girl,
trying hard to maintain the advantageous position in which
Margaret had placed her. But nature, and the joy and surprise,
were too strong even for a virgin's bashful cunning. She cast an
eloquent look on them both, and sank at her father's knees, and
begged his pardon, with many sobs for having doubted his
tenderness.

He raised her in his arms, and took her, radiant through her tears
with joy, and returning life, and filial love, to his breast; and
the pair passed a truly sacred moment, and the dignitary was as
happy as he thought to be miserable; so hard is it for mortals to
foresee. And they looked round for Margaret, but she had stolen
away softly.

The young girl searched the house for her.

"Where is she hid? Where on earth is she?"

Where was she? why, in her own house, dressing meat for her two
old children, and crying bitterly the while at the living picture
of happiness she had just created.

"Well-a-day, the odds between her lot and mine; well-a-day!"

Next time she met the dignitary he hemm'd and hawed, and remarked
what a pity it was the law forbade him to pay her who had cured
his daughter. "However, when all is done, 'twas not art, 'twas but
woman's wit."

"Nought but that, burgomaster," said Margaret bitterly. "Pay the
men of art for not curing her: all the guerdon I seek, that cured
her, is this: go not and give your foul linen away from me by way
of thanks."

"Why should I?" inquired he.

"Marry, because there be fools about ye will tell ye she that hath
wit to cure dark diseases, cannot have wit to take dirt out o'
rags; so pledge me your faith."

The dignitary promised pompously, and felt all the patron.

Something must be done to fill "To-morrow's" box. She hawked her
initial letters and her illuminated vellums all about the town.
Printing had by this time dealt caligraphy in black and white a
terrible blow in Holland and Germany. But some copies of the
printed books were usually illuminated and fettered. The printers
offered Margaret prices for work in these two kinds.

"I'll think on't," said she.

She took down her diurnal book, and calculated that the price of
an hour's work on those arts would be about one-fifth what she got
for an hour at the tub and mangle. "I'll starve first," said she;
"what, pay a craft and a mystery five times less than a
handicraft!"

Martin, carrying the dry clothes-basket, got treated, and drunk.
This time he babbled her whole story. The girls got hold of it and
gibed her at the fountain.

All she had gone through was light to her, compared with the pins
and bodkins her own sex drove into her heart, whenever she came
near the merry crew with her pitcher, and that was every day. Each
sex has its form of cruelty; man's is more brutal and terrible;
but shallow women, that have neither read nor suffered, have an
unmuscular barbarity of their own (where no feeling of sex steps
in to overpower it). This defect, intellectual perhaps rather than
moral, has been mitigated in our day by books, especially by able
works of fiction; for there are two roads to the highest effort of
intelligence, Pity; Experience of sorrows, and Imagination, by
which alone we realize the grief we never felt. In the fifteenth
century girls with pitchers had but one; Experience; and at
sixteen years of age or so, that road had scarce been trodden.
These girls persisted that Margaret was deserted by her lover. And
to be deserted was a crime (They had not been deserted yet.) Not a
word against the Gerard they had created out of their own heads.
For the imaginary crime they fell foul of the supposed victim.
Sometimes they affronted her to her face. Oftener they talked at
her backwards and forwards with a subtle skill, and a perseverance
which, "oh, that they had bestowed on the arts," as poor Aguecheek
says.

Now Margaret was brave, and a coward; brave to battle difficulties
and ill fortune; brave to shed her own blood for those she loved.
Fortitude she had. But she had no true fighting courage. She was a
powerful young woman, rather tall, full, and symmetrical; yet had
one of those slips of girls slapped her face, the poor fool's
hands would have dropped powerless, or gone to her own eyes
instead of her adversary's. Nor was she even a match for so many
tongues; and besides, what could she say? She knew nothing of
these girls, except that somehow they had found out her sorrows,
and hated her; only she thought to herself they must be very
happy, or they would not be so hard on her.

So she took their taunts in silence; and all her struggle was not
to let them see their power to make her writhe within.

Here came in her fortitude; and she received their blows with
well-feigned, icy hauteur. They slapped a statue.

But one day, when her spirits were weak, as happens at times to
females in her condition, a dozen assailants followed suit so
admirably, that her whole sex seemed to the dispirited one to be
against her, and she lost heart, and the tears began to run
silently at each fresh stab.

On this their triumph knew no bounds, and they followed her half
way home casting barbed speeches.

After that exposure of weakness the statue could be assumed no
more. So then she would stand timidly aloof out of tongue-shot,
till her young tyrants' pitchers were all filled, and they gone;
and then creep up with hers. And one day she waited so long that
the fount had ceased to flow. So the next day she was obliged to
face the phalanx, or her house go dry. She drew near slowly, but
with the less tremor, that she saw a man at the well talking to
them. He would distract their attention, and besides, they would
keep their foul tongues quiet if only to blind the male to their
real character. This conjecture, though shrewd, was erroneous.
They could not all flirt with that one man; so the outsiders
indemnified themselves by talking at her the very moment she came
up.

"Any news from foreign parts, Jacqueline?"

"None for me, Martha. My lad goes no farther from me than the town
wall."

"I can't say as much," says a third.

"But if he goes t' Italy I have got another ready to take the
fool's place."

"He'll not go thither, lass. They go not so far till they are sick
of us that bide in Holland."

Surprise and indignation, and the presence of a man, gave Margaret
a moment's fighting courage.

"Oh, flout me not, and show your ill nature before the very
soldier. In Heaven's name, what ill did I ever to ye? what harsh
word cast back, for all you have flung on me, a desolate stranger
in your cruel town, that ye flout me for my bereavement and my
poor lad's most unwilling banishment? Hearts of flesh would surely
pity us both, for that ye cast in my teeth these many days, ye
brows of brass, ye bosoms of stone."

They stared at this novelty, resistance; and ere they could
recover and make mincement of her, she put her pitcher quietly
down, and threw her coarse apron over her head, and stood there
grieving, her short-lived spirit oozing fast. "Hallo!" cried the
soldier, "why, what is your ill?" She made no reply. But a little
girl, who had long secretly hated the big ones, squeaked out,
"They did flout her, they are aye flouting her; she may not come
nigh the fountain for fear o' them, and 'tis a black shame."

"Who spoke to her! Not I for one."

"Nor I. I would not bemean myself so far."

The man laughed heartily at this display of dignity. "Come, wife,"
said he, "never lower thy flag to such light skirmishers as these.
Hast a tongue i' thy head as well as they."

"Alack, good soldier, I was not bred to bandy foul terms."

"Well, but hast a better arm than these. Why not take 'em by twos
across thy knee, and skelp 'em till they cry Meculpee?"

"Nay, I would not hurt their bodies for all their cruel hearts."

"Then ye must e'en laugh at them, wife. What! a woman grown, and
not see why mesdames give tongue? You are a buxom wife; they are a
bundle of thread-papers. You are fair and fresh; they have all the
Dutch rim under their bright eyes, that comes of dwelling in
eternal swamps. There lies your crime. Come, gie me thy pitcher,
and if they flout me, shalt see me scrub 'em all wi' my beard till
they squeak holy mother." The pitcher was soon filled, and the
soldier put it in Margaret's hand. She murmured, "Thank you
kindly, brave soldier."

He patted her on the shoulder. "Come, courage, brave wife; the
divell is dead!" She let the heavy pitcher fall on his foot
directly. He cursed horribly, and hopped in a circle, saying, "No,
the Thief's alive and has broken my great toe."

The apron came down, and there was a lovely face all flushed with'
emotion, and two beaming eyes in front of him, and two hands held
out clasped.

"Nay, nay, 'tis nought," said he good-humouredly, mistaking.

"Denys?"

"Well? - But - Hallo! How know you my name is - "

"Denys of Burgundy!"

"Why, ods bodikins! I know you not, and you know me."

"By Gerard's letter. Crossbow! beard! handsome! The divell is
dead."

"Sword of Goliah! this must be she. Red hair, violet eyes, lovely
face. But I took ye for a married wife, seeing ye- - "

"Tell me my name," said she quickly.

"Margaret Brandt."

"Gerard? Where is he? Is he in life? Is he well? Is he coming? Is
he come? Why is he not here? Where have ye left him? Oh tell me!
prithee, prithee, prithee, tell me!"

"Ay, ay, but not here. Oh, ye are all curiosity now, mesdames, eh?
Lass, I have been three months a-foot travelling all Holland to
find ye, and here you are. Oh, be joyful!" and he flung his cap in
the air, and seizing both her hands kissed them ardently. "Ah, my
pretty she-comrade, I have found thee at last. I knew I should.
Shall be flouted no more. I'll twist your necks at the first word,
ye little trollops. And I have got fifteen gold angels left for
thee, and our Gerard will soon be here. Shalt wet thy purple eyes
no more."

But the fair eyes were wet even now, looking kindly and gratefully
at the friend that had dropped among her foes as if from heaven;
Gerard's comrade. "Prithee come home with me good, kind Denys. I
cannot speak of him before these." They went off together,
followed by a chorus. "She has gotten a man. She has gotten a man
at last. Boo! boo! boo!"

Margaret quickened her steps; but Denys took down his crossbow and
pretended to shoot them all dead: they fled quadrivious,
shrieking.

CHAPTER LI

The reader already knows how much these two had to tell one
another. It was a sweet yet bitter day for Margaret, since it
brought her a true friend, and ill news; for now first she learned
that Gerard was all alone in that strange land. She could not
think with Denys that he would come home; indeed he would have
arrived before this.

Denys was a balm. He called her his she-comrade, and was always
cheering her up with his formula and hilarities, and she petted
him and made much of him, and feebly hectored it over him as well
as over Martin, and would not let him eat a single meal out of her
house, and forbade him to use naughty words. "It spoils you,
Denys. Good lack, to hear such ugly words come forth so comely a
head: forbear, or I shall be angry: so be civil." Whereupon Denys
was upon his good behaviour, and ludicrous the struggle between
his native politeness and his acquired ruffianism. And as it never
rains but it pours, other persons now solicited Margaret's
friendship. She had written to Margaret Van Eyck a humble letter
telling her she knew she was no longer the favourite she had been,
and would keep her distance; but could not forget her
benefactress's past kindness. She then told her briefly how many
ways she had battled for a living, and in conclusion, begged
earnestly that her residence might not be betrayed, "least of all
to his people. I do hate them, they drove him from me. And even
when he was gone, their hearts turned not to me as they would an
if they had repented their cruelty to him."

The Van Eyck was perplexed. At last she made a confidante of
Reicht. The secret ran through Reicht, as through a cylinder, to
Catherine.

"Ay, and is she turned that bitter against us?" said that good
woman. "She stole our son from us, and now she hates us for not
running into her arms. Natheless it is a blessing she is alive and
no farther away than Rotterdam."

The English princess, now Countess Charolois, made a stately
progress through the northern states of the duchy, accompanied by
her stepdaughter the young heiress of Burgundy, Marie de
Bourgogne. Then the old duke, the most magnificent prince in
Europe, put out his splendour. Troops of dazzling knights, and
bevies of fair ladies gorgeously attired, attended the two
princesses; and minstrels, jongleurs, or story-tellers, bards,
musicians, actors, tumblers followed in the train; and there was
fencing, dancing, and joy in every town they shone on. Richart
invited all his people to meet him at Rotterdam and view the
pageant.

They had been in Rotterdam some days, when Denys met Catherine
accidentally in the street, and after a warm greeting on both
sides, bade her rejoice, for he had found the she-comrade, and
crowed; but Catherine cooled him by showing him how much earlier
he would have found her by staying quietly at Tergou, than by
vagabondizing it all over Holland. "And being found, what the
better are we? her heart is set dead against us now."

"Oh, let that flea stick; come you with me to her house."

No, she would not go where she was sure of an ill welcome. "Them
that come unbidden sit unseated." No, let Denys be mediator, and
bring the parties to a good understanding. He undertook the office
at once, and with great pomp and confidence. He trotted off to
Margaret and said, "She-comrade, I met this day a friend of
thine."

"Thou didst look into the Rotter then, and see thyself."

"Nay, 'twas a female, and one that seeks thy regard; 'twas
Catherine, Gerard's mother."

"Oh, was it?" said Margaret; "then you may tell her she comes too
late. There was a time I longed and longed for her; but she held
aloof in my hour of most need, so now we will be as we ha' been.'

Denys tried to shake this resolution. He coaxed her, but she was
bitter and sullen, and not to be coaxed. Then he scolded her well;
then, at that she went into hysterics.

He was frightened at this result of his eloquence, and being off
his guard, allowed himself to be entrapped into a solemn promise
never to recur to the subject. He went back to Catherine
crestfallen, and told her. She fired up and told the family how
his overtures had been received. Then they fired up; it became a
feud and burned fiercer every day. Little Kate alone made some
excuses for Margaret.

The very next day another visitor came to Margaret, and found the
military enslaved and degraded, Martin up to his elbows in
soapsuds, and Denys ironing very clumsily, and Margaret plaiting
ruffs, but with a mistress's eye on her raw levies. To these there
entered an old man, venerable at first sight, but on nearer view
keen and wizened.

"Ah," cried Margaret. Then swiftly turned her back on him and hid
her face with invincible repugnance. "Oh, that man! that man!"

"Nay, fear me not," said Ghysbrecht; "I come on a friend's errand.
I bring ye a letter from foreign parts."

"Mock me not, old man," and she turned slowly round.

"Nay, see;" and he held out an enormous letter.

Margaret darted on it, and held it with trembling hands and
glistening eyes. It was Gerard's handwriting.

"Oh, thank you, sir, bless you for this, I forgive you all the ill
you ever wrought me."

And she pressed the letter to her bosom with one hand, and glided
swiftly from the room with it.

As she did not come back, Ghysbrecht went away, but not without a
scowl at Martha. Margaret was hours alone with her letter.

CHAPTER LI

When she came down again she was a changed woman. Her eyes were
wet, but calm, and all her bitterness and excitement charmed away.

"Denys," said she softly, "I have got my orders. I am to read my
lover's letter to his folk."

"Ye will never do that?"

"Ay will I."

"I see there is something in the letter has softened ye towards
them."

"Not a jot, Denys, not a jot. But an I hated them like poison I
would not disobey my love. Denys, 'tis so sweet to obey, and
sweetest of all to obey one who is far, far away, and cannot
enforce my duty, but must trust my love for my obedience. Ah,
Gerard, my darling, at hand I might have slighted thy commands,
misliking thy folk as I have cause to do; but now, didst bid me go
into the raging sea and read thy sweet letter to the sharks, there
I'd go. Therefore, Denys, tell his mother I have got a letter, and
if she and hers would hear it, I am their servant; let them say
their hour, and I'll seat them as best I can, and welcome them as
best I may."

Denys went off to Catherine with this good news. He found the
family at dinner, and told them there was a long letter from
Gerard. Then in the midst of the joy this caused, he said, "And
her heart is softened, and she will read it to you herself; you
are to choose your own time."

"What does she think there are none can read but her?" asked
Catherine. "Let her send the letter and we will read it."

"Nay, but, mother," objected little Kate; "mayhap she cannot bear
to part it from her hand; she loves him dearly."

"What, thinks she we shall steal it?"

Cornelis suggested that she would fain wedge herself into the
family by means of this letter.

Denys cast a look of scorn on the speaker. "There spoke a bad
heart," said he. "La camarade hates you all like poison. Oh,
mistake me not, dame; I defend her not, but so 'tis; yet maugre
her spleen at a word from Gerard she proffers to read you his
letter with her own pretty mouth, and hath a voice like honey -
sure 'tis a fair proffer."

"'Tis so, mine honest soldier," said the father of the family,
"and merits a civil reply, therefore hold your whisht ye that be
women, and I shall answer her. Tell her I, his father, setting
aside all past grudges, do for this grace thank her, and would she
have double thanks, let her send my son's letter by thy faithful
hand, the which will I read to his flesh and blood, and will then
to her so surely and faithful return, as I am Eli a Dierich a
William a Luke, free burgher of Tergou, like my forbears, and like
them, a man of my word."

"Ay, and a man who is better than his word," cried Catherine; "the
only one I ever did foregather."

"Hold thy peace, wife."

"Art a man of sense, Eli, a dirk, a chose, a chose[1],"' shouted
Denys. "The she-comrade will be right glad to obey Gerard and yet
not face you all, whom she hates as wormwood, saving your
presence. Bless ye, the world hath changed, she is all submission
to-day: 'obedience is honey,' quoth she; and in sooth 'tis a
sweetmeat she cannot but savour, eating so little on't, for what
with her fair face, and her mellow tongue; and what wi' flying in
fits and terrifying us that be soldiers to death, an we thwart
her; and what wi' chiding us one while, and petting us like lambs
t' other, she hath made two of the crawlingest slaves ever you saw
out of two honest swashbucklers. I be the ironing ruffian, t'
other washes."

"What next?

"What next? why, whenever the brat is in the world I shall rock
cradle, and t' other knave will wash tucker and bib. So, then,
I'll go fetch the letter on the instant. Ye will let me bide and
hear it read, will ye not?"

"Else our hearts were black as coal," said Catherine.

So Denys went for the letter. He came back crestfallen. "She will
not let it out of her hand neither to me nor you, nor any he or
she that lives."

"I knew she would not," said Cornelis.

"Whisht! whisht!" said Eli, "and let Denys tell his story."

"'Nay,' said I, 'but be ruled by me.' 'Not I,' quoth she. 'Well,
but,' quoth I, 'that same honey Obedience ye spake of.' 'You are a
fool,' says she; 'obedience to Gerard is sweet, but obedience to
any other body, who ever said that was sweet?'

"At last she seemed to soften a bit, and did give me a written
paper for you, mademoiselle. Here 'tis."

"For me?" said little Kate, colouring.

"Give that here!" said Eli, and he scanned the writing, and said
almost in a whisper, "These be words from the letter Hearken!

"'And, sweetheart, an if these lines should travel safe to thee,
make thou trial of my people's hearts withal. Maybe they are
somewhat turned towards me, being far away. If 'tis so they will
show it to thee, since now to me they may not. Read, then, this
letter! But I do strictly forbid thee to let it from thy hand; and
if they still hold aloof from thee, why, then say nought, but let
them think me dead. Obey me in this; for, if thou dost disrespect
my judgment and my will in this, thou lovest me not.'"

There was a silence, and Gerard's words copied by Margaret here
handed round and inspected.

"Well," said Catherine, "that is another matter. But methinks 'tis
for her to come to us, not we to her."

"Alas, mother! what odds does that make?"

"Much," said Eli. "Tell her we are over many to come to her, and
bid her hither, the sooner the better."

When Denys was gone, Eli owned it was a bitter pill to him.

"When that lass shall cross my threshold, all the mischief and
misery she hath made here will seem to come in adoors in one heap.
But what could I do, wife? We must hear the news of Gerard. I saw
that in thine eyes, and felt it in my own heart. And she is backed
by our undutiful but still beloved son, and so is she stronger
than we, and brings our noses down to the grindstone, the sly,
cruel jade. But never heed. We will hear the letter; and then let
her go unblessed as she came unwelcome."

"Make your mind easy," said Catherine. "She will not come at all."
And a tone of regret was visible.

Shortly after Richart, who had been hourly expected, arrived from
Amsterdam grave and dignified in his burgher's robe and gold
chain, ruff, and furred cap, and was received not with affection
only, but respect; for he had risen a step higher than his
parents, and such steps were marked in mediaeval society almost as
visibly as those in their staircases.

Admitted in due course to the family council, he showed plainly,
though not discourteously, that his pride was deeply wounded by
their having deigned to treat with Margaret Brandt. "I see the
temptation," said he. "But which of us hath not at times to wish
one way and do another?" This threw a considerable chill over the
old people. So little Kate put in a word. "Vex not thyself, dear
Richart. Mother says she will not come.

"All the better, sweetheart. I fear me, if she do, I shall hie me
back to Amsterdam."

Here Denys popped his head in at the door, and said -

"She will be here at three on the great dial."

They all looked at one another in silence.

[1] Anglice, a Thing-em-bob.

CHAPTER LIII

"Nay, Richart," said Catherine at last, "for Heaven's sake let not
this one sorry wench set us all by the ears: hath she not made ill
blood enough already?"

"In very deed she hath. Fear me not, good mother. Let her come and
read the letter of the poor boy she hath by devilish arts
bewitched and then let her go. Give me your words to show her no
countenance beyond decent and constrained civility: less we may
not, being in our own house; and I will say no more." On this
understanding they waited the foe. She, for her part, prepared for
the interview in a spirit little less hostile. When Denys brought
word they would not come to her, but would receive her, her lip
curled, and she bade him observe how in them every feeling,
however small, was larger than the love for Gerard. "Well," said
she, "I have not that excuse; so why mimic the pretty burgher's
pride, the pride of all unlettered folk? I will go to them for
Gerard's sake. Oh, how I loathe them!"

Thus poor good-natured Denys was bringing into one house the
materials of an explosion.

Margaret made her toilet in the same spirit that a knight of her
day dressed for battle - he to parry blows, and she to parry
glances - glances of contempt at her poverty, or of irony at her
extravagance. Her kirtle was of English cloth, dark blue, and her
farthingale and hose of the same material, but a glossy roan, or
claret colour. Not an inch of pretentious fur about her, but plain
snowy linen wristbands, and curiously plaited linen from the bosom
of the kirtle up to the commencement of the throat; it did not
encircle her throat, but framed it, being square, not round. Her
front hair still peeped in two waves much after the fashion which
Mary Queen of Scots revived a century later; but instead of the
silver net, which would have ill become her present condition, the
rest of her head was covered with a very small tight-fitting hood
of dark blue cloth, hemmed with silver. Her shoes were red; but
the roan petticoat and hose prepared the spectator's mind for the
shock, and they set off the arched instep and shapely foot.

Beauty knew its business then as now.

And with all this she kept her enemies waiting, though it was
three by the dial.

At last she started, attended by her he-comrade. And when they
were halfway, she stopped and said thoughtfully, "Denys!"

"Well, she-general?"

"I must go home" (piteously).

"What, have ye left somewhat behind?"

"What?"

"My courage. Oh! oh! oh!"

"Nay, nay, be brave, she-general. I shall be with you."

"Ay, but wilt keep close to me when I be there?"

Denys promised, and she resumed her march, but gingerly.

Meantime they were all assembled, and waiting for her with a
strange mixture of feelings.

Mortification, curiosity, panting affection, aversion to her who
came to gratify those feelings, yet another curiosity to see what
she was like, and what there was in her to bewitch Gerard and make
so much mischief.

At last Denys came alone, and whispered, "The she-comrade is
without."

"Fetch her in," said Eli. "Now whisht, all of ye. None speak to
her but I."

They all turned their eyes to the door in dead silence.

A little muttering was heard outside; Denys's rough organ and a
woman's soft and mellow voice.

Presently that stopped; and then the door opened slowly, and
Margaret Brandt, dressed as I have described, and somewhat pale,
but calm and lovely, stood on the threshold, looking straight
before her.

They all rose but Kate, and remained mute and staring.

"Be seated, mistress," said Eli gravely, and motioned to a seat
that had been set apart for her.

She inclined her head, and crossed the apartment; and in so doing
her condition was very visible, not only in her shape, but in her
languor.

Cornelis and Sybrandt hated her for it. Richart thought it spoiled
her beauty.

It softened the women somewhat.

She took her letter out of her bosom, and kissed it as if she had
been alone; then disposed herself to read it, with the air of one
who knew she was there for that single purpose.

But as she began, she noticed they had seated her all by herself
like a leper. She looked at Denys, and putting her hand down by
her side, made him a swift furtive motion to come by her.

He went with an obedient start as if she had cried "March!" and
stood at her shoulder like a sentinel; but this zealous manner of
doing it revealed to the company that he had been ordered thither;
and at that she coloured. And now she began to read her Gerard,
their Gerard, to their eager ears, in a mellow, clear voice, so
soft, so earnest, so thrilling, her very soul seemed to cling
about each precious sound. It was a voice as of a woman's bosom
set speaking by Heaven itself.

"I do nothing doubt, my Margaret, that long ere this shall meet
thy beloved eyes, Denys, my most dear friend, will have sought
thee out, and told thee the manner of our unlooked for and most
tearful parting. Therefore I will e'en begin at that most doleful
day. What befell him after, poor faithful soul, fain, fain would I
hear, but may not. But I pray for him day and night next after
thee, dearest. Friend more stanch and loving had not David in
Jonathan, than I in him. Be good to him, for poor Gerard's sake."

At these words, which came quite unexpectedly to him, Denys leaned
his head on Margaret's high chair, and groaned aloud.

She turned quickly as she sat, and found his hand, and pressed it.

And so the sweetheart and the friend held hands while the
sweetheart read.

"I went forward all dizzied, like one in an ill dream; and
presently a gentleman came up with his servants, all on horseback,
and had liked to have rid o'er me. And he drew rein at the brow of
the hill, and sent his armed men back to rob me. They robbed me
civilly enough and took my purse and the last copper, and rid
gaily away. I wandered stupid on, a friendless pauper.

There was a general sigh, followed by an oath from Denys.

"Presently a strange dimness came o'er me; I lay down to sleep on
the snow. 'Twas ill done, and with store of wolves hard by. Had I
loved thee as thou dost deserve, I had shown more manhood. But oh,
sweet love, the drowsiness that did crawl o'er me desolate, and
benumb me, was more than nature. And so I slept; and but that God
was better to us, than I to thee or to myself, from that sleep I
ne'er had waked; so all do say. I had slept an hour or two, as I
suppose, but no more, when a hand did shake me rudely. I awoke to
my troubles. And there stood a servant girl in her holiday suit.
'Are ye mad,' quoth she, in seeming choler, 'to sleep in snow, and
under wolves' nosen? Art weary o' life, and not long weaned? Come,
now, said she, more kindly, 'get up like a good lad;' so I did
rise up. 'Are ye rich, or are ye poor?' But I stared at her as one
amazed. 'Why, 'tis easy of reply,' quoth she. 'Are ye rich, or are
ye poor?' Then I gave a great, loud cry; that she did start back.
'Am I rich, or am I poor? Had ye asked me an hour agone, I had
said I am rich. But now I am so poor as sure earth beareth on her
bosom none poorer. An hour agone I was rich in a friend, rich in
money, rich in hope and spirits of youth; but now the Bastard of
Burgundy hath taken my friend, and another gentleman my purse; and
I can neither go forward to Rome nor back to her I left in
Holland. I am poorest of the poor.' 'Alack!' said the wench.
'Natheless, an ye had been rich ye might ha' lain down again in
the snow for any use I had for ye; and then I trow ye had soon
fared out o' this world as bare as ye came into it. But, being
poor, you are our man: so come wi' me.' Then I went because she
bade me, and because I recked not now whither I went. And she took
me to a fine house hard by, and into a noble dining-hall hung with
black; and there was set a table with many dishes, and but one
plate and one chair. 'Fall to!' said she, in a whisper. 'What,
alone?' said I. 'Alone? And which of us, think ye, would eat out
of the same dish with ye? Are we robbers o' the dead?' Then she
speered where I was born. 'At Tergou,' said I. Says she, 'And when
a gentleman dies in that country, serve they not the dead man's
dinner up as usual, till he be in the ground, and set some poor
man to it?' I told her, 'nay.' She blushed for us then. Here they
were better Christians.' So I behoved to sit down. But small was
my heart for meat. Then this kind lass sat by me and poured me out
wine; and tasting it, it cut me to the heart Denys was not there
to drink with me. He doth so love good wine, and women good, bad,
or indifferent. The rich, strong wine curled round my sick heart;
and that day first I did seem to glimpse why folk in trouble run
to drink so. She made me eat of every dish. ''Twas unlucky to pass
one. Nought was here but her master's daily dinner.' 'He had a
good stomach, then,' said I. 'Ay, lad, and a good heart.
Leastways, so we all say now he is dead; but, being alive, no word
on't e'er heard I.' So I did eat as a bird, nibbling of every
dish. And she hearing me sigh, and seeing me like to choke at the
food, took pity and bade me be of good cheer. I should sup and lie
there that night. And she went to the hind, and he gave me a right
good bed; and I told him all, and asked him would the law give me
back my purse. 'Law!' quoth he; 'law there was none for the poor
in Burgundy. Why, 'twas the cousin of the Lady of the Manor, he
that had robbed me. He knew the wild spark. The matter must be
judged before the lady; and she was quite young, and far more like
to hang me for slandering her cousin, and a gentleman, and a
handsome man, than to make him give me back my own. Inside the
liberties of a town a poor man might now and then see the face of
justice; but out among the grand seigneurs and dames - never.' So
I said, 'I'll sit down robbed rather than seek justice and find
gallows.' They were all most kind to me next day; and the girl
proffered me money from her small wage to help me towards Rhine."

"Oh, then, he is coming home! he is coming home!" shouted Denys,
interrupting the reader. She shook her head gently at him, by way
of reproof.

"I beg pardon, all the company," said he stiffly.

"'Twas a sore temptation; but being a servant, my stomach rose
against it. 'Nay, nay,' said I. She told me I was wrong. ''Twas
pride out o' place; poor folk should help one another; or who on
earth would?' I said if I could do aught in return 'twere well;
but for a free gift, nay: I was overmuch beholden already. Should
I write a letter for her? 'Nay, he is in the house at present,'
said she. 'Should I draw her picture, and so earn my money?'
'What, can ye?' said she. I told her I could try; and her habit
would well become a picture. So she was agog to be limned, and
give it her lad. And I set her to stand in a good light, and soon
made sketches two, whereof I send thee one, coloured at odd hours.
The other I did most hastily, and with little conscience daub, for
which may Heaven forgive me; but time was short. They, poor
things, knew no better, and were most proud and joyous; and both
kissing me after their country fashion, 'twas the hind that was
her sweetheart, they did bid me God-speed; and I towards Rhine."

Margaret paused here, and gave Denys the coloured drawing to hand
round. It was eagerly examined by the females on account of the
costume, which differed in some respects from that of the Dutch
domestic: the hair was in a tight linen bag, a yellow half
kerchief crossed her head from ear to ear, but threw out a
rectangular point that descended the centre of her forehead, and
it met in two more points over her bosom. She wore a red kirtle
with long sleeves, kilted very high in front, and showing a green
farthingale and a great red leather purse hanging down over it;
red stockings, yellow leathern shoes, ahead of her age; for they
were low-quartered and square-toed, secured by a strap buckling
over the instep, which was not uncommon, and was perhaps the rude
germ of the diamond buckle to come.

Margaret continued:-

"But oh! how I missed my Denys at every step! often I sat down on
the road and groaned. And in the afternoon it chanced that I did
so set me down where two roads met, and with heavy head in hand,
and heavy heart, did think of thee, my poor sweetheart, and of my
lost friend, and of the little house at Tergou, where they all
loved me once; though now it is turned to hate.

Catherine. "Alas! that he will think so."

Eli. "Whisht, wife!"

"And I did sigh loud, and often. And me sighing so, one came
carolling like a bird adown t' other road. 'Ay, chirp and chirp,'
cried I bitterly. 'Thou has not lost sweetheart, and friend, they
father's hearth, thy mother's smile, and every penny in the
world.' And at last he did so carol, and carol, I jumped up in ire
to get away from his most jarring mirth. But ere I lied from it, I
looked down the path to see what could make a man so lighthearted
in this weary world; and lo! the songster was a humpbacked
cripple, with a bloody bandage o'er his eye, and both legs gone at
the knee."

"He! he! he! he! he!" went Sybrandt, laughing and cackling.

Margaret's eyes flashed: she began to fold the letter up.

"Nay, lass," said Eli, "heed him not! Thou unmannerly cur, offer't
but again and I put thee to the door."

"Why, what was there to gibe at, Sybrandt?" remonstrated Catherine
more mildly. "Is not our Kate afflicted? and is she not the most
content of us all, and singeth like a merle at times between her
pains? But I am as bad as thou; prithee read on, lass, and stop
our gabble wi' somewhat worth the hearkening."

"'Then,' said I, 'may this thing be?' And I took myself to task.
'Gerard, son of Eli, dost thou well to bemoan thy lot, thou hast
youth and health; and here comes the wreck of nature on crutches,
praising God's goodness with singing like a mavis?'"

Catherine. "There you see."

Eli. "Whisht, dame, whisht!"

"And whenever he saw me, he left carolling and presently hobbled
up and chanted, 'Charity, for love of Heaven, sweet master,
charity,' with a whine as piteous as wind at keyhole. 'Alack, poor
soul,' said I, 'charity is in my heart, but not my purse; I am
poor as thou.' Then he believed me none, and to melt me undid his
sleeve, and showed a sore wound on his arm, and said he, 'Poor
cripple though I be, I am like to lose this eye to boot, look
else.' I saw and groaned for him, and to excuse myself let him wot
how I had been robbed of my last copper. Thereat he left whining
all in a moment, and said, in a big manly voice, 'Then I'll e'en
take a rest. Here, youngster, pull thou this strap: nay, fear
not!' I pulled, and down came a stout pair of legs out of his
back; and half his hump had melted away, and the wound in his eye
no deeper than the bandage.

"Oh!" ejaculated Margaret's hearers in a body.

"Whereat, seeing me astounded, he laughed in my face, and told me
I was not worth gulling, and offered me his protection. 'My face
was prophetic,' he said. 'Of what?' said I. 'Marry,' said he,
'that its owner will starve in this thievish land.' Travel teaches
e'en the young wisdom. Time was I had turned and fled this
impostor as a pestilence; but now I listened patiently to pick up
crumbs of counsel. And well I did: for nature and his adventurous
life had crammed the poor knave with shrewdness and knowledge of
the homelier sort - a child was I beside him. When he had turned
me inside out, said he, 'Didst well to leave France and make for
Germany; but think not of Holland again. Nay, on to Augsburg and
Nurnberg, the Paradise of craftsmen: thence to Venice, an thou
wilt. But thou wilt never bide in Italy nor any other land, having
once tasted the great German cities. Why, there is but one honest
country in Europe, and that is Germany; and since thou art honest,
and since I am a vagabone, Germany was made for us twain.' I bade
him make that good: how might one country fit true men and knaves!
'Why, thou novice,' said he, 'because in an honest land are fewer
knaves to bite the honest man, and many honest men for the knave
to bite. I was in luck, being honest, to have fallen in with a
friendly sharp. Be my pal,' said he; 'I go to Nurnberg; we will
reach it with full pouches. I'll learn ye the cul de bois, and the
cul de jatte, and how to maund, and chaunt, and patter, and to
raise swellings, and paint sores and ulcers on thy body would take
in the divell.' I told him shivering, I'd liever die than shame
myself and my folk so."

Eli. "Good lad! good lad!"

"Why, what shame was it for such as I to turn beggar? Beggary was
an ancient and most honourable mystery. What did holy monks, and
bishops, and kings, when they would win Heaven's smile? why, wash
the feet of beggars, those favourites of the saints. 'The saints
were no fools,' he told me. Then he did put out his foot. 'Look at
that, that was washed by the greatest king alive, Louis, of
France, the last Holy Thursday that was. And the next day, Friday,
clapped in the stocks by the warden of a petty hamlet.' So I told
him my foot should walk between such high honour and such low
disgrace, on the same path of honesty, please God. Well then,
since I had not spirit to beg, he would indulge my perversity. I
should work under him, he be the head, I the fingers. And with
that he set himself up like a judge, on a heap of dust by the
road's side, and questioned me strictly what I could do. I began
to say I was strong and willing. 'Ba!' said he, 'so is an ox. Say,
what canst do that Sir Ox cannot?' I could write; I had won a
prize for it. 'Canst write as fast as the printers?' quo' he,
jeering. 'What else?' I could paint. 'That was better.' I was like
to tear my hair to hear him say so, and me going to Rome to write.
I could twang the psaltery a bit. 'That was well. Could I tell
stories?' Ay, by the score. 'Then,' said he, 'I hire you from this
moment.' 'What to do?' said I. 'Nought crooked, Sir Candour,' says
he. 'I will feed thee all the way and find thee work; and take
half thine earnings, no more.' 'Agreed,' said I, and gave my hand
on it, 'Now, servant,' said he, 'we will dine. But ye need not
stand behind my chair, for two reasons - first I ha' got no chair;
and next, good fellowship likes me better than state.' And out of
his wallet he brought flesh, fowl, and pastry, a good dozen of
spices lapped in flax paper, and wine fit for a king. Ne'er
feasted I better than out of this beggar's wallet, now my master.
When we had well eaten I was for going on. 'But,' said he,
'servants should not drive their masters too hard, especially
after feeding, for then the body is for repose, and the mind turns
to contemplation;' and he lay on his back gazing calmly at the
sky, and presently wondered whether there were any beggars up
there. I told him I knew but of one, called Lazarus. 'Could he do
the cul de jatte better than I?' said he, and looked quite jealous
like. I told him nay; Lazarus was honest, though a beggar, and fed
daily of the crumbs fal'n from a rich man's table, and the dogs
licked his sores. 'Servant,' quo' he, 'I spy a foul fault in thee.
Thou liest without discretion: now the end of lying being to gull,
this is no better than fumbling with the divell's tail. I pray
Heaven thou mayest prove to paint better than thou cuttest whids,
or I am done out of a dinner. No beggar eats crumbs, but only the
fat of the land; and dogs lick not a beggar's sores, being made
with spearwort, or ratsbane, or biting acids, from all which dogs,
and even pigs, abhor. My sores are made after my proper receipt;
but no dog would lick e'en them twice. I have made a scurvy
bargain: art a cozening knave, I doubt, as well as a nincompoop.'
I deigned no reply to this bundle of lies, which did accuse
heavenly truth of falsehood for not being in a tale with him. He
rose and we took the road; and presently we came to a place where
were two little wayside inns, scarce a furlong apart. 'Halt,' said
my master. 'Their armories are sore faded - all the better. Go
thou in; shun the master; board the wife; and flatter her inn sky
high, all but the armories, and offer to colour them dirt cheap.'
So I went in and told the wife I was a painter, and would revive
her armories cheap; but she sent me away with a rebuff. I to my
master. He groaned. 'Ye are all fingers and no tongue,' said he;
'I have made a scurvy bargain. Come and hear me patter and
flatter.' Between the two inns was a high hedge. He goes behind it
a minute and comes out a decent tradesman. We went on to the other
inn, and then I heard him praise it so fulsome as the very wife
did blush. 'But,' says he, 'there is one little, little fault;
your armories are dull and faded. Say but the word, and for a
silver franc my apprentice here, the cunningest e'er I had, shall
make them bright as ever. Whilst she hesitated, the rogue told her
he had done it to a little inn hard by, and now the inn's face was
like the starry firmament. 'D'ye hear that, my man?' cries she,
'"The Three Frogs" have been and painted up their armories; shall
"The Four Hedgehogs" be outshone by them?' So I painted, and my
master stood by like a lord, advising me how to do, and winking to
me to heed him none, and I got a silver franc. And he took me back
to 'The Three Frogs,' and on the way put me on a beard and
disguised me, and flattered 'The Three Frogs,' and told them how
he had adorned 'The Four Hedgehogs,' and into the net jumped the
three poor simple frogs, and I earned another silver franc. Then
we went on and he found his crutches, and sent me forward, and
showed his "cicatrices d'emprunt," as he called them, and all his
infirmities, at 'The Four Hedgehogs,' and got both food and money.
'Come, share and share,' quoth he: so I gave him one franc. 'I
have made a good bargain,' said he. 'Art a master limner, but
takest too much time.' So I let him know that in matters of honest
craft things could not be done quick and well. 'Then do them
quick,' quoth he. And he told me my name was Bon Bec; and I might
call him Cul de Jatte, because that was his lay at our first
meeting. And at the next town my master, Cul de Jatte, bought me a
psaltery, and set himself up again by the roadside in state like
him that erst judged Marsyas and Apollo, piping for vain glory. So
I played a strain. 'Indifferent well, harmonious Bon Bec,' said he
haughtily. 'Now tune thy pipes.' So I did sing a sweet strain the
good monks taught me; and singing it reminded poor Bon Bec, Gerard
erst, of his young days and home, and brought the water to my een.
But looking up, my master's visage was as the face of a little boy
whipt soundly, or sipping foulest medicine. 'Zounds, stop that
bellyache blether,' quoth he, 'that will ne'er wile a stiver out
o' peasants' purses; 'twill but sour the nurses' milk, and gar the
kine jump into rivers to be out of earshot on't. What, false
knave, did I buy thee a fine new psaltery to be minded o' my
latter end withal? Hearken! these be the songs that glad the
heart, and fill the minstrel's purse.' And he sung so blasphemous
a stave, and eke so obscene, as I drew away from him a space that
the lightning might not spoil the new psaltery. However, none
came, being winter, and then I said, 'Master, the Lord is
debonair. Held I the thunder, yon ribaldry had been thy last, thou
foul-mouthed wretch.'

"'Why, Bon Bec, what is to do?' quoth he. 'I have made an ill
bargain. Oh, perverse heart, that turneth from doctrine.' So I
bade him keep his breath to cool his broth, ne'er would I shame my
folk with singing ribald songs. 'Then,' says he sulkily, 'the
first fire we light by the wayside, clap thou on the music box! so
'twill make our pot boil for the nonce; but with your
     Good people, let us peak and pine,
     Cut tristful mugs, and miaul and whine
     Thorough our nosen chaunts divine
never, never, never. Ye might as well go through Lorraine crying,
Mulleygrubs, Mulleygrubs, who'll buy my Mulleygrubs!' So we fared
on, bad friends. But I took a thought, and prayed him hum me one
of his naughty ditties again. Then he brightened, and broke forth
into ribaldry like a nightingale. Finger in ears stuffed I. 'No
words; naught but the bare melody.' For oh, Margaret, note the sly
malice of the Evil One! Still to the scurviest matter he wedded
the tunablest ditties."

Catherine. "That is true as Holy Writ."

Sybrandt. "How know you that, mother?"

Cornelis. "He! he! he!"

Eli. "Whisht, ye uneasy wights, and let me hear the boy. He is
wiser than ye; wiser than his years."

"'What tomfoolery is this,' said he; yet he yielded to me, and
soon I garnered three of his melodies; but I would not let Cul de
Jatte wot the thing I meditated. 'Show not fools nor bairns
unfinished work,' saith the byword. And by this time 'twas night,
and a little town at hand, where we went each to his inn; for my
master would not yield to put off his rags and other sores till
morning; nor I to enter an inn with a tatterdemalion. So we were
to meet on the road at peep of day. and indeed, we still lodged
apart, meeting at morn and parting at eve outside each town we lay
at. And waking at midnight and cogitating, good thoughts came down
to me, and sudden my heart was enlightened. I called to mind that
my Margaret had withstood the taking of the burgomaster's purse.
''Tis theft,' said you; 'disguise it how ye will.' But I must be
wiser than my betters; and now that which I had as good as stolen,
others had stolen from me. As it came so it was gone. Then I said,
'Heaven is not cruel, but just;' and I vowed a vow, to repay our
burgomaster every shilling an' I could. And I went forth in the
morning sad, but hopeful. I felt lighter for the purse being gone.
My master was at the gate becrutched. I told him I'd liever have
seen him in another disguise. 'Beggars must not be choosers,' said
he. However, soon he bade me untruss him, for he felt sadly. His
head swam. I told him forcefully to deform nature thus could
scarce be wholesome. He answered none; but looked scared, and hand
on head. By-and-by he gave a groan, and rolled on the ground like
a ball, and writhed sore. I was scared, and wist not what to do,
but went to lift him; but his trouble rose higher and higher, he
gnashed his teeth fearfully, and the foam did fly from his lips;
and presently his body bended itself like a bow, and jerked and
bounded many times into the air. I exorcised him; it but made him
worse. There was water in a ditch hard by, not very clear; but the
poor creature struggling between life and death, I filled my hat
withal, and came flying to souse him. Then my lord laughed in my
face. 'Come, Bon Bec, by thy white gills, I have not forgotten my
trade.' I stood with watery hat in hand, glaring. 'Could this be
feigning?' 'What else?' said he. 'Why, a real fit is the sorriest
thing; but a stroke with a feather compared with mine. Art still
betters nature.' 'But look, e'en now blood trickleth from your
nose,' said I. 'Ay, ay, pricked my nostrils with a straw.' 'But ye
foamed at the lips.' 'Oh, a little soap makes a mickle foam.' And
he drew out a morsel like a bean from his mouth. 'Thank thy stars,
Bon Bec,' says he, 'for leading thee to a worthy master. Each day
his lesson. To-morrow we will study the cul de bois and other
branches. To-day, own me prince of demoniacs, and indeed of all
good fellows.' Then, being puffed up, he forgot yesterday's
grudge, and discoursed me freely of beggars; and gave me, who
eftsoons thought a beggar was a beggar, and there an end, the
names and qualities of full thirty sorts of masterful and crafty
mendicants in France and Germany and England; his three provinces;
for so the poor, proud knave yclept those kingdoms three; wherein
his throne it was the stocks I ween. And outside the next village
one had gone to dinner, and left his wheelbarrow. So says he,
'I'll tie myself in a knot, and shalt wheel me through; and what
with my crippledom and thy piety, a-wheeling of thy poor old dad,
we'll bleed the bumpkins of a dacha-saltee.' I did refuse. I would
work for him; but no hand would have in begging. 'And wheeling an
"asker" in a barrow, is not that work?' said he; 'then fling yon
muckle stone in to boot: stay, I'll soil it a bit, and swear it is
a chip of the holy sepulchre; and you wheeled us both from
Jerusalem.' Said I, 'Wheeling a pair o' lies, one stony, one
fleshy, may be work, and hard work, but honest work 'tis not. 'Tis
fumbling with his tail you wot of. And,' said I, 'master, next
time you go to tempt me to knavery, speak not to me of my poor old
dad.' Said I, 'You have minded me of my real father's face, the
truest man in Holland. He and I are ill friends now, worse luck.
But though I offend him shame him I never will.' Dear Margaret,
with this knave' saying, 'your poor old dad,' it had gone to my
heart like a knife. ''Tis well,' said my master gloomily; 'I have
made a bad bargain.' Presently he halts, and eyes a tree by the
wayside. 'Go spell me what is writ on yon tree.' So I went, and
there was nought but a long square drawn in outline. I told him
so. 'So much for thy monkish lore,' quoth he. A little farther,
and he sent me to read a wall. There was nought but a circle
scratched on the stone with a point of nail or knife, and in the
circle two dots. I said so Then said he, 'Bon Bec, that square was
a warning. Some good Truand left it, that came through this
village faring west; that means "dangerous." The circle with the
two dots was writ by another of our brotherhood; and it signifies
as how the writer, soit Rollin Trapu, soit Triboulet, soit Catin
Cul de Bois, or what not, was becked for asking here, and lay two
months in Starabin.' Then he broke forth. 'Talk: of your little
snivelling books that go in pouch. Three hooks have I, France,
England, and Germany; and they are writ all over in one tongue,
that my brethren of all countries understand; and that is what I
call learning. So sith here they whip sores, and imprison
infirmities, I to my tiring room.' And he popped behind the hedge,
and came back worshipful. We passed through the village, and I sat
me down on the stocks, and even the barber's apprentice whets his
razor on a block, so did I flesh my psaltery on this village,
fearing great cities. I tuned it, and coursed up and down the
wires nimbly with my two wooden strikers; and then chanted loud
and clear, as I had heard the minstrels of the country,
     'Qui veut ouir qui veut Savoir,'
some trash, I mind not what. And soon the villagers, male and
female, thronged about me; thereat I left singing, and recited
them to the psaltery a short but right merry tale out of 'the
lives of the saints,' which it is my handbook of pleasant figments
and this ended, instantly struck up and whistled one of Cul de
Jatte's devil's ditties, and played it on the psaltery to boot.
Thou knowest Heaven hath bestowed on me a rare whistle, both for
compass and tune. And with me whistling bright and full this
sprightly air, and making the wires slow when the tune did gallop,
and tripping when the tune did amble, or I did stop and shake on
one note like a lark i' the air, they were like to eat me; but
looking round, lo! my master had given way to his itch, and there
was his hat on the ground, and copper pouring in. I deemed it
cruel to whistle the bread out of poverty's pouch; so broke off
and away; yet could not get clear so swift, but both men and women
did slobber me sore, and smelled all of garlic. 'There, master,'
said I, 'I call that cleaving the divell in twain and keeping his
white half.' Said he, 'Bon Bec, I have made a good bargain.' Then
he bade me stay where I was while he went to the Holy Land. I
stayed, and he leaped the churchyard dike, and the sexton was
digging a grave, and my master chaffered with him, and came back
with a knuckle bone. But why he clept a churchyard Holy Land, that
I learned not then, but after dinner. I was colouring the armories
of a little inn; and he sat by me most peaceable, a cutting, and
filing, and polishing bones, sedately; so I speered was not honest
work sweet? 'As rain water,' said he, mocking. 'What was he a
making?' 'A pair of bones to play on with thee; and with the
refuse a St. Anthony's thumb and a St. Martin's little finger, for
the devout.' The vagabone! And now, sweet Margaret, thou seest our
manner of life faring Rhineward. I with the two arts I had least
prized or counted on for bread was welcome everywhere; too poor
now to fear robbers, yet able to keep both master and man on the
road. For at night I often made a portraiture of the innkeeper or
his dame, and so went richer from an inn; the which it is the lot
of few. But my master despised this even way of life. 'I love ups
and downs,' said he. And certes he lacked them not. One day he
would gather more than I in three; another, to hear his tale, it
had rained kicks all day in lieu of 'saltees,' and that is
pennies. Yet even then at heart he despised me for a poor
mechanical soul, and scorned my arts, extolling his own, the art
of feigning.

"Natheless, at odd times was he ill at his ease. Going through the
town of Aix, we came upon a beggar walking, fast by one hand to a
cart-tail, and the hangman a lashing his bare bloody back. He,
stout knave, so whipt, did not a jot relent; but I did wince at
every stroke; and my master hung his head.

"'Soon or late, Bon Bec,' quoth he. 'Soon or late.' I, seeing his
haggard face, knew what he meaned. And at a town whose name hath
slipped me, but 'twas on a fair river, as we came to the foot of
the bridge he halted, and shuddered. 'Why what is the coil?' said
I. 'Oh, blind,' said he, 'they are justifying there.' So nought
would serve him but take a boat, and cross the river by water. But
'twas out of the frying-pan, as the word goeth. For the boatman
had scarce told us the matter, and that it was a man and a woman
for stealing glazed windows out of housen, and that the man was
hanged at daybreak, and the quean to be drowned, when lo! they did
fling her off the bridge, and fell in the water not far from us.
And oh! Margaret, the deadly splash! It ringeth in mine ears even
now. But worse was coming; for, though tied, she came up. and
cried 'Help! help!' and I, forgetting all, and hearing a woman's
voice cry 'Help!' was for leaping in to save her; and had surely
done it, but the boatman and Cul de Jatte clung round me, and in a
moment the bourreau's man, that waited in a beat, came and
entangled his hooked pole in her long hair, and so thrust her down
and ended her. Oh! if the saints answered so our cries for help!
And poor Cul de Jatte groaned; and I sat sobbing, and beat my
breast, and cried, 'Of what hath God made men's hearts?'"

The reader stopped, and the tears trickled down her cheeks. Gerard
crying in Lorraine, made her cry at Rotterdam. The leagues were no
more to her heart than the breadth of a room.

Eli, softened by many touches in the letter, and by the reader's
womanly graces, said kindly enough, "Take thy time, lass. And
methinks some of ye might find her a creepie to rest her foot, and
she so near her own trouble."

"I'd do more for her than that an I durst," said Catherine. "Here,
Cornelis," and she held out her little wooden stool, and that
worthy, who hated Margaret worse than ever, had to take the
creepie and put it carefully under her foot.

"You are very kind, dame," she faltered. "I will read on; 'tis all
I can do for you in turn.

"Thus seeing my master ashy and sore shaken, I deemed this
horrible tragic act came timeously to warn him, so I strove sore
to turn him from his ill ways, discoursing of sinners and their
lethal end. 'Too late!' said he, 'too late!' and gnashed his
teeth. Then I told him 'too late' was the divell's favourite
whisper in repentant ears. Said I -
     'The Lord is debonair,
     Let sinners nought despair.'

'Too late!' said he, and gnashed his teeth, and writhed his face,
as though vipers were biting his inward parts. But, dear heart,
his was a mind like running water. Ere we cleared the town he was
carolling, and outside the gate hung the other culprit, from the
bough of a little tree, and scarce a yard above the ground. And
that stayed my vagabone's music. But ere we had gone another
furlong, he feigned to have dropped his, rosary, and ran back,
with no good intent, as you shall hear. I strolled on very slowly,
and often halting, and presently he came stumping up on one leg,
and that bandaged. I asked him how he could contrive that, for
'twas masterly done. 'Oh, that was his mystery. Would I know that,
I must join the brotherhood.' And presently we did pass a narrow
lane, and at the mouth on't espied a written stone, telling
beggars by a word like a wee pitchfork to go that way. ''Tis yon
farmhouse,' said he: 'bide thou at hand.' And he went to the
house, and came back with money, food, and wine. 'This lad did the
business,' said he, slapping his one leg proudly. Then he undid
the bandage, and with prideful face showed me a hole in his calf
you could have put your neef in. Had I been strange to his tricks,
here was a leg had drawn my last penny. Presently another
farmhouse by the road. He made for it. I stood, and asked myself,
should I run away and leave him, not to be shamed in my own
despite by him? But while I doubted, there was a great noise, and
my master well cudgelled by the farmer and his men, came towards
me hobbling and holloaing, for the peasants had laid on heartily.
But more trouble was at his heels. Some mischievous wight loosed a
dog as big as a jackass colt, and came roaring after him, and
downed him momently. I, deeming the poor rogue's death certain,
and him least fit to die, drew my sword and ran shouting. But ere
I could come near, the muckle dog had torn away his bad leg, and
ran growling to his lair with it; and Cul de Jatte slipped his
knot, and came running like a lapwing, with his hair on end, and
so striking with both crutches before and behind at unreal dogs as
'twas like a windmill crazed. He fled adown the road. I followed
leisurely, and found him at dinner. 'Curse the quiens,' said he.
And not a word all dinner time but 'Curse the quiens!'

"I said, I must know who' they were, before I would curse them.

"'Quiens? why, that was dogs. And I knew not even that much? He
had made a bad bargain. Well, well,' said he, 'to-morrow we shall
be in Germany. There the folk are music bitten, and they molest
not beggars, unless they fake to boot, and then they drown us out
of hand that moment, curse 'em!' We came to Strasbourg. And I
looked down Rhine with longing heart. The stream how swift! It
seemed running to clip Sevenbergen to its soft bosom. With but a
piece of timber and an oar I might drift at my ease to thee,
sleeping yet gliding still. 'Twas a sore temptation. But the fear
of an ill welcome from my folk, and of the neighbours' sneers, and
the hope of coming back to thee victorious, not, as now I must,
defeated and shamed, and thee with me, it did withhold me; and so,
with many sighs, and often turning of the head to look on beloved
Rhine, I turned sorrowful face and heavy heart towards Augsburg."

"Alas, dame, alas! Good master Eli, forgive me! But I ne'er can
win over this part all at one time. It taketh my breath away.
Welladay! Why did he not listen to his heart? Had he not gone
through peril enow, sorrow enow? Well-a-day! well-a-day!"

The letter dropped from her hand, and she drooped like a wounded
lily.

Then there was a clatter on the floor, and it was little Kate
going on her crutches, with flushed face, and eyes full of pity,
to console her. "Water, mother," she cried. "I am afeared she
shall swoon."

"Nay, nay, fear me not," said Margaret feebly. "I will not be so
troublesome. Thy good-will it maketh me stouter hearted, sweet
mistress Kate. For, if thou carest how I fare, sure Heaven is not
against me."

Catherine. "D'ye hear that, my man!"

Eli. "Ay, wife, I hear; and mark to boot."

Little Kate went back to her place, and Margaret read on.

"The Germans are fonder of armorials than the French. So I found
work every day. And whiles I wrought, my master would leave me,
and doff his raiment and don his rags, and other infirmities, and
cozen the world, which he did clepe it 'plucking of the goose:'
this done, would meet me and demand half my earnings; and with
restless piercing eye ask me would I be so base as cheat my poor
master by making three parts in lieu of two, till I threatened to
lend him a cuff to boot in requital of his suspicion; and
thenceforth took his due, with feigned confidence in my good
faith, the which his dancing eye belied. Early in Germany we had a
quarrel. I had seen him buy a skull of a jailer's wife, and mighty
zealous a polishing it. Thought I, 'How can he carry yon memento,
and not repent, seeing where ends his way?' Presently I did catch
him selling it to a woman for the head of St. Barnabas, with a
tale had cozened an Ebrew. So I snatched it out of their hands,
and trundled it into the ditch. 'How, thou impious knave,' said I,
'wouldst sell for a saint the skull of some dead thief, thy
brother?' He slunk away. But shallow she did crawl after the
skull, and with apron reverently dust it for Barnabas, and it
Barabbas; and so home with it. Said I, 'Non vult anser velli, sed
populus vult decipi.'"

Catherine. "Oh, the goodly Latin!"

Eli. "What meaneth it?"

Catherine. "Nay, I know not; but 'tis Latin; is not that enow? He
was the flower of the flock."

"Then I to him, 'Take now thy psaltery, and part we here, for art
a walking prison, a walking hell.' But lo! my master fell on his
knees, and begged me for pity's sake not turn him off. 'What would
become of him? He did so love honesty.' 'Thou love honesty?' said
I. 'Ay,' said he, 'not to enact it; the saints forbid. But to look
on. 'Tis so fair a thing to look on. Alas, good Bon Bec,' said he;
'hadst starved peradventure but for me. Kick not down thy ladder!
Call ye that just? Nay, calm thy choler! Have pity on me! I must
have a pal; and how could I bear one like myself after one so
simple as thou? He might cut my throat for the money that is hid
in my belt. 'Tis not much; 'tis not much. With thee I walk at mine
ease; with a sharp I dare not go before in a narrow way. Alas!
forgive me. Now I know where in thy bonnet lurks the bee, I will
ware his sting; I will but pluck the secular goose. 'So be it,'
said I. 'And example was contagious: he should be a true man by
then we reached Nurnberg. 'Twas a long way to Nurnberg.' Seeing
him so humble, I said, 'well, doff rags, and make thyself decent;
'twill help me forget what thou art.' And he did so; and we sat
down to our nonemete. Presently came by a reverend palmer with hat
stuck round with cockle shells from Holy Land, and great rosary of
beads like eggs of teal, and sandals for shoes. And he leaned
a-weary on his long staff, and offered us a shell apiece. My
master would none. But I, to set him a better example, took one,
and for it gave the poor pilgrim two batzen, and had his blessing.
And he was scarce gone, when we heard savage cries, and came a
sorry sight, one leading a wild woman in a chain, all rags and
howling like a wolf. And when they came nigh us, she fell to
tearing her rags to threads. The man sought an alms of us, and
told us his hard case. 'Twas his wife stark raving mad; and he
could not work in the fields, and leave her in his house to fire
it, nor cure her could be without the Saintys' help, and had vowed
six pounds of wax to St. Anthony to heal her, and so was fain beg
of charitable folk for the money. And now she espied us, and flew
at me with her long nails, and I was cold with fear, so devilish
showed, her face and rolling eyes and nails like birdys talons.
But he with the chain checked her sudden, and with his whip did
cruelly lash her for it, that I cried, 'Forbear! forbear! She
knoweth not what she doth;' and gave him a batz. And being gone,
said I, 'Master, of those twain I know not which is the more
pitiable.' And he laughed in my face, 'Behold thy justice, Bon
Bec,' said he. 'Thou railest on thy poor, good, within an ace of
honest master, and bestowest alms on a "vopper."' 'Vopper,' said
I, 'what is a vopper?' 'why, a trull that feigns madness. That was
one of us, that sham maniac, and wow but she did it clumsily. I
blushed for her and thee. Also gavest two batzen for a shell from
Holy Land, that came no farther than Normandy. I have culled them
myself on that coast by scores, and sold them to pilgrims true and
pilgrims false, to gull flats like thee withal.' 'What!' said I;
'that reverend man?' 'One of us!' cried Cul de Jatte; 'one of us!
In France we call them "Coquillarts," but here "Calmierers."
Railest on me for selling a false relic now and then, and wastest
thy earnings on such as sell nought else. I tell thee, Bon Bec,'
said he, 'there is not one true relic on earth's face. The Saints
died a thousand years agone, and their bones mixed with the dust;
but the trade in relics, it is of yesterday; and there are forty
thousand tramps in Europe live by it; selling relics of forty or
fifty bodies; oh, threadbare lie! And of the true Cross enow to
build Cologne Minster. Why, then, may not poor Cul de Jatte turn
his penny with the crowd? Art but a scurvy tyrannical servant to
let thy poor master from his share of the swag with your whoreson
pilgrims, palmers and friars, black, grey, and crutched; for all
these are of our brotherhood, and of our art, only masters they,
and we but poor apprentices, in guild.' For his tongue was an ell
and a half.

"'A truce to thy irreverend sophistries,' said I, 'and say what
company is this a coming.' 'Bohemians,' cried he, 'Ay, ay, this
shall be the rest of the band.' With that came along so motley a
crew as never your eyes beheld, dear Margaret. Marched at their
head one with a banner on a steel-pointed lance, and girded with a
great long sword, and in velvet doublet and leathern jerkin, the
which stuffs ne'er saw I wedded afore on mortal flesh, and a gay
feather in his lordly cap, and a couple of dead fowls at his back,
the which, an the spark had come by honestly, I am much mistook.
Him followed wives and babes on two lean horses, whose flanks
still rattled like parchment drum, being beaten by kettles and
caldrons. Next an armed man a-riding of a horse, which drew a cart
full of females and children; and in it, sitting backwards, a
lusty lazy knave, lance in hand, with his luxurious feet raised on
a holy water-pail, that lay along, and therein a cat, new
kittened, sat glowing o'er her brood, and sparks for eyes. And the
cart-horse cavalier had on his shoulders a round bundle, and
thereon did perch a cock and crowed with zeal, poor ruffler, proud
of his brave feathers as the rest, and haply with more reason,
being his own. And on an ass another wife and new-born child; and
one poor quean a-foot scarce dragged herself along, so near her
time was she, yet held two little ones by the hand, and helplessly
helped them on the road. And the little folk were just a farce;
some rode sticks, with horses' heads, between their legs, which
pranced and caracoled, and soon wearied the riders so sore, they
stood stock still and wept, which cavaliers were presently taken
into cart and cuffed. And one, more grave, lost in a man's hat and
feather, walked in Egyptian darkness, handed by a girl; another
had the great saucepan on his back, and a tremendous three-footed
clay-pot sat on his head and shoulders, swallowing him so as he
too went darkling led by his sweetheart three foot high. When they
were gone by, and we had both laughed lustily, said I, 'Natheless,
master, my bowels they yearn for one of that tawdry band, even for
the poor wife so near the downlying, scarce able to drag herself,
yet still, poor soul, helping the weaker on the way.

Catherine. "Nay, nay, Margaret. Why, wench, pluck up heart. Certes
thou art no Bohemian."

Kate. "Nay, mother, 'tis not that, I trow, but her father. And,
dear heart, why take notice to put her to the blush?"

Richart. "So I say."

"And he derided me. 'Why, that is a "biltreger,"' said he, 'and
you waste your bowels on a pillow, or so forth.' I told him he
lied. 'Time would show,' said he, 'wait till they camp.' And
rising after meat and meditation, and travelling forward, we found
them camped between two great trees on a common by the wayside;
and they had lighted a great fire, and on it was their caldron;
and one of the trees slanting o'er the fire, a kid hung down by a
chain from the tree-fork to the fire, and in the fork was wedged
an urchin turning still the chain to keep the meat from burning,
and a gay spark with a feather in his cap cut up a sheep; and
another had spitted a leg of it on a wooden stake; and a woman
ended chanticleer's pride with wringing of his neck. And under the
other tree four rufflers played at cards and quarrelled, and no
word sans oath; and of these lewd gamblers one had cockles in his
hat and was my reverend pilgrim. And a female, young and comely,
and dressed like a butterfly, sat and mended a heap of dirty rags.
And Cul de Jatte said, 'Yon is the "vopper,"' and I looked
incredulous and looked again, and it was so, and at her feet sat
he that had so late lashed her; but I ween he had wist where to
strike, or woe betide him; and she did now oppress him sore, and
made him thread her very needle, the which he did with all
humility; so was their comedy turned seamy side without; and Cul
de Jatte told me 'twas still so with 'voppers' and their men in
camp; they would don their bravery though but for an hour, and
with their tinsel, empire, and the man durst not the least gainsay
the 'vopper,' or she would turn him off at these times, as I my
master, and take another tyrant more submissive. And my master
chuckled over me. Natheless we soon espied a wife set with her
back against the tree, and her hair down, and her face white, and
by her side a wench held up to her eye a newborn babe, with words
of cheer, and the rough fellow, her husband, did bring her hot
wine in a cup, and bade her take courage. And just o'er the place
she sat, they had pinned from bough to bough of those neighbouring
trees two shawls, and blankets two, together, to keep the drizzle
off her. And so had another poor little rogue come into the world;
and by her own particular folk tended gipsywise, but of the
roasters, and boilers, and voppers, and gamblers, no more noticed,
no, not for a single moment, than sheep which droppeth her lamb in
a field, by travellers upon the way. Then said I, 'What of thy
foul suspicions, master? over-knavery blinds the eye as well as
over-simplicity.' And he laughed and said, 'Triumph, Bon Bec,
triumph. The chances were nine in ten against thee.' Then I did
pity her, to be in a crowd at such a time; but he rebuked me. 'I
should pity rather your queens and royal duchesses, which by law
are condemned to groan in a crowd of nobles and courtiers, and do
writhe with shame as, well as sorrow, being come of decent
mothers, whereas these gipsy women have no more shame under their
skins than a wolf ruth, or a hare valour. And, Bon Bec,' quoth he,
'I espy in thee a lamentable fault. Wastest thy bowels. wilt have
none left for thy poor good master which doeth thy will by night
and day.' Then we came forward; and he talked with the men in some
strange Hebrew cant whereof no word knew I; and the poor knaves
bade us welcome and denied us nought. With them, and all they had,
'twas lightly come and lightly go; and when we left them, my
master said to me 'This is thy first lesson, but to-night we shall
lie at Hansburgh. Come with me to the "rotboss" there, and I'll
show thee all our folk and their lays, and especially "the
lossners," "the dutzers," "the schleppers," "the gickisses," "the
schwanfelders, whom in England we call "shivering Jemmies," "the
suntvegers," "the schwiegers," "the joners," "the sesseldegers,"
"the gensscherers," in France "marcandiers or rifodes," "the
veranerins," "the stabulers," with a few foreigners like
ourselves, such as "pietres," "francmitoux," "polissons"
"malingreux," "traters," "rufflers," "whipjalks," "dommerars,"
"glymmerars," "jarkmen," "patricos," "swadders," "autem morts,"
"walking morts" 'Enow,' cried I, stopping him, 'art as gleesome as
the Evil One a counting of his imps. I'll jot down in my tablet
all these caitiffs and their accursed names: for knowledge is
knowledge. But go among them, alive or dead, that will I not with
my good will. Moreover,' said I, 'what need? since I have a
companion in thee who is all the knaves on earth in one?' and
thought to abash him but his face shone with pride, and hand on
breast he did bow low to me. 'If thy wit be scant, good Bon Bec,
thy manners are a charm. I have made a good bargain.' So he to the
'rotboss,' and I to a decent inn, and sketched the landlord's
daughter by candle-light, and started at morn batzen three the
richer, but could not find my master, so loitered slowly on, and
presently met him coming west for me, and cursing the quiens. Why
so? Because he could blind the culls but not the quiens. At last I
prevailed on him to leave cursing and canting, and tell me his
adventure. Said he, 'I sat outside the gate of yon monastery, full
of sores, which I sho'ed the passers-by. Oh, Bon Bec, beautifuller
sores you never saw; and it rained coppers in my hat. Presently
the monks came home from some procession, and the convent dogs ran
out to meet them, curse the quiens!' 'What, did they fall on thee
and bite thee, poor soul?' 'Worse, worse, dear Bon Bec. Had they
bitten me I had earned silver. But the great idiots, being, as I
think, puppies, or little better, fell on me where I sat, downed
me, and fell a licking my sores among them. As thou, false knave,
didst swear the whelps in heaven licked the sores of Lazybones, a
beggar of old.' 'Nay, nay,' said I, 'I said no such thing. But
tell me, since they bit thee not, but sportfully licked thee, what
harm?' 'What harm, noodle; why, the sores came off.' 'How could
that be?' 'How could aught else be? and them just fresh put on.
Did I think he was so weak as bite holes in his flesh with
ratsbane? Nay, he was an artist, a painter, like his servant, and
had put on sores made of pig's blood, rye meal, and glue. So when
the folk saw my sores go on tongues of puppies, they laughed, and
I saw cord or sack before me. So up I jumped, and shouted, "A
miracle a miracle! The very dogs of this holy convent be holy, and
have cured me. Good fathers," cried I, "whose day is this?" "St.
Isidore's," said one. "St. Isidore," cried I, in a sort of
rapture. "Why, St. Isidore is my patron saint: so that accounts."
And the simple folk swallowed my miracle as those accursed quiens
my wounds. But the monks took me inside and shut the gate, and put
their heads together; but I have a quick ear, and one did say,
"Caret miraculo monasterium," which is Greek patter, leastways it
is no beggar's cant. Finally they bade the lay brethren give me a
hiding, and take me out a back way and put me on the road, and
threatened me did I come back to the town to hand me to the
magistrate and have me drowned for a plain impostor. "Profit now
by the Church's grace," said they, "and mend thy ways." So
forward, Bon Bec, for my life is not sure nigh hand this town.' As
we went he worked his shoulders, 'Wow but the brethren laid on.
And what means yon piece of monk's cant, I wonder?' So I told him
the words meant 'the monastery is in want of a miracle,' but the
application thereof was dark to me. 'Dark,' cried he, 'dark as
noon. Why, it means they are going to work the miracle, my
miracle, and gather all the grain I sowed. Therefore these blows
on their benefactor's shoulders; therefore is he that wrought
their scurry miracle driven forth with stripes and threats. Oh,
cozening knaves!' Said I, 'Becomes you to complain of guile.'
'Alas, Bon Bec,' said he, 'I but outwit the simple, but these
monks would pluck Lucifer of his wing feathers.' And went a league
bemoaning himself that he was not convent-bred like his servant
'He would put it to more profit;' and railing on quiens. 'And as
for those monks, there was one Above.' 'Certes,' said I, 'there is
one Above. What then?' 'Who will call those shavelings to compt,
one day,' quoth he. 'And all deceitful men' said I. At one that
afternoon I got armories to paint: so my master took the yellow
jaundice and went begging through the town, and with his oily
tongue, and saffron-water face, did fill his hat. Now in all the
towns are certain licensed beggars, and one of these was an old
favourite with the townsfolk: had his station at St. Martin's
porch, the greatest church: a blind man: they called him blind
Hans. He saw my master drawing coppers on the other side the
street, and knew him by his tricks for an impostor, so sent and
warned the constables, and I met my master in the constables'
hands, and going to his trial in the town hall. I followed and
many more; and he was none abashed, neither by the pomp of
justice, nor memory of his misdeeds, but demanded his accuser like
a trumpet. And blind Hans's boy came forward, but was sifted
narrowly by my master, and stammered and faltered, and owned he
had seen nothing, but only carried blind Hans's tale to the chief
constable. 'This is but hearsay,' said my master. 'Lo ye now, here
standeth Misfortune backbit by Envy. But stand thou forth, blind
Envy, and vent thine own lie.' And blind Hans behoved to stand
forth, sore against his will. Him did my master so press with
questions, and so pinch and torture, asking him again and again,
how, being blind, he could see all that befell, and some that
befell not, across a way; and why, an he could not see, he came
there holding up his perjured hand, and maligning the
misfortunate, that at last he groaned aloud and would utter no
word more. And an alderman said, 'In sooth, Hans, ye are to blame;
hast cast more dirt of suspicion on thyself than on him.' But the
burgomaster, a wondrous fat man, and methinks of his fat some had
gotten into his head, checked him, and said, 'Nay, Hans we know
this many years, and be he blind or not, he hath passed for blind
so long, 'tis all one. Back to thy porch, good Hans, and let the
strange varlet leave the town incontinent on pain of whipping.'
Then my master winked to me; but there rose a civic officer in his
gown of state and golden chain, a Dignity with us lightly prized,
and even shunned of some, but in Germany and France much courted,
save by condemned malefactors, to wit the hangman; and says he,
'Ant please you, first let us see why he weareth his hair so thick
and low.' And his man went and lifted Cul de Jatte's hair, and lo,
the upper gristle of both ears was gone. 'How is this knave? quoth
the burgomaster. My master said carelessly, he minded not
precisely: his had been a life of misfortunes and losses. When a
poor soul has lost the use of his leg, noble sirs, these more
trivial woes rest lightly in his memory.' When he found this would
not serve his turn, he named two famous battles, in each of which
he had lost half an ear, a fighting like a true man against
traitors and rebels. But the hangman showed them the two cuts were
made at one time, and by measurement. ''Tis no bungling soldiers'
work, my masters,' said he, ''tis ourn.' Then the burgomaster gave
judgment: 'The present charge is not proven against thee; but, an
thou beest not guilty now, thou hast been at other times, witness
thine ears. Wherefore I send thee to prison for one month, and to
give a florin towards the new hall of the guilds now a building,
and to be whipt out of the town, and pay the hangman's fee for the
same.' And all the aldermen approved, and my master was haled to
prison with one look of anguish. It did strike my bosom. I tried
to get speech of him, but the jailer denied me. But lingering near
the jail I heard a whistle, and there was Cul de Jatte at a narrow
window twenty feet from earth. I went under, and he asked me what
made I there? I told him I was loath to go forward and not bid him
farewell. He seemed quite amazed; but soon his suspicious soul got
the better. That was not all mine errand. I told him not all: the
psaltery: 'Well, what of that?' 'Twas not mine, but his; I would
pay him the price of it. 'Then throw me a rix dollar,' said he. I
counted out my coins, and they came to a rix dollar and two
batzen. I threw him up his money in three throws, and when he had
got it all he said, softly, 'Bon Bec.' 'Master,' said I. Then the
poor rogue was greatly moved. 'I thought ye had been mocking me,'
said he; 'oh, Bon Bec, Bon Bec, if I had found the world like thee
at starting I had put my wit to better use, and I had not lain
here.' Then he whimpered out, 'I gave not quite a rix dollar for
the jingler;' and threw me back that he had gone to cheat me of;
honest for once, and over late; and so, with many sighs, bade me
Godspeed. Thus did my master, after often baffling men's justice,
fall by their injustice; for his lost ears proved not his guilt
only, but of that guilt the bitter punishment: so the account was
even; yet they for his chastisement did chastise him. Natheless he
was a parlous rogue. Yet he holp to make a man of me. Thanks to
his good wit I went forward richer far with my psaltery and brush,
than with yon as good as stolen purse; for that must have run dry
in time, like a big trough, but these a little fountain."

Richart. "How pregnant his reflections be; and but a curly pated
lad when last I saw him. Asking your pardon, mistress. Prithee
read on."

"One day I walked alone, and sooth to say, lighthearted, for mine
honest Denys sweetened the air on the way; but poor Cul de Jatte
poisoned it. The next day passing a grand house, out came on
prancing steeds a gentleman in brave attire and two servants; they
overtook me. The gentleman bade me halt. I laughed in my sleeve;
for a few batzen were all my store. He bade me doff my doublet and
jerkin. Then I chuckled no more. 'Bethink you, my lord,' said I,
''tis winter. How may a poor fellow go bare and live? So he told
me I shot mine arrow wide of his thought, and off with his own gay
jerkin, richly furred, and doublet to match, and held them forth
to me. Then a servant let me know it was a penance. 'His lordship
had had the ill luck to slay his cousin in their cups.' Down to my
shoes he changed with me; and set me on his horse like a popinjay,
and fared by my side in my worn weeds, with my psaltery on his
back. And said he, 'Now, good youth, thou art Cousin Detstein; and
I, late count, thy Servant. Play the part well, and help me save
my bloodstained soul! Be haughty and choleric, as any noble; and I
will be as humble as I may.' I said I would do my best to play the
noble. But what should I call him? He bade me call him nought but
Servant. That would mortify him most, he wist. We rode on a long
way in silence; for I was meditating this strange chance, that
from a beggar's servant had made me master to a count, and also
cudgelling my brains how best I might play the master, without
being run through the body all at one time like his cousin. For I
mistrusted sore my spark's humility; your German nobles being, to
my knowledge, proud as Lucifer, and choleric as fire. As for the
servants, they did slily grin to one another to see their master
so humbled

"What is that?"

A lump, as of lead, had just bounced against the door, and the
latch was fumbled with unsuccessfully. Another bounce, and the
door swung inwards with Giles arrayed in cloth of gold sticking to
it like a wasp. He landed on the floor, and was embraced; but on
learning what was going on, trumpeted that he would much liever
hear of Gerard than gossip.

Sybrandt pointed to a diminutive chair.

Giles showed his sense of this civility by tearing the said
Sybrandt out of a very big one, and there ensconced himself
gorgeous and glowing. Sybrandt had to wedge himself into the one,
which was too small for the magnificent dwarf's soul, and Margaret
resumed. But as this part of the letter was occupied with notices
of places, all which my reader probably knows, and if not, can
find handled at large in a dozen well-known books, from Munster to
Murray, I skip the topography, and hasten to that part where it
occurred to him to throw his letter into a journal. The personal
narrative that intervened may be thus condensed.

He spoke but little at first to his new companions, but listened
to pick up their characters. Neither his noble Servant nor his
servants could read or write; and as he often made entries in his
tablets, he impressed them with some awe. One of his entries was,
"Le peu que sont les hommes." For he found the surly innkeepers
licked the very ground before him now; nor did a soul suspect the
hosier's son in the count's feathers, nor the count in the
minstrel's weeds.

This seems to have surprised him; for he enlarged on it with the
naivete and pomposity of youth. At one pl