"May I so find mercy in your eyes," said the Jew," as I know not one word which the reverend prelate spake to me all this fearful night. Alas! I was so distraught with agony, and fear, and grief, that had our holy father Abraham come to preach to me, he had found but a deaf listener."

"Thou liest, Jew, and thou knowest thou dost," said the Friar ; "I will remind thee but of one word of our conference - - thou didst promise to give all thy substance to our holy Order."

"So help me the Promise, fair sirs," said Isaac, even more alarmed than before, "as no such sounds ever crossed my lips! Alas! I am an aged beggar'd man I fear me a childless

have ruth on me, and let me go!"

Nay," said the Friar, "if thou dost retract vows made in favour of holy Church, thou must do penance.”

Accordingly, he raised his halberd, and would have laid the staff of it lustily on the Jew's shoulders, had not the Black Knight stopped the blow, and thereby transferred the Holy Clerk's resentment to himself.

"By Saint Thomas of Kent," said he, "an I buckle to my gear, I will teach thee, sir lazy lover, to mell with thine own matters, maugre thine iron case there!"

"Nay, be not wroth with me," said the Knight; "thou knowest I am thy sworn friend and comrade."

"I know no such thing," answered the Friar; "and defy thee for a meddling coxcomb!"

"Nay, but," said the Knight, who seemed to take a pleasure in provoking his quondam host, "hast thou forgotten how, that for my sake (for I say nothing of the temptation of the flagon and the pasty) thou didst break thy vow of fast and vigil ?"

Truly, friend," said the Friar, clenching his huge fist, “I will bestow a buffet on thee."

"I accept of no such presents," said the Knight; "I am content to take thy cuff* as a loan, but I will repay thee with usury as deep as ever thy prisoner there exacted in his traffic."

'I will prove that presently," said the Friar.

"Hola !" cried the Captain, "what art thou after, mad Friar? brawling beneath our Trysting-tree?"

"No brawling," said the Knight, "it is but a friendly interchange of courtesy.- Friar, strike an thou darest I will stand thy blow, if thou wilt stand mine."

"Thou hast the advantage with that iron pot on thy head," said the churchman; "but have at thee - Down thou goest an thou wert Goliath of Gath in his brazen helmet."

The Friar bared his brawny arm up to the elbow, and putting his full strength to the blow, gave the knight a buffet that might have felled an ox. But his adversary stood firm as rock. A loud shout was uttered by all the yeomen around; for the Clerk's

cuff was proverbial amongst them, and there were few who, in jest or earnest, had not had occasion to know its vigour.

"Now, Priest," said the Knight, pulling off his guantlet, "if I had vantage on my head, I will have none on my hand-stand fast as a true man."

Genam meam dedi vapulatori—I have given my cheek to the smiter," said the Priest; "an thou canst stir me from the spot, fellow, I will freely bestow on thee the Jew's ransom.'

So spoke the burly Priest, assuming, on his part, high defiance. But who may resist his fate? The buffet of the Knight was given with such strength and good-will, that the Friar rolled head over heels upon the plain, to the great amazement of all the spectators. But he arose neither angry nor crest-fallen.

"Brother," said he to the Knight, "thou shouldst have used thy strength with more discretion. I had mumbled but a lame mass an thou hadst broken my haw, for the piper plays ill that wants the nether chops. Nevertheless, there is my hand, in friendly witness that I will exchange no more cuffs with thee, having been a loser by the barter. End now all unkindness. Let us put the Jew to ransom, since the leopard will not change his spots, and a Jew he will continue to be."

“The Priest,” said Clement, "is not half so confident of the Jew's conversion, since he received that buffet on the ear."

"Go to, knave, what pratest thou of conversions?—what, is there no respect?-all masters and no men? I tell thee, fellow, I was somewhat totty when I received the good knight's blow, or I had kept my ground under it. But an thou gibest more of it, thou shalt learn I can give as well as take."

"Peace all!" said the Captain. "And thou, Jew, think of thy ransom; thou needest not to be told that thy race are held to be accursed in all Christian communities, and trust me that we cannot endure thy presence among us. Think, therefore, of an offer, while I examine a prisoner of another cast."

"Were many of Front-de-Bouf's men taken?" demanded the 'Black Knight.

"None of note enough to be put to ransom," answered the Captain; "a set of hilding fellows there were, whom we dismissed to find them a new master- enough had been done for revenge and profit; the bunch of them were not worth a cardecu. The prisoner I speak of is better booty a jolly monk riding to visit his leman, an I may judge by his horse-gear and wearing apparel.

Here cometh the worthy prelate, as pert as a pyet." And, between two yeomen, was brought before the silvan throne of the outlaw Chief, our friend, Prior Aymer of Jorvaulx.

CHAPTER XXXIV.

Flower of warriors,

How is 't with Titus Lartius?

Marcius. As with a man busied about decrees,
Condemning some to death and some to exile,
Ransoming him or pitying, threatening the other.

Coriolanus.

THE captive Abbot's features and manners exhibited a whimsical mixture of offended pride, and deranged foppery and bodily

terror.

"Why, how now, my masters?" said he, with a voice in which all three emotions were blended. "What order is this among ye? Be ye Turks or Christians, that handle a churchman?Know ye what it is, manus imponere in servos Domini? Ye have plundered my mails-torn my cope of curious cut lace, which might have served a cardinal! Another in my place would have been at his excommunicabo vos; but I am placable, and if ye order forth my palfreys, release my brethren, and restore my mails, tell down with all speed an hundred crowns to be expended in masses at the high altar of Jorvaulx Abbey, and make your vow to eat no venison until next Pentecost, it may be you shall hear little more of this mad frolic."

"Holy Father," said the chief Outlaw, "it grieves me to think that you have met with such usage from any of my followers, as calls for your fatherly reprehension."

"Usage!" echoed the priest, encouraged by the mild tone of the silvan leader; "it were usage fit for no hound of good racemuch less for a Christian - far less for a priest-and least of all for the Prior of the holy community of Jorvaulx. Here is a profane and drunken minstrel, called Allan-a-Dale-nebulo quidam-who has menaced me with corporal punishment-nay, with death itself, an I pay not down four hundred crowns of ransom, to the boot of all the treasure he hath already robbed me of-gold chains and gymmal rings to an unknown value; besides what is broken and spoiled among their rude hands, such as my pouncet-box and silver crisping-tongs."

"It is impossible that Allan-a-Dale can have thus treated a man of your reverend bearing," replied the Captain.

"It is true as the gospel of Saint Nicodemus," said the Prior; "he swore, with many a cruel north-country oath, that he would hang me up on the highest tree in the greenwood."

"Did he so in very deed? Nay, then, reverend father, I think you had better comply with his demands—for Allan-a-Dale is the very man to abide by his word when he has so pledged it."*

* A commissary is said to have received similar consolation from a certain commander-in-chief, to whom he complained that a general officer had used some such threat towards him as that in the text.

"You do but jest with me," said the astounded Prior, with a forced laugh; "and I love a good jest with all my heart. But, ha ha ha! when the mirth has lasted the live-long night, it is time to be grave in the morning."

"And I am as grave as a father confessor," replied the Outlaw; you must pay a round ransom, Sir Prior, or your convent is likely to be called to a new election; for your place will know you no more."

"Are ye Christians," said the Prior, "and hold this language to a churchman ?"

“Christians! ay, marry are we, and have divinity among us to boot," answered the Outlaw. "Let our buxom chaplain stand forth, and expound to this reverend father the texts which concern this matter."

The Friar, half-drunk, half-sober, had huddled a friar's frock over his green cassock, and now summoning together whatever scraps of learning he had acquired by rote in former days, " Holy father," said he, "Deus faciat salcam benignitatem vestram are welcome to the greenwood."

- You

"What profane mummery is this?" said the Prior. "Friend, if thou be'st indeed of the church, it were a better deed to shew me how I may escape from these men's hands, than to stand ducking and grinning here like a morris-dancer."

"Truly, reverend father," said the Friar, "I know but one mode in which thou mayst escape. This is Saint Andrew's day with us, we are taking our tithes."

"But not of the church then, I trust, my good brother?" said the Prior.

"Of church and lay," said the Friar; "and therefore, Sir Prior, facite vobis amicos de Mammone iniquitatis — make yourselves friends of the Mammon of unrighteousness, for no other friendship is like to serve your turn."

"I love a jolly woodsman at heart," said the Prior, softening his tone; 66 come, ye must not deal too hard with me- - I can well of woodcraft, and can wind a horn clear and lustily, and hollo till every oak rings again - Come, ye must not deal too hard with

me."

"Give him a horn," said the Outlaw; "we will prove the skill he boasts of."

The Prior Aymer winded a blast accordingly. The Captain shook his head.

"Sir Prior," he said, "thou blowest a merry note, but it may not ransom thee- we cannot afford, as the legend on a good knight's shield hath it, to set thee free for a blast. Moreover, I have found thee-thou art one of those, who, with new French graces and Tra-li-ras, disturb the ancient English bugle notes.Prior, that last flourish on the recheat hath added fifty crowns to thy ransom, for corrupting the true old manly blasts of

venerie."

"Well, friend," said the Abbot, peevishly, "thou art ill to please with thy woodcraft. I pray thee be more conformable in this matter of my ransom. At a word since I must needs, for once, hold a candle to the devil — what ransom am I to pay for walking on Watling-street, without having fifty men at my back?" "Were it not well," said the Lieutenant of the gang apart to the Captain, "that the Prior should name the Jew's ransom, and the Jew name the Prior's ?"

"Thou art a mad knave," said the Captain, "but thy plan transcends! Here, Jew, step forth - Look at that holy Father Aymer, Prior of the rich Abbey of Jorvaulx, and tell us at what ransom we should hold him!- Thou knowest the income of his convent, I warrant thee."

"Oh, assuredly," said Isaac, "I have trafficked with the good fathers, and bought wheat and barley, and fruits of the earth, and also much wool. Oh, it is a rich abbey-stede, and they do live upon the fat, and drink the sweet wines upon the lees, these good fathers of Jorvaulx. Ah, if an outcast like me had such a home to go to, and such incomings by the year and by the month, I would pay much gold and silver to redeem my captivity."

"Hound of a Jew !" exclaimed the Prior, "no one knows better than thy own cursed self, that our holy house of God is indebted for the finishing of our chancel

"And for the storing of your cellars in the last season with the due allowance of Gascon wine," interrupted the Jew ; "but that - that is small matters."

"Hear the infidel dog!" said the churchman; ❝he jangles as if our holy community did come under debts for the wines we have a licence to drink propter necessitatem, et ad frigus depellendum. The circumcised villain blasphemeth the holy church, and Christian men listen and rebuke him not !"

"All this helps nothing," said the leader." Isaac pronounce what he may pay, without flaying both hide and hair."

"An six hundred crowns," said Isaac, "the good Prior might well pay to your honoured valours, and never sit less soft in his stall."

"Six hundred crowns," said the leader, gravely; "I am contented thou hast well spoken, Isaac - six hundred crowns.-

It is a sentence, Sir Prior."
"A sentence !- -a sentence !" exclaimed the band;
had not done it better."

"Solomon

"Thou hearest thy doom, Prior," said the leader. "Ye are mad, my masters," said the Prior; "where am I to find such a sum ! If I sell the very pyx and candlesticks on the altar at Jorvaulx, I shall scarce raise the half; and it will be necessary for that purpose that I go to Jorvaulx myself: ye may retain as borrows my two priests."

*

* Borghs, or borrows, signifies pledges. Hence our word to borrow, because we pledge ourselves to restore what is lent.