close and woodland, and be servants in your own houses, and your sons
shall be the lords' lads, and your daughters their lemans, and ye shall
buy a bold word with many stripes, and an honest deed with a leap from
the gallows-tree.

"Bethink ye, too, that ye have no longer to deal with Duke William,
who, if he were a thief and a cruel lord, was yet a prudent man and a
wise warrior; but cruel are these, and headstrong, yea, thieves and
fools in one--and ye shall lay their heads in the dust."

A shout would have arisen again, but his eager voice rising higher yet,
restrained it as he said:

"And how shall it be then when these are gone? What else shall ye lack
when ye lack masters? Ye shall not lack for the fields ye have tilled,
nor the houses ye have built, nor the cloth ye have woven; all these
shall be yours, and whatso ye will of all that the earth beareth; then
shall no man mow the deep grass for another, while his own kine lack
cow-meat; and he that soweth shall reap, and the reaper shall eat in
fellowship the harvest that in fellowship he hath won; and he that
buildeth a house shall dwell in it with those that he biddeth of his
free will; and the tithe barn shall garner the wheat for all men to eat
of when the seasons are untoward, and the rain-drift hideth the sheaves
in August; and all shall be without money and without price.
Faithfully and merrily then shall all men keep the holidays of the
Church in peace of body and joy of heart. And man shall help man, and
the saints in heaven shall be glad, because men no more fear each
other; and the churl shall be ashamed, and shall hide his churlishness
till it be gone, and he be no more a churl; and fellowship shall be
established in heaven and on the earth."

CHAPTER V

THEY HEAR TIDINGS OF BATTLE AND MAKE THEM READY

He left off as one who had yet something else to say; and, indeed, I
thought he would give us some word as to the trysting-place, and
whither the army was to go from it; because it was now clear to me that
this gathering was but a band of an army. But much happened before
John Ball spoke again from the cross, and it was on this wise.

When there was silence after the last shout that the crowd had raised a
while ago, I thought I heard a thin sharp noise far away, somewhat to
the north of the cross, which I took rather for the sound of a trumpet
or horn, than for the voice of a man or any beast. Will Green also
seemed to have heard it,