tatis'--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;
"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."

"O, assuredly," said Isaac. "I have trafficked with the good fathers,
and bought wheat and barley, and fruits of the earth, and also much
wool. O, 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