omen, beyond measure credulous as we are,
yield overmuch faith, can be and are whiles adroitly befooled, and
that not by men only, but even by certain of our own sex.

In our city, the which is fuller of cozenage than of love or faith,
there was, not many years agone, a gentlewoman adorned with beauty and
charms and as richly endowed by nature as any of her sex with engaging
manners and loftiness of spirit and subtle wit, whose name albeit I
know, I purpose not to discover it, no, nor any other that pertaineth
unto the present story, for that there be folk yet alive who would
take it in despite, whereas it should be passed over with a laugh.
This lady, then, seeing herself, though of high lineage, married to a
wool-monger and unable, for that he was a craftsman, to put off the
haughtiness of her spirit, whereby she deemed no man of mean
condition, how rich soever he might be, worthy of a gentlewoman and
seeing him moreover, for all his wealth, to be apt unto nothing of
more moment than to lay a warp for a piece of motley or let weave a
cloth or chaffer with a spinster anent her yarn, resolved on no wise
to admit of his embraces, save in so far as she might not deny him,
but to seek, for her own satisfaction, to find some one who should be
worthier of her favours than the wool-monger appeared to her to be,
and accordingly fell so fervently in love with a man of very good
quality and middle age, that, whenas she saw him not by day, she could
not pass the ensuing night without unease. The gentleman, perceiving
not how the case stood, took no heed of her, and she, being very
circumspect, dared not make the matter known to him by sending of
women nor by letter, fearing the possible perils that might betide.
However, observing that he companied much with a churchman, who,
albeit a dull lump of a fellow, was nevertheless, for that he was a
man of very devout life, reputed of well nigh all a most worthy friar,
she bethought herself that this latter would make an excellent
go-between herself and her lover and having considered what means she
should use, she repaired, at a fitting season, to the church where he
abode, and letting call him to her, told him that, an he pleased, she
would fain confess herself to him. The friar seeing her and judging
her to be a woman of condition, willingly gave ear to her, and she,
after confession, said to him, 'Father mine, it behoveth me have
recourse to you for aid and counsel anent that which