ly to stay there all the days of their life: it was ordered
that all of whatever kind, men or women, admitted within this abbey,
should have full leave to depart with peace and contentment whensoever
it should seem good to them so to do.

_Item_, For that the religious men and women did ordinarily make three
vows--to wit, those of chastity, poverty, and obedience: it was
therefore constituted and appointed that in this convent they might be
honorably married, that they might be rich, and live at liberty. In
regard to the legitimate age, the women were to be admitted from ten
till fifteen, and the men from twelve till eighteen.

For the fabric and furniture of the abbey, Gargantua caused to be
delivered out in ready money twenty-seven hundred thousand eight
hundred and one-and-thirty of those long-wooled rams; and for every
year until the whole work was completed he allotted threescore nine
thousand gold crowns, and as many of the seven stars, to be charged
all upon the receipt of the river Dive. For the foundation and
maintenance thereof he settled in perpetuity three-and-twenty hundred
threescore and nine thousand five hundred and fourteen rose nobles,
taxes exempted from all in landed rents, and payable every year at the
gate of the abbey; and for this gave them fair letters patent.

The building was hexagonal, and in such a fashion that in every one of
the six corners there was built a great round tower, sixty paces in
diameter, and were all of a like form and bigness. Upon the north side
ran the river Loire, on the bank whereof was situated the tower called
Arctic. Going toward the east there was another called Calaer, the next
following Anatole, the next Mesembrine, the next Hesperia, and the
last Criere. Between each two towers was the space of three hundred
and twelve paces. The whole edifice was built in six stories,
reckoning the cellars underground for one. The second was vaulted
after the fashion of a basket-handle; the rest were coated with
Flanders plaster, in the form of a lamp foot. It was roofed with fine
slates of lead, carrying figures of baskets and animals; the ridge
gilt, together with the gutters, which issued without the wall between
the windows, painted diagonally in gold and blue down to the ground,
where they ended in great canals, which carried away the water below
the house into the river.

This same building was a hundred times more sumptuous and magnificent
than ever was Bonivet; for th