candle-light, and started
at morn batzen three the richer, but could not find my master, so
loitered slowly on, and presently met him coming west for me, and
cursing the quiens. Why so? Because he could blind the culls but not
the quiens. At last I prevailed on him to leave cursing and canting,
and tell me his adventure. Said he, 'I sat outside the gate of yon
monastery, full of sores, which I sho'ed the passers-by. Oh, Bon Bec,
beautifuller sores you never saw; and it rained coppers in my hat.
Presently the monks came home from some procession, and the convent dogs
ran out to meet them, curse the quiens!' 'What, did they fall on thee
and bite thee, poor soul?' 'Worse, worse, dear Bon Bec. Had they
bitten me I had earned silver. But the great idiots, being, as I think,
puppies, or little better, fell on me where I sat, downed me, and fell
a licking my sores among them. As thou, false knave, didst swear the
whelps in heaven licked the sores of Lazybones, a beggar of old.' 'Nay,
nay,' said I, 'I said no such thing. But tell me, since they bit thee
not, but sportfully licked thee, what harm?' 'What harm, noodle; why,
the sores came off.' 'How could that be?' 'How could aught else be? and
them just fresh put on. Did I think he was so weak as bite holes in his
flesh with ratsbane? Nay, he was an artist, a painter, like his servant,
and had put on sores made of pig's blood, rye meal, and glue. So when
the folk saw my sores go on tongues of puppies, they laughed, and I
saw cord or sack before me. So up I jumped, and shouted, "A miracle a
miracle! The very dogs of this holy convent be holy, and have cured me.
Good fathers," cried I, "whose day is this?" "St. Isidore's," said one.
"St. Isidore," cried I, in a sort of rapture. "Why, St. Isidore is
my patron saint: so that accounts." And the simple folk swallowed my
miracle as those accursed quiens my wounds. But the monks took me inside
and shut the gate, and put their heads together; but I have a quick ear,
and one did say, "Caret miraculo monasterium," which is Greek patter,
leastways it is no beggar's cant. Finally they bade the lay brethren
give me a hiding, and take me out a back way and put me on the road, and
threatened me did I come back to the town to hand me to the magistrate
and have me drowned for a plain impostor. "Profit now by the Church's
grace," said they, "and mend thy ways." So forward, Bon Bec, for my life
is not sure nigh hand this town.' As we went he worked h