s,
an effect of divine justice! This comes of putting the sacred Scriptures
to such profane uses.
At Paris, said Carpalin, Snip Groignet the tailor had turned an old
Clementinae into patterns and measures, and all the clothes that were cut
on them were utterly spoiled and lost; gowns, hoods, cloaks, cassocks,
jerkins, jackets, waistcoats, capes, doublets, petticoats, corps de robes,
farthingales, and so forth. Snip, thinking to cut a hood, would cut you
out a codpiece; instead of a cassock he would make you a high-crowned hat;
for a waistcoat he'd shape you out a rochet; on the pattern of a doublet
he'd make you a thing like a frying-pan. Then his journeymen having
stitched it up did jag it and pink it at the bottom, and so it looked like
a pan to fry chestnuts. Instead of a cape he made a buskin; for a
farthingale he shaped a montero cap; and thinking to make a cloak, he'd cut
out a pair of your big out-strouting Swiss breeches, with panes like the
outside of a tabor. Insomuch that Snip was condemned to make good the
stuffs to all his customers; and to this day poor Cabbage's hair grows
through his hood and his arse through his pocket-holes. Mark, an effect of
heavenly wrath and vengeance! cried Homenas.
At Cahusac, said Gymnast, a match being made by the lords of Estissac and
Viscount Lausun to shoot at a mark, Perotou had taken to pieces a set of
decretals and set one of the leaves for the white to shoot at. Now I sell,
nay, I give and bequeath for ever and aye, the mould of my doublet to
fifteen hundred hampers full of black devils, if ever any archer in the
country (though they are singular marksmen in Guienne) could hit the white.
Not the least bit of the holy scribble was contaminated or touched; nay,
and Sansornin the elder, who held stakes, swore to us, figues dioures, hard
figs (his greatest oath), that he had openly, visibly, and manifestly seen
the bolt of Carquelin moving right to the round circle in the middle of the
white; and that just on the point, when it was going to hit and enter, it
had gone aside above seven foot and four inches wide of it towards the
bakehouse.
Miracle! cried Homenas, miracle! miracle! Clerica, come wench, light,
light here. Here's to you all, gentlemen; I vow you seem to me very sound
Christians. While he said this, the maidens began to snicker at his elbow,
grinning, giggling, and twittering among themselves. Friar John began to
paw, neigh, and whinny at the snou
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