and last tale; it is therefore for me to
choose who shall begin to-day. Madame Oisille was the first of the
ladies to speak, as being the oldest and wisest, and so I now give my
vote to the youngest--I do not also say the flightiest--for I am sure
that if we all follow her leading we shall not delay vespers so long
as we did yesterday. Wherefore, Nomerfide, you shall lead us, but I beg
that you will not cause us to begin our second day in tears."

"There was no need to make that request," said Nomerfide, "for one of
our number has made me choose a tale which has taken such a hold on me
that I can tell no other; and should it occasion sadness in you, your
natures must be melancholy ones indeed."

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_TALE XI._ (A).

_Madame de Roncex, while at the monastery of the Grey Friars
at Thouars, (1) was constrained to go in great haste to a
certain place, and, not looking to see whether the seats
were clean, sat down in a filthy spot and befouled both her
person and clothes; whereupon crying out for assistance, in
the hope that some woman would come and cleanse her, she was
waited on by men, who beheld her in the worst plight in
which a woman could be found_. (2)

1 In the department of the Deux-Sevres.--Ed.

2 This story, given in Boaistuau's version of Margaret's
tales, and to be found in most of the MS. copies of the
_Heptameron_ at the 'Paris Bibliotheque Nationale', was not
included in the edition issued by Gruget, who replaced it by
a story called _The jests made by a Grey Friar_, for which
see _post_, p. 95 _et seq_.--Ed.

In the household of Madame de la Tremoille there was a lady named
Roncex, who one day, when her mistress had gone to visit the monastery
of the Grey Friars, found herself in great need to go to a certain place
whither her maid could not go in her stead. She took with her a girl
named La Mothe to keep her company, but being modest and unwilling to
be seen, left her in the room, and went alone into a darksome privy,
a place used in common by all the friars, who had given such a good
account therein of all their victuals, that seat and floor, and in sooth
the whole place, were thickly covered with the must of Bacchus and Ceres
that had passed through the friars' bellies.

The unhappy lady, who was so hard pressed that she had scarcely time to
lift her dress, chanced to sit down in t