them; and they looked up into his face and began to laugh. And as they
were of the age of about three years, he said, Your laughing will be
turned into tears, for your innocent blood must now be shed, and
therewith he cut off their heads. Then he laid them back in the bed, and
put the heads upon the bodies, and covered them as though they were
sleeping: and with the blood which he had taken he washed his comrade,
and said, Lord Jesus Christ! who hast commanded men to keep faith on
earth, and didst heal the leper by Thy word! cleanse now my comrade, for
whose love I have shed the blood of my children.

"Then Amis was cleansed of his leprosy. And Amile clothed his companion
in his best robes; and as they went to the church to give thanks, the
bells, by the will of God, rang of their own accord. And when the people
of the city heard that, they ran together to see the marvel. And the
wife of Amile, when she saw Amis and Amile coming, began to ask which of
the twain was her husband, and said, I know well the vesture of them
both, but I know not which of them is Amile. And Amile said to her, I am
Amile, and my companion is Amis, who is healed of his sickness. And she
was full of wonder, and desired to know in what manner he was healed.
Give thanks to our Lord, answered Amile, but trouble not thyself as to
the manner of the healing.

"Now neither the father nor the mother had yet entered where the
children were; but the father sighed heavily because of their death, and
the mother asked for them, that they might rejoice together; but Amile
said, Dame! Let the children sleep. And it was already the hour of
Tierce. And going in alone to the children to weep over them, he found
them at play in the bed; only, in the place of the sword-cuts about
their throats was as it were a thread of crimson. And he took them in
his arms and carried them to his wife and said, Rejoice greatly, for thy
children whom I had slain by the commandment of the angel are alive, and
by their blood is Amis healed."

There, as I said, is the strength of the old French story. For the
Renaissance has not only the sweetness which it derives from the
classical world, but also that curious strength of which there are great
resources in the true middle age. And as I have illustrated the early
strength of the Renaissance by the story of Amis and Amile, a story
which comes from the North, in which even a certain racy Teutonic
flavour is perceptible, so I shall ill