Grief, and pain, and penury.
Christians still may boast of madness—
Never was there greater gladness,
More delightsome solace never
Than for love of Jesu ever
Thus to rage in holy madness.'[3]
The heads of the spectators reeled, and their hands and feet were set in motion; suddenly children, men, feeble women joined in the frantic dance. One old and unwieldy monk, like an aged faun, tripped, fell, and was hurt so that the blood flowed; he was flung aside, barely escaping trampling, and the dance rolled on. The fire's crimson and flickering glow lighted convulsed faces: a vast shadow was thrown by the crucifix, the moveless centre of the whirling circles.
'If of wit my mind doth show,
Jesu, in thy courtesie,
Rid it thence and let me know