"And so you propose to run the Vagrery, little she-devil, confounded wench?"
"Yes, seigneur bishop; I am now twenty years of age, and this is the first day of my life that I have been able to say: 'I belong to myself—I can go and come, jump, sing, dance, just as I please'—"
"You belong to yourself, do you, brazen minx? You belong to me! But with the aid of God you will yet be re-captured either by the Church, or by some Frankish seigneur—and I hope you may fall into even worse slavery, God-forsaken wench!"
"I will then, at least, have tasted freedom—"
And the young woman dashed off, jumping and singing, in pursuit of a butterfly that fluttered in the bush.
The troop of Vagres arrived at the hovels of some slaves that belonged to the domain of the Church, and that lay scattered along the road. Little wan, sickly looking children, absolutely bare by reason of their parents' pinching poverty, were wallowing in the dust. Their fathers were off on the fields since dawn; their mothers, as wan-looking and thin as the children, sat at the entrance of their hovels upon bunches of decaying straw; they were clad in rags and busily plied their distaffs for the benefit of the bishop; their long and unkempt hair tumbled over their foreheads upon their bony shoulders; their eyes were hollow, their cheeks sunburnt and sunken; the aspect that they presented was at once so repulsive and painful that the hermit-laborer could not refrain from pointing them out to the bishop, saying:
"Look at those unhappy creatures!"
"Resignation, misery and sorrow here below, everlasting reward above—otherwise as everlasting and frightful tortures!" cried Cautin. "The Church so decrees; it is the law of God!"
"Blasphemer! Your words are like those of the impostor physicians who pretend that man was born for fevers, the pest and ulcers, and not for health!"
At the sight of the approaching and well-armed troop, the women and children were first afraid and ran to hide in their hovels; but stepping forward, Ronan called out to them: