Then she said:—
“Father,—they do affirm 't is full time for me to begone on the King's errand. Thou wilt not say me nay? Thou wilt bless me?”
He sat down on the doorstone and took her in his arm. He was smiling.
“Sweet, my daughter; and dost thou truly think that this puissant realm of England shall be turned up-so-down and made new by a plotting of young children and rustics?”
“Wherefore no, if God will?”
“Nay, I 'll not believe that God hath so great spite against us English,” he made answer, whimsical.
“But the Vision, father? If thy ploughman be no rustic, what then is he?”
“I fell eft-soon asleep,” quoth Long Will,—
"'and suddenly me saw,
That Piers the Ploughman was painted all bloody,
And come in with a cross before the common people,
And right like, in all limbs, to our Lord Jesus;
And then called I Conscience to tell me the truth.
“Is this Jesus the Jouster?” quoth I, "that Jews did to death,
Or is it Piers the Ploughman?—Who painted him so red?"
Quoth Conscience, and kneeled then, "These are Piers arms,
His colours and his coat-armour, and he that cometh so bloody
Is Christ with his Cross, conqueror of Christians."'"
“Who is 't, then, we wait for?” Calote cried. “Is it Christ, or is it Piers? O me, but I 'm sore bewildered! An' if 't were Christ, yet may not Piers do his devoir? Do all we sit idle with folded hands because Christ cometh not? Surely, 't were better He find us busy, a-striving our weak way to come into His Kingdom! What though we may not 'do best,' yet may we do well.”