At the further end of this Jewish quarter stood a little school for Christian children, who learnt in it “swich maner doctrine as men used there,” that is, “to singen and to rede.” Among these youthful scholars was a widow’s son, “a litel clergeon, seven year of age,” whom his mother had taught to kneel and pray before the Virgin’s image. Day by day on his way to and from school, as he passed through the Jewry, this Innocent used full merrily to sing “Alma Redemptoris”:
“The swetnes hath his herte perced so
Of Cristes mooder, that, to hir to preye,
He can not stinte of singing by the weye.”
But
“Our firste foo, the serpent Sathanas,
That hath in Jewes herte his waspes nest,”
was sorely vexed at the child’s piety, and stirred up the inmates of the Jewry with such words:
“O Hebraik peple, allas!
Is this to yow a thing that is honest,