He read out to him Gunzo's libel which had just arrived. The old man listened attentively, but his eyebrows contracted and his nostrils expanded during the lecture.
When he had come to the description of Ekkehard's curly hair and fine shoes, the Abbot was nearly convulsed with laughter, but Moengal sat there, rigid and serious, and on his forehead a frown had gathered, like clouds before a thunderstorm.
"Well I reckon, that his pride will be well whipped out of him!" said the Abbot. "Sublime! really sublime! And an abundance of knowledge. That will strike home, and cannot be answered."
"But it can though," grimly said the parish-priest.
"And in what way?" eagerly asked the Abbot.
Moengal made a gesture of evil import. "A good stick from a holly-bush, or a brave hazel-wand, is all that's wanted, and then to go down the Rhine, until there is but an arm's length left between the Suabian wood and the Italian writer's back. And then." ... He concluded his speech figuratively.
"You are somewhat rude, parish-priest, and have no appreciation of learning," said the Abbot. "To be sure--such a treatise as that can only be written by a refined intellect. Respect, I say!"
"Fine learning that, indeed!" exclaimed Moengal, who had worked himself into a downright rage. "'Puffed-up lips, and a bad and wicked heart, are like an earthen pot, covered with tinsel,' says Solomon. Learned? Why, the wood in my parish is as learned as that, for it also repeats, what you call out to it, and that is at least a melodious echo. We know these Belgian peacocks, which are to be found though, also in other parts. Their feathers are stolen, and their singing, in spite of tail and rainbow-colours behind, is hoarse, and will always be hoarse; no matter what airs the creatures may give themselves. Before my great recovery, I also believed that it was singing, instead of croaking, when a fellow puffed up his cheeks with grammar and dialectics, but now: 'Farewell, Marcianus Capella,' say we now at Radolfszell!"
"I believe that it is time for you to think of going home, as the clouds are fast gathering over Constance," said the Abbot.
Then the parish-priest found out, that he had not chosen a suitable individual, for expounding his views on healthy opinions and science to. So he took leave.