"Ah, brother, what are you saying?" cried the knight, anxiously. "Surely you forget our vows and our cloth."
"I forget neither the one nor the other," returned Tuck. "But I would be no true man did I submit to watch quietly such bungling as these fellows have done. Come hither, Midge."
"You know them—you are of this company?" continued the knight, as if in alarm.
"I am very proud to be of it, brother," said the friar.
"I crave a boon," the knight then said, turning to Robin. "This is a little man who will receive the buffets; and though I seem a priest, yet am I willing to take the blow instead."
"If you would care to have a buffet from me," the friar cried, "you are most welcome. For though my arm is sore still from our play of this morn, I warrant me there is still some strength left in it;" and he rolled up his sleeve.
"Take, then, the first blow," said the knight, "and I promise you I will return it you with interest."
A smile lit up the face of the jolly friar. He turned up the sleeve of his cassock still further, and smote the false abbot such a blow as would have felled an ox.
"Thou hittest well, brother," the knight remarked, coolly.
The friar was amazed to see him withstand such a blow, and so was Robin. "Now, 'tis my turn," the knight said; and, baring his arm, he dealt Tuck such a blow as to send him flat upon his back.