The dinner which has been described being thus finished, our preacher, who was now as round as a tick, pronounced grace, and then said to his hostess;
“Damsel, I thank you for your good gifts; you have given me a hearty welcome, for which I am much obliged to you. I will pray to Him who fed five thousand men with a few loaves of barley bread and two small fishes, and after they were all filled there remained over twelve basketfuls—I will pray to Him to reward you.”
“By St. John!” said the maid-servant coming forward, “you may well talk about that. I believe that if you had been one of that multitude there would not have been anything left over; for you would have eaten up everything, and me into the bargain, if I had happened to have been there.”
“No, truly, my dear,” replied the monk, who was a jovial fellow with a ready wit, “I should not have eaten you, but I should have spitted you, and put you down to roast—that is what I should have done to you.”
The lady began to laugh, and so did the varlet and the maid-servant, in spite of themselves. And our monk, who had his belly well stuffed, again thanked his hostess for having so well filled him, and went off to another village to earn his supper—but whether that was as good as his dinner I cannot say.
