“There was a clerk, one Lucius,
A comely, famous man;
Of every wit some what he can,
Out-take that him lacketh rule,
His own estate to guide and rule—”
So he took to riotous living, “and was not wise in his doing”; ergo—
“After the need of his desert,
So fell this clerke in poverte.”
The thief, whether poor man or ruined clerk, removed the treasures, was seen by the people, and brought before the emperor, on the charge of breaking the royal edict.
But the thief said: “Good my lord—suffer me to speak.”