'And as for Gregory's gigantic paynim,' said Fabian, 'why, he lies yonder in the guard-room, the very size, shape, and colour of a spider in a yew-hedge.'
'It is false!' said Gregory. 'Colbrand the Dane was a dwarf to him.'
'It is as true,' returned Fabian, 'as that the Tasker is to be married on Tuesday to pretty Margery. Gregory, thy sheet hath brought them between a pair of blankets.'
'I care no more for such a gillflirt,' said the jester,' than I do for thy leasings. Marry, thou hop-o'-my-thumb, happy wouldst thou be could thy head reach the captive Baron's girdle.'
'By the mass,' said Peter Lanaret, 'I will have one peep at this burly gallant'; and, leaving the buttery, he went to the guard-room where Gaston Saint Clere was confined. A man-at-arms, who kept sentinel on the strong studded door of the apartment, said he believed he slept; for that, after raging, stamping, and uttering the most horrid imprecations, he had been of late perfectly still. The falconer gently drew back a sliding board of a foot square towards the top of the door, which covered a hole of the same size, strongly latticed, through which the warder, without opening the door, could look in upon his prisoner. From this aperture he beheld the wretched Gaston suspended by the neck by his own girdle to an iron ring in the side of his prison. He had clambered to it by means of the table on which his food had been placed; and, in the agonies of shame and disappointed malice, had adopted this mode of ridding himself of a wretched life. He was found yet warm, but totally lifeless. A proper account of the manner of his death was drawn up and certified. He was buried that evening in the chapel of the castle, out of respect to his high birth; and the chaplain of Fitzallen of Marden, who said the service upon the occasion, preached the next Sunday an excellent sermon upon the text, 'Radix malorum est cupiditas,' which we have here transcribed.
Here the manuscript, from which we have painfully transcribed, and frequently, as it were, translated, this tale for the reader's edification, is so indistinct and defaced, that, excepting certain howbeits, nathlesses, lo ye's! etc., we can pick out little that is intelligible, saving that avarice is defined 'a likourishness of heart after earthly things.' A little farther there seems to have been a gay account of Margery's wedding with Ralph the Tasker, the running at the quintain, and other rural games practised on the occasion. There are also fragments of a mock sermon preached by Gregory upon that occasion, as for example:—
'My dear cursed caitiffs, there was once a king, and he wedded a young old queen, and she had a child; and this child was sent to Solomon the Sage, praying he would give it the same blessing which he got from the witch of Endor when she bit him by the heel. Hereof speaks the worthy Doctor Radigundus Potator; why should not mass be said for all the roasted shoe souls served up in the king's dish on Saturday; for true it is, that Saint Peter asked Father Adam, as they journeyed to Camelot, an high, great, and doubtful question, "Adam, Adam, why eated'st thou the apple without paring?"
[Footnote: This tirade of gibberish is literally taken or selected from a mock discourse pronounced by a professed jester, which occurs in an ancient manuscript in the Advocates' Library, the same from which the late ingenious Mr. Weber published the curious comic romance of the Hunting of the Hare. It was introduced in compliance with Mr Strutt's plan of rendering his tale an illustration of ancient manners A similar burlesque sermon is pronounced by the fool in Sir David Lindesay's satire of the Three Estates. The nonsense and vulgar burlesque of that composition illustrate the ground of Sir Andrew Aguecheek's eulogy on the exploits of the jester in Twelfth Night, who, reserving his sharper jests for Sir Toby, had doubtless enough of the jargon of his calling to captivate the imbecility of his brother knight, who is made to exclaim—'In sooth, thou wast in very gracious fooling last night, when thou spokest of Pigrogremitus, and of the vapours passing the equinoctials of Quenbus; 't was very good, i' faith!' It is entertaining to find commentators seeking to discover some meaning in the professional jargon of such a passage as this.]
With much goodly gibberish to the same effect; which display of Gregory's ready wit not only threw the whole company into convulsions of laughter, but made such an impression on Rose, the Potter's daughter, that it was thought it would be the Jester's own fault if Jack was long without his Jill. Much pithy matter, concerning the bringing the bride to bed, the loosing the bridegroom's points, the scramble which ensued for them, and the casting of the stocking, is also omitted from its obscurity.
The following song which has been since borrowed by the worshipful author of the famous History of Fryar Bacon, has been with difficulty deciphered. It seems to have been sung on occasion of carrying home the bride