Then at the chirurgeon's bidding she was untied. She did not speak,

but struck on her breast to say the hot water had burned her. When

the sheriff perceived that she had recovered from this first torment

he said to her:

"Confess thou art a witch, and that thou didst cast a spell upon

the cow."

"I will not confess," said she. "I love all dumb beasts, as much as my

poor heart may, and I would harm myself rather than them, who cannot

defend themselves. I used the needful simples to cure the cow."

But the sheriff:

"Thou didst give her poison," said he, "for the cow is dead."

"Master sheriff," answered Katheline, "I am here before you, in

your power. I dare say to you, nevertheless, that a beast can die of

sickness, like a man, in spite of the assistance of the surgeons and

the doctors. And I swear by my Lord Christ who died on the cross for

our sins, that I have wished no harm to this cow, but sought to cure

her by simple remedies."

Then said the sheriff, enraged:

"This devil's hag will not always deny, let her be put on another

bench for the torment!"

And therewith he drank a great glass of brandy.

The executioner made Katheline sit on the lid of an oaken coffin

placed upon trestles. The said lid, shaped like a roof, was sharp

as a blade. A great fire was burning in the fireplace, for it was

then November.

Katheline, seated upon the coffin and a spit of sharpened wood, was

shod with tight shoes of new leather and set before the fire. When

she felt the sharp wooden edge of the coffin and the pointed spit

entering her flesh, and when the fire heated and shrank the leather

of her shoes, she cried:

"I suffer a thousand pangs! Who will give me black poison?"

"Put her nearer the fire," said the sheriff. Then questioning

Katheline:

"How often," said he, "didst thou bestride a broom to go to the

Sabbath? How often didst thou blast the corn in the ear, the fruit

upon the tree, the babe in the mother's womb? How often didst thou

turn two brothers to sworn foes, and two sisters into rivals filled

with hatred?"

Katheline would have spoken, but could not, and moved her arms as

though to say no. The sheriff then:

"She will only speak when she feels all her witch fat melt in the

fire. Put her nearer."

Katheline cried out. The sheriff said:

"Pray to Satan that he may cool thee."

She made a movement as though she would take off her shoes that were

smoking in the fierceness of the fire.

"Pray to Satan that he pull off thy shoes," said the sheriff.

The clock was striking ten, the furious creature's dinner hour;

he went away with the executioner and the clerk, leaving Katheline

alone before the fire, in the torture chamber.

At eleven they came back and found Katheline seated stiff and

motionless. The clerk said:

"She is dead, I think."

The sheriff ordered the executioner to take Katheline down from the

coffin and the shoes from off her feet. Not being able to pull them

off, he cut them away, and the feet of Katheline were disclosed red

and bleeding.

And the sheriff, thinking of his meal, looked at her without a word;

but presently she recovered her senses, and falling on the ground

and unable to rise for all her efforts, she said to the sheriff:

"Once on a time wouldst fain have had me to wife, but now thou

shalt not have me. Four times three it is the sacred number, and the

thirteenth is the husband."

Then as the sheriff would have spoken, she said to him:

"Stay silent, he has hearing finer than the archangel that in heaven

counts the heart beats of the just. Why dost thou come so late? Four

times three it is the sacred number, he slayeth those that desire me."

The sheriff said:

"She receives the devil in her bed."

"She is out of her wits with the anguish of the torment," said

the clerk.

Katheline was taken back to prison. Three days after, the sheriff's

court being assembled in the Vierschare, Katheline after deliberation

was condemned to the fire.

The executioner and his assistants brought her to the marketplace

of Damme where there was a scaffold on which she mounted. In the

marketplace were the provost, the herald, and the judges.

The trumpets of the town herald sounded three times, and turning to

the people he announced:

"The magistrate of Damme, having had compassion on the woman Katheline,

has been pleased not to exact punishment according to the extreme

rigour of the law of the town, but in order to bear witness that

she is a witch, her hair shall be burned, she shall pay twenty gold

carolus by way of fine, and shall be banished for three years from

the precincts of Damme under pain of losing one limb."

And the people applauded this harsh lenity.

The executioner thereupon bound Katheline to the stake, set a wig of

tow upon her shaven head and set it on fire. And the tow burned long

and Katheline cried out and wept.

Then she was unbound and taken without the boundaries of Damme upon

a cart, for her feet were burned.

XXXIX

Ulenspiegel being now at Bois-le-Duc in Brabant, the magnates of the

town would fain have appointed him their fool, but he would none of

this dignity. "Pilgrim on pilgrimage cannot play fool as a permanency,

but only at inns and on the highways."

At this same time Philip, who was King of England, came to visit the

countries of his future inheritance, Flanders, Brabant, Hainault,

Holland, and Zealand. He was then in his twenty-ninth year; in his

grayish eyes dwelt sour melancholy, savage dissimulation, and cruel

resolution. Cold was his countenance, and stiff his head covered with

tawny hair; stiff, too, his meagre torso and spindle limbs. Slow was

his speech and thick as though he had wool in his mouth.

Amid tourneys, jousts, and feastings, he visited the joyous duchy of

Brabant, the rich county Flanders, and his other seignories. Everywhere

he swore to observe and confirm the privileges; but when at Brussels

he took oath upon the Testament to observe the Golden Bull of Brabant

his hand clenched so tight that he must needs take it away from the

sacred book.

He went to Antwerp, where they put up twenty-three triumphal arches to

receive him. The city disbursed two hundred and eighty-seven thousand

florins to pay for these arches and for the costumes of eighteen

hundred and seventy-nine merchants all clad in crimson velvet and for

the rich livery of four hundred and sixteen lackeys and the brilliant

silk trappings of four thousand burgesses, all clad alike. Many feasts

were given by the rhetoricians of all the cities in the Low Countries,

or nearly all.

There were seen, with their fools male and female, the Prince of Love,

of Tournai, mounted upon a sow that was called Astarte; the King

of Fools, of Lille, who led a horse by the tail and walked behind;

the Prince of Pleasure, of Valenciennes, who amused himself counting

how many times his donkey broke wind; the Abbot of Mirth, of Arras,

who drank Brussels wine from a flask shaped like a breviary, and

that was gay reading; the Abbot of the Paux-Pourvus, of Ath, who was

provided with linen full of holes and boots down at heel, but had a

sausage with which he made good provision for his belly; the Provost

of Madcaps, a young man mounted on a shy goat, and who trotting in the

crowd got many a thwack because of her; the Abbot of the Silver Dish,

from Quesnoy, who mounted on his horse pretended to be sitting in a

dish, saying "there is no beast so big that fire cannot cook him."

And they played all kinds of harmless foolery, but the King remained

sad and severe.

That same evening, the Markgrave of Antwerp, the burgomasters,

captains and deans, assembled together to find out some game or play

that might win Philip the King to laughter.

Said the Markgrave:

"Have ye not heard tell of a certain Pierkin Jacobsen, the town-fool

of Bois-le-Duc, and far renowned for his merry tricks?"

"Yes," said the others.

"Well!" said the Markgrave, "let us summon him to come hither, and

bid him do us some nimblewitted turn, since our own fool has his

boots stuffed with lead."

"Let us summon him hither," said they.

When the messenger from Antwerp came to Bois-le-Duc, they told him that

the fool Pierkin had snuffed out his candle with over-much laughing,

but that there was in the town another fool, a bird of passage,

called Ulenspiegel. The messenger went to look for him in a tavern

where he was eating a fricassee of mussels and making a petticoat

for a girl with the shells.

Ulenspiegel was delighted when he knew that it was for him the courier

of the commune had come all the way from Antwerp, mounted upon a fine

horse of Vuern-Ambacht and leading another by the bridle.

Without setting foot to ground, the courier asked him if he knew

where to find a new trick to make King Philip laugh.

"I have a mine of them under my hair," answered Ulenspiegel.

They went away together. The two horses galloping loose-reined brought

Ulenspiegel and the courier to Antwerp.

Ulenspiegel made his appearance before the Markgrave, the two

burgomasters, and the officials of the commune.

"What do you intend to do?" asked the Markgrave.

"Fly in the air," replied Ulenspiegel.

"How will you set about this?" asked the Markgrave.

"Do you know," asked Ulenspiegel, "what is worth less than a burst

bladder?"

"I do not know," said the Markgrave.

"A secret that has been let out," replied Ulenspiegel.

In the meanwhile, the heralds of the games, mounted upon their handsome

steeds caparisoned with crimson velvet, rode through all the main

streets, squares, and carfaxes of the city, sounding clarions and

with beat of drum. In this fashion they announced to the signorkes

and the signorkinnes that Ulenspiegel, the fool of Damme, would fly

in the air at the quay, there being present upon a staging King Philip

and his high illustrious and distinguished company.

Over against the staging there was a house built in the Italian

fashion, with a gutter running along the whole length of the roof. A

garret window opened upon the gutter.

Ulenspiegel on this day went through the city everywhere riding upon

an ass. A footman ran alongside him. Ulenspiegel had donned the fine

robe of crimson silk the magnates of the commune had given him. His

headgear was a hood, crimson as well, on which were seen two asses'

ears with a bell on the tip of each. He wore a necklace of copper

medallions embossed with the shield of Antwerp. On the sleeves of the

robe there tinkled at each pointed elbow a gilt bell. He had shoes

with gilt soles, and a bell at the tip of each.

His ass was caparisoned with crimson silk and on each thigh carried

the shield of Antwerp broidered in fine gold.

The footman brandished a donkey's head in one hand and in the other

a branch at the end of which chimed a cowbell from a forest-bred cow.

Ulenspiegel, leaving his ass and his footman in the street, climbed

up into the gutter.

There, shaking his bells, he opened out his arms as if he was on the

point of flying. Then leaning down towards King Philip, he said:

"I thought there was no fool in Antwerp save only me, but I perceive

the town is full of them. If you had told me you were going to fly,

I should not have believed you; but let a fool come and tell you he

will do it, and you believe him. How would you have me fly, since I

have no wings?"

Some laughed, others swore, but all said:

"This fool says what is none the less quite true."

But King Philip remained stiff as a king of stone.

And the magnates of the commune said softly one to the other:

"There was no need to make such great festival for such a sour-face."

And they gave three florins to Ulenspiegel, who departed, first

perforce restoring to them the robe of crimson silk.

"What are three florins in the pouch of a young man but a snowball

before a fire, a full bottle in front of you, wide-throated

drinkers? Three florins! The leaves fall from the trees and sprout

again upon them, but florins leave pouches and return thither no more:

the butterflies flitter away with the summer time, and the florins,

too, although they weigh two estrelins and nine as."

So saying, Ulenspiegel contemplated his three florins closely.

"What a haughty mien," murmured he, "hath the Emperor Charles upon the

obverse, cuirassed and helmeted, holding a sword in one hand and in

the other the globe of this poor earthly world! He is by the grace of

God Emperor of the Romans, King of Spain, and so forth, and he is most

gracious towards these our countries, this emperor in the cuirass. And

here on the reverse is a shield on which are graven and displayed the

arms of a duke, count, etc., pertaining to his divers possessions,

with this goodly device: Da mihi virtutem contra hostes tuos: 'Give

me strength against thy enemies.' He was valiant indeed against those

of the reformed that have goods to confiscate, and he inheriteth

them. Ah! were I the Emperor Charles, I would have florins minted

for everybody, and each man being rich, no one should work more."

But Ulenspiegel looked in vain at the lovely money; it was gone

towards the land of ruin to the clinking of quart pots and the chiming

of bottles.

XL

While he displayed himself on the gutter all clad in crimson silk,

Ulenspiegel had not seen Nele who from the crowd was looking on him

smiling. She was living at this time at Borgerhout near Antwerp,

and thought that if some fool was to fly before King Philip, it could

only be her friend Ulenspiegel.

As he marched along the way, plunged in reverie, he did not hear a

sound of hastening steps behind him, but felt two hands that were

laid flat upon his eyes. Guessing Nele instinctively:

"Are you there?" said he.

"Aye," she said, "I have been running behind you ever since you came

out of the city. Come with me."

"But where," said he, "where is Katheline?"

"Thou dost not know it," said she, "that she was tortured unjustly for

a witch, then banished out of Damme for three years, and that they

burned her feet and burned tow upon her head. I tell thee this that

thou mayest have no fear of her, for she is out of her wits because

of the cruel torment. Often she spends whole hours looking at her

feet and saying: 'Hanske, my sweet devil, see what they did to thy

dear. And her poor feet are like two wounds.' Then she weeps, saying:

'Other women have a husband or a lover, but I live at this moment as a

widow.' I tell her then that Hanske will hate her if she speaks of him

before other folk than me. And she obeys me like a child save when she

sees a cow or an ox, the cause of her torture; then she flees running

without stay, and nothing can stop her, fences, streams, or ditches,

till she falls for weariness in some corner of the wayside or against

the wall of a farm, whither I go and take her up and dress her poor

feet that are by then all bleeding. And I deem that in burning the

hank of tow they burned also her brain in her head."

And both were grieved thinking upon Katheline.

They came to her and saw her sitting upon a bench in the sun against

the wall of a house. Ulenspiegel said to her:

"Do you know me?"

"Four times three," quoth she, "it is the sacred number, and the

thirteenth is Thereb. Who art thou, child of this wicked world?"

"I am Ulenspiegel," he answered, "the son of Soetkin and of Claes."

She shook her head and knew him; then beckoning him close with her

finger and bending to his ear:

"If thou see him whose kisses are as snow, tell him to come back to

me, Ulenspiegel."

Then showing her burned hair:

"I am ill," she said; "they have taken my wits, but when he comes he

will fill my head again, which now is all empty. Hearest thou? it

sounds like a bell; it is my soul knocking at the door to depart,

because it burns. If Hanske comes and has no mind to fill me my head

again, I will tell him to make a hole in it with a knife: the soul

that is there, ever knocking to come out, grieveth me cruelly, and

I shall die, yea. And now I never sleep, and I look for him always,

and he must fill me my head again, yea."

And sinking down again, she groaned.

And the peasants that were coming back from the fields to go to

dinner, while the church bell called them to it, passed before

Katheline saying:

"There is the madwife."

And they made the sign of the cross.

And Nele and Ulenspiegel wept, and Ulenspiegel must needs go on upon

his pilgrimage.

XLI

At this time as he pilgrimaged he entered into the service of one

Josse, surnamed the Kwaebakker, the cross baker, because of his

vinegar face. The Kwaebakker gave him three stale loaves every week

for his food, and for lodging a sloping garret under the roof, where

the rain rained and the wind blew marvellously.

Seeing himself so evilly entreated, Ulenspiegel played him different

tricks and this among them. When they bake in the early morning,

the flour must be bolted over night. One night, then, when the moon

was shining, Ulenspiegel asked for a candle to see to work and had

this answer from his master:

"Bolt the flour in the light of the moon."

Ulenspiegel, obeying him, bolted the flour upon the earth, where the

moonlight was shining.

In the morning the Kwaebakker, coming to see how much work Ulenspiegel

had done, found him still bolting and said to him:

"Does flour now cost nothing at all that it should be bolted on the

ground like this?"

"I bolted the flour in the moonlight as you had bidden me," answered

Ulenspiegel.

The baker replied:

"Pack-donkey, it was in a sieve you should have done it."

"I thought the moon was a new-fangled kind of sieve," replied

Ulenspiegel. "But there will be no great loss, I will scrape up

the flour."

"It is too late," answered the Kwaebakker, "to get ready the dough

and to bake it."

Ulenspiegel rejoined:

"Baes, our neighbour's dough is ready in the mill; shall I go and

take that?"

"Go to the gallows," replied the Kwaebakker, "and fetch what is

on that."

"I go, baes," answered Ulenspiegel.

He ran to the gallows field, found there the dried hand of a robber,

brought it to the Kwaebakker, and said:

"Here is a hand of glory that maketh invisible all those that carry

it. Wilt thou henceforward conceal thy evil disposition?"

"I shall inform the commune against you," replied the Kwaebakker, "and

you will see that you have infringed upon the rights of the overlord."

When they were both before the burgomaster, the Kwaebakker, wishing

to tell the whole rosary of Ulenspiegel's misdeeds and delinquencies,

saw that he was opening his eyes to their widest. He became so angry

at this that interrupting his deposition he said to him:

"What do you want?"

Ulenspiegel replied:

"You told me you would accuse me in such wise that I 'would see.' I

am trying to see, that is why I look."

"Out of my eyes," cried the baker.

"If I was in your eyes," answered Ulenspiegel, "I could only come out,

seeing that you shut them, through your nostrils."

The burgomaster, seeing that this day was the day for the fair of

japes, would listen to them no longer.

Ulenspiegel and the Kwaebakker went away together, the Kwaebakker

raised his cudgel on him; Ulenspiegel dodged it, saying:

"Baes, since it is with blows my flour is to be sifted, you take the

bran of it--it is your anger: I keep the white--it is my gaiety."

Then showing him his nether face:

"And here," he added, "is the door of the oven, if you want to bake."

XLII

Ulenspiegel as he pilgrimaged would gladly have turned highway robber,

but he found the stones too heavy to carry.

He was trudging by chance on the road to Audenaerde where there was

then a garrison of Flemish reiters charged with the defence of the

town against the French bands that ravaged the country like locusts.

The reiters had at their head a certain captain, a Frisian born,

by name Kornjuin. They also overran the low country and pillaged the

peoples, who were thus, as usual, devoured on both sides.

Everything was good in their eyes: hens, chickens, ducks, pigeons,

calves, and pigs. One day, as they were coming back laden with plunder,

Kornjuin and his lieutenants saw at the foot of a tree Ulenspiegel

lying asleep and dreaming of fricassees.

"What do you do for a living?" asked Kornjuin.

"I'm dying of hunger," replied Ulenspiegel.

"What is your trade?"

"To go on pilgrimage for my sins, look on at others toiling, dance on

the rope, paint pretty faces, carve knife handles, play the rommel-pot,

and blow the trumpet."

Now if Ulenspiegel spoke so bold of trumpets, it was because he had

learned that the post of watchman to the Castle of Audenaerde was

vacant after the death of an old man who had held it.

Kornjuin said to him:

"You shall be trumpeter to the town."

Ulenspiegel went with him and was posted on the tallest tower on the

ramparts, in a little box of a cell well ventilated by the four winds,

all except the south wind that fanned it only with one wing.

He was enjoined to sound the trumpet as soon as he might see an enemy

coming and, to that end, to keep his head clear and his eyes keen;

and so they did not give him overmuch either to eat or to drink.

The captain and his soldiers stayed in the tower and feasted there all

day long at the expense of the low country. There was killed and eaten

there more than one capon whose one crime was to be plump. Ulenspiegel,

always forgotten and forced to be satisfied with his meagre soup, found

no pleasure in the smell of the sauces. The French came and carried

off a great deal of cattle; Ulenspiegel did not sound his trumpet.

Kornjuin climbed up to his cell and said to him:

"Why did you not sound the trumpet?"

Ulenspiegel said to him:

"I give you no thanks for your provender."

The next day, the captain ordered a great feast for himself and his

soldiers, but Ulenspiegel was still forgotten. They were on the point

of beginning to gorge, when Ulenspiegel blew his trumpet.

Kornjuin and his soldiers, thinking it was the French, left their

wines and meats, leapt upon their horses, rode hastily out of the town,

but found nothing in the country but an ox chewing the cud in the sun,

and brought him back with them.

Meanwhile, Ulenspiegel had filled himself with wines and meats. The

captain as he returned saw him standing, smiling, and his legs

tottering at the door of the feast hall. He said to him:

"It is traitor's work to sound the alarm when you do not see the enemy,

and not to sound it when you do see them."

"Master captain," said Ulenspiegel, "I am in my tower so puffed out

and swollen up with the four winds that I could float like a bladder

if I had not blown in my trumpet to ease me. Have me hanged now,

or another time when you need an ass's skin for your drums."

Kornjuin went away without a word.

Meanwhile, news came to Audenaerde that the gracious Emperor Charles

was about to come to the town, with a most noble company. On this

occasion the sheriffs gave Ulenspiegel a pair of spectacles that he

might the better discern His Sacred Majesty's coming. Ulenspiegel was

to blow three blasts on the trumpet as soon as he saw the Emperor

marching upon Luppeghem, which is a quarter of a league away from

the Borg-poort.

Thus the townsfolk would have time to ring their bells, to make ready

fireworks, to put the meats in the oven, and to broach the hogsheads.

One day, towards noon, the wind was blowing from Brabant and the sky

was clear: Ulenspiegel saw on the road leading to Luppeghem a great

band of horsemen mounted on caracoling steeds, the long feathers

in their caps streaming in the wind. Some carried banners. He who

rode proudly at their head wore a bonnet of cloth of gold with great

plumes. He was arrayed in brown velvet broidered with brocatel.

Ulenspiegel put on his spectacles and saw it was the Emperor Charles

the Fifth who was coming to give the folk of Audenaerde permission

to serve him their choicest wines and their choicest viands.

His whole band was moving leisurely, snuffing up the fresh air that

awakens appetite, but Ulenspiegel thought that they made good cheer

by custom and might very well fast for one day without perishing. So

he looked on at them as they came and did not blow his trumpet.

They came on laughing and talking freely, whilst His Sacred Majesty

looked into his stomach to see if there was enough room for the dinner

of the Audenaerde folk. He appeared surprised and displeased that no

bell rang to announce his coming.

At this juncture a peasant entered the town running, to announce that

he had seen a French band riding in the neighbourhood and marching

upon the town to devour and pillage everything.

At this word the porter fastened the gate and sent a servant of the

commune to warn the other porters of the town. But the reiters feasted

without knowing anything.

His Majesty was still coming on, annoyed not to hear bells and cannon

and arquebuses sounding and thundering and volleying. Straining his

ears in vain, he heard nothing but the chime marking the half hour. He

arrived before the gate, found it shut and beat on it with his fist

to have it opened.

And the lords in his retinue, angry like him, muttered sour

speeches. The porter who was on the summit of the ramparts cried out

to them that if they did not put an end to this hubbub he would spray

them with grapeshot to cool their impatience.

But His Majesty in a fury:

"Blind hog," said he, "dost thou not know thy Emperor?"

The porter answered:

That the least hoggish are not always the most gilded; that he knew,

besides, that the French were good mockers by their nature, since

the Emperor Charles, at this moment waging war in Italy, could not

be at the gates of Audenaerde.

Thereupon Charles and the lords cried out the more, saying:

"If thou dost not open, we shall roast thee on the point of a

spear. And thou shalt eat thy keys first and foremost."

At the noise they were making, an old man-at-arms came out from the

artillery room and showing his nose above the wall:

"Porter," said he, "you are all wrong, it is our Emperor yonder;

I know him well, though he has aged since he took Maria van der

Gheynst from here to the Castle of Lallaing."

The porter fell down stiff as death with terror, and the man-at-arms

seized his keys and went to open the gate.

The Emperor asked why he had been forced to wait so long: the

man-at-arms having told him, His Majesty ordered him to shut the gate

again, and to fetch him the reiters of Kornjuin, whom he commanded

to march before him beating their tambourines and playing their fifes.

Soon one by one the bells awoke to sound full peal. Thus preceded,

His Majesty came with an imperial din to the Great Marketplace. The

burgomasters and sheriffs were all assembled there; the sheriff

Ian Guigelaar came out at the noise. He went back into the council

chamber saying:

"Keyser Karel is alhier! The Emperor Charles is here!"

Sorely affrighted to hear these tidings, the burgomasters, sheriffs,

and councillors came out from the Townhall to go in a body to greet

the Emperor, while their men ran throughout the whole town to have

the fireworks got ready, to put the chickens to the fire, and to

broach the casks.

Men, women, and children ran everywhere crying:

"Keyser Karel is op't groot marckt! The Emperor is in the Great

Market!"

Ere long great was the crowd in the square.

The Emperor, in deep anger, asked the two burgomasters if they did not

deserve to be hanged for thus failing in respect to their sovereign.

The burgomasters replied that they deserved hanging indeed, but

that Ulenspiegel, the trumpeter of the tower, deserved it much

more, seeing that upon the rumour of His Majesty's coming he had

been stationed there, equipped with a good pair of barnacles, with

express instructions that he should sound his trumpet three times

as soon as he should see the imperial convoy approaching. But he had

done nothing of this.

The Emperor, still angry, asked them to send for Ulenspiegel.

"Why," said he, "having such clear spectacles, didst thou not blow

a point on the trumpet at my coming?"

So saying, he passed his hand over his eyes, because of the brightness

of the sun, and looked at Ulenspiegel.

Ulenspiegel also passed his hand over his eyes, and replied that

since he had seen His Sacred Majesty looking between his fingers,

he had no longer desired to make use of the spectacles.

The Emperor told him he was to be hanged, the town porter said it was

well done, and the burgomasters were so terrified at this sentence that

they made no word of answer, neither to approve it nor to oppose it.

The executioner and his assistants were sent for. They came carrying a

ladder and a new rope, seized Ulenspiegel by the collar, as he walked

in front of Kornjuin's hundred reiters, keeping very quiet and saying

his prayers. But they mocked him bitterly.

The people who were following said:

"It is a great cruelty to put to death a poor young man in this way

for so small a fault."

And the weavers were there in great numbers and under arms, and

they said:

"We shall not leave Ulenspiegel to be hanged: it is contrary to the

law of Audenaerde."

By now they were come to the gallows field, Ulenspiegel was hoisted up

on the ladder, and the executioner put the rope on him. The weavers

flocked up around the gallows. The provost was there on horseback,

resting the rod of justice on his horse's shoulder, the wand wherewith

at the Emperor's word he should give the signal for the execution.

All the assembled people cried out:

"Mercy! mercy for Ulenspiegel!"

Ulenspiegel upon his ladder said:

"Pity! gracious Emperor!"

The Emperor lifted his hand and said:

"If this rascal asks me for something I cannot do, he shall have

his life!"

"Speak, Ulenspiegel," cried the people.

The women wept and said:

"He can ask for nothing, poor fellow, for the Emperor can do all

things."

And all said:

"Speak, Ulenspiegel!"

"Sacred Majesty," said Ulenspiegel, "I shall ask thee neither for

money, nor for lands, nor for life, but only one thing, for which thou

must not, if I dare to say it, have me whipped nor laid on the rack,

before I depart to the land of spirits."

"I promise thee this," said the Emperor.

"Majesty," said Ulenspiegel, "I ask that before I be hanged, you

shall come and kiss the mouth with which I speak no Flemish."

The Emperor, laughing like all the people, replied:

"I cannot do what thou dost ask, and thou shalt not hang, Ulenspiegel."

But he condemned the burgomasters and sheriffs to wear spectacles on

the back of their heads for six months, in order, said he, that if

the Audenaerde folk do not see in front, they may at least see behind.

And by imperial decree, these spectacles are still seen in the arms

of the town.

And Ulenspiegel went away modestly, with a little bag of money the

women had given him.

XLIII

Ulenspiegel being at Liege, in the fish market, he followed after a

big young man who with a net bag under one arm filled with every kind

of poultry was filling another with haddocks, trout, eels, and pike.

Ulenspiegel knew Lamme Goedzak.

"What are you doing here, Lamme?" said he.

"You know," said he, "how many Flanders folk have come to this kind

country of Liege; for me, I follow my love here. And you?"

"I seek a master to serve for my bread," replied Ulenspiegel.

"That is very dry food," said Lamme. "It would be better for you to

pass from dish to mouth a rosary of ortolans with a thrush for Credo."

"You are rich?" asked Ulenspiegel.

Lamme Goedzak answered:

"I have lost my father, my mother, and my young sister that used to

beat me so soundly; I shall inherit their goods, and I live with a

one-eyed servant woman, a great doctor in fricassees."

"Would you like me to carry your fish and your poultry?" asked

Ulenspiegel.

"Aye," said Lamme.

And together they wandered about the market.

Suddenly Lamme said:

"Do you know why you are mad?"

"No," replied Ulenspiegel.

"Because you are carrying your fish and your poultry in your hand,

instead of carrying them in your belly."

"You have said well, Lamme," said Ulenspiegel; "but since I have no

longer even bread, the ortolans won't look at me now."

"You shall eat them, Ulenspiegel," said Lamme, "and you shall serve

me if my cook will have you."

While they were wending their way, Lamme pointed out to Ulenspiegel

a pretty, neat, and lovesome girl, in silk attire, who was hastening

about the market here and there and looked at Lamme with her soft eyes.

An old man, her father, walked behind her, laden with two net bags,

one of fish, the other of game.

"That one," said Lamme, pointing to her, "I am going to make her

my wife."

"Aye," said Ulenspiegel, "I know her, she is Flemish from Zotteghem,

she lives in the rue Vinave-d'Isle, and the neighbours say that her

mother sweeps the street, in front of the house, instead of her,

and that her father irons her shifts."

But Lamme made no answer and said gleefully:

"She looked at me."

They came together to Lamme's house, near the Pont-des-Arches, and

knocked at the door. A one-eyed serving woman came and opened to

them. Ulenspiegel saw she was old, lean and long, flat and fierce.

"La Sanginne," said Lamme to her, "will you have this one to help

you in your work?"

"I will take him on trial," said she.

"Take him, then," said he, "and make him know and test the delights

of your cookery."

La Sanginne then put three black puddings on the table, a quart of

cervoise ale, and a big hunch of bread.

While Ulenspiegel ate, Lamme also munched a black pudding.

"Do you know," said he, "where our soul hath its habitation?"

"No, Lamme," said Ulenspiegel.

"In our stomach it dwelleth," said Lamme, "to delve therein without

ceasing and ever renew in our bodies the force of life. And what are

its best companions? They are all good and choice eatables and wine

of the Meuse over and above."

"Aye," said Ulenspiegel, "black puddings are agreeable company for

the lonely soul."

"He wants more of them, give him some, la Sanginne," said Lamme.

La Sanginne gave him more, this time white puddings.

While he was eating largely, Lamme, grown pensive, said:

"When I die, my belly will die with me, and there below in purgatory,

I shall be left fasting, carrying my paunch about with me all flabby

and empty."

"The black seem to me better," said Ulenspiegel.

"You have eaten six," replied la Sanginne, "and you shall have

no more."

"You know," said Lamme, "that you will be well treated here and will

eat like myself."

"I will remember that word," said Ulenspiegel.

Ulenspiegel, seeing that he ate the same as Lamme, was happy and

content. The black puddings had given him so high a spirit that on

that day he made all the caldrons, pans, and cooking pots shine and

glitter like so many suns.

Living well in this house, he delighted to haunt kitchen and cellar,

leaving the garret to the cats. One day, la Sanginne had two fowls

to roast and bade Ulenspiegel turn the spit while she went to the

market to fetch herbs for the seasoning.

The two fowls being roasted, Ulenspiegel ate one. La Sanginne,

returning, said:

"There were two fowls, now I see only one."

"Open your other eye, you will see both of them," replied Ulenspiegel.

She went all in a rage to tell the business to Lamme Goedzak, who

came down into the kitchen and said to Ulenspiegel:

"Why do you make game of my servant? There were two fowls."

"There were of a truth two, Lamme," said Ulenspiegel, "but when I came

here you told me I should drink and eat as yourself. There were two

fowls; I have eaten one, you will eat the other; my pleasure is past,

yours is to come; are you not better off than I?"

"Yea," said Lamme, smiling, "but do everything la Sanginne bids you,

and you will have but half tasks."

"I shall watch that, Lamme," replied Ulenspiegel.

And so, every time that la Sanginne bade him do anything, he only did

the half of it; if she told him to draw two buckets of water from the

well, he brought back only one; if she told him to go and fill a jug

of cervoise from the cask, he poured half of it down his throat on

the way and so on with the rest.

At length la Sanginne, grown tired of these ways, told Lamme that

if this good-for-naught remained in the house, she would go away on

the spot.

Lamme went down to Ulenspiegel and said to him:

"You must depart, my son, although you have come to look well in

this house. Listen to that cock crowing, it is two o'clock of the

afternoon, it is a presage of rain. I would fain not turn you out of

doors in this ill weather that is about to come upon us; but consider,

my son, that la Sanginne by her fricassees is the warden of my life;

I cannot, without risking a speedy death, allow her to leave me. Go,

then, my boy, with God's grace, and to enliven your way take these

three florins and this string of saveloys."

And Ulenspiegel went away grieving, regretting Lamme and his fleshpots.

XLIV

November came to Damme and elsewhere, but the winter was tardy. No

snow, no rain, nor cold weather; the sun shone from morning to evening

without dimming: the children rolled about in the dust of the streets

and the highways; at the hour of repose, after supper, the merchants,

shopkeepers, goldsmiths, wheelwrights, and artisans came out upon their

doorsteps to look on the sky that was always blue, the trees whose

leaves were still not falling, the storks standing up on the ridges

of the roofs, and the swallows that had not yet gone away. The roses

had flowered thrice, and for the fourth time were in bud; the nights

were warm, the nightingale had not ceased to sing.

The folk of Damme said:

"Winter is dead, let us burn winter."

And they built a giant figure with a bear's face, a long beard of

shavings, a thick shock head of flax. They clothed him in white

garments and burned him with great ceremony.

Claes was steeped in melancholy, he blessed not the sky that was

ever blue, nor the swallows that would not depart. For now nobody in

Damme was burning charcoal save for cooking, and each having enough

did not go to buy from Claes, who had disbursed all his savings to

pay for his stock.

So, if standing on his doorstep, the coalman felt the tip of his nose

grow chilly in some puff of sharpish wind:

"Ah!" he would say, "it is my bread coming to me!"

But the sharp wind would not continue to blow, and the sky stayed

always blue, and the leaves would not fall. And Claes refused to

sell his stock at half price to the miser Grypstuiver, the dean of

the fishmongers. And soon bread began to lack in the cottage.

XLV

But King Philip was not hungry, and ate pastries by the side of his

wife, ugly Mary, of the royal house of the Tudors. He did not love her

for love, but hoped by begetting a child on this miserable creature

to give the English nation a Spanish monarch.

He loathed this union which was a union of a paving stone and of

a burning coal. Still, they were sufficiently united to have poor

Protestants burned and drowned by hundreds.

When Philip was not away from London, or slipped out in disguise

to wallow in some evil haunt, the bedtime hour brought the wedded

pair together.

Then Queen Mary, attired in fine linen of Tournai and Irish lace,

would lie down supine upon the nuptial couch, while Philip would stand

before her rigid as a post, and look if he could not see in his wife

some sign or symptom of motherhood; but seeing none he was wroth,

said no word, and stared at his nails.

Then the barren ghoul spoke tenderly and with her eyes, which she

sought to make soft, begged the frosty Philip for love. Tears, cries,

entreaties, she spared nothing to win a lukewarm caress from him who

loved her not at all.

Vainly, joining her hands, she dragged herself at his feet; in vain,

like a woman out of her wits, she wept and laughed together to soften

him; nor the laugh nor the tears melted the stone of that hard heart.

In vain, like an amorous snake, she coiled her thin arms about him

and clasped against her flat breast the narrow cage in which dwelt

the stunted soul of the bloody king; he budged no more than if he

had been stock or stone.

She tried, poor ugly thing, to make herself alluring; she called him

by all the sweet names that women wild with love give the lover of

their choice; Philip still stared at his nails.

Sometimes he answered:

"Will you not have any children?"

At that word, Mary's head fell forward on her breast.

"Is it my fault," said she, "if I am barren? Take pity upon me,

I live a widow's life."

"Why have you no children?" said Philip.

Then the Queen fell on the carpet like one smitten with death. And

in her eyes were only tears, and she would have wept blood, if she

had been able, the poor ghoul.

And in this wise God avenged upon their murderers the victims with

which they had strewn the soil of England.

XLVI

The rumour ran among the people that the Emperor Charles was minded

to take away from the monks the free heirship of all who died in

their convents, which mightily displeased the Pope.

Ulenspiegel being then upon the banks of the Meuse thought that the

Emperor thus reaped his profit on all sides, since he was the heir

when the family did not inherit. He sate him down on the bank of the

river and cast into it a well-baited line. Then munching an ancient

piece of brown bread, he regretted that he had no wine of Romagna to

wash it down withal, but he bethought him that a man cannot always

have his comforts.

However, he tossed some of his bread into the water, saying that he

who eats without sharing his meal with his neighbour is not worthy

to have victual to eat.

Up came a gudgeon, that first came to nose at a crumb, licked it all

about and opened up his innocent mouth, believing, doubtless, that

the bread would fall into it of its own accord. While he was thus

gazing into the air, he was all at once gulped down by a treacherous

pike that darted out on him like an arrow.

The pike did the same to a carp that was catching flies in their

flight, heedless of any danger. Being thus nobly replete, he remained

motionless and still, dilly-dallying, scorning the small fry that

in any case made haste to flee from his presence with all their

fins. While he was basking in this fashion, upon him came swift,

voracious jaws agape, a fasting pike that with one bound hurled himself

upon him. A fierce battle was joined between them: undying jaw strokes

were given and taken; the water ran red with their blood. The pike

that had dined could ill defend himself against the pike that was

fasting; and the latter having hauled off, returned with a rush and

flung himself like a bullet on his adversary, who, awaiting him with

wide-open jaws, swallowed his head half way, and would fain have

got rid of it again, but could not because of his backward slanting

teeth. And both thrashed about miserably.

Thus interlocked together, they saw not a stout hook that, fastened

to a silk twine, rose up from the bottom of the water, sank deep in

under the fin of the pike that had dined, drew him out of the water

with his adversary, and cast them both rudely on the grass together.

Ulenspiegel, as he killed them, said:

"Pikes, my dears, would you two be the Pope and the Emperor devouring

each the other, and would not I be the people who in God's hour seize

you on the hook, both of you amid your battles?"

XLVII

Meanwhile Katheline, who had not left Borgerhout, never ceased from

wandering through the outskirts of the place, still saying: "Hanske,

my man, they have made a fire upon my head: make a hole in it that

my soul may win out. Alas! it beats ever against it and with every

blow it is a cruel pang."

And Nele tended her in her madness, and by her side thought sadly of

her friend Ulenspiegel.

And at Damme Claes tied his faggots, sold his charcoal, and many

times fell into melancholy, thinking that the banished Ulenspiegel

could not for long and long come back to their cottage.

Soetkin stayed all day long at the window, looking if she would not

see her son Ulenspiegel coming.

The latter, being arrived in the neighbourhood of Cologne, thought

that for the moment he had a fancy for gardening.

He went and offered himself as servant to Jan of Zuursmoel, who being

a captain of landsknechts, had narrowly escaped hanging in default of

ransom and had an utter horror of hemp, which in the Fleming tongue

was then called kennip.

One day, Jan of Zuursmoel, wishing to show Ulenspiegel his tasks,

brought him to the end of his garden and there they saw a cantle of

land, next to the garden, all planted over with green kennip.

Jan of Zuursmoel said to Ulenspiegel:

"Every time you see this ugly plant, you must entreat it shamefully,

for this it is that serveth for rack and gallows."

"I will shamefully entreat it," replied Ulenspiegel.

Jan of Zuursmoel being one day at table with certain gourmand friends

of his, the cook said to Ulenspiegel:

"Go to the cellar and get some zennip," which is mustard.

Ulenspiegel, cunningly taking it kennip instead of zennip, foully

and shamefully entreated the pot of zennip in the cellar and came

back to put it on the table, not without laughing.

"Why are you laughing?" asked Jan of Zuursmoel. "Do you think that

our nostrils are made of brass? Eat of this zennip, since it is you

that dressed it yourself."

"I like better things grilled with cinnamon," answered Ulenspiegel.

Jan of Zuursmoel got up to beat him.

"There is," said he, "foulness in this pot of mustard."

"Baes," said Ulenspiegel, "have you no mind of the day when I went at

your heels to the far end of your garden? There, you bade me, showing

the zennip: 'Everywhere you see that plant, entreat it foully, for

this it is that serveth for rack and gallows.' I did entreat it so,

baes, I did entreat it shamefully with great affronting; do not now

go to murder me for my obedience."

"I said kennip and not zennip," shouted Jan of Zuursmoel in a fury.

"Baes, you said zennip and not kennip," retorted Ulenspiegel.

Thus they argued loud and long, Ulenspiegel speaking humbly, Jan of

Zuursmoel screaming like an eagle and mixing up zennip, kennip, kemp,

zemp, zemp, kemp, zemp, like a skein of ravelled silk.

And the guests laughed like devils eating cutlets of Dominican friars

and inquisitors' kidneys.

But Ulenspiegel must needs leave Jan of Zuursmoel.

XLVIII

Nele was still always miserable for the sake of herself and her

witless mother.

Ulenspiegel hired himself to a tailor who said to him:

"When you sew, sew close, so that I can see nothing."

Ulenspiegel went and sat under a cask and there began to sew.

"That is not what I mean," cried the tailor.

"I am close in a cask; how do you think any one can see in

it?" answered Ulenspiegel.

"Come," said the tailor, "take your seat there on the table and make

your stitches close one to the other and make the coat like this

wolf--" wolf was the name of a peasant's jerkin.

Ulenspiegel took the jerkin, cut it in pieces and sewed it so as to

give it the semblance and shape of a wolf.

The tailor, seeing this, cried out:

"What have you made, in the devil's name?"

"A wolf," replied Ulenspiegel.

"Evil mocker," said the tailor, "I had told you a wolf, it is true,

but you know that wolf is said of a peasant's jerkin."

Sometime after he said:

"Boy, cast these sleeves on to this doublet before you go to your bed."

Ulenspiegel hung up the doublet on a nail and spent the whole night

throwing the sleeves at it.

The tailor came down to the noise.

"Good-for-naught," said he, "what new ill trick are you playing

me now?"

"Is that an ill trick?" answered Ulenspiegel. "See those sleeves,

I have thrown them all night long against the doublet, and they don't

stick to it yet."

"That is natural," said the tailor. "And that is why I am throwing

you out into the street: see if you will stick there better than the

sleeves did."

XLIX

Meanwhile Nele, when Katheline was in the house of some kindly

neighbour, and well looked after, Nele used to go far far afield,

all alone, as far as Antwerp, all along by the Scheldt or elsewhere,

ever seeking, both on the river banks and on the dusty highways,

if she could not see her friend Ulenspiegel.

One fair-day, being at Hamburg, he saw merchants everywhere, and

among them certain old Jews living on usury and old clothes.

Ulenspiegel, desiring to be a merchant, too, saw lying on the ground

some lumps of horse dung and brought them to his lodging, which was

a bastion of the rampart wall. There he dried them, and then bought

red silk and green silk and made little bags with them, and put the

horse dung in the bags and tied them with ribbon, as if they had been

full of musk.

Then with some pieces of board he made himself a pedlar's tray, hung

it about his neck by means of old cords and came into the market,

carrying in front of him his tray filled with these sachets. In the

evening to light them up he had a little candle burning in their midst.

When any came and asked him what he had for sale, he would reply

mysteriously:

"I will tell you, but let us not speak too loud."

"What is it then?" the customers would say.

"These," Ulenspiegel replied, "are prophetical seeds, fetched straight

from Araby into Flanders, and prepared with mighty art by the master

Abdul-Medil of the kin of the great Mahomet."

Certain customers would say one to another:

"He is a Turk."

But the others:

"This is a pilgrim coming out of Flanders," they would say; "do you

not hear it by his speech?"

And the ragged, lousy, wretched poor folk came to Ulenspiegel and

said to him:

"Give us of these prophetical seeds?"

"When you have florins to buy them," answered Ulenspiegel. And the

poor, ragged, lousy, wretched went away sorrowful, saying:

"There is no content in this world but for the rich."

The tale of these seeds for sale was soon spread abroad in the

market. The citizens said one to another:

"There is a Flanders man there that hath prophetical seeds blessed

at Jerusalem upon the tomb of Our Lord Jesus, but they say he has no

mind to sell them."

And all the good citizens came to Ulenspiegel and asked him for

his seeds.

But Ulenspiegel, who meant to have great profits, answered that they

were not as yet ripened sufficiently, and he had an eye upon two rich

Jews that went wandering about the market.

"I would fain know," said one of the citizens, "what will come of my

ship that is on the sea."

"It will go as far as heaven, if the waves are high enough," said

Ulenspiegel.

Another said, showing him his pretty daughter, all full of blushes:

"This one will doubtless turn out well?"

"Everything turns to what nature will have," replied Ulenspiegel,

for he had just seen the girl give a key to a young man who, puffed

up with content, said to Ulenspiegel:

"Master merchant, give me one of your prophesying bags, that I may

see whether I shall sleep alone to-night."

"It is written," replied Ulenspiegel, "that he who soweth the rye of

seduction reaps the ergot of cuckoldom."

The young man became wrathful.

"What are you talking about?" said he.

"The seeds say," replied Ulenspiegel, "that they wish thee a happy

marriage and a wife that will not bring thee Vulcan's hat. Dost thou

know that headgear?"

Then declaiming like a preacher:

"For she," said he, "that giveth earnest upon the marriage bargain

leaves afterwards the whole merchandise to others for nothing."

Hereupon the girl, wishing to pretend assurance:

"Is all that to be seen in the prophesying sachets?"

"There is a key to be seen there also," said Ulenspiegel low in

her ear.

But the young man had gone already with the key.

Suddenly Ulenspiegel perceived a thief sneaking from a pork butcher's

stall a sausage an ell long and putting it under his cloak. But the

merchant saw him not. The thief, full of glee, came to Ulenspiegel

and said to him:

"What are you selling there, prophet of ill?"

"Sachets wherein you shall see that you will be hanged for loving

sausage overly much," replied Ulenspiegel.

At that word the thief fled swiftly, while the robbed merchant

cried out:

"Stop thief! stop thief!"

But he was too late.

While Ulenspiegel was speaking, the two rich Jews, who had listened

with the sharpest attention, came up to him and said:

"What sellest thou there, Fleming?"

"Sachets," replied Ulenspiegel.

"What can one see," they asked, "by means of thy prophetical seeds?"

"Future events, when one sucks them," replied Ulenspiegel.

The two Jews consulted one another, and the elder said to the other:

"We could see thus when our Messiah will come; that would be a mighty

consolement to us. Let us buy one of these sachets. How much is your

price?" said they.

"Fifty florins," replied Ulenspiegel. "If ye are not willing to pay

this for it, ye may as well be off. He that will not buy the field

must leave the dung where it is."

Seeing Ulenspiegel so determined, they counted out his money, took

away one of the sachets and hied them to their place of assembly,

whither came all the Jews hastily flocking, having learned that one of

the two old men had bought a secret device by which he could discover

and announce the coming of the Messiah.

Apprised of the matter, they would all fain have sucked at the

prophesying sachet without paying; but the elder of the two Jews,

who had bought it and whose name was Jehu, claimed to do this himself.

"Son of Israel," said he, holding the sachet in his hand, "the

Christians mock at us, we are driven out from among our fellowmen, and

folk cry out after us as they cry out after thieves. The Philistines

would fain abase us lower than the earth; they spit in our faces,

for God hath cut our bowstrings and shaken the bridle before us. Must

it still be long, Lord, God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, that

evil cometh to us when we look for good, and the shadows fall when

we hope for the light? Wilt thou soon appear upon the earth, divine

Messiah? When shall the Christians hide themselves in the caves and

the holes of the earth because of the terror they will have of thee

and of thy glory magnifical when thou dost rise up to chastise them?"

And the Jews began to clamour.

"Come, Messias! Suck, Jehu!"

Jehu sucked, and spewing out, cried lamentably:

"I tell you verily this is nothing else but dung, and that pilgrim

out of Flanders is a robber."

Then all the Jews, rushing up, tore open the sachet and saw what it

contained, and went off in high fury to the fair to find Ulenspiegel

there, who forsooth had not awaited their coming.

L

A man of Damme, not being able to pay Claes for his coal, gave him his

most valuable possession, which was an arbalest with twelve quarrels

well pointed to serve as missiles.

In hours when work was slack Claes went shooting with the cross

bow; more than one hare was killed by his prowess and turned into a

fricassee all through harbouring an inordinate love of cabbages.

Then would Claes eat greedily, and Soetkin would say, looking out

upon the empty high road:

"Thyl, my son, dost thou not smell the fragrance of the sauces? He is

an-hungered without doubt at this hour." And all pensive, she would

fain have kept him his share of the feast.

"If he is hungry," said Claes, "it is his own fault; let him come back,

he shall fare as we do."

Claes kept pigeons; he liked, besides, to hear singing and chirruping

about him, warblers, goldfinches, sparrows, and other birds that sing

and chatter. And so he was swift and ready to shoot the buzzards and

the royal sparhawks that were devourers of this poor folk.

Now once when he was measuring coal in the yard, Soetkin pointed out

to him a great bird hovering high in air above the dove cote.

Claes seized his cross bow and said:

"May the Devil save his Hawkship!"

Having made ready his cross bow, he took his stand in the yard,

following every movement of the bird, so as not to miss it. The light

in the sky was between day and night, Claes could only discern a black

speck. He loosed the quarrel and saw a stork come tumbling down into

the yard.

Claes was sorely grieved thereat; but Soetkin was grieved worse,

and cried out:

"Cruel, thou hast slain God's own bird!"

Then she took up the stork, and saw that she was but wounded in a wing,

went to fetch a balsam, and said while she was dressing the wound:

"Stork, my dear, 'tis not clever of you that we all love, to hover

in the sky like the sparhawk we all hate. And so poor folks' arrows

fly to the wrong address. Art thou hurt in thy poor wing, stork,

that dost submit so patiently, knowing that our hands are the loving

hands of friends?"

When the stork was healed, she had everything to eat that she wanted;

but she liked best the fish Claes went and caught in the canal for

her. And every time the bird of God saw him coming, she opened her

huge beak.

She followed Claes about like a dog, but stayed in the kitchen for

preference, warming her belly by the fire, and knocking with her beak

on Soetkin's front as she got the dinner ready, as much as to ask her:

"Is there nothing for me?"

And it was merry to behold this solemn messenger of good luck wandering

about the cottage on her long stilts.

LI

Now the bad days were come again; Claes was working alone and sadly

on the land, for there was not work enough for two. Soetkin stayed

in the cottage alone, dressing in every possible way the beans that

were their daily fare, in order to liven her man's appetite. And she

went singing and laughing so that he should not suffer to see her

sad. The stork stayed close beside her, mounted on one leg and beak

buried in her feathers.

A man on horseback stopped before the cottage; he was all arrayed in

black, very lean, and had an air of profound sadness.

"Is there any one within?" he asked.

"God bless Your Melancholy," answered Soetkin; "but am I, for one, a

phantom that seeing me here you should ask if there is any one within?"

"Where is your father?" asked the horseman.

"If my father's name be Claes, he is out yonder," answered Soetkin,

"and you see him sowing corn."

The horseman went away, and Soetkin, too, all downcast, for she must go

for the sixth time to fetch bread from the baker's without paying for

it. When she came back thence with empty hands, she was astonished

to see Claes coming back to their house, triumphant and lordly,

upon the horse of the man in black, who was going afoot beside him

and holding the rein. Claes was proudly holding in one hand against

his thigh a leathern wallet that seemed well stuffed.

Dismounting, he embraced the man, banged him merrily, then shaking

the bag, he cried out:

"Long live my brother Josse, the good hermit! God keep him in joy,

in fat, in mirth, in health! He is the Josse of benediction, the

Josse of plenty, the Josse of rich fat soups! The stork did not play

us false!" And he put the bag down upon the table.

Therewith said Soetkin lamentably:

"My man, we shall not eat to-day: the baker has denied me bread."

"Bread?" said Claes, opening the bag and pouring out a stream of

gold on the table, "bread? Lo, here is bread, butter, meat, wine,

beer! Here be hams, marrow bones, pies of herons, ortolans, fat hens,

as for great lords! Here is beer in hogsheads and wine by the cask! Mad

and mad will be the baker that will deny us bread, we shall buy no

more in his shop."

"But, my man...!" said Soetkin all a-daze.

"Now, then, hearken," said Claes, "and be light of heart. Katheline,

instead of wearing out her term of banishment in the marquisate of

Antwerp, went on foot, under Nele's guidance, as far as Meyborg. There

Nele told my brother Josse that often we live in black want, in spite

of my sore toil. According to what this good fellow messenger has

told me but now"--and Claes pointed to the horseman in black--"Josse

hath abandoned the Roman religion to adhere to the heresy of Luther."

The man in black replied:

"Those be the heretics that follow the cult of the Great Harlot. For

the Pope hath betrayed his trust and is a seller of holy things."

"Ah!" said Soetkin, "speak not so loud, good sir, you will cause us

to be burned all three."

"And so," said Claes, "Josse said to this good fellow messenger that

since he was about to fight among the troops of Frederick of Saxony,

and was taking him fifty well-found men at arms, he had no need,

going into war, of so much money, to bequeath it in some ill hour to

some rogue of a landsknecht. 'So,' said he, 'take it to my brother

Claes, with my blessing, these seven hundred gold florins carolus:

tell him to live in comfort and think upon his soul's salvation'."

"Aye," said the horseman, "it is time for it, for God will render

unto man according to his works, and will entreat each one according

as he hath deserved in his life."

"Good sir," said Claes, "it will not be forbidden me in the meantime to

rejoice at this good tidings; deign to stay within here, we shall, to

do it honour, eat goodly tripe, carbonadoes without stint, a neat ham

which lately I beheld so plump and appetizing in the pork butcher's,

that it made my teeth come out a foot long out of my jaws."

"Alas!" said the other, "madmen thus take their joy the while the

eyes of God are upon their ways."

"Come now, messenger," said Claes, "Will you or will you not eat and

drink with us?"

The man replied:

"It will be time for the faithful to give their souls up to earthly

joys when great Babylon is fallen!"

Soetkin and Claes making the sign of the cross, he would have gone

away:

Claes said to him:

"Since it is your pleasure thus to go away without being made much

of, give my brother Josse the kiss of peace and watch over him in

the battle."

"I will do so," said the man.

And he went away, while Soetkin went to bring wherewithal to feast

propitious fortune. The stork that day had for supper two gudgeons

and a cod's head.

The news spread swiftly through Damme that Claes the poor had become

Claes the rich through the act of his brother Josse, and the dean said

that Katheline had doubtless cast a spell on Josse, since Claes had

received from him a sum of money, a very great sum, beyond a doubt,

and had not given the poorest robe to Our Lady.

Claes and Soetkin were happy, Claes working in the fields or selling

his coal, and Soetkin showing herself a brave housekeeper at home.

But Soetkin, always sad, sought unceasingly with her eyes for

Ulenspiegel along the highway.

LII

That day the Emperor Charles received from England a letter in which

his son said to him:

Sir and Father:

It displeases me to have to live in this land where the accursed

heretics breed like fleas and caterpillars and locusts. Fire and

sword would not be amiss to lop them from off the trunk of the

life-giving tree our mother Holy Church. As if this grief were

not enough for me, still it must needs be that they will not look

on me as their king, but as their queen's husband, and having no

authority apart from her. They make game of me, saying in malicious

pamphlets, whose authors and printers none can discover, that the

Pope pays me to trouble and harm the realm with impious hangings

and burnings, and when I would raise some urgent levy from them,

for oftentimes they leave me without money, out of mere malice,

they reply in evil lampoons that I have but to ask money from Satan

whose work I do. The men of the Parliament make excuses and hunch

up their backs in fear lest I should bite, but they grant nothing.

All the while the walls of London are covered with lampoons

representing me as a parricide ready to strike down Your Majesty

to have your inheritance.

But you know, my lord and father, that in spite of all my

legitimate ambition and pride, I wish Your Majesty a long and

glorious reign.

They scatter also throughout the town a drawing all too cleverly

engraved on copper, in which I am seen making cats play upon

a harpsichord with their paws, shut up inside the instruments,

with their tails protruding through round holes into which they

are fastened with iron pins. A man, who is myself, is burning

their tails with a red-hot iron, and so making them strike on the

keys with their paws and yowl desperately. I am depicted as so

ugly that I cannot even bear to look at myself in it. And they

show me laughing. Now you must know, dear sir and father, if I

happened to take this profane pleasure at any time, I doubtless

endeavoured to amuse myself by making these cats mew, but I never

laughed. They make it a crime in me, in their rebel's talk, what

they call the newfangledness and cruelty of this harpsichord,

although the beasts have no souls, and though men and especially

all royal personages may use them even unto death for their

diversion. But in this land of England they are so well mated

with beasts that they treat them better than their servants;

stables and kennels here are palaces, and there are lords even

that sleep with their horses on the same litter.

Furthermore, my noble wife and queen is barren; they declare by

way of brutal insult that I am the reason, and not she who is

also jealous, sullen, and gluttonous of love beyond degree. Dear

sir and father, every day I implore our Lord God to have me in

his grace, hoping for another throne, were it among the Turks,

while awaiting that to which I am called by the honour of being

the son of your most glorious and greatly victorious Majesty.

(Signed) Philip.

To this letter the Emperor made answer:

Sir and Son:

Your enemies are strong, I do not contest the fact, but endeavour

to endure with patience the waiting for a more illustrious crown. I

have already announced to divers the intention I have conceived

of withdrawing from the Low Countries and my other dominions,

for I am well aware that old and gouty as I now become, I cannot

well make head against Henry of France, second of the name,

for Fortune loveth the young. Think also that as the master of

England you wound by your power our enemy France.

I was foully beaten before Metz, and lost forty thousand men

there. I was forced to flee before him of Saxony. If God doth not

restore me by a touch of his good and divine will unto my full

strength and vigour, I am minded, dear sir and son, to quit my

realms and leave them to you.

Have therefore patience and meanwhile do your duty fully against

the heretics, sparing none of them, men, women, girls, nor babes,

for word has come to me, to my great grief, that madame the queen

would fain ofttimes have shown them grace.

Your affectionate father,

(Signed) Charles.

LIII

Having tramped a long time, Ulenspiegel's feet were bleeding, and in

the bishopric of Mayence he met with a pilgrims' cart that brought

him to Rome.

When he came into the city and got down from his cart, he descried

upon the threshold of an inn a pretty goodwife who smiled, seeing

him look at her.

Auguring well from this good humour:

"Hostess," said he, "will you give a sanctuary to a pilgrim on

pilgrimage, for I have come to my time and must be brought to bed

with the remission of my sins."

"We grant sanctuary to all that pay us."

"I have a hundred ducats in my wallet," said Ulenspiegel, who had

but one, "and I would be pleased to spend the first one with you in

drinking a bottle of old wine of Rome."

"Wine is not dear in these holy places," answered she. "Come in and

drink for a soldo."

They drank together so long and emptied so many flagons with small

talk that the hostess was forced to bid her servant give the customers

their drink, while she and Ulenspiegel withdrew into a back parlour

all of marble and as cold as winter.

Leaning her head on his shoulder she asked him who he was. Ulenspiegel

replied:

"I am Sire of Geeland, Count of Gavergeeten, Baron of Tuchtendell,

and at Damme, which is my birthplace, I have five and twenty bonniers

of moonshine."

"What land is that?" asked the hostess, drinking out of Ulenspiegel's

tankard.

"It is," said he, "a soil wherein are sown the seeds of illusion,

of wild hopes and airy promises. But thou wast not born in the

moonlight land, sweet hostess of the amber skin, and eyes shining like

pearls. 'Tis the sun's colour the embrowned gold of thy hair; it was

Venus that without jealousy bestowed on thee thy plump shoulders,

thy full breasts, thy round arms, thy dainty hands. Shall we sup

together to-night?"

"Handsome pilgrim of Flanders," said she, "why do you come hither?"

"To talk with the Pope," said Ulenspiegel.

"Alas!" said she, joining her hands, "talk with the Pope! I that am

of this land, I have never been able to do that."

"I shall do it," said Ulenspiegel.

"But," said she, "know you where he goes, what manner of man he is,

what are his habits and his ways of living?"

"They told me on my way," said Ulenspiegel, "that he has to name

Julius the Third, that he is wanton, gay, and dissolute, a good talker

and quick in repartee. They told me, too, that he had conceived an

extraordinary friendship for a little beggar fellow, black, dirty,

and forbidding, who begged for alms with a monkey, and that on his

arriving at the pontifical throne, he made him cardinal of the Mount,

and that he is ill whenever a day goes by without seeing him."

"Drink," said she, "and do not speak so loud."

"They told me, too," said Ulenspiegel, "that he swore like a trooper:

Al dispetto di Dio, potta di Dio; one day when at supper he did

not find a cold peacock he had had kept for himself, saying, 'I,

the Vicar of God, may very well swear over a peacock since my master

lost his temper for an apple!' You see, my dear, that I know the Pope

and what he is."

"Alas!" said she, "but don't speak of it to other people. And in any

case you will never see him."

"I shall speak with him," said Ulenspiegel.

"If you do, I give you a hundred florins."

"They are mine already," said Ulenspiegel.

The next day, although he was leg-weary, he went about the town

and discovered where the Pope would say mass that day, at St. John

Lateran. Ulenspiegel went thither and stationed himself as near and as

plain to the Pope as he could compass, and every time the Pope raised

the chalice or the host, Ulenspiegel turned his back upon the altar.

Beside the Pope was a cardinal serving, brown of visage, cunning

and portly, who, with an ape on his shoulder, gave the people the

sacrament with many wanton gestures. He called the Pope's attention

to Ulenspiegel, and as soon as the mass was completed, His Holiness

sent four famous soldiers such as are known in these warlike lands,

to seize the pilgrim.

"What is your belief?" the Pope asked him.

"Most Holy Father," replied Ulenspiegel, "I hold the same belief as

my hostess."

The Pope sent for the goodwife.

"What dost thou believe?" he said to her.

"What your Holiness believes," she answered.

"And I the same," said Ulenspiegel.

The Pope then asked him why he had turned his back on the Holy

Sacrament.

"I felt myself unworthy to look upon it face to face," replied

Ulenspiegel.

"Thou art a pilgrim," said the Pope.

"Yea," said he, "and from Flanders I come to beg the remission of

my sins."

The Pope gave him his blessing, and Ulenspiegel departed with the

hostess, who told him out one hundred florins. Thus ballasted he left

Rome to return thence to the land of Flanders.

But he must needs pay seven ducats for his pardon inscribed on

parchment.

LIV

In these days there came two Premonstratensian friars to Damme with

indulgences for sale. They were attired, over their monkish array,

in a fine shirt trimmed with lace.

Posting themselves at the church door when it was fair weather,

and under the porch when it was foul and rainy, they put up their

tariff, in which they marked down for six liards, for a patard, a half

livre of Paris, for seven, for twelve florins carolus, a hundred, two

hundred, four hundred years of indulgence, and according to the price,

demiplenary or full plenary, and forgiveness for the most heinous

crimes, even that of desiring to violate Madame the Virgin. But that

one cost seventeen florins.

They delivered to buyers who paid them certain little bits of parchment

on which was written the number of years of indulgence. Above was

found this inscription:

He that would not be

Stewed, roast, or fried

A thousand years in purgatory

Still in hell burning,

Let him buy indulgence,

Grace and compassion,

For a little silver,

God will repay him.

And there came buyers from ten leagues roundabout. One of the good

friars often preached to the people; he had a face well blossomed

and carried his three chins and his paunch with no false modesty.

"Miserable man!" he would say, fixing his eyes on one or another

of his hearers; "miserable man! lo, there thou art, in hell! The

fire burns thee cruelly: they are boiling thee in the cauldron of

oil in which they cook Astarte's olie koekjes; thou art but a black

pudding on Lucifer's frying pan, a leg of mutton on Guilguiroth's,

the great devil, for thou art first cut into joints. Look now on this

great sinner, who contemned indulgences; see that dish of fricadelle;

'tis he, 'tis he, his impious body, his damned body boiled down to

this. And what a sauce! sulphur, pitch, and tar! And all these poor

sinners are thus eaten only to be reborn continually to anguish. And

it is there that there is verily weeping and wailing and gnashing of

teeth. Have pity, God of compassion! Aye, there thou art in hell,

poor damned one, suffering all these torments. Should one give a

denier for thee, thou feelest all at once an easement in thy right

hand; should another half denier be given, there are both thy hands

out of the flame. But the rest of the body? A florin, and here falls

the healing dew of the indulgence. O coolness delicious! And for ten

days, a hundred days, a thousand years, according to what is paid:

no more roast, no more olie koekje, nor fricassee! And if it be not

for thee, sinner, are there not yonder in the hidden deeps of the fire

poor souls thy parents, a beloved wife, some dear girl with whom thou

once delightedst to sin?"

And so saying, the monk would give a nudge to the friar who stood

beside him, with a silver basin. And the friar, lowering his eyes

at this signal, would shake his basin impressively to call the money

to it.

"Hast thou not," the monk would continue, "hast thou not in this

dreadful fire a son, a daughter, some darling babe? They cry, they

weep, they call on thee. Canst thou remain deaf to those lamentable

voices? Thou couldst not; thy heart of ice will melt, but that

will cost thee a carolus. And see: at the chime of the carolus

upon this common metal ... (the other monk still shook his basin)

a void is made within the fire, and the poor soul mounts up to the

lip of some volcano. Lo, there it is in the cool air, in the free

air! Where are the torments of the fire? The sea is near at hand, it

plunges in, it swims on back, on front, above the waves and beneath

the waves. Hearken how it crieth out for joy, look how it wallows in

the water! The angels look on it and rejoice. They await it, but still

it hath not enough, fain would it become a fish. It knoweth not that

there on high are delicious baths full of perfumes in which float

great lumps of sugar candy white and cold as ice. A shark cometh:

the soul dreads him not. It climbs upon his back, but he feels it

not; it would fain go with him into the depths of the sea. There it

goeth to salute the angels of the waters, that eat waterzoey in coral

kettles and fresh oysters on platters of mother of pearl. And how it

is welcomed, feasted, made much of; the angels still call it from on

high. At length, nobly refreshed, and happy, dost thou see it, how it

flies up singing like a lark up to the highest heaven where God sitteth

throned in glory? There it findeth all its earthly relatives and

friends, save those that having slandered and missaid the indulgences

of our Mother Holy Church, burn in the abyss of hell. And so for ever,

ever, ever and always, even from age to age, throughout eternity of

agony. But the other soul, that is close to God, refreshing itself

in the delicious baths and eating the sugar candy. Buy indulgences,

my brothers; they are to be had for crusadoes, for gold florins. Buy,

buy, buy! this is the holy shop; there is here for the poor and for

the rich, but unhappily there can be no credit, my brothers, for to

buy and not pay ready money is a crime in the Lord's eyes."

The brother who was not preaching went on shaking his dish. Florins,

crusadoes, ducats, patards, sols, and deniers fell into it thick

as hail.

Claes, seeing himself a rich man, paid a florin for ten thousand years'

indulgence. The monks gave him a piece of parchment in exchange.

Soon, seeing that there was nobody left in Damme who had not bought

indulgence except the very scum of poverty, they went away together

to Heyst.

LV

Clad in his pilgrim's garb and duly and well absolved of his sins,

Ulenspiegel left Rome, tramping ever straight on before him, and came

to Bamberg, where the best vegetables in the world are.

He went into an inn where there was a jolly hostess, who said to him:

"Young master, would you have victual for your money?"

"Aye," said Ulenspiegel. "But for what sum does one eat here?"

The hostess answered:

"You eat at the nobles' table for six florins; at the citizens'

table for four florins, at the house table for two."

"The most money is the best for me," replied Ulenspiegel.

So he went and sate down at the nobles' table. When he was well filled

and had washed down his dinner with Rhine wine, he said to his hostess:

"Goodwife, I have eaten well for my money. Give me the six florins."

The hostess said to him:

"Are you making game of me? Pay your score."

"Dear baesine," replied Ulenspiegel, "you have not the countenance of

a fraudulent debtor; I see in it, on the contrary, so great a good

faith, so much loyalty and love of neighbours that you would liefer

pay me eighteen florins than refuse me the six you owe me. Those

lovely eyes! 'tis the sun blazing on me, making the madness of love

spring up higher than couch grass in a deserted garden."

The hostess answered:

"I have nothing to do with your madness or your couch grass; pay and

be off."

"To be off," said Ulenspiegel, "and never you see again! Far rather

would I die on the spot. Baesine, gentle baesine, I am little used to

eat for six florins, I, a poor young man wandering by hill and dale;

I am stuffed and full, and presently my tongue will hang out like

a dog's in the sun: be so good as to pay me, I have well and duly

earned the six florins by my hard jaw work; give me them and I will

caress you, kiss you, embrace you with so great heat of gratitude that

twenty-seven lovers could not all together suffice for such a task."

"You are talking for money," said she.

"Would you have me eat you for nothing?" said he.

"No," said she, defending herself from him.

"Ah!" he sighed, pursuing her, "your skin is like cream, your hair

like pheasant roasted golden on the spit, your lips like cherries! Is

there any woman more dainty than you?"

"It becomes you well, nasty ruffian," said she, smiling, "to come

still demanding six florins from me. Be happy that I have fed you

gratis and asked you for nothing."

"If you only knew," said Ulenspiegel, "how much space there is still!"

"Go!" said the hostess, "before my husband comes."

"I will be a lenient creditor," replied Ulenspiegel; "give me just

one florin for future thirst."

"Here," said she, "bad boy."

And she gave it to him.

"Will you kindly go away?" said she.

"To go kindly would be to go to you, my dear, but it is going unkindly

to leave your beauteous eyes. If you would deign to keep me with you

I should eat no more than but a florin every day."

"Must I take a yard stick?" said she.

"Take mine," replied Ulenspiegel.

She laughed, but he must needs be gone.

LVI

Lamme Goedzak, in these days, came once more to live in Damme, the

country of Liege being far from tranquil on account of heresy. His

wife followed him with a good will, because the Liege people, good

mockers by nature, made game of her husband's easy meekness.

Lamme often visited Claes, who since he had his inheritance, haunted

the tavern of the Blauwe Torre and had chosen out a table there

for himself and his boon companions. At the next table there sat,

meanly drinking his pint pot, Josse Grypstuiver, the miserly dean of

the fishmongers, a scurvy fellow, niggard, living on red herrings,

loving money more than his soul's salvation. Claes had put in his

pouch the piece of parchment on which were marked his ten thousand

years of indulgence.

One night when he was at the Blauwe Torre in the company of Lamme

Goedzak, Jan van Roosebekke, and Mathys van Assche, Josse Grypstuiver

being present, Claes made good play with the pot, and Jan Roosebekke

said to him:

"'Tis a sin to drink so much!"

Claes replied:

"You only burn half a day for a quart too much. And I have ten thousand

years of indulgence in my pouch. Who would like a hundred so as to

be able to drown his belly without fear or favour?"

All cried out:

"What is your price for them?"

"A quart," replied Claes, "but I will give a hundred and fifty for

a muske conyn."

Certain drinkers paid Claes, one a stoup, one a piece of ham, and he

cut off a little strip of parchment for each of them. It was not Claes

who ate and drank the price of the indulgence, but Lamme Goedzak,

who ate until he was visibly a-swelling while Claes came and went

through the tavern retailing his wares.

Grypstuiver, turning his sour face towards him:

"Have you a piece for ten days?" said he.

"No," said Claes, "it's too hard to cut."

And everyone laughed, and Grypstuiver swallowed his rage. Then Claes

went off to his cottage, followed by Lamme, walking as if his legs

were made of wool.

LVII

Towards the end of her third year of banishment Katheline came back to

her own house at Damme. And she never ceased to say in witless fashion:

"Fire on my head, the soul is knocking, make a hole, it would fain come

out." And she still fled away at the sight of oxen and of sheep. And

she sat on the bench under the lime trees, behind her cottage, wagging

her head and looking, without knowing them, at the folk of Damme,

who said as they passed by in front of her, "There is the madwife."

At this time, strolling by highways and byways, Ulenspiegel saw on

the high road an ass harnessed with leather studded with copper nails,

and its head adorned with tufts and tassels of red wool.

Certain old women stood about the ass all talking at the same time

and saying: "No one can take possession of it, it is the horrible

mount of the great wizard the Baron de Raix, who was burned alive

for having sacrificed eight children to the devil----" "Gossips, he

ran away so quickly that they could not catch him. Satan is in him

to protect him----" "For while being weary, he stayed on his way,

the sergeants of the commune came to take him bodily, but he reared

and brayed so terribly that they dared not come near him----" "And it

was not the braying of an ass but the roaring voice of a demon----"

"So they left him to browse on thistles without putting him on his

trial or burning him alive as a wizard----" "These folk have no kind

of courage----"

In spite of all this fine talk, as soon as the donkey pricked up

his ears or lashed his ribs with his tail, the women fled shrieking,

to come in again chattering and jabbering, and to do the same thing

again at the least movement of the donkey.

But Ulenspiegel, contemplating them and laughing:

"Ah," said he, "endless curiosity and everlasting babble flow like

a river from the mouths of gossips and especially the old ones,

for in the young, the flood is less common because of their amorous

employments."

Considering next the ass:

"This wizard beast," said he, "is nimble and without doubt no sloucher;

I can either ride or sell him."

He went off without a word, to fetch a peck of oats, made the ass

eat them, leaped lightly on his back, and tightening up the rein,

turned to the north, the east, and the west, and from afar blessed

the old women. These, swooning for terror, knelt down, and that day

at the evening hour in the village it was told how an angel with a

pheasant plumed hat on his head had come, had blessed them all and

taken away the wizard's ass, by special favour of God.

And Ulenspiegel went off bestriding his ass among rich fat meadows

where the horses leaped in freedom, where cows and heifers grazed,

lying idly in the sun. And he called him Jef.

The ass stopped and dined merrily on thistles. Sometimes he shivered

with all his skin the while, and lashed his ribs with his tail to

drive off the greedy horse flies that would fain dine like himself,

but on his flesh.

Ulenspiegel, whose stomach cried hunger, was melancholy.

"You would be full happy," said he, "master ass, dining like this on

fine fat thistles, if no one came to disturb you in your comfort and

remind you that you are mortal, that is to say, born to endure every

kind of hardship."

"Even like thee," he went on, gripping him with his legs, "even

like thyself He of the Holy Slipper hath his gadfly, 'tis Master

Luther; and his High Majesty King Charles hath his also, that is

Messire Francois first of the name, the King with the long nose

and the still longer sword. It is then permissible for me, a poor

little fellow wandering like a Jew, to have my gadfly, too, master

donkey. Alas, all my pockets have holes, and through the holes away

go gadding all my lovely ducats, florins, and daelders, like a legion

of mice scattering to flight before the jaws of a cat. I know not

why money will have naught to do with me, me who so greatly desire

money. Fortune is no woman, whatever they say, for she loveth but the

scurvy miser loons that coffer her up, pouch her up, lock her up under

twenty keys, and never allow her to show as much as the tip of her

little golden nose at the window. That is the gadfly that devours me

and stings me, and tickles me but not to make me laugh. You are not

listening to me, master donkey, and you are thinking of nothing but

your grazing. Ah! belly worshipper, filling thy belly, thy long ears

are deaf to the cry of an empty stomach. Listen to me, I want you to."

And he lashed him bitterly. The ass began to bray.

"Let us come away now that you have sung your song," said Ulenspiegel.

But the donkey would not budge any more than a stone post, and

seemed to have resolved to eat to the last one every thistle along

the way. And there was no lack of them.

Ulenspiegel, perceiving this, he dismounted, cut a bunch of thistles,

got up on his donkey again, held the bunch under his muzzle, and led

him by the nose as far as the territories of the Landgrave of Hesse.

"Master donkey," said he, as they went on their way, "you run nimbly

behind my bunch of thistles, a thin diet and poor, and leave behind

you the fine highway all thick beset with these dainty plants. Even

so do men, smelling some after the bouquet of glory that Fortune

holds under their noses, others after the nosegay of gain, others the

nosegay of love. At the end of the road they perceive like you that

they have pursued that which is but little, and have left behind

them that which is somewhat, that is to say, health, work, rest,

and comfort in their homes."

So conversing with his ass, Ulenspiegel came before the landgrave's

palace.

Two captains of musketeers were playing dice on the stair.

One of them, red headed and of giant size, caught sight of Ulenspiegel

modestly sitting upon Jef and watching their play.

"What do you want with us," said he, "hungry pilgrim-face?"

"I am exceedingly hungry, in very deed," said Ulenspiegel, "and am

pilgrimaging against my will."

"If you are hungry," rejoined the captain, "eat with your neck the

rope that swings from the nearest gallows destined for vagabonds."

"Messire captain," replied Ulenspiegel, "if you were to give me that

fine gold cord you wear on your hat, I should go and hang myself with

my teeth to that fat ham that swings yonder at the cook shop."

"Where do you come from?" asked the captain.

"From Flanders," replied Ulenspiegel.

"What would you?"

"Show His Highness the Landgrave a painting after my fashion."

"If you are a painter and out of Flanders," said the captain, "come

within, and I will bring you to my master."

Being come before the landgrave, Ulenspiegel saluted him three times

and more.

"May Your Highness," said he, "deign to excuse my impertinence in

daring to come to lay at your noble feet a painting I made for you,

wherein I had the honour to pourtray Madame the Virgin in imperial

array."

"This painting," he went on, "may perhaps be to your liking, and in

that case I vaunt myself sufficiently of my skill to hope to raise

myself to that fine chair of crimson velvet wherein, during his life,

the ever to be lamented painter of Your Magnanimity had place."

The landgrave having contemplated the picture, which was a beautiful

one:

"Thou shalt be our painter," said he, "take thy seat in the chair."

And gaily he kissed him on both cheeks. Ulenspiegel sat down.

"Thou art full ragged," said the landgrave, scrutinizing him.

Ulenspiegel replied:

"In very truth, Monseigneur, Jef, the which is my ass, dined upon

thistles, but I, for three days, I have lived only on want and fed

only upon the savour of hope."

"Thou shalt sup presently on better meat," replied the landgrave,

"but where is thy ass?"

Ulenspiegel answered:

"I left him on the Great Marketplace, over against the palace of Your

Goodness; I should be glad indeed if Jef had shelter and litter and

fodder for the night."

The landgrave gave instant command to one of his pages to treat

Ulenspiegel's ass like one of his own.

Soon came the hour of the supper, that was as a revel and a feast. And

the meats gave up a noble savour and the wines rained down their

throats.

Ulenspiegel and the landgrave being both fire red like live coals,

Ulenspiegel became gay, but the landgrave remained pensive.

"Our painter," said he, suddenly, "thou must paint my portrait,

for it is a great satisfaction to a mortal prince to bequeath to his

descendants the memory of his countenance."

"Sire Landgrave," said Ulenspiegel, "your pleasure is my will, but it

seems to my poor self that pourtrayed alone by yourself Your Lordship

will have no great joy in ages to come. You must be accompanied by your

noble wife, Madame the Landgravine, and your ladies and lords, your

most warlike captains and officers, in the midst of whom Monseigneur

and Madame will shine like two suns surrounded by lanterns."

"True indeed, our painter," replied the landgrave, "and what should

I have to pay thee for this great work?"

"One hundred florins, in advance or otherwise," answered Ulenspiegel.

"Here they are in advance," said the landgrave.

"Kind and good lord," replied Ulenspiegel, "you put oil in my lamp,

it shall burn in your honour."

The next day he asked the landgrave to cause to pass before him all

those for whom he reserved the honour of figuring in the portraiture.

Came then the Duke of Lunebourg, the commander of the lansquenets

in the landgrave's service. This was a big heavy man, carrying with

difficulty his paunch swollen with victuals. He drew near Ulenspiegel

and whispered a word in his ear:

"If you do not, in making my portrait, take away half my fat, I shall

have you hanged by my troopers."

The duke passed on.

And then a noble lady, the which had a hump on her back and a bosom

as flat as the blade of an executioner's glaive:

"Messire painter," said she, "if you do not give me two humps for

the one that you shall take away, and do not put them in front,

I shall have you quartered as a poisoner."

The lady passed on.

Then came a young maid of honour, fair, fresh, and pretty, but who

lacked three teeth under her upper lip.

"Messire painter," she said, "if you do not make me laugh and show

thirty-two teeth, I shall have you cut to pieces by my lover, who is

over there."

And pointing out the captain of musketeers who had before been playing

dice on the palace stairway, she passed on.

The procession continued; Ulenspiegel remained alone with the

landgrave.

"If thou hast the ill-luck," said the landgrave, "to err in one

feature the pourtraying all these countenances, I shall have thy head

cut off like a chicken's."

"Bereft of my head," thought Ulenspiegel, "quartered, chopped in

pieces, or hanged at least, it will be much more comfortable to

pourtray nothing at all. I will bethink me for it."

"Where," he asked the landgrave, "is the hall that I am to decorate

with all these paintings?"

"Follow me," said the landgrave.

And showing him a great room with spacious walls all bare and empty:

"This," he said, "is the hall."

"I should greatly like," said Ulenspiegel, "that they should set

great curtains on these walls, so as to assure my paintings against

the insults of flies and against dust."

"That shall be done," said the landgrave.

The curtains being put in place, Ulenspiegel asked for three

apprentices, as he said, to make them prepare his colours.

For thirty days, Ulenspiegel and the apprentices did nothing but

hold feast and revel, sparing neither the choice viands nor the old

wines. The landgrave watched over all.

However, on the thirty-first day he came and put in his nose at the

door of the room which Ulenspiegel had enjoined on him not to enter.

"Well, Thyl, where are thy portraits?"

"Far away," replied Ulenspiegel.

"Could not one see them?"

"Not yet."

The thirty-sixth day, he put his nose in at the door again.

"Well, Thyl?" he asked.

"Ah! sire Landgrave, they are travelling towards the end."

The sixtieth day, the landgrave became angry, and entering the room:

"Thou art immediately to show me the pictures," said he.

"Yea, great lord," replied Ulenspiegel, "but deign not to draw aside

this curtain until you have summoned hither the lords and captains

and ladies of your court."

"I consent to this," said the landgrave.

They all came at his command.

Ulenspiegel stood before the curtain closely drawn.

"Monseigneur Landgrave," said he, "Madame Landgravine, and you,

Monseigneur de Lunebourg, and you other beauteous dames and valiant

captains, I have pourtrayed as best I could your pretty or warlike

faces behind this curtain. It will be easy to recognize each one of

you there. You are curious to see yourselves, it is natural, but pray

have patience and permit me to say a word or two to you. Beauteous

ladies and valiant captains, who are all of noble blood, you can see

and admire my painting; but if among you there is one of low origin,

he will see nothing save the blank wall. And now deign to open your

noble eyes."

Ulenspiegel pulled the curtain back.

"Noble men alone see aught, alone they see aught there, the noble

ladies, so shall men say ere long: 'blind in painting as a base fellow,

clear seeing as a noble gentleman'!"

All opened their eyes to the widest, pretending to see, mutually

pointing themselves out to one another, showing and recognizing each

other, but seeing nothing in reality but the white wall, which made

them grieved.

All at once the fool who was there bounded three feet into the air

and shaking his bells:

"Let me be looked on as base," said he, "a base fellow full of

basest baseness, but I will say and cry and proclaim with trumpets

and flourish of trumpets that I see there a bare wall, a blank wall,

a naked wall. So help me God and all His saints!"

Ulenspiegel replied:

"When fools begin to talk it is time for wise men to be off."

He was making to leave the palace when the landgrave staying him:

"Fool full of folly," said he, "that goest about the world praising

things fine and good and mocking at things stupid with wide mouth,

thou that hast dared before so many noble dames and most high and

mighty lords to make a vulgar mock of pride of blasonry and lordship,

thou wilt be hanged one day for thy over-free speech."

"If the rope be a golden rope," replied Ulenspiegel, "it will break

with terror to see me coming."

"There," said the landgrave, giving him fifteen florins, "there is

the first piece of it."

"All thanks, Monseigneur," answered Ulenspiegel, "every inn by the way

shall have a strand of it, a strand all of gold that maketh Croesuses

of all these thieving innkeepers."

And away he went on his ass, his bonnet high, his plume streaming in

the wind, merry and jolly.

LVIII

The leaves were yellowing on the trees and the autumn wind was

beginning to blow. Katheline sometimes had her reason for an hour or

two or three. And Claes then said that the spirit of God had visited

her in His great compassion. At these moments she had power by passes

and by words to cast a spell upon Nele, who saw more than a hundred

leagues away all that happened in city places, in the streets, or

within the houses.

On this day then, Katheline, being in her wits, was eating olie

koekjes well washed down with dobbel-cuyt in company with Claes,

Soetkin, and Nele.

Said Claes:

"To-day is the day of the abdication of His Sacred Majesty the Emperor

Charles the Fifth. Nele, my dear, could you see as far as Brussels

in Brabant?"

"I could, if Katheline is willing," answered Nele.

Then Katheline made the girl sit upon a bench, and by her words and

passes, acting like a spell, Nele sank down all deep in slumber.

Katheline said to her:

"Go into the little house in the Park, which is the favourite abode

of the Emperor Charles the Fifth."

"I am," said Nele, speaking low and as though she was being stifled,

"I am in a little chamber painted green with oil colours. There there

is a man bordering upon four and fifty years, bald and gray, with

a fair beard on a jutting chin, with an evil look in his gray eyes,

full of cunning, of cruelty, and feigned good nature. And this man he

is called Sacred Majesty. He is in catarrh and coughs sorely. Beside

him is another, young, with an ugly mask like an ape hydrocephalous;

that one I saw at Antwerp, it is King Philip. His Sacred Majesty at

this moment is reproaching him for having slept abroad last night;

doubtless, he saith, to go and find some vile creature in a filthy den

in the low quarters of the city. He says his hair stinks of the tavern,

which is no pleasure for a king that hath only to choose sweet bodies,

skins of satin refreshed in baths of perfumes, and hands of great

ladies amorous, which is far better, saith he, than a wild sow, come

hardly washed from the arms of a drunken trooper. There is, saith he,

never a maiden, wife, or widow who would resist him, among the most

noble and beauteous, that illumine their loves with perfumed tapers,

not by the greasy glimmer of stinking tallow-dips.

"The king replied that he will obey His Sacred Majesty in all things.

"Then His Sacred Majesty coughs and drinks some mouthfuls of hypocras.

"'You will presently,' says he, addressing Philip, 'see the States

General, prelates, nobles, and burgesses: Orange the Silent, Egmont

the Vain, de Hornes the Unpopular, Brederode the Lion; and also all

those of the Fleece of Gold of whom I make you sovereign. You will

see there a hundred wearers of baubles, who would all cut their noses

off to have the privilege of hanging them from a gold chain on their

breasts, in token of higher nobility.'

"Then, changing his tone and full of sadness, His Sacred Majesty

saith to King Philip:

"'Thou knowest, my son, that I am about to abdicate in thy favour,

to give the world a great spectacle and to speak in front of a huge

crowd, though hiccupping and coughing--for all my life I have eaten

over much, my son--and thy heart must be hard indeed, if having heard

me, thou dost not shed a few tears.'

"'I shall weep, father,' answers King Philip.

"Then His Sacred Majesty speaks to a valet called Dubois:

"'Dubois,' says he, 'give me a piece of Madeira sugar, I have a

hiccup. If only it will not seize me when I shall be speaking to

all these people. Will that goose I had yesterday never be done

with! Should I drink a tankard of Orleans wine? No, it is too

harsh! Should I eat a few anchovies? They are very oily. Dubois,

give me some Romagna wine.'

"Dubois gives His Majesty what he asketh, then puts upon him a gown

of crimson velvet, wraps him in a gold cloak, girds on his sword, puts

into his hands the sceptre and the globe, and the crown upon his head.

"Then His Sacred Majesty leaves the house in the Park, riding on a

low mule and followed by King Philip and many high personages. In

this fashion they go into a great building that they call a palace,

and there they find in a chamber a tall slender man, richly clad,

whom they call Orange.

"His Sacred Majesty speaks to this man and says to him: 'Do I look

well, cousin William?'

"But the man makes no answer, not a word.

"His Sacred Majesty then says to him, half laughing, half angry:

"'You will be dumb always, then, cousin, even to tell the truth to old

broken-down things? Ought I to reign still or to abdicate, Silent One?'

"'Sacred Majesty,' replied the slender man, 'when winter cometh the

most vigorous oaks let their leaves fall.'

"Three of the clock strikes.

"'Silent One,' says he, 'lend me thy shoulder, that I may lean on it.'

"And he enters with him and with his retinue into a great hall,

takes his seat under a canopy and on a dais covered with silk or

crimson carpets. There are three seats on it: His Sacred Majesty

takes the middle one, more ornate than the others, and surmounted

with an imperial crown; King Philip sits on the second, and the third

is for a woman, who is doubtless a queen. To the right and to the

left, seated upon tapestried benches and cushioned, are men clad in

red and wearing a little gold sheep on their necks. Behind them are

placed many persons who are doubtless princes and lords. Over against

them and at the foot of the dais are seated, upon benches that have

no cushions, men clad in cloth. I hear them say that they are thus

modestly seated and clad only because they are themselves paying all

their proper charges. All rose up when His Sacred Majesty came in,

but he soon sate him down and signed to all to sit down likewise.

"An old man next speaks long about the gout, then the woman, who

seemeth to be a queen, hands His Sacred Majesty a roll of parchment in

which are written things which His Sacred Majesty reads out, coughing,

and in a voice low and indistinct, and speaking of himself says:

"'I have made many voyages in Spain, in Italy, in the Low Countries,

in England and in Africa, all for the glory of God, the lustre of my

arms, and the welfare of my peoples.'

"Then having spoken long, he says that he is broken and weary,

and fain to deliver the crown of Spain, the counties, duchies,

marquisates of these lands into his son's hands.

"Then he weeps, and all weep with him.

"King Philip now rises, and falling upon his knees:

"'Sacred Majesty,' he says, 'is it for me to accept this crown at

your hands when you are so capable of wearing it still!'

"Then His Sacred Majesty whispered in his ear to speak comfortably

to the men seated upon the cushioned benches.

"King Philip, turning towards them, says to them in a harsh tone and

without rising:

"'I understand French passing well, but not sufficiently to speak

to you in that tongue. Ye will hear what the Bishop of Arras, Master

Grandvelle, shall say to you on my behalf.'

"'Thou sayest ill, my son,' says His Sacred Majesty.

"And indeed the assembly murmurs, seeing the young king so arrogant

and so haughty. The woman, who is the queen, speaks also to make her

eulogy, then comes the turn of an aged man of learning who, when he has

made an end, receives a sign from the hand of His Sacred Majesty by

way of thanks. These ceremonies and harangues being over, His Sacred

Majesty declares his subjects released from their oath of fidelity,

signs the acts drawn up to that end, and rising up from his throne,

sets his son therein. And everyone in the hall weeps. Then they go

back to the house in the Park.

"There, being once more in the green chamber, alone and all doors

fast shut, His Sacred Majesty laughs loud and long, and speaking to

King Philip who laughs not:

"'Did you see,' he says, speaking, hiccuping, and laughing all

together, 'how little is needed to move these good souls? What a deluge

of tears! And that fat Maes who, when he finished his long discourse,

wept like a calf. You yourself seemed touched, but not enough. These

are the true spectacles the common folk must have. My son, we men love

our mistresses the more the more they cost us. It is the same with

peoples. The more we make them pay, the more they love us. In Germany

I tolerated the reformed faith that I punished severely in the Low

Countries. If the princes of Germany had been catholic, I would have

been Lutheran and confiscated their goods. They believe in the reality

of my zeal for the Roman faith and regret to see me leave them. There

have perished at my hands, in the Low Countries and for heresy, fifty

thousand of their most hardy men and prettiest maids. I am departing,

they lament. Without counting confiscations, I have made them pay more

than the Indies and Peru: they are heartbroken at losing me. I have

torn up the peace of Cadzand, broken Ghent, suppressed everything that

could come in my way; liberties, franchises, privileges, everything

is at the discretion of the prince's officers: these good souls think

they are still free because I allow them to shoot with the cross

bow and carry the banners of their guilds in procession. They felt

my hand as master: put in a cage, they find themselves comfortable

there, they sing in it and weep for me. My son, be to them as I have

been: benign in words, harsh in deeds; lick as long as there is no

need to bite. Swear, swear always to their liberties, franchises,

and privileges, but if there be any peril to yourself, destroy

them all. They are iron if one touch them with a faltering hand,

glass if you brush them with a strong arm. Smite heresy not because

of its divergence from the Roman religion, but because in these Low

Countries it would destroy our authority; those that attack the Pope,

who weareth a triple crown, have speedily done with princes that have

but one. Make it treason, as I did liberty of conscience, entailing the

confiscation of goods, and you will inherit them as I did all my life,

and when you depart, to abdicate or to die, they will say:--'Oh! the

good prince!' and they will weep.

"And I hear nothing more," went on Nele, "for His Sacred Majesty has

lain down on a bed and is asleep, and King Philip, arrogant and proud,

looks upon him with no love."

Having said so much, Nele was awakened by Katheline. And Claes,

pensive, looked at the flame on the hearth lightening up the chimney

place.

LIX

Ulenspiegel, leaving the landgrave of Hesse, mounted his ass and

crossing the town square, met certain wrathful countenances of lords

and ladies, but he took no heed of them.

Soon he arrived on the lands of the Duke of Lunebourg, and there fell

in with a band of Smaedelyke broeders, jolly Flemings from Sluys who

laid aside some money every Saturday so that once a year they could

go for a tour in Germany.

They were going on their way singing, in an open cart drawn by a

stout horse of Vuerne-Ambacht, that brought them gambolling by the

highways and marshy lands of the duchy of Lunebourg. Among them were

some that played the fife, the rebeck, the viol, and the bagpipe with

a mighty din. Beside the cart there walked at frequent intervals

a dikzak playing on the rommel-pot and going afoot in the hope of

melting off some of his great belly.

As they were down to their last florin they saw Ulenspiegel come

up to them, laden with chiming coin, and went into an inn and paid

for his draught. Ulenspiegel gladly accepted. Seeing the while the

Smaedelyke broeders were winking as they looked at him and smiling

while they poured out his wine for him, he had wind of some trick,

went outside, and posted himself at the door to hear their talk. He

heard the dikzak saying of him:

"This is the painter of the landgrave who gave him more than a thousand

florins for a picture. Let us feast him full with beer and wine,

he will pay us back twofold."

"Amen," said the others.

Ulenspiegel went to fasten his ass all saddled a thousand paces

away at a farmer's, gave two patards to a girl to take charge of it,

came back into the chamber of the inn and sat down at the Smaedelyke

broeders' table, without uttering a word. They poured out wine for him

and paid. Ulenspiegel rattled the landgrave's florins in his satchel,

saying that he had just sold his ass to a countryman for seventeen

silver daelders.

They travelled on, eating and drinking, playing the fife, the

bagpipe, and rommel-pot, and picking up by the way the goodwives

they thought comely. In this way they begot foundling children, and

beyond all, Ulenspiegel, whose gossip later bore a son which she named

Eulenspiegelken, which signifies, in high German, little mirror and

owl, and that because she did not understand clearly the meaning of

her casual man's name, and also perhaps in memory of the hour when

the child was made. And this is the Eulenspiegelken wrongly said to

have been born at Krittingen, in the land of Saxony.

Drawn by their stout horse they went along a highway at the side of

which was a village and an inn with the sign In den ketele: "In the

Kettle." Thence issued a goodly savour of fricassee.

The dikzak who played the rommel-pot went to the baes and said to him,

speaking of Ulenspiegel:

"That is the landgrave's painter; he will pay for all."

The baes, perusing Ulenspiegel's appearance, which was excellent,

and hearing the chink of florins and daelders, set upon the table

wherewith to eat and drink; Ulenspiegel did not shrink from it. And

ever and always jingled the crowns in his wallet. Many a time, too, he

had stuck his hand on his hat saying it covered his chief treasure. The

revels having lasted two days and one night, the Smaedelyke broeders

said to Ulenspiegel:

"Let us be off from here and pay the bill."

Ulenspiegel answered:

"When the rat is in the cheese, doth he ask to leave it?"

"Nay," said they.

"And when a man eats well and drinks well, does he seek out the dust

of the roads and the water from springs full of leeches?"

"Nay, indeed," said they.

"Well, then," said Ulenspiegel, "let us stay here as long as my florins

and daelders serve us as funnels to pour into our throats the drinks

that bring us to laughter."

And he bade the host bring still more wine and more sausage.

While they drank and ate, Ulenspiegel said:

"'Tis I who pay, I am landgrave for the nonce. If my wallet were empty,

what would you do, comrades? You might take my soft felt headgear

and you might find it full of carolus, in the crown as well as round

the brim."

"Let us feel," cried they all with one accord. And sighing they felt

in it between their fingers large coins of the size and dimensions

of gold carolus. But one among them handled it so lovingly that

Ulenspiegel took it back, saying:

"Impetuous dairy man, you must learn to await the milking hour."

"Give me the half of your hat," said the Smaedelyke broeders.

"Nay," answered Ulenspiegel, "I don't want you to have a madman's

brain, one half in the shade and the other in the sun."

Then giving his headgear over to the baes:

"You," said he, "do you keep it in any case, for it is hot. For my

part, I am going out to ease me."

He went, and the host took charge of the hat.

Presently he left the inn, went to the peasant's cottage, got up upon

his ass, and went off full speed along the road that leads to Embden.

The Smaedelyke broeders, not seeing him come back, said one to another:

"Has he gone? Who will pay the charges?"

The baes, seized with fear, cut open Ulenspiegel's hat with a

knife. But instead of the carolus, he found nothing in it between

the felt and the lining but worthless copper counters.

Raging then against the Smaedelyke broeders he said to them:

"Brothers of roguery, ye shall not stir out of here save leaving

behind all your clothes except only your shirts."

And they had every man to strip off his clothes to pay his shot.

In this fashion they went in their shirts over hill and dale, for

they would by no means sell their horse nor their cart.

And all that beheld them in so pitiable a plight, gave them freely

bread to eat, beer, and sometimes meat; for everywhere they told the

tale how they had been despoiled by robbers.

And among the lot they had but one pair of breeches.

And thus they came back to Sluys in their shirts, dancing in their

cart and playing the rommel-pot.

LX

Meanwhile Ulenspiegel bestrode the back of Jef through the lands and

the marshes of the Duke of Lunebourg. The Flemings call this duke

Water-Signorke because it is always damp in his country.

Jef obeyed Ulenspiegel like a dog, drank bruinbier, danced better

than a Hungarian master of arts in posturing, pretended to be dead

and lay down on his back at the least signal.

Ulenspiegel knew that the Duke of Lunebourg, annoyed and angry at

Ulenspiegel's making a mock of him at Darmstadt before the landgrave

of Hesse, had forbidden him to set foot on his territories on pain

of the halter. Suddenly he saw His Ducal Highness in person, and

as he knew it was a hasty and violent Highness, he was seized with

fright. Speaking to his ass:

"Jef," said he, "here is Monseigneur of Lunebourg coming. I feel

a sore itch of rope on my neck; but may it not be the hangman that

will scratch me for it. Jef, I would gladly be scratched, but not

hanged. Think that we are brothers in distress and long ears; think,

too, what a good friend you would lose if you lost me."

And Ulenspiegel wiped his eyes, and Jef began to bray.

Continuing his discourse:

"We live together in mirth," said Ulenspiegel to him, "or in moan,

according to circumstances; do you remember, Jef?..." The ass continued

to bray, for he was hungry.

"And you will never be able to forget me," said his master, "for

what friendship is strong but that which laughs with the same joy

and weeps with the same distress! Jef, you must get down on your back."

The gentle ass obeyed, and was seen by the duke with all four hoofs

in the air. Ulenspiegel quickly took seat on his belly. The duke came

to him.

"What dost thou here?" said he, "knowest thou not that in my last

edict I forbade thee under pain of the rope to set thy dusty foot on

my territory?"

Ulenspiegel replied:

"Gracious lord, have compassion upon me!"

Then showing his ass:

"You know full well," said he, "that by law and by justice, he is

always free that dwelleth between his own four posts."

The duke answered:

"Be off from out my territories, else thou shalt die."

"Monseigneur," replied Ulenspiegel, "I should be off from them so

swiftly mounted on a florin or two!"

"Rogue," said the duke, "wilt thou, not satisfied with thy

disobedience, ask money of me to boot?"

"Needs must indeed, Monseigneur, I cannot take it from you...."

The duke gave him a florin.

Then said Ulenspiegel, speaking to his ass:

"Up, Jef, and salute Monseigneur."

The ass got up and began to bray again. Then both of them took

themselves off.

LXI

Soetkin and Nele were seated at one of the windows of the cottage

and looked into the street.

Soetkin said to Nele:

"Dearest, see you not my boy Ulenspiegel coming?"

"No," said Nele, "we shall never see him again, the naughty vagabond."

"Nele," said Soetkin, "you must not be angry with him but sorry for

him, for he is away from his home, poor fellow."

"I know full well," said Nele, "he hath another house far from here,

richer than his own, where some beauteous dame doubtless gives him

lodging."

"That would be good luck indeed for him," said Soetkin; "mayhap there

he feedeth upon ortolans."

"Why do they not give him stones to eat: speedily would he be here

then, the glutton!" said Nele.

Then Soetkin laughed and said:

"Whence doth it arise then, dearest, all this big anger?"

But Claes, who, all pensive, too, was binding faggots in a corner.

"Do you not see," said he, "that she is infatuate for him?"

"Lo you," said Soetkin, "the crafty cunning thing that never murmured

word of it! Is it so, dearest, that you long for him?"

"Never believe it," said Nele.

"You will have there," said Claes, "a stout husband with a big mouth,

a hollow belly, and a long tongue, turning florins into liards and

never a half-penny for his work, always loafing about and measuring

the highways with the ell wand of vagabondage."

But Nele replied, all red and cross:

"Why did you not make something different of him?"

"There," said Soetkin, "now she is weeping; hold your tongue, husband."

LXII

Ulenspiegel upon a day came to Nuremberg and gave himself out for

a great physician, the conqueror of sickness, a most illustrious

purger, renowned queller of fevers, celebrated scavenger of plagues,

and scourge invincible of the itch and mange.

There were in the hospital so many sick that they could not know

where to put them. The master hospitaller hearing of Ulenspiegel's

coming, came to see him and inquired if it was true that he could

heal all diseases.

"Except the last sickness," replied Ulenspiegel; "but promise me

two hundred florins for the cure of all the others, and I will not

accept a liard till all your sick confess themselves cured and leave

the hospital."

On the morrow he came to the said hospital with a confident look and

carrying his phiz solemnly and doctorally. Once within the wards,

he took each sick man separately and said:

"Swear," quoth he, "not to confide to any what I am about to tell

thee in thine ear. What is thy malady?"

The sick man would tell him, and swear by his almighty God to hold

his tongue.

"Know," said Ulenspiegel, "that I mean to reduce one of you to

powder by means of fire, that of this dust or powder I shall concoct

a marvellous mixture and give it to all the sick to drink. The one

that cannot walk shall be burned. To-morrow I shall come here and

standing in the street with the master hospitaller, I shall summon

you all crying, 'Let him that is not sick take up his duds and come!'"

In the morning, Ulenspiegel came and called out as he had said. All

the sick, the lame, the rheumy, the coughing, the fever stricken,

would fain come out together. All were in the street, even some that

for ten years had not left their bed.

The master hospitaller asked them if they were cured and could walk.

"Aye," replied they, imagining that one of them was burning in the

courtyard.

Ulenspiegel then said to the master hospitaller:

"Pay me, since they are all outside, and declare themselves cured."

The master paid him two hundred florins. And Ulenspiegel departed.

But on the second day the master beheld his sick folk coming back in

a worse state than before, save one who, being cured in the open air,

was found drunk and singing through the streets: "Noel to the great

physician Ulenspiegel!"

LXIII

The two hundred florins having gone their light ways Ulenspiegel came

to Vienne where he hired himself to a wheelwright who continually

scolded his workmen because they did not blow the bellows of his

forge strongly enough:

"Keep time," he would be crying always, "follow with the bellows."

One day when the baes went into the garden Ulenspiegel took down the

bellows, carried it off on his shoulders, and followed his master. The

latter being astonished to see him so strangely burthened, Ulenspiegel

said to him:

"Baes, you ordered me to follow with the bellows, where am I to put

this one while I go and fetch the other."

"Dear lad," said the baes, "I did not say that; go and put the bellows

back in its place."

However, he studied how to pay him out for this trick. Thenceforward

he rose every day at midnight, awoke his men and made them work.

Then men said to him:

"Baes, why do you wake us up in the middle of the night?"