_How Sir Launcelot came into a chapel, where he found dead, in a white
shirt, a man of religion of an hundred winter old._
When the hermit had kept Sir Launcelot three days, the hermit gat him
an horse, an helm, and a sword. And then he departed about the hour of
noon. And then he saw a little house, and when he came near he saw a
chapel, and there beside he saw an old man that was clothed all in
white full richly, and then Sir Launcelot said, God save you. God keep
you, said the good man, and make you a good knight. Then Sir Launcelot
alight, and entered into the chapel, and there he saw an old man dead,
in a white shirt of passing fine cloth. Sir, said the good man, this
man that is dead ought not to be in such clothing as ye see him in, for
in that he brake the oath of his order. For he hath been more than an
hundred winters a man of a religion. And then the good man and Sir
Launcelot went into the chapel, and the good man took a stole about his
neck, and a book, and then he conjured on that book, and with that they
saw in an hideous figure and an horrible, that there was no man so
hard-hearted nor so hard but he should have been afeard. Then said the
fiend, Thou hast travailed me greatly, now tell me what thou wilt with
me? I will, said the good man, that thou tell me how my fellow became
dead, and whether he be saved or damned? Then he said with a horrible
voice, He is not lost, but saved. How may that be? said the good man;
it seemed to me that he lived not well, for he brake his order for to
wear a shirt, where he ought to wear none: and who that trespasseth
against our order doth not well. Not so, said the fiend, this man that
lieth here dead was come of a great lineage. And there was a lord that
hight the earl de Vale, that held great war against this man’s nephew,
the which hight Aguarus. And so this Aguarus saw the earl was bigger
than he, then he went for to take counsel of his uncle, the which lieth
here dead as ye may see. And then he asked leave, and went out of his
hermitage for to maintain his nephew against the mighty earl. And so it
happed that this man that lieth here dead did so much by his wisdom and
hardiness that the earl was taken, and three of his lords, by force of
this dead man.