By Monseigneur De Saint Pol.
_Of a knight who, whilst he was waiting for his mistress amused himself
three times with her maid, who had been sent to keep him company that
he might not be dull; and afterwards amused himself three times with
the lady, and how the husband learned it all from the maid, as you will
hear._
A noble knight of the Marches of Haynau--rich, powerful, brave, and a
good fellow--was in love with a fair lady for a long time, and was so
esteemed and secretly loved by her, that whenever he liked he repaired
to a private and remote part of her castle, where she came to visit him,
and they conversed at their leisure of their pleasant mutual love.
Not a soul knew of their pleasant pastime, except a damsel who served
the lady, and who had kept the matter secret for a long time, and had
served the dame so willingly in all her affairs that she was worthy of a
great reward. Moreover, she was such a good girl, that not only had she
gained the affection of her mistress for her services in this and other
matters, but the husband of the lady esteemed her as much as his wife
did, because he found her good, trustworthy, and diligent.
It chanced one day that the lady knew her aforesaid lover to be in
the house, but could not go to him as soon as she wished, because her
husband detained her; at which she was much vexed, and sent the damsel
to tell him that he must yet have patience, and that, as soon as she
could get rid of her husband, she would come to him.
The damsel went to the knight, who was awaiting the lady, and delivered
her message, and he, being a courteous knight, thanked her much for her
message, and made her sit by him; then tenderly kissed her two or
three times. She did not object, which gave the knight encouragement to
proceed to other liberties, which also were not refused him.
This being finished, she returned to her mistress, and told her that her
lover was anxiously awaiting her.
“Alas!” said the lady, “I know full well he is, but my husband will not
go to bed, and there are a lot of people here whom I cannot leave. God
curse them! I would much rather be with him. He is very dull, is he
not--all alone up there?”
“Faith! I believe he is,” replied the damsel, “but he comforts himself
as well as he can with the hope of your coming.’’
“That I believe, but at any rate he has been all alone, and without a
light, for more than two hours; it must be very lonely. I beg you, my
dear, to go back to him again and make excuses for me, and stay with
him. May the devil take the people who keep me here!”
“I will do what you please, madam, but it seems to me that he loves you
so much you have no need to make excuses; and also, that, if I go, you
will have no woman here, and perhaps monseigneur may ask for me and I
cannot be found.”
“Do not trouble about that,” said the lady. “I will manage that all
right if he should ask for you. But it vexes me that my friend should be
alone--go and see what he is doing, I beg.”
“I will go, since you wish it,” she replied.
That she was pleased with her errand need not be said, though to conceal
her willingness she had made excuses to her mistress. She soon came to
the knight, who was still waiting, and said to him;
“Monseigneur, madame has sent me to you again to make her excuses for
keeping you so long waiting, and to tell you how vexed she is.”
“You may tell her,” said he, “that she may come at her leisure, and not
to hurry on my account, for you can take her place.”
With that he kissed and cuddled her, and did not suffer her to depart
till he had tumbled her twice, which was not much trouble to him, for he
was young and vigorous, and fond of that sport.
The damsel bore it all patiently, and would have been glad to often have
the same luck, if she could without prejudice to her mistress.
When she was about to leave, she begged the knight to say nothing to her
mistress.
“Have no fear,” said he.
“I beg of you to be silent,” she said.
Then she returned to her mistress, who asked what her friend was doing?
“He is still,” the damsel replied, “awaiting you.”
“But,” said the lady, “is he not vexed and angry?”
“No,” said the damsel, “since he had company. He is much obliged to you
for having sent me, and if he often had to wait would like to have me to
talk to him to pass the time,--and, faith! I should like nothing better,
for he is the pleasantest man I ever talked to. God knows that it
was good to hear him curse the folks who detained you--all except
monseigneur; he would say nothing against him.”
“St. John! I wish that he and all his company were in the river, so that
I could get away.”
In due time monseigneur--thank God--sent away his servants, retired
to his chamber, undressed, and went to bed. Madame, dressed only in
a petticoat, put on her night-dress, took her prayer-book, and
began,--devoutly enough God knows--to say her psalms and paternosters,
but monseigneur, who was as wide awake as a rat, was anxious for a
little conversation, and wished madame to put off saying her prayers
till the morrow, and talk to him.
“Pardon me,” she replied, “but I cannot talk to you now--God comes first
you know. Nothing would go right in the house all the week if I did not
give God what little praise I can, and I should expect bad luck if I did
not say my prayers now.”
“You sicken me with all this bigotry,” said monseigneur. “What is
the use of saying all these prayers? Come on, come on! and leave
that business to the priests. Am I not right, Jehannette?” he added,
addressing the damsel before mentioned.
“Monseigneur,” she replied, “I do not know what to say, except that as
madame is accustomed to serve God, let her do so.”
“There, there!” said madame to her husband, “I see well that you want
to argue, and I wish to finish my prayers, so we shall not agree. I will
leave Jehannette to talk to you, and will go to my little chamber behind
to petition God.”
Monseigneur was satisfied, and madame went off at full gallop to her
friend, the knight, who received her with God knows how great joy, and
the honour that he did her was to bend her knees and lay her down.
But you must know that whilst madame was saying her prayers with her
lover, it happened, I know not how, that her husband begged Jehannette,
who was keeping him company, to grant him her favours.
To cut matters short, by his promises and fine words she was induced to
obey him, but the worst of it was that madame, when she returned from
seeing her lover, who had tumbled her twice before she left, found her
husband and Jehannette, her waiting-woman, engaged in the very same work
which she had been performing, at which she was much astonished; and
still more so were her husband and Jehannette at being thus surprised.
When madame saw that, God knows how she saluted them, though she would
have done better to hold her tongue; and she vented her rage so on poor
Jehannette that it seemed as though she must have a devil in her belly,
or she could not have used such abominable words.
Indeed she did more and worse, for she picked up a big stick and laid
it across the girl’s shoulders, on seeing which, monseigneur, who was
already vexed and angry, jumped up and so beat his wife that she could
not rise.
Having then nothing but her tongue, she used it freely God knows, but
addressed most of her venomous speeches to poor Jehannette, who no
longer able to bear them, told monseigneur of the goings-on of his wife,
and where she had been to say her prayers, and with whom.
The whole company was troubled--monseigneur because he had good cause to
suspect his wife, and madame, who was wild with rage, well beaten, and
accused by her waiting-woman.
How this unfortunate household lived after that, those who know can
tell.
*****
STORY THE FORTIETH -- THE BUTCHER’S WIFE WHO PLAYED THE GHOST IN THE
CHIMNEY.
By Michault De Changy.
_Of a Jacobin who left his mistress, a butcher’s wife, for another woman
who was younger and prettier, and how the said butcher’s wife tried to
enter his house by the chimney._
It happened formerly at Lille, that a famous clerk and preacher of the
order of St. Dominic, converted, by his holy and eloquent preaching,
the wife of a butcher; in such wise that she loved him more than all the
world, and was never perfectly happy when he was not with her.
But in the end Master Monk tired of her, and wished that she would not
visit him so often, at which she was as vexed as she could be, but the
rebuff only made her love him the more.
The monk, seeing that, forbade her to come to his chamber, and charged
his clerk not to admit her, whatever she might say; at which she was
more vexed and infuriated than ever, and small marvel.
If you ask me why the monk did this, I should reply that it was not from
devotion, or a desire to lead a chaste life, but that he had made the
acquaintance of another woman, who was prettier, much younger, and
richer, and with whom he was on such terms that she had a key to his
chamber.
Thus it was that the butcher’s wife never came to him, as she had been
accustomed, so that his new mistress could in all leisure and security
come and gain her pardons and pay her tithe, like the women of
Ostelleria, of whom mention has been made.
One day, after dinner, there was a great feast held in the chamber of
Master Monk, and his mistress had promised to come and bring her
share both of wine and meat. And as some of the other brothers in that
monastery were of the same kidney, he secretly invited two or three of
them; and God knows they had good cheer at this dinner, which did not
finish without plenty of drink.
Now you must know that the butcher’s wife was acquainted with many of
the servants of these preachers, and she saw them pass her house, some
bearing wine, some pasties, some tarts, and so many other things that it
was wonderful.
She could not refrain from asking what feast was going forward at
their house? And the answer was that all this dainties were for such an
one,--that is to say her monk--who had some great people to dinner.
“And who are they?” she asked.
“Faith! I know not,” he said. “I only carry my wine to the door, and
there our master takes it from us. I know not who is there!”
“I see,” she said, “that it is a secret. Well, well! go on and do your
duty.”
Soon there passed another servant, of whom she asked the same questions,
and he replied as his fellow had done, but rather more, for he said,
“I believe there is a damsel there;--but she wishes her presence to be
neither seen nor known.”
She guessed who it was, and was in a great rage, and said to herself
that she would keep an eye upon the woman who had robbed her of the love
of her friend, and, no doubt, if she had met her she would have read her
a pretty lesson, and scratched her face.
She set forth with the intention of executing the plan she had
conceived. When she arrived at the place, she waited long to meet the
person she most hated in the world, but she had not the patience to wait
till her rival came out of the chamber where the feast was being held,
so at last she determined to use a ladder that a tiler, who was at work
at the roof, had left there whilst he went to dinner.
She placed this ladder against the kitchen chimney of the house, with
the intention of dropping in and saluting the company, for she knew well
that she could not enter in any other way.
The ladder being placed exactly as she wished it, she ascended it to
the chimney, round which she tied a fairly thick cord that by chance she
found there. Having tied that firmly, as she believed, she entered the
said chimney and began to descend; but the worst of it was that she
stuck there without being able to go up or down, however much she
tried--and this was owing to her backside being so big and heavy, and to
the fact that the cord broke, so that she could not climb back. She was
in sore distress, God knows, and did not know what to say or do. She
reflected that it would be better to await the arrival of the tiler, and
make an appeal to him when he came to look for his ladder and his rope;
but this hope was taken from her, for the tiler did not come to work
until the next morning, on account of the heavy rain, of which she had
her share, for she was quite drenched.
When the evening grew late, the poor woman heard persons talking in
the kitchen, whereupon she began to shout, at which they were much
astonished and frightened, for they knew not who was calling them,
or whence the voice came. Nevertheless, astonished as they were, they
listened a little while, and heard the voice now in front and now
behind, shrieking shrilly. They believed it was a spirit, and went to
tell their master, who was in the dormitory, and was not brave enough to
come and see what it was, but put it off till the morning.
You may guess what long hours the poor woman spent, being all night in
the chimney. And, by bad luck, it rained heavily for a long time.
The next day, early in the morning, the tiler came to work, to make
up for the time the rain had made him lose on the previous day. He was
quite astonished to find his ladder in another place than where he left
it, and the rope tied round the chimney, and did not know who had done
it. He determined to fetch the rope, and mounted the ladder and came
to the chimney, and undid the cord, and put his head down the chimney,
where he saw the butcher’s wife, looking more wretched than a drowned
cat, at which he was much astonished.
“What are you doing here, dame?” he asked. “Do you want to rob the poor
monks who live here?”
“Alas, friend,” she replied, “by my oath I do not. I beg of you to help
me to get out, and I will give you whatever you ask.”
“I will do nothing of the kind,” he said, “if I do not know who you are
and whence you come.”
“I will tell you if you like,” she said, “but I beg of you not to repeat
it.”
Then she told him all about her love affair with the monk, and why she
had come there. The tiler took pity on her, and with some trouble,
and by means of his rope, pulled her out, and brought her down to the
ground. And she promised him that if he held his tongue she would give
him beef and mutton enough to supply him and his family all the year,
which she did. And the other kept the matter so secret that everybody
heard of it.
*****
[Illustration: 41.jpg Love in Arms.]