Chapter 37 - Page 2

withdrawing of his main battle, even as
you may have marked the heron eschew the stoop of the falcon,
receiving him rather upon his beak than upon his wing, affairs, as I
do conceive, might have had a different face, and we might then, in a
more bellacose manner, have maintained that affray. Nevertheless, I
would not be understood to speak any thing in disregard of Julian
Avenel, whom I saw fall fighting manfully with his face to his enemy,
which hath banished from my memory the unseemly term of 'meddling
coxcomb,' with which it pleased him something rashly to qualify my
advice, and for which, had it pleased Heaven and the saints to have
prolonged the life of that excellent person, I had it bound upon my
soul to have put him to death with my own hand."

"Sir Piercie," said the Abbot, at length interrupting him, "our time
allows brief leisure to speak what might have been."

"You are right, most venerable Lord and Father," replied the
incorrigible Euphuist; "the preterite, as grammarians have it,
concerns frail mortality less than the future mood, and indeed our
cogitations respect chiefly the present. In a word, I am willing to
head all who will follow me, and offer such opposition as manhood and
mortality may permit, to the advance of the English, though they be my
own countrymen; and be assured, Piercie Shafton will measure his
length, being five feet ten inches, on the ground as he stands, rather
than give two yards in retreat, according to the usual motion in which
we retrograde."

"I thank you, Sir Knight," said the Abbot, "and I doubt not that you
would make your words good; but it is not the will of Heaven that carnal
weapons should rescue us. We are called to endure, not to resist, and may
not waste the blood of our innocent commons in vain--Fruitless opposition
becomes not men of our profession; they have my commands to resign the
sword and the spear,--God and Our Lady have not blessed our banner."

"Bethink you, reverend lord," said Piercie Shafton, very eagerly, "ere
you resign the defence that is in your power--there are many posts
near the entry of this village, where brave men might live or die to
the advantage; and I have this additional motive to make defence,--the
safety, namely, of a fair friend, who, I hope, hath escaped the hands
of the heretics."

"I understand you, Sir Piercie," said the Abbot--"you mean the
daughter of our Convent's miller?"

"Reverend my lord," said Sir Piercie, not without hesitation, "the
fair Mysinda is, as may be in some sort alleged, the daughter of one
who mechanically prepareth corn to be manipulated into bread, without