Mylio—"What feast did I rob you of, Sir Paunch? Come, wake up!"
Goose-Skin—"You woke me up at the sweetest moment of my dream! And what a dream! I was witnessing the combat of Shrove-Tide against Shrove-Tuesday. Shrove-Tide, armed cap-a-pie, advanced mounted astride of a salmon. For casque he had on an enormous oyster, for buckler a cheese, for cuirass a ray, for spurs a round of sea-urchins, and for sling an eel with an egg between its teeth for a stone!"
MYLIO—"Such is the gluttony of this Sir Paunch that even asleep he dreams of eatables! Oh, you devil of a gourmand!"
Goose-Skin—"Miscreant! You snatched from my mouth dishes that cost me nothing, because, if Shrove-Tide was toothsomely armed, Shrove-Tuesday was no less so. His casque consisted of a veal patty with a roasted peacock for its top. Shrove-Tuesday, all cased in in hams, was astride of a roe whose many-branched antlers were loaded with partridges. For lance he had a long spit, run through a number of roast capons. (Addressing the trouvere with a redoubled affectation of grotesque anger) Vagabond! Man without faith or law! You woke me up at the very moment when, Shrove-Tide succumbing to the blows of Shrove-Tuesday, I was on the point of eating both the vanquished and the vanquisher! Arms and armor! Everything! I was on the point of eating everything including the mounts of the combatants! Oh, in all my life I shall not pardon you for your villainy."
Mylio—"Calm down! I shall substitute your dream with the reality. You shall not want for victuals."
Goose-Skin—"Oxhorns! A wonderful proposition! To eat with eyes open! What would there be wonderful about that! On the contrary, without you I was eating asleep! Oh, a plague upon you!"
Mylio—"But suppose I were to furnish you wherewith to guzzle a whole day and night, what would you then have to reproach me with? Just answer, comrade!"
Goose-Skin (gravely)—"You shut my mouth with the promise to fill it with good wine and plenty!"
Mylio—"Will you render me a service?"
Goose-Skin—"I'm a glutton, a boozer, a gambler, a libertine, a lover of wenches, a liar, a roysterer, a braggard, and a poltroon, but—oxhorns! I am not an ingrate. Never shall I forget that you, Mylio, the celebrated and brilliant trouvere, whose harp is the delight of the castles, have more than once shared your purse with old Goose-Skin the juggler, whose humble hurdy-gurdy cheers only taverns patronized by vagabonds, serfs and wenches! No! Never shall I forget your generosity, Mylio; and I swear to you that you always can count upon me—by the faith of Goose-Skin, which is my war name."
Mylio—"Are we not fellows in the gay science? Is not your merry hurdy-gurdy, which rejoices the poor and causes them to forget for a moment the misery of their lives, worth as much as my harp, which entertains the lustful or cloyed idleness of the noble dames? Mention not the services that I have rendered to you, my old friend."
Goose-Skin (interrupting him)—"In helping me you have done more than your duty. Never; no, never shall I forget it!"
Mylio—"Very well! But now listen to me—"
Goose-skin (with solemnity)—"When God created the world he put in it three kinds of men: the nobles, the priests and the serfs. To the nobles he gave the land, to the priests the goods of the simpletons, and to the serfs robust arms to work without let for the benefit of the priests."
Mylio—"Well said. But now stop your speech-making, and let me inform you—"
Goose-Skin—"The lots being then distributed by the Almighty, there remained two other and highly interesting classes to be provided for—the jugglers and the wenches. The Lord thereupon charged the priests to nourish the wenches, and he enjoined the seigneurs to keep the jugglers well fed. So, you see, it was no duty on your part, seeing that you are not a noble, to share your purse with me. Consequently, you have done more than your duty. Consequently the ones who fall short of their divine duty are the degenerate nobles, the curmudgeons, the misers, the skin-flints, the pedants, the—"
Mylio—"God's blood! By the horns of St. Joseph! Will you give me a chance to speak?"
Goose-Skin (in a pitiful and plaintive tone)—"Oh, the good times of the jugglers are gone! Formerly their purses and their bellies were always kept full. Alas! Our fathers have eaten the meat, we only have the bone to gnaw upon. But, now, speak, Mylio! I shall be as silent as my friend Gueulette, the tavern-keeper's daughter, when I implore her with love—the cruel, pitiless lass! Speak, my benign companion. I listen."
Mylio (impatiently)—"Are you really done?"
Goose-Skin—"You will sooner pull out my tongue than make me say another word, one single word more! My friend Gueulette herself, the roguish lassy, whose nose is so provoking, and whose corsage is so attractive—even she with her throat—"
Mylio (walking away)—"The devil take the babbler!"
Goose-Skin runs after the trouvere, and imitating the gestures of the deaf-and-dumb, indicates that he pledges himself to silence.
Mylio (returning)—"I have here in my almoner ten handsome silver deniers. They will be yours if you serve me well; but every superfluous word that you utter means one denier less."
Goose-Skin renews his silent pledges, swearing upon his hurdy-gurdy and his chaplet of vine-leaves that he will be mute as a fish.
Mylio—"You know Chaillot, the miller of the Abbey of Citeaux?"
Goose-Skin nods affirmatively with his head.
Mylio (smiling)—"By the Lord, Master Goose-Skin! You are keeping a good guard on your silver deniers. Well, then, that Chaillot, a confirmed drunkard, has for wife Chaillotte, an equally confirmed jade. Being of an accommodating disposition she entertained the monks right royally whenever they went to drink at her mill, until finally the miller's house became nothing but a tavern for the monks of the Abbey of Citeaux. Two weeks ago Abbot Reynier, the superior of Citeaux—"
Goose-Skin—"If I did not fear that it would cost me a silver denier, I would make free to say that the said Reynier is the most dissolute and most wicked scamp that the devil ever tonsured! But out of fear of having to pay for these truths with my good cash, I shall remain mute!"
Mylio—"In honor to the accuracy of the picture that you have drawn I shall pardon the interruption. But do not let it happen again! Now, then, Abbot Reynier said to me two weeks ago: 'Would you like to see a veritable treasure of rustic beauty? Join us to-morrow at the mill of the abbey. There is a girl at the place who is barely fifteen years old. Her aunt, the miller's wife, brought her up away from the public gaze. The fruit is cherry-ripe. I wish you to give me your opinion of her.' I accepted the abbot's offer. I love to witness the debaucheries of these monks whom I hate. They furnish me with good points for my satires. Well, I accompanied the superior and several of his friends to the mill. Thanks to the provisions that we brought along from the abbey, the meat was tender and the wine old. The heads began to swim. The repast being over, the infamous Chaillotte triumphantly fetches in her niece, a girl of fifteen, so beautiful—Oh, so beautiful!—a flower of grace and innocence. At her sight, the frocked debauchers, the tonsured tipplers, heated with wine, jump up neighing with lustful admiration. Frightened out of her senses, the poor little girl steps hastily back, forgetting that behind her is an open window that looks over the water of the mill—"
Goose-skin (with a tone of sorrow)—"And the little girl drops into the water? Poor little one!"
Mylio—"Yes, but fortunately I stood near and I leaped after her. It was in time. Drawn by the current, Florette was on the point of being broken by the wheel of the mill when I pulled her out."
Goose-Skin—"Even if it should cost me all my ten deniers, I shall cry out aloud that you behaved like a brave fellow!"
Mylio—"I carried Florette to the river bank. She regained consciousness. I read in her sweet looks her ingenuous gratitude. Profiting by the time that it would take the infamous Chaillotte