“I will take care of that, reverend Prior,” said the Hermit of Copmanhurst ; “for I will wear them myself.”

“Friend, or brother,” said the Prior, in answer to this solution of his doubts, “if thou hast really taken religious orders, I pray thee to look how thou wilt answer to thine official for the share thou hast taken in this day’s work.”

“Friend Prior,” returned the Hermit, “you are to know that I belong to a little diocese, where I am my own diocesan, and care as little for the Bishop of York as I do for the Abbot of Jorvaulx, the Prior, and all the convent.”

“Thou art utterly irregular,” said the Prior; “one of those disorderly men, who, taking on them the sacred character without due cause, profane the holy rites, and endanger the souls of those who take counsel at their hands; lapides pro pane condonantes iis , giving them stones instead of bread as the Vulgate hath it.”

“Nay,” said the Friar, “an my brainpan could have been broken by Latin, it had not held so long together.⁠—I say, that easing a world of such misproud priests as thou art of their jewels and their gimcracks, is a lawful spoiling of the Egyptians .”

“Thou be’st a hedge-priest,” 46 said the Prior, in great wrath, “ excommunicabo vos. ”