“Clerk me no Clerks,” replied the transformed priest; “by Saint George and the Dragon, I am no longer a shaveling than while my frock is on my back⁠—When I am cased in my green cassock, I will drink, swear, and woo a lass, with any blithe forester in the West Riding.”

“Come on, Jack Priest,” said Locksley, “and be silent; thou art as noisy as a whole convent on a holy eve, when the Father Abbot has gone to bed.⁠—Come on you, too, my masters, tarry not to talk of it⁠—I say, come on, we must collect all our forces, and few enough we shall have, if we are to storm the Castle of Reginald Front-de-Boeuf.”

“What! is it Front-de-Boeuf,” said the Black Knight, “who has stopped on the king’s highway the king’s liege subjects?⁠—Is he turned thief and oppressor?”

“Oppressor he ever was,” said Locksley.

“And for thief,” said the priest, “I doubt if ever he were even half so honest a man as many a thief of my acquaintance.”