Author Description

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1846 edition. Excerpt:... third line the more common reading is, " to fetch a pail," &c. The monks employed another method of exaction, which was neither more nor less than begging--the vocation of a large portion of the fraternity. There is preserved a short but pithy exhortation to the poor gulled peasant, to be aware of this insidious mode of tax-gathering, which sounds thus to ears uninitiated: " Why give all to the friar? You poor simple boor! Button your pockets, and Give him no more l" "The sum of this short pasquinade," observes Mr. Ker, "amounts to,--don't be a proof of the old saying, of 'a fool and his money are soon parted.' " The wretchedness of the plundered peasantry sometimes drew forth the commiseration even of those who plundered them; but the expression of such feeling came so little from the heart, that it commonly dwindled into a sneer. Take, for example, the following, in our homely style of translating,--for we approach as nearly as possible the manner of the originals: Mr. Ker says that it is "a jeering apostrophe to the noodle peasant put into the mouth of the monk by the in Mr. Ker's decision on this point, because it is the only instance wherein we find the hard-hearted monks susceptible of compassion. How different is the spirit of the following, evidently sung by the monks over their cups, when exulting at a successful excursion of their provider, the begging friar! " Little Boo-peep! His food is good liquor: When his cup's drained out, Why, he begs all the quicker. A fig for their grumbling! Live the jolly old dog! Who procures for us all Good swipes and good prog." Mr. Ker gives the following explanation of the name which occurs in...