. . .Church,” cried a weazened boat-builder with a giant’s arm, as he buried his face in a cup of sack and plunged his hand into a fishwife’s basket of limpets.

“Ay, but what means she by kissing and arm-getting with a priest?” cried a snarling vraic-gatherer. “’Tis some jest upon Holy Church, or yon priest is no better than common men, but an idle shame.”

By this time Michel was among them.[Pg 38] “Priest I am none, but a soldier,” he said, in a loud voice, and told them bluntly the reasons for his disguise; then, taking a purse from his pocket, thrust into the hands of his rescuers and their families pieces of silver and gave them brave words of thanks.

But the seigneur was not to be outdone in generosity. His vanity ran high; he was fain to show Angèle what a gorgeous gentleman she had failed to make her own; and he was in ripe good-humor all round.

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