"To all of us the wardrobes, the fine clothes, the warm robes--and then alms, alms to the poor who suffer with cold!"
"And then, fire to the episcopal villa--and to the sack!"
"We shall take with us the young girls, who will follow us gladly!"
"Long live love and the Vagrery!" cried Ronan, saying which he struck up the song:
"My father was a Bagauder, and I a Vagre am; born under the green foliage as any bird in May.
"Where is my mother? I do not know, forsooth!
"The poniard in one hand, the torch held in the other, he moves from burg to burg and villas kept by bishops; he carries off the wives or concubines of bishops and of counts, and takes the belles along into the thickest of the woods!
"And first they weep and then they laugh. The jolly Vagre knows the art of love. In his strong arms the loving belles forget full soon the cacochymic bishop or the brutified duke!"
"Aye, Simon, we are about to put a bishop's house to the sack!"
"No more nor less so than Aman and Aëlian, our prophets, Bagauders in their days as we are Vagres in ours. For all that, the poor say: 'Good Aëlian!' 'Good Aman!' May they some day say: 'Good Ronan!' I would die happy, Simon!"
"Always living in the recesses of the woods--"
"It is warm there in winter, cool in summer!"
"Always on the alert; always on the run over hill and valley; always wandering without hearth or home--"
"But always living free, old Simon. Yes, free! free! instead of leading a slave's life under the whip of some Frankish master or some bishop! Join us, Simon!"
"Do you not hate your master, Bishop Cautin, and the whole seigniory?"
"One time I was young, rich and happy. The Franks invaded Touraine, my native country. They slew my wife after violating her; they dashed my little girl's head against the wall; they pillaged my house; they sold me into slavery, and from master to master, I have finally fallen into the hands of Bishop Cautin. So you see, I have every reason to execrate the Franks; but worse than them, if possible, I execrate the Gallic bishops, who hold us Gauls in bondage, and sanctify the crime of our foreign oppressors. I would hang them all if I could!"
"Who goes there?" cried Ronan noticing a human form on the outside, creeping on its knees and approaching the door of the chapel in that posture. "Who goes there?"