When rich men's minstrels entered the hall after the repast, bringing with them their viols, he waited to hear grace until the minstrel had finished his chant; then he rose and the priests who said grace stood before him. When we were at his court in a private way,[466] he used to sit at the foot of his bed, and when the Franciscans and Dominicans[467] who were there spoke of a book that would give him pleasure, he would say to them: "You shall not read to me, for, after eating, there is no book so pleasant as _quolibets_,"--that is, that every one should say what he likes. When men of quality dined with him, he made himself agreeable to them.... [Sidenote: His primitive method of dispensing justice] Many a time it happened that in the summer he would go and sit down in the wood at Vincennes,[468] with his back to an oak, and make us take our seats around him. And all those who had complaints to make came to him, without hindrance from ushers or other folk. Then he asked them with his own lips: "Is there any one here who has a cause?"[469] Those who had a cause stood up, when he would say to them: "Silence all, and you shall be dispatched one after the other." Then he would call Monseigneur de Fontaines, or Monseigneur Geoffrey de Villette, and would say to one of them: "Dispose of this case for me." When he saw anything to amend in the words of those who spoke for others, he would correct it with his own lips. Sometimes in summer I have seen him, in order to administer justice to the people, come into the garden of Paris dressed in a camlet coat, a surcoat of woollen stuff, without sleeves, a mantle of black taffety around his neck, his hair well combed and without coif, a hat with white peacock's feathers on his head. Carpets were spread for us to sit down upon around him, and all the people who had business to dispatch stood about in front of him. Then he would have it dispatched in the same manner as I have already described in the wood of Vincennes. FOOTNOTES: [446] April 25, 1215. [447] Louis started on his first crusade in August, 1248. After a series of disasters in Egypt he managed to reach the Holy Land, where he spent nearly four years fortifying the great seaports. He returned to France in July, 1254. Sixteen years later, in July, 1270, he started on his second crusade. He had but reached Carthage when he was suddenly taken ill and compelled to halt the expedition. He died there August 25, 1270. Louis was as typical a crusader as ever lived, but in his day men of his kind were few; the great era of crusading enterprise was past. [448] This was Philip, son of Philip Augustus. The lands of the count of Boulogne lay on the coast of the English Channel north of the Somme. [449] An important church center about seventy miles north of Paris. [450] A town a few miles south of Paris.