Archbishop Arundel, who seems at times to be the one interrogated (but we must not forget that we have only Thorpe’s version, unrevised by the other party), makes a more picturesque than telling answer: “Lewd losell! thou seest not far enough in this matter! for thou considerest not the great travail of pilgrims. . . . I say to thee that it is right well done, that pilgrims have with them both singers and also pipers: that when one of them that goeth barefoot striketh his toe upon a stone, and hurteth him sore and maketh him to bleed, it is well done that he or his fellow begin then a song or else take out of his bosom a bagpipe to drive away with such mirth the hurt of his fellow.” Lay writers of a reforming mind objected to pilgrimages, not so much on account of the worship of images, but because they thought these travels an encouragement to laziness and idle living. We know the opinion of Langland. The same views are expressed by an author of a quite different turn of mind, the one who wrote the “Roman de Renart,” and who has a special chapter to inform us “of the pilgrimage of Reynard and how he went to Rome.” Reynard cannot but consider that he has greatly {361} and many a time sinned, and feeling some anxiety about his misdeeds, goes to a hermit and confesses himself. Such are the faults he has to declare that the holy man does not dare absolve him, but advises him to go to Rome and ask the absolution of the Pope. Reynard accordingly “takes his scrip and burdon [that is, his wallet and staff, as did all pilgrims], and begins to move on, and takes his way; he looks quite like a pilgrim, his scrip fits his neck beautifully.” But travelling alone is not pleasant; he meets Belin the Sheep, and persuades him to come with him, and a little farther “Bernart the arch-priest,” a donkey, who was eating thistles in a ditch; he also secures this new companion.