All these are unworthy of pity, and, adds Langland, with that aristocratic touch which now and then recurs in his lines, all these hermits were common artisans, “workmen, webbes and taillours, and carters’ knaves”; formerly they had “long labour and lyte wynnynge,” but they noticed one day that these deceitful friars swarming everywhere, “hadde fatte chekus” (cheeks); they thereupon abandoned their labour and took lying garments, as though they were clerks: . . . “Other of som ordre, other elles a prophete.” They are seldom seen at church, these false hermits, but they are found seated at great men’s tables because of their cloth. Look at them eating and drinking of the best! they who formerly were of the lowest rank, at the side tables, never tasting wine, never eating white bread, without a blanket for their bed: “Ac while he wrought in thys worlde · and wan hus mete with treuthe, He sat atte sydbenche · and secounde table; Cam no wyn in hus wombe · thorw the weke longe, Nother blankett in hus bed · ne white bred by-fore hym. The cause of al thys caitifte · cometh of meny bisshopes That suffren suche sottes.”[173] {147} These rascals escape the bishops, who ought to have their eyes wider open. “Alas!” said, in charming language, a French poet of the thirteenth century, Rutebeuf, “the coat does not make the hermit; if a man dwell in a hermitage and be clothed in hermit’s dress, I don’t care two straws for his habit nor his vesture if he does not lead a life as pure as his frock betokens. But many folk make a fine show and marvellous seeming of worth; they resemble those over-blossoming trees that fail to bring forth fruit.”[174] Under the eyes of the placid hermit, comfortably established by the roadside, calmly preparing himself by a carefree life for a blissful eternity, moved the variegated flow of travellers, vagabonds, wayfarers, and wanderers. His benediction rewarded the generous passer-by; the stern look of the austere man did not disturb his sanctimonious indifference. The life of others might rapidly consume itself, burnt by the sun, gnawed by care; his own endured in the shade of the trees, and continued without hurt, lulled by the murmur of human passions— Et je dirai, songeant aux hommes, que font-ils? Et le ressouvenir des amours et des haines Me bercera pareil au bruit des mers lointaines. (Sully Prudhomme.) {148} Good or bad, the whole race (still surviving in the East) disappeared in England at the Reformation, leaving but a memory, and surviving only in poetry: It is the Hermit good! He singeth loud his godly hymns That he makes in the wood. He’ll shrive my soul, he’ll wash away The Albatross’s blood. {149} [Illustration 31. AN ESCAPED PRISONER FLYING TO SANCTUARY. (_From the MS. 10 E. IV._)] CHAPTER III SECURITY OF THE ROADS