_Scope for humour._ _Grotesque figures._ In the illumination of his manuscript the monastic scribe, even when decorating a sacred book, could lay aside for a moment the solemn religious thoughts to which his vows had bound him; he could sport with every variety of grotesque monster and of Pagan imagery, and could find vent for his repressed sense of fun and humour by the introduction of caricatures and pictorial jokes of all kinds among the foliage of his borders and initials without any fear of reproof on the part of his superiors[208]. Fig. 52 from a French fourteenth century manuscript shows a characteristic example of an illuminators humorous fancy, a grotesque Bishop, with a mitre made out of a pair of bellows. [Illustration: Fig. 52. Grotesque figure from a French manuscript of the fourteenth century.] Very frequently the jealousy which existed between the Regular and the Secular Clergy is expressed in the pictorial sarcasms of the monastic illuminators. This feeling, on the Secular side, is vividly set forth in the amusing Latin Poems of Walter Map[209], who, toward the close of the twelfth century, was the Parish Priest of a little church in the Forest of Dean[210]. Walter Map's satire is mainly directed against the Cistercian order of monks, with whom he was specially brought into contact owing to his parish being situated near the Cistercian Abbey of Flaxley. _Humorous scene._ Fig. 53. from a German manuscript of the end of the twelfth century, now in the Chapter library of Prague Cathedral, gives an interesting example of the introduction of a humorous scene into a grave work, Saint Augustine's _De civitate Dei_. The illuminator, who was named Hildebert, has been worried by a mouse, which stole his food; and here on the last leaf of the manuscript he represents himself interrupted in his work and throwing something at the mouse which is nibbling at his food. These explanatory words are written on the open page of his book, _A wicked mouse._ Pessime mus, sepius me probocas ad iram, ut te deus perdat. "You wicked mouse, too often you provoke me to anger, may God destroy you." [Illustration: Fig. 53. Miniature of a comic subject from a German manuscript of the twelfth century, representing a monastic scribe worried by a mouse.] _Portrait of the scribe._ At the feet of the scribe a lad named Everwinus, possibly a monastic novice, is seated on a low stool, drawing a piece of ornamental scroll-work. The Monk Hildebert's desk is in the form of a lectern supported by a carved lion; in it are holes to hold the black and red inkhorns, and two pens or brushes. In his left hand the scribe holds the usual penknife, and another pen is stuck behind his ear. _Short hours of labour._