Gaucelm the Fortunate’s father had been Gaucelm the Crusader, Gaucelm of the Star. Certain of the ideas of the burghers of Roche-de-Frêne had been approved by this prince. Others found themselves stingingly rebuked. One of Roche-de-Frêne’s concepts of its own good might flourish in court favour, a second just exist like grass under a stone, wan and sere, a third encounter all the forces of extirpation. In the main Gaucelm of the Star bore hardly against the struggle for liberty. But at the last he took the cross, and needing moneys so that he might go to Jerusalem with great array, granted “privileges.” After three years he returned from Palestine and granted no more. He died and Gaucelm the Fortunate reigned. For five years he fought the ideas of Roche-de-Frêne. Then he changed, almost in a night-time, and granted almost more than was asked. His barons and knights stared and wondered; Gaucelm was no weakling. Roche-de-Frêne sat down to digest and assimilate what it had gained. The town was no more radical than it thought reasonable. The meal was sufficient for the time being. There began a string of quiet years. The bishop’s palace stood a long building, with wings at right angles. Before it spread a flagged place, and in the middle of this a fountain jetted, the water streaming from dolphins’ jaws. In old times the bishops of Roche-de-Frêne had been mightier than its ravening, war-shredded lords. Then had arisen the great line that built the castle and subdued the fiefs and turned from baron to prince and outweighed the bishops. The fountain, shifting its spray as the wind blew, had seen a-many matters, a-many ambitions rise and fall and rise again. The fountain streamed and the spray shifted this autumn, while the trees turned to gold and bronze and the grapes were gathered, and through the country-side bare feet of peasants trod the wine-press, and over the bridge in droves lowed the cream-hued cattle. It rose and fell time before and time after that feast-day on which the squire Garin had knelt in the cathedral dusk between the Palestine pillars, before Our Lady of Roche-de-Frêne in blue samite and a gemmy crown. It streamed and sparkled on a sunny morning when Bishop Ugo, bound for the castle, behind him a secretary and other goodly following, checked his white mule beside the basin and blessed the lounging folk who sank upon their knees.