Whereon he tied a
great sack to the ship's head, and cut the bottom out, and made every one
of those monks get into that sack and so fall through into the sea;
whereby he rid the monks of Ely of their rivals."
"Pish! why tell me such an old-wives' fable, knight?"
"Because the monks believe that old-wives' fable, and are stout-hearted
and stiff-necked accordingly."
"The blood of martyrs is the seed of the Church," said William's chaplain,
a pupil and friend of Lanfranc; "and if these men of Belial drowned every
man of God in Normandy, ten would spring up in their places to convert
this benighted and besotted land of Simonites and Balaamites, whose
priests, like the brutes which perish, scruple not to defile themselves
and the service of the altar with things which they impudently call their
wives."
"We know that, good chaplain," quoth William, impatiently. He had enough
of that language from Lanfranc himself; and, moreover, was thinking more
of the Isle of Ely than of the celibacy of the clergy.
"Well, Sir Dade?"
"So they have got together all their kin; for among these monks every one
is kin to a Thane, or Knight, or even an Earl. And there they are, brother
by brother, cousin by cousin, knee to knee, and back to back, like a pack
of wolves, and that in a hold which you will not enter yet awhile.
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