{"collection":"myth-cosmogony","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_68434/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_68434","id":"gutenberg_68434","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/68434","summary":null,"tags":["Category: History - Medieval/Middle Ages","Category: Mythology, Legends & Folklore","Category: Plays/Films/Dramas","Dutch literature -- To 1500 -- Translations into English","Mystery and miracle plays"],"text":"THE DUTCH LIBRARY.\n\n\n    Vol.   I. LANCELOT OF DENMARK\n    Vol.  II. ESMOREIT\n    Vol. III. MARY OF NIMMEGEN\n\n\n\n\n                            THE DUTCH LIBRARY\n\n                                   III\n\n                           A MARVELOUS HISTORY\n                           OF MARY OF NIMMEGEN\n\n                        PRINTED IN THE NETHERLANDS\n\n\n\n\n                                    A\n                           MARVELOUS HISTORY OF\n                             MARY OF NIMMEGEN\n\n                       WHO FOR MORE THAN SEVEN YEAR\n                     LIVED AND HAD ADO WITH THE DEVIL\n\n                   Translated from the Middle Dutch by\n                            HARRY MORGAN AYRES\n                Associate Professor in Columbia University\n\n                         With an introduction by\n                            ADRIAAN J. BARNOUW\n            Queen Wilhelmina Professor in Columbia University\n\n                             [Illustration]\n\n              Of this series fifty copies have been printed\n                on real Dutch hand-made paper, in 8vo size\n\n\n\n\n_INTRODUCTION_\n\n\n_The miracle play of Mary of Nimmegen is one of the gems of Dutch\nmediaeval literature. Its heroine is a reincarnation of Beatrice, the\nrunaway nun from a Brabant convent who, after wandering seven years with\nher paramour, and living other seven as a public woman, returned, a\nrepentant sinner, to the convent to find that she had never been missed.\nFor all those fourteen years the Mother of God had served, in her person,\nas sacristan, because Beatrice had never let a day go by without praying\nan Ave Maria._\n\n_The love idyll of this early legend has been turned into a grotesque\ncaricature by the author of our miracle play. The handsome youth whose\nseductions proved stronger than the nun\u2019s monastic vows is changed\ninto \u201can ill-favored devil of a man\u201d, as he is described by one of the\ntipplers in the Antwerp tavern. Leering Moonen\u2019s one eye is a mirror that\ndistorts the smile of love into a grimace. His promise to satisfy the\ngirl\u2019s craving for pleasure and finery is the substitute magic whereby he\nworks his charm upon her, and even that would have failed of its effect\nwithout the aid of Mary\u2019s fit of despair. Despondency is the devil\u2019s\nabettor. To us moderns, accustomed to the searching analysis of mental\nreactions, the girl\u2019s easy surrender to both the fit and the fiend is\nnot sufficiently accounted for. But the author of \u201cMary of Nimmegen\u201d\ndid not attempt to unravel the involutions of the mind. His aim was to\nglorify the ways of God\u2019s mother to man, and the actions of man required\nno further exposition than sufficed to exemplify her divine mercy in\nits fullness. For that purpose the relation between cause and effect\ncould be expressed in the simplest of terms, such as give force to the\nproverbial wisdom of those early days. Wanhope is the devil\u2019s snare. That\nhomely truth, a reflection of the mediaeval doctrine that wanhope was one\nof the sins against the Holy Ghost, is illustrated by Mary\u2019s reckless\ninvocation of \u201ceither God or all the fiends of Hell\u201d, and Moonen appears\non the scene at once in accordance with the Dutch adage which says that\nwhen you speak of the devil you tread on his tail. English sense of\ndecorum, which shuns the mention of the unspeakable one, pretends to hear\nthe flutter of wings when it speaks of an angel of heaven. Dutch love\nof realism, in scorning to barter the tangible tail under foot for the\ninvisible wings over head, is truer to the experience of life, for weak\nhumanity has always been more easily susceptible to the suggestive power\nof evil than of good._\n\n_Mary of Nimmegen finds it so. Her \u201cGod or the Devil, \u2019tis all one to\nme\u201d, is a vain pretence at impartial allegiance. Who stands at the\nparting of the ways to Heaven and Hell, waiting for God to call or\nfor the Devil to snatch her, has already passed beyond the point of\nretrievement. The response to the divine summons will require a moral\neffort which the snatcher will spare her. The way of least resistance is\nthe way to Hell._\n\n_Mary is never in doubt as to the real nature of her one-eyed companion.\n\u201cYe be the devil out of hell!\u201d, is her reply to Moonen\u2019s introduction of\nhimself, and in her first lament over the sinful life she is leading she\nadmits to her own soul that_\n\n    \u201c_Though he saith little, I may not him mistake:_\n    _He is a fiend or but little more._\u201d\n\n_The innocent maiden who lived a blameless life in her uncle\u2019s home has,\nby one night\u2019s experience, become a hardened sinner. It is difficult\nfor a modern reader to believe in Mary\u2019s sudden wickedness. But we must\nremember that the mediaeval playwright did not mean to show his audience\nthe consecutive stages of her degradation. The action on the stage is an\nepitome of that mental process, condensing temptation and surrender into\none simple scene, the intervening phases of mental struggle and agony\nbeing left to the imagination of the audience. The language, which is\nmore conservative than the stage, has retained that simple allegory which\nmodern drama has discarded: we still speak of \u201ca fallen girl\u201d, although\nwe demand from the modern playwright that he show us how she slid into\nsin._\n\n_While the inner life is thus translated into the simplest of\nallegories, life\u2019s visible pageant is mirrored in all its variety. Its\nrealistic portrayal is the chief beauty of this drama. In the romantic\nplaylets of \u201cEsmoreit\u201d and of \u201cLanseloot\u201d a faint reflection is seen of\ncourtly manners imported from France. In \u201cMary of Nimmegen\u201d the everyday\nlife of Netherlands burghers is astir on the stage. We get a glimpse of\nthe simple household of a village priest, who, not unknown to his niece,\ndabbles in necromancy, we are introduced into the low life of Antwerp\nand hear the drawer\u2019s call to the tapster repeating an order, \u201cA first,\nho, a first! Draw of the best and fill to the brim!\u201d, we watch with the\ngood people of Nimmegen the performance of a mystery on a pageant-wain in\nthe market-place, and see women take a passionate part in the political\nfactions of the day._\n\n_This participation of women in politics was evidently characteristic\nof the Netherlands. Their meddling with affairs of state suggested to\nan English dramatist of a later period a vivid scene between an English\ngentlewoman and a group of Dutch Pankhursts. They counsel her to follow\ntheir example_:\n\n                      \u201c_You are wellcom, Lady_\n    _And your comming over hether is most happy;_\n    _For here you may behold the generall freedom_\n    _We live and traffique in, the ioy of woemen._\n    _No emperious Spanish eye governes our actions,_\n    _Nor Italian jealouzie locks up our meetings:_\n    _We are ourselves our owne disposers, masters;_\n    _And those that you call husbands are our Servants._\n    ...\n\n                      _Do you think there\u2019s any thing_\n    _Our husbands labour for, and not for our ends?_\n    _Are we shut out of Counsailes, privacies,_\n    _And onely lymitted our household business?_\n    _No, certaine, Lady, we pertake with all,_\n    _Or our good men pertake no rest._\u201d\n\n                    _The Tragedy of Sir John van Olden Barnavelt (1619)._\n\n_Women in the Netherlands were evidently emancipated before their\nsisters elsewhere. The Italian Quirini, Venetian envoy to the Court at\nBrussels, in the early sixteenth century, was amazed at the freedom\nthe women of Antwerp enjoyed. \u201cThe ladies\u201d, he wrote in 1506, \u201cwear\nbright costumes and spend all their leisure, when the work is done, in\ndancing, singing, and playing musical instruments, giving themselves\nentirely over to pleasure. They keep house, in addition, and manage all\ndomestic affairs, without their husbands\u2019 control.\u201d And when Albrecht\nD\u00fcrer visited Antwerp, with his wife and maid, in the autumn of 1520, he\nfound it difficult to bring his own ideas of decorum into line with the\nequality which there prevailed between the sexes. At the banquet given in\nhis honor by the Guild of St. Luke, the artists\u2019 wives were all present,\nand D\u00fcrer could not do otherwise than bring his women companions to the\nfeast. But at his inn in the Woolstreet where he could live in German\nfashion, he let his wife and maid have their meals in the kitchen, and\ntook his own in the parlor with mine host._\n\n_The Antwerp that D\u00fcrer knew can not have been much different from that\nwhere Moonen and Mary lived for seven years. For hardly more than a\ngeneration had passed, in 1520, since the author conceived his play. The\nwicked aunt\u2019s fealty to Duke Adolf of Guelders is a motif extraneous to\nthe plot, as poetic justice demands that her suicide be an atonement\nfor her cruelty to young Mary, but it reconciles the historian to its\npreposterous intrusion by affording him a clue to the date of composition\nof the drama. The old Duke Aernout was imprisoned by his son in the year\n1465, and in 1471 occurred his release, which stirred the virago\u2019s wrath\nto such a pitch that \u201cshe cut her throat out of pure spite\u201d. At the time\nof Mary and Moonen\u2019s return to Nimmegen three years had gone by since her\ndeath, and Mary, after her pilgrimage to Rome, is said in the Epilogue to\nhave survived the miracle of the rings for \u201cabout two years.\u201d The play\ndoes not tell us how many years her penance lasted, but supposing that\nit was short and that the author wrote soon after Mary\u2019s death, the date\nof composition can hardly have been much earlier than 1480. It matters\nlittle whether the poet dramatized historical events or an invented\nstory. The records of the town of Nimmegen contain no reference to a\nperformance of the wain-pageant of Maskeroon, nor has a trace been found\nof Mary\u2019s grave, with the three rings suspended over it, in the convent\nfor converted sinners at Maastricht. But even if she were a fictitious\ncharacter, the author, while inserting these chronological data into the\nplay, imagined the incidents of his female rake\u2019s progress as actual\noccurrences in a recent past, which justifies the historian\u2019s use of\nthese data in trying to fix the date of composition._\n\n_If the poet were also the writer of the prose sections, it would be\nwrong to ignore the statement that Mary\u2019s uncle, after their visit to the\nPope, lived yet, according to the earliest version, for twenty-four years\nin his village near Nimmegen. The author recording events of a quarter\nof a century ago would, in that case, have written, at the earliest, in\nthe year 1498. But there is good ground to believe that the poet was\nnot responsible for the interpolated prose, which is not essential to\nthe play on the stage. Some Dutch critics hold the prose to be part of\nthe drama as originally written, and intended to be spoken by a stage\nmanager who supplied in his narrative the missing links between the\nscenes. But the fact is that only in a few instances does the prose\nserve that purpose, and in those isolated cases the imagination of the\naudience could be relied upon to help itself. By far the greater part of\nthe prose narrative either repeats the drift of the preceding dialogue\nor anticipates the incidents of later scenes. The first meeting between\nMary and her aunt is introduced by a short account in prose from which\nwe gather that the aunt \u201cheld of the side of the young Duke, and after\ndid destroy herself whenas she learned that the old Duke was made quit of\nprison\u201d. If this was destined to be addressed to the audience from the\nstage, not the past, but the present, tense would have been in order. But\napart from this grammatical unfitness for a speaker\u2019s role, these words\nare dramatically unfit as they forestall the surprise of the audience at\nthe aunt\u2019s scornful reception of her niece. That the author can not be\nguilty of thus crudely spoiling his own creation is sufficiently evident\nfrom many instances of his insight into the exigencies of dramatic\ntechnique. By premonition and foreboding he will give the audience an\ninkling of imminent calamity, but to blurt out the full truth before the\ntruth is seen in action is not his manner. When Mary has departed from\nher uncle, the good priest becomes aware of a heaviness that he can not\nexplain_:\n\n    \u201c_Scarce had the maiden from me gone,_\n    _It came o\u2019er my spirits, how I can not tell._\n    _I fear with her or me \u2019twill not go well._\u201d\n\n_The audience get an intimation that something awful is impending, but\nthey are kept in suspense as to what it will be and who will be the\nvictim, whether Mary or her uncle. In that we observe the subtle touch of\nthe artist who wrote the dialogue. He can not have been the same man who\ninserted the superfluous and meddlesome prose._\n\n_How, then, must we account for its intrusion if the prose did not\noriginally form part of the play? The manner in which the drama has been\npreserved accounts for it. \u201cMary of Nimmegen\u201d has not come down to us in\nmanuscript form. The earliest known version is a printed chapbook from\nthe press of Willem Vorsterman of Antwerp, who was admitted as a member\nof St. Luke\u2019s Guild in 1512, and remained at work in that city until\n1543. The volume is not dated but probably came from the press in 1518\nor 1519. Printed plays were a novelty at that early date. Vorsterman\nmay have felt that to publish a drama in book form needed some\njustification. The word that was intended to be spoken could not be made\nto serve the reader\u2019s purpose without a compromise between the dramatic\nand the epic. For the book is the story-teller\u2019s domain, and the dialogue\nwas not felt to be a story until the narrator\u2019s \u201cquoth he\u201d subordinated\nevery speech to his control. That seems to be the purpose of the inserted\nprose sections. They were not written, in the first instance, to\nelucidate situations left indistinct by the dramatist, but to lend to the\ndrama the semblance of a narrative and thereby justify its appearance in\nprint. Willem Vorsterman was careful not to offer his book to the public\nas a play: \u201cA very marvelous story of Mary of Nimmegen who for more than\nseven years lived and had ado with the devil\u201d, is his description of\nthe contents of the volume on its title-page. And the three subsequent\neditions, that of 1608 by Herman van Borculo, of Utrecht, that of 1615\nby Pauwels Stroobant, of Antwerp, and a reprint of the latter probably\npublished in Holland, though falsely bearing the imprint of Stroobant on\nthe title-page, all persist in calling the book a \u201cstory\u201d, be it a \u201cvery\nmarvelous\u201d according to Vorsterman, or a \u201cbeautiful and very marvelous\nand true\u201d according to Van Borculo and Stroobant. The printers knew\ntoo well that the play\u2019s dramatic qualities would not secure its ready\nsale. The moral tale it embodied, not its literary form, was its chief\nattraction, and as a \u201cstory\u201d it made its appeal to the reading public._\n\n_This popular estimate of the drama as literature accounts for the manner\nin which an English translator of \u201cMary of Nimmegen\u201d felt free to handle\nthe original. \u201cHere begynneth a lyttell story that was of a trwethe\ndone in the lande of Gelders of a mayde that was named Mary of Nemmegen\nthat was the dyuels paramoure by the space of vij yere longe\u201d, runs the\ntitle of this rendering, and its \u201cAmen\u201d is followed by the statement,\n\u201cThus endeth this lyttell treatyse Imprynted at Anwarpe by me John\nDuisbrowghe dwellynge besyde the camer porte.\u201d The story in dialogue\nas printed by Vorsterman became a \u201ctreatyse\u201d in the English version\nas printed, in probably the same year, by his fellow citizen Jan van\nDoesborch. Vorsterman left the dialogue of the playwright intact from no\nscrupulous respect for an author\u2019s work of art. It suited his convenience\nto print it as it was written, his own prose, or that of the scribbler he\nemployed, being sufficient to justify his labeling the book a \u201cstory\u201d.\nBut the translator, who had to re-word the entire dialogue in any case,\nhad no reasons of convenience to make him spare the poet\u2019s creation. He\nmade a fairly literal rendering of the interpolated prose and turned\nthe dramatic dialogue into a clumsily phrased narrative, of which the\nfollowing extract may serve as a sample_:\n\n    \u201c_When they were come to Nemmegyn it fortuned on the same that\n    it was the dilycacyon of a chyrche, and when they were within\n    the Towne than sayde Emmekyn to Satan let us goo see howe my\n    aunte dothe, than sayde Satan ye nede nat go to hyr for she is\n    dead more than a yere a goo, than sayd Emmekyn is it trewth,\n    than sayd Satan ye, than sayd Emmekyn to the dyuell what do\n    all yender folks that be yender gathered than sayde the dyuell\n    the play a play that is wont every yere to be played, than\n    sayde Emmekyn good love let us goo here it for I have harde my\n    vnckyll say often tymes that a play were better than a sermant\n    to some folke._\u201d\n\n_The Englishman who perpetrated this murder of a good book was not more\nguilty in intention than Willem Vorsterman, only the result of his\nlabor, due to the different task he undertook, makes him seem the greater\nsinner of the two._\n\n_Although extraneous to the play as it was acted, the prose is not\naltogether a negligible accretion. For its writer evidently drew on his\nrecollections of the play as he had seen it staged for his description\nof some of the incidents. The quarrel between the aunt and her gossips,\nenacted by their shouting and cursing and pulling of each other\u2019s hair;\nthe row stirred up by Moonen among the crowd that listened to Mary\u2019s\nrecital of a \u201cgoodly ballat\u201d, one among the folk being stabbed to death,\nwhereupon \u201che who did this had his head smote off\u201d; the manslaughter\ncommitted by one of Mary\u2019s potmates at the Golden Tree; the uncle\nlocking the rings round Mary\u2019s neck and hands; these are apparently\nbits of pantomime as essentially part of the play as is the written\ncontext. And because of its value as the only testimony we possess of an\neye-witness of the drama\u2019s production on the mediaeval stage, the prose\nhas been retained by the present translator, his book being a faithful\nreproduction in English of the earliest version of the play as printed by\nWillem Vorsterman._\n\n_Of the author of our little drama nothing is known. He was, doubtless,\nnot a native of the good town of Nimmegen. For it appears from verse\n652 that he imagined Mary\u2019s uncle to live at Venlo, and a citizen of\nNimmegen would have known that the distance between these two places was\nnot a three hours\u2019 walk but four times as long. The poet was evidently\nmore familiar with the city of Antwerp, and his picture of the drinking\nscene in the tavern of the Golden Tree is vivid enough to be a first-hand\nimpression. He was a poet of no mean talent, and not unconscious, it\nseems, of his own excellence in the noble art of rhetoric. The pride of\nthe poets of the Renaissance is forestalled in his praise of poesy, of\nwhich he made Mary his mouthpiece_:\n\n    \u201c_Rhetoric is not to be learned by skill._\n    _\u2019Tis an art that cometh of itself solely._\n    _The other arts, if a man giveth himself thereto wholly,_\n    _These be to be learned and eke taught._\n    _But rhetoric is to be praised beyond aught._\n    _\u2019Tis a gift of the Holy Ghost\u2019s bestowing._\u201d\n\n_The goodly ballat lamenting in its refrain that \u201cthrough folly falls\npoesy to decay\u201d seems itself to bear the marks of folly\u2019s blight. It was\na concession to the taste of the day, which held the accumulation of\nrhymes, the use of grandiloquent gallicisms, and the elaborate structure\nof stanzas\u2014all skilfully reproduced in Mr. Ayres\u2019 rendering\u2014to be the\nelements of poetry. That was the kind of versification admired and\ncultivated in the so-called Chambers of Rhetoric, a kind of mediaeval\ntheatre guilds where the local poets and poetasters imbibed the love of\npoetry with their beer. But our author, who believed in \u201cPoeta nascitur,\nnon fit\u201d, proved by his own achievement that neither can the born poet be\nunmade by the temporary vagaries of poetic fashion. Where he wrote the\nlanguage that his mother had taught him, instead of the bombast admired\namong the brethren of his craft, it yielded true poetry, vibrant with\nemotion in the lyrical parts, and full of plastic force in its realistic\npassages. Intricate rhyme schemes are employed to emphasize the lyrical\nnote, but the verse runs on so smoothly through the reverberation\nof sounds, and the language remains so simple and direct, that the\nartificial effort does not obtrude itself upon our notice. Sometimes\nthe dialogue assumes the form of a rondeau, and in the scene between\nuncle and aunt this device is applied with consummate skill, the uncle\u2019s\nsad lament \u201cAlas, my sister, ye deceive me\u201d, which is its \u201cleitmotif\u201d,\nbecoming intensified at its second and third repetition by its contrast\nwith the aunt\u2019s replies, which proceed from mockery at her clodpate\nbrother John to heartless slander of the lost girl. The poet\u2019s device of\nvarying the rhyme scheme of the dialogue according to the mood of the\nspeakers has been carefully reproduced by the translator, so that the\nreader can form his own opinion of its effectiveness._\n\n_Apart from its poetical qualities the play of \u201cMary of Nimmegen\u201d\ndeserves to be read\u2014and enacted, to be sure\u2014because it is a fine specimen\nof mediaeval drama. Recent productions in Holland have shown that the\nplay does not miss its effect upon a twentieth-century audience. The\nauthor selected a plot which yielded to modern literature two of its\nnoblest dramatic compositions. For the heroine of the Dutch poet is a\nfemale prototype of Faust and of Tannh\u00e4user. To have been the first to\ndiscover its fitness for the stage is a title of distinction for our\nplaywright, and we regret our ignorance that can not link his name, as\nit deserves, with those greater names of Marlowe, Goethe and Wagner. His\ndrama also affords an early instance of the effective introduction of the\nplay within the play. It served a double purpose in this case. For not\nonly did the show of \u201cMaskeroon\u201d cause Mary to repent her sinful life,\nbut it was, at the same time, an \u201coratio pro domo\u201d of the poet, as it\nfitly impressed the audience with the ethical value of his art. \u201cBetter\nthan many a preaching,\u201d was the village priest\u2019s verdict. And we, of the\ntwentieth century, can agree with him, though we do not share the poet\u2019s\nMariolatry. For Heaven\u2019s joy over a repentant sinner must ever find its\necho in the poetry of this world which is a gift of Heaven to its chosen.\nAnd of those chosen was our nameless author. The play of \u201cMaskeroon\u201d has\nlong ceased to impress repentant Maries, but \u201cMary of Nimmegen\u201d herself\nhas attained immortality, thanks to her maker\u2019s gift, which was of the\nHoly Ghost\u2019s bestowing._\n\n\n\n\n_PROLOGUE_\n\n\nIn the days that Duke Arent of Guelders was done in prison at Grave by\nhis son Duke Adolf and his knavish fellows there dwelt three mile from\nNimmegen a devout priest hight Sir Gysbrecht, and with him dwelt a fair\nyoung maid hight Mary, his sister\u2019s daughter, whose mother was dead. And\nthis aforesaid maid kept her uncle\u2019s house serving him in all needful\nwith honesty and diligence.\n\n\n\u00b6 How Sir Gysbrecht hath sent his niece Mary to Nimmegen.\n\nIt chanced that this Sir Gysbrecht would send his niece Mary to Nimmegen\nthere to buy what so they needed, saying to her thus:\n\n    Mary!\n\n    MARY\n\n                      What would ye, my good eme?\n\n    UNCLE\n\n    Hark, child, give heed as doth beseem.\n    Get ye to Nimmegen with all speed\n    To fetch straight our provisions; we have need\n    Of candles, of oil in the lamp to set;\n    Salt, vinegar, and onions eke must ye get,\n    And store of sulphur matches, as ye say truly.\n    Here be eight stivers, go hen and buy\n    In Nimmegen what so we lack, as ye well may.\n    It is by good hap the week\u2019s market day,\n    So shall ye the better find what ye desire.\n\n    MARY\n\n        Good eme, to do even as ye require\n        Ye know me ready; I will go my gait.\n\n    UNCLE\n\n    This even to win home again if it be too late,\n    For the days be now full short the while,\n    And \u2019tis hither to Nimmegen two great mile,\n    And now ten o\u2019 the clock, or well more,\n    Heark, child, and if ye may not give o\u2019er\n    Ere by broad day, as it seemeth you,\n    Ye may win home as ye would fain do,\n    Bide there the night, I would be the more at ease,\n    And go sleep at thine aunt\u2019s, my sister, if it please;\n    She will not deny you for a night but one.\n    I had liefer that, than ye should over stile and stone\n    Come homewards darkling and alone all wholly;\n    For the road is of stout knaves none too free.\n    And ye be a maid, but young and fair thereto,\n    And like to be accosted.\n\n    MARY\n\n                                  Eme, as it pleaseth you,\n    I will nought other do than as ye tell.\n\n    UNCLE\n\n    Greet me your aunt, my sister, and farewell.\n    Buy what we lack by weight and measure true.\n\n    MARY\n\n    I will, good eme; adieu.\n\n    UNCLE\n\n                                    Dear niece, adieu.\n    God\u2019s grace be ever thy company.\u2014\n    Lord God, why doth my heart so heavy lie?\n    Is it that the land so sorely is distraught?\n    Or that my niece may in some snare be caught?\n    Stay, whence this heaviness? \u2019Tis strange to think upon.\n    Scarce had the maiden from me gone\n    It came o\u2019er my spirits, how I cannot tell.\n    I fear with her or me \u2019twill not go well.\n    Would I had kept her with me at home.\n    \u2019Tis madness at their will to let roam\n    Young maids or women through the countryside.\n    The knavery of this world is deep and wide.\n\n\n\u00b6 How Mary was shamefully bespoken of her aunt.\n\nThus is Mary departed from her uncle and come unto Nimmegen, where she\ndid buy all that was needful for her or her uncle. And on the selfsame\nday that she was come to Nimmegen her aunt had fallen out with four or\nfive of her gossips concerning the Duke Adolf who had done into prison\nthe old Duke his father. So that she was the rather mad or a raging\nshe-devil than a Christian wight; for she held of the side of the young\nDuke, and after did destroy herself whenas she learned that the old Duke\nwas made quit of prison by the hand of the chastelain of Grave, as ye\nwill hereafter learn. Mary, seeing that it grew to evening when she had\ndone all those things for the which she had come to Nimmegen, said unto\nherself thus:\n\n    Now have I all such as we wanted,\n    By weight and measure no whit scanted,\n    Bought and duly therefor paid.\n    But meseems I have here so long delayed\n    That yonder is the night risen well nigh.\n    There is a dial, whereon I may espie\n    The hour of the day. \u2019Tis already betwixt four and five.\n    Here I must get me a lodging, as I would thrive.\n    There remains yet an hour more of day,\n    And in three hours I scarcely may\n    Win home to mine eme\u2019s. Nay, to stay here were best.\n    Mine aunt dwelleth hard by, as I have guessed.\n    I will go pray her that she make me a bed,\n    An on the morrow, so soon as I be awak\u2019ned,\n    I will haste me home to my task once more.\n    I see mine aunt standing before her door.\n    In seemly wise I will her greet.\u2014\n    Aunt, may Christ make all your sorrow sweet,\n    And all them you love keep both fair and well.\n\n    AUNT\n\n    Fy, welcome, devil, how do ye in hell?\n    Well, mistress, what would ye hereabout?\n\n    MARY\n\n    Mine eme sent me at noon, without a doubt,\n    For candles, mustard, vinegar and verjuice\n    And for such other as at home we have use;\n    And ere I could run from one thing to another in hie\n    And search out each and all and then buy,\n    It is grown so late; and little may it misease you\n    That as for tonight ye make me a bed, an it please you.\n    I would e\u2019en now get me home, but in the night\n    There be those who lie in wait for maids to do them despite,\n    Ay, and dishonor, so that they have shame of it;\n    And for that I am afraid.\n\n    AUNT\n\n                                    Out upon it, chit!\n    God a mercy! Make ye so much pother about a maidenhead?\n    Fy, dear niece, ye ken well how ye were bred\n    This long time, though ye pretend to such dismay.\n    Nor with your household matters since noonday\n    Ye have not been busy, as to my thinking.\n\n    MARY\n\n    In good sooth, aunt, I have.\n\n    AUNT\n\n                              Yea, or sitting a-drinking\n    In some snug corner with \u201cfill the can, fill.\u201d\n    Fy, niece, in the country Dickon or Will\n    Know well how to go with the lasses amids the rye,\n    And when at even their sports they ply,\n    Hath not Gill won a pretty forfeit from Jack?\n    Fy, niece, ere now ye have got a green gown to your back.\n    At home, I doubt not, many brisk lads there be.\n\n    MARY\n\n    Why say ye so, aunt?\n\n    AUNT\n\n                                Ay, mistress hypocrisy!\n    Though the truth on\u2019t cannot be told, I\u2019ll be bound,\n    Ye have tripped it lightly many a round\n    Where the piper got not five groats for his noise.\n    Let \u2019em go to it never so with the boys,\n    \u2019Tis all virgin, ay, till girdles be let out.\n\n    MARY\n\n    That I should be so shent and shamed, without\n    All guilt, is more than heart can bear.\n\n    AUNT\n\n    And I have spoke with them too who would swear\n    They saw you and your own eme in such guise\n    That it cannot be told of in no seemly wise.\n    All our kin ye bring to scandal and shame.\n    Tush, vile progeny, ye be too much to blame,\n    Out of my sight! Ye do mine eyes no good!\n\n    MARY\n\n    Lord God, what woe is mine in mood!\n    How doth the blood forsake my body utterly.\n    So vile reproach, such words of ignomy,\n    To hear and suffer, all unmerited!\n    Now, aunt, tell me if ye will make me a bed\n    For this one night?\n\n    AUNT\n\n                                    Ye were me liefer lie,\n    As deep as this roof-tree is high,\n    In the Meuse as bait for all its fish.\n    Be gone, ere you repent your wish.\n    I tremble like a leaf for teen.\n\n    MARY\n\n    Ye do me wrong, aunt.\n\n    AUNT\n\n                                Stay, this cursed quean\n    With vexing me will not be done or quit.\n    Would ye have those fine braids tousled a bit?\u2014\n    Yea, she rouses the maggot in my head.\n    I could bring the devil himself to bed\n    And bind him to the pillow like a doting wight.\n    I be grown so awry with spite,\n    I know not if I stand on head or feet.\n    To them withall that I today meet\n    I shall make answer, wherefor wrathful I am,\n    Even the same answer as the devil giveth his dam.\n\n    MARY\n\n    Ah, wretch! now be ye fallen on sorry days.\n    I stand here as one in a maze,\n    And of myself I know not the what or the how;\n    Meseems, I should have run frantic from the town erenow,\n    Mindful nor of knaves nor of thieves.\n    Under the trees I will make me a bed of leaves.\n    I reck not whom I meet, be it fremd or kin,\n    Though the devil came in his own proper skin.\n    To ask no questions thinketh me best.\n    Under this hedge I will sit me down to rest,\n    Yielding myself, for ill or well,\n    To god or all the fiends of hell.\n\n\n\u00b6 How Mary took leave of her aunt and departed out of Nimmegen.\n\nThus is the young maiden, Mary, departed from her aunt and piteously\nweeping in sore distress hath betaken her out of the town Nimmegen in the\ndark of evening, until she is come to a great thick hedge, beneath the\nwhich she sat her down in sorrowful mood, weeping and wailing, and oft\ncommending herself to the devil, and to herself sorrowfully saying:\n\n    Weeping and wailing and mine hands wringing,\n    Calling myself maledight,\n    Be all my solace and none other thing,\n    By cause mine aunt hath done me despite.\n    Is it wrong that I should be in spite\n    That causeless she blam\u00ebd me at erst?\n    Nay! Such anger doth on me alight\n    And waxeth in my heart aright,\n    That I sit here in wrathful plight\n    And ever hold myself accurst.\n\n    Help, what temptations on me throng!\n    Shall I yet do some violence?\n    Ah, youth, canst thou bear up so long?\n    Can reason offer no defence?\n    How should I stomach such offence\n    All guiltless? Whosoe\u2019er he be,\n    None living hath patience.\n    Wanhope doth drive me from my sense.\n    Help me lament mine innocence,\n    God or the Devil, \u2019tis all one to me.\n\n\n\u00b6 The Devil, who always spreadeth his nets and snares wherein to catch\nsouls ripe unto damnation, on hearing these words said with himself as\nfollows:\n\n    Ah! I\u2019m the richer by one more soul!\n    Ye see me disguised and, on the whole,\n    Quite the sort of gentleman God approves,\n    And, except for my one eye, just as behoves;\n    The other perchance was cast out by a spell.\n    It\u2019s not in our power, we devils of hell,\n    To incarnate ourselves, as ye are aware,\n    Without some little defect here or there,\n    Be it in the head or the hands or the feet.\n    Now as I may I will make my voice sweet,\n    And speak with such modest and winsome cheer\n    As to do none offense to my sweet lemman here.\n    With the women \u2019tis doucely at first that gets on.\n    Fair child, why sit ye here sorrow-begone?\n    Hath some one misdone you, sans reason or right,\n    As a good honest fellow would gladly requite?\n    The picture of innocence, child, ye resemble,\n    Wherefore I would comfort you.\n\n    MARY\n\n                            Help, God, how I tremble!\n    How stands it with me? I know not aright\n    Since first this good man came on my sight.\n    Help, how all faintly throbbeth my heart!\n\n    THE DEVIL\n\n    Fair child, fear ye no grief nor smart.\n    I will do you neither harm nor let,\n    But I make avouch if your course ye will set\n    By my avise, and go with me by all means,\n    I will make you ere long a queen among queens.\n    ...\n\n    MARY\n\n                                        ... Friend,\n    I sit now all at my wits\u2019 end,\n    This my machine so wrought to hurt\n    By shameful words, the which without desert\n    I needs must bear: slut, harlot, whore,\n    That to the Fiend I\u2019d liefly give me o\u2019er\n    As to God, for I be half from my wit.\n\n    THE DEVIL\n\n    By Lucifer, \u2019tis purchase, all of it!\n    She hath drunk up her wrath at one\n    And sits in wanhope like a stone.\n    Hope bids me shed no tears today:\n    I shall not fail.\u2014Fair child, I pray\n    That we in friendship may agree.\n\n    MARY\n\n    Who are ye, friend?\n\n    THE DEVIL\n\n                          A master of much subtlety,\n    Who never comes short in aught he essays.\n\n    MARY\n\n    It skills not with whom I go my ways,\n    As well with the worst as with the best.\n\n    THE DEVIL\n\n    If to mewards your love were dress\u2019d\n    I would teach you in all their parts\n    Music, rhetoric, all the seven arts,\n    Logic, grammar, geometry,\n    Arithmetic and alchemy,\n    All the which be worthy of heed;\n    No woman on earth in learning shall speed\n    As ye shall do.\n\n    MARY\n\n                  Ye should have potent gramerye.\n    Who may ye be?\n\n    THE DEVIL\n\n                                    Why, what care ye?\n    To ask me that \u2019twere wiser not.\n    In truth, I am not the best of my lot.\n    But none could love you as well as I.\n\n    MARY\n\n    How hight ye, friend?\n\n    THE DEVIL\n\n                          Moonen with the single eye,\n    Whom all good fellows know right well.\n\n    MARY\n\n    Ye be the devil out of hell!\n\n    THE DEVIL\n\n    At least your humble servant and true friend.\n\n    MARY\n\n    Strange, but ye do not me offend.\n    Though Lucifer self were come from hell,\n    I stand in case to greet him well.\n    I be wholly quit of fear.\n\n    THE DEVIL\n\n    So this is the short and long, my dear:\n    If you will do after my rate,\n    All that your fancy may dictate\n    I\u2019ll teach you, as at erst I told.\n    Of goods, of jewels, or of gold\n    Ye shall never more have need.\n\n    MARY\n\n    \u2019Tis well said; but by your rede,\n    Ere we be given each to each,\n    The seven arts ye shall me teach,\n    For in such learning I would speed.\n    Ye will me teach them?\n\n    THE DEVIL\n\n                                        Faith, in deed.\n    All seemly lore I will impart.\n\n    MARY\n\n    Nigromancy is a merry art.\n    Mine eme therein hath a pretty wit.\n    He hath a book and wonders works with it,\n    Nor never fails, he is so sly.\n    He can through the needle\u2019s eye\n    Send the devil a-creeping willy-nilly.\n    That trick I fain would learn.\n\n    THE DEVIL\n\n                                            Ah, silly,\n    My knowledge is wholly at your device.\n    But I never studied, to be precise,\n    Nigromancy in all its parts.\n    It is quite the hardest of all the arts,\n    And for a novice perilous as well.\n    Suppose there\u2019s wanting in your spell\n    A word or letter wherewithal\n    Ye would make the spirit that ye call\n    Your wishes duly to obey,\n    The fiend would break your neck straightway.\n    My dear, be sure there\u2019s mischief in it.\n\n    MARY\n\n    Well, in that case I\u2019ll not begin it.\n    I would not meet death in such a kind.\n\n    THE DEVIL\n\n    Ha, ha! I\u2019ve put that out of her mind,\n    What would she be wanting to learn such a thing?\n    An she did, it would not be long ere she\u2019d bring\n    On all us poor spirits the worst of our fears,\n    At her own sweet will set all hell by the ears,\n    And force even me in some dreadful tight squeak.\n    I teach her nigromancy? Not this week!\n    It is something at all costs she must not consider of.\u2014\n    Now hearken to what I shall teach you, my love.\n    If nigromancy ye will wholly let be.\n\n    MARY\n\n    What will ye teach me?\n\n    THE DEVIL\n\n                                          Ah, let us see.\n    I will make you master of every tongue,\n    So that far and wide your fame shall be rung.\n    In the knowledge of tongues much virtue abides,\n    And the seven liberal arts there besides.\n    Ye shall be exalted of all and each.\n\n    MARY\n\n    My sorrow wanes at your fair speech.\n    Do that, and wholly at your will\n    I hold me.\n\n    THE DEVIL\n\n                                  One little matter still;\n    But grant my prayer, and well will you betide.\n\n    MARY\n\n    What is your prayer?\n\n    THE DEVIL\n\n                                To lay your name aside.\n    And give yourself another therefor.\n    Mary\u2019s a name I never learned to care for.\n    Along of one Mary I and my fellows into such mischief fell\n    That \u2019tis a name we like but indifferent well.\n    Were ye called Lisbeth or Lina or Gretchen, my dear,\n    It would get you more, I\u2019ll be sworn, in a year\n    Than ever ye had of kin or kith.\n\n    MARY\n\n    Alas, wherefore do ye take ill therewith?\n    \u2019Tis ever the sweetest and noblest name\n    That the tongue of man can fashion or frame.\n    Why should ye thereagainst make war?\n    I may not change, for worlds and more,\n    A name which nought could make more sweet.\n\n    THE DEVIL\n\n    Tut, tut! It\u2019s all about one\u2019s feet\n    Again, but if she will thereto consent!\u2014\n    Would we, my dear, to our content\n    Go wandering, ye must change that name,\n    Or here we part. Yet more I claim\n    Of you. A promise is a debt.\n\n    MARY\n\n    What must it be?\n\n    THE DEVIL\n\n                                      Not to forget,\n    Come weal, come woe, I cannot bear\n    To have you cross yourself.\n\n    MARY\n\n                                    I grant it well and fair.\n    On crossing I set but little store.\n    But my name I can ill brook to give o\u2019er.\n    For Maria, whence I have it, is my hope and trust,\n    And when in sorrow I am thrust\n    I cry on her to intercede.\n    Daily thus I bid my bede\n    Even as a child I learned it of yore.\n    Praised be Mary evermore!\n    While I have life I will ne\u2019er have done,\n    Though wild and wanton I may run,\n    With praising her, nor at all forget.\n\n    THE DEVIL\n\n    Well, since your will be wholly set\n    Upon this name, I will somewhat abate:\n    Of all the letters keep at any rate\n    The first and drop the other three;\n    That is the M, and Emma shall ye be,\n    As in your countryside be many a maid and dame.\n\n    MARY\n\n    Well, since I may not have my proper name\n    I were indeed to blame, if we parted for a letter;\n    Emma I am, since I may be no better:\n    But still I like it not.\n\n    THE DEVIL\n\n                                            Nay, come,\n    If ye have not everything beneath your thumb\n    Within the year, I have nought to say.\n    Haste we to Bolduc without a stay\n    And thenceward let us take no rest\n    Ere to Antwerp we have pressed;\n    There we shall a wonder show.\n    By that, the tongues ye shall wholly know\n    At your desire, I pledge me to \u2019t,\n    And the seven liberal arts, to boot.\n    Bastard and malmsey shall ye drink.\n    But be my friend and ye may not think\n    Of the marvels all ye shall do and see.\u2014\n    But at last your soul belongs to me!\n\nAfter these words Emma and Moonen have taken their way to Bolduc, where\nfor some while they tarried, feasting merrily, and paying the shot of\neach and all who ate and drank in their company.\n\nNow shall we stint a little of Emma and Moonen and tell of Sir Gysbrecht,\nher eme.\n\nAfter that Mary, the which now hight Emma, had been for some while away,\nSir Gysbrecht, her eme, much wondered at her tarrying, and said with\nhimself thus:\n\n    O anxiety, which clamors within me strong,\n    How dost thou rend my heart and my wit molest.\n    For that my niece Mary doth bide so long\n    Who to Nimmegen market hath her dress\u2019d,\n    Where if it grew dark, I told her, as for the best,\n    Or haply in any wise she were frighted,\n    She should at my sister\u2019s seek her rest;\n    There ever I lodge when I am benighted.\n    Nor will my troubled heart be righted\n    Ere I know how she doth speed.\n    If mischief on her hath alighted,\n    I die without all hope or rede,\n    For the lass is all I have at need,\n    And ever from childhood hath been my care;\n    If foul befall her \u2019twere woe indeed.\n    These lasses lightly fall in despair.\n    Now to Nimmegen I repair\n    To get me tidings without fail.\n    Men oft must hear a sorry tale.\n\nAfter these words is Sir Gysbrecht gone to his sister\u2019s house, asking\nafter Mary, the niece of them both, the which answered rudely that she\nwist nought of her. Whereat he was right sad, saying to her thus:\n\n    Alas, my sister, ye deceive me,\n    When ye say that of Mary ye nothing wot.\n\n    AUNT\n\n    Nay, good clodpate John, believe me.\n\n    UNCLE\n\n    Alas, my sister, ye deceive me.\n\n    AUNT\n\n    Nay, she is cloistered, I conceive me\n    Where such birds be spitted for a groat.\n\n    UNCLE\n\n    Alas, my sister, ye deceive me,\n    When ye say that of her ye nothing wot;\n    And thus with wrath yourself besot,\n    Though I bid you but tell in all gentleness\n    If ye have seen her.\n\n    AUNT\n\n                                    Natheless,\n    Say ye not her charge was mine.\n    She came, \u2019tis true, eight or ten days syne,\n    Saying, \u201cMake me a bed, aunt, for to-night\n    I dare not go home, lest I be done despight\n    Of knaves who would lightly some mischief begin.\u201d\n    I bade her take her once more to the inn\n    Where the livelong day she had sat drinking and skinking.\n\n    UNCLE\n\n    How! had she the livelong day been a-drinking?\n\n    AUNT\n\n    That you may well be thinking, and nothing loath.\n    And her cheeks were as red, I make an oath,\n    As a baby\u2019s bottom that has been well thwack\u2019d.\n    When I blamed her a little for her shameful fact,\n    She made as with good sharp sauce she could eat me straight.\n    Thus cursing and shouting she goes her gate,\n    And no more of my fine young lady I see.\n\n    UNCLE\n\n    Alas, what shall become of me?\n    O God in three, where hath she gone or far or near?\n\n    AUNT\n\n    Why, goodman dull, in the muddy wine or clear,\n    Where they resort as for such sport are meet.\n\n    UNCLE\n\n    Alas, my sister, ye gar me greet,\n    That ye make me such shameful mocks.\n\n    AUNT\n\n    Yea, had ye kept her locked up in a box,\n    So had your trouble not begun.\n    God\u2019s son, goodman, what harm is done\n    If she follow her lust at large a bit?\n    It will not matter to her no whit\n    Nor fare the worse by a single straw.\n    She will not go halt for it.\n\n    UNCLE\n\n                              This doth my spirit so adaw\n    I fear mine heart in four will cleave.\n    I must turn me about and with my sleeve\n    Wipe from mine eyes and cheeks a tear.\n\n    O mother of God, the which each year\n    In Aix I visit and adore,\n    Help me now as ye have done yore,\n    And ye in Maestricht, Saint Servace,\n    Devoutly have I set in place\n    Full many a candle, as ye wot:\n    I pray you now, forsake me not.\n\n    In time of need it is to one\u2019s friends one must look;\n    I will now let search for her in every nook\n    If any of her may have heard.\n    Though I be stirred,\n    \u2019Tis but small wonder that I grieve:\n    Of lief \u2019tis ill to take one\u2019s leave.\n\nAfter this Sir Gysbrecht departed him from his sister sad at heart\nbecause he gat no tidings of Mary his niece.\n\n\n\u00b6 How the wicked aunt thrust a dagger in her throat.\n\nIn the meanwhile the chastelain of Grave let the old duke Arent forth of\nthe prison and led him to the town of Bolduc where he was right royally\nreceived by the lords of that same. Which hearing, the wicked aunt waxed\nso wrathful in her venomous heart that she well nigh burst for spite,\nsaying:\n\n    Help me, liver, lights, and spleen,\n    Teeth and head, nought goes aright!\n    I shall smother or split with teen:\n    Like a spider I swell with spite;\n    From my wits I be thrust out quite\n    At the tidings that I hear.\n    The old thief, in the castle that was locked tight,\n    He is got from Grave scot-free and clear.\n    Now all my comfort is but drear,\n    And the young duke, whom I obeyed,\n    Will shortly have but sorry cheer.\n    Such woe is me that I am near\n    To yield me, body and soul as I was made,\n    And summon all devils to mine aid.\n\n    THE DEVIL\n\n    Ha, ha! there\u2019s profit as in this case!\n    Her soul is mine if I have the space\n    Of half an hour on her to bestow.\n\n    AUNT\n\n    Is it not noyous?\n\n    THE DEVIL\n\n                              Yea, and a shrewd blow\n    To them as were counted the young duke\u2019s men.\n\n    AUNT\n\n    To say the truth on\u2019t, what is he, then,\n    Who ever a finer fellow saw with eye?\n    Yea, though in hell I must everlastingly fry,\n    I could cut my throat out of pure spite,\n    So I were done with this business quite.\n    Adieu and farewell, valiant young peer.\n    But so ye be duke in after year\n    Is all I ask for my shortened life.\n    Thus in my throat I thrust the knife\n    And with a blow I end me quite.\n    Faction has damned full many a wight.\n\n    THE DEVIL\n\n    To Hell\u2019s convocation, in unending dole,\n    I summon this soul to its final fruition.\n    The folly of men who in factions enroll\n    And for some princeling get damned to perdition!\n    They are ours! all ours, who in this condition\n    Persist stubborn-hearted despite of all ill.\n    Envious faction gives yearly addition\n    To Hell of its millions, lament it who will.\n\n\n\u00b6 How Emma and Moonen journeyed to Antwerp, where they wrought much evil.\n\nWhen Emma and Moonen had for some while tarried at Bolduc they journeyed\nto Antwerp whither they be speedily come. And Moonen said unto Emma thus:\n\n    Now be we in Antwerp, as ye well would,\n    Here will we triumph and scatter our good.\n    Go we in to the \u201cTree\u201d for a pint of romany.\n\n    EMMA\n\n    To the \u201cTree\u201d, say ye?\n\n    MOONEN\n\n                              Yes, faith, there shall ye see\n    All the spendthrifts that thrive by mischance;\n    And the wenches who know well all the old dance,\n    The which on ten and four hazard all at a throw.\n    Above sit the burghers, and the craft below,\n    With whom \u2019tis more blessed to take than to give.\n\n    EMMA\n\n    All that I would liefly behold, as I live.\n    Nought could be better, as to my thinking.\n\n    MOONEN\n\n    Yea, in the Gold Room we shall be drinking\n    Ere that we part what pleaseth you most.\n    Sit down, love. Yea, a first, mine host!\n    And if it grew musty in cask, we were evil paid.\n\n    THE DRAWER\n\n    What wine drink ye, good man?\n\n    MOONEN\n\n                                      A pint of grenade,\n    And for my wife a pint of ypocras,\n    And of romany a pint, the which nought doth surpass\n    To raise a man\u2019s spirits when they be low.\n\n    THE DRAWER\n\n    Ay, that\u2019s the truth. A first! ho! a first! ho!\n    Draw of the best and fill to the brim!\n\n    FIRST TIPPLER\n\n    See, Hans, yon is a wench that is trim.\n\n    SECOND TIPPLER\n\n    Ye say sooth, and but an ill-favored devil of a man!\n\n    FIRST TIPPLER\n\n    Let us sit by them and drink of our can.\n    If she be but his doxy and not his wife\n    We\u2019ll filch her of him.\n\n    SECOND TIPPLER\n\n                    Ay, he shall have a taste of the knife,\n    For he is but a foul, ill-favored lout,\n    But the wench is sweet flesh past all doubt.\n    Be she his doxy, I know where this night I shall lie.\n    Will aid me?\n\n    FIRST TIPPLER\n\n                            In the throat, yea, that will I.\n    Foot to foot we will stand fast as we may.\u2014\n    God a mercy, toper!\n\n    MOONEN\n\n                          Pot-mates, come drink, I pray.\n\n    SECOND TIPPLER\n\n    Nay, toper, we drink of the same tun.\n    But may we sit you beside?\n\n    MOONEN\n\n                        Yea, surely, that were well done.\n    Good fellowship is to me nothing loath.\n\n    FIRST TIPPLER\n\n    By your good leave, whence come ye both?\n\n    MOONEN\n\n    From Bolduc and beyond be we.\n\n    EMMA\n\n    Dear Moonen, were it not geometry\n    If perchance I could surely scan\n    How many drops of wine there be in a can?\n\n    MOONEN\n\n    Yea, love, and have ye the trick of that still?\n    I taught it you but yesterday.\n\n    EMMA\n\n                                    To forget it were ill.\n    Logic ye after taught me well and fair:\n    I hold it all fast in mind.\n\n    FIRST TIPPLER\n\n                      Toper, what saith your wife there?\n    Can she soothly reckon to a jot\n    How many drops of wine be in this pot?\n    Of stranger thing I have never heard write.\n\n    MOONEN\n\n    She will do yet stranger in your sight.\n    Her like ye have never met withall;\n    The seven arts she hath mastered all;\n    Ars metric and geometry,\n    Logic, grammar, astronomy,\n    Music, and rhetoric, of ancientest repute.\n    With the stoutest clerk she dare dispute\n    In the schools of Paris or Louvain.\n\n    SECOND TIPPLER\n\n    Good toper, under your leave we were fain\n    See or hear some of her art.\n\n    FIRST TIPPLER\n\n    Yea, surely, and I pledge two stoups of wine for my part,\n    And, by cog\u2019s ribs, if any scant her in her tale\n    We will shed our blood for you without fail,\n    In any mischief that may you befall.\n\n    MOONEN\n\n    That merry ballat, as ye may call,\n    Wherewith our last noonday in Highstreet ye amused,\n    Do ye tell o\u2019er for these folk.\n\n    EMMA\n\n                              I pray you hold me excused.\n    In rhetoric I be but a dull wight,\n    Allbe I would fain go to it with my might,\n    The circle of the seven arts to fulfill.\n    Rhetoric is not to be learned by skill;\n    \u2019Tis an art that cometh of itself solely.\n    The other arts, if a man giveth himself thereto wholly,\n    These be to be learned and eke taught.\n    But rhetoric is to be praised beyond aught.\n    \u2019Tis a gift of the Holy Ghost\u2019s bestowing,\n    Though there be rude folk of such small knowing\n    That they reject it. \u2019Tis great dole\n    To them who love it.\n\n    SECOND TOPER\n\n                                        Ay, good soul,\n    Must we use so much argument?\n\n    FIRST TOPER\n\n    Say us somewhat, we were well content\n    With what ye can, and out of good will\n    I will eke say somewhat.\n\n    EMMA\n\n                                    Now, hold ye still,\n    For rhetoric asketh good understanding;\n    And after my best cunning I will sing.\n\n    O rhetoric, sweet theoric and comfortable,\n    I lament with dreariment that men thee hate;\n    Unto the heart that loves thine art \u2019tis lamentable.\n    Cry on them fy! who thee not cultivate\n    Or thy first finder\u2019s fame abate!\n    Lewd and without shame are they.\n    Them I despise who do after this rate;\n    And to the wise \u2019tis grief to hear this say:\n    Through folly falls poesy to decay.\n\n    \u201cPoesy hath praise\u201d: an ancient saying;\n    But weighing it, its mettle is but base:\n    Put case, a poet true art essaying\n    The braying of the unlettered race\n    Will chase him straightway forth from place,\n    Nor grace nor gear shall him repay.\n    But they some bold Tom Piper will agrace\n    Alway. Wherefore none may gainsay:\n    Through folly falls poesy to decay.\n\n    Fy ye blind and clumsy wits,\n    Poesy ye should strive to understand, and\n    Love it rightly, as befits.\n    Let it in honor on every hand stand;\n    By poesy only is a land grand.\n    Praise to them who own its sway!\n    Fy on the foolish who would have it out of hand bann\u2019d!\n    Wherefore yet once more I say:\n    Through folly falls poesy to decay.\n\n    Prince, to poesy I will set my mind\n    And to its doctrine be faithfully inclined,\n    For it may be come at none other way.\n    But to the crafty seemeth it ever unkind\n    That the foolish be to poesy blind.\n\nTo hear this goodly ballat great press of folk gathered and Moonen\nbeholding this did after his hellish kind and stirred among them such\nstrife that one among the folk was stabbed to death. And he who did this\nhad his head smote off. Thus Emma and Moonen lived at Antwerp at the sign\nof the \u201cGolden Tree\u201d in the market, where daily of his contriving were\nmany murders and slayings together with every sort of wickedness. In the\nwhich he greatly rejoiced, saying with himself thus:\n\n    What prodigy can I do?\n    Hell, I hope, will lend its aid thereto,\n    And get of it fair gain.\n    If but a little longer I may here reign,\n    Hell-mouth will be filled till it split.\n    \u2019Twere a pity this good inn to quit,\n    For all who live in riot and wantonness\n    And win a profit of very idleness,\n    Gamblers, fighters, daughters of the game,\n    Bawds and all they who use the same,\n    Of these there be here a goodly retinue,\n    And \u2019tis of them my profit doth accrue.\n    Wherefore in this house as for this time I will lie.\n    Now will I go ask of mine host in hie\n    At what cost we twain lodge here.\n    If I do stay, I will have good cheer\n    And all things wholly to my pay.\n    Betide what betide I will as I may\n    Keep mischief stirring here and there.\n    Within a year I would see a hundred stabbed, I swear,\n    So that Lucifer shall not lack company in Hell.\n    As a doctor of physic I will disguise me well.\n    Good Doctor Gallipot shall not want for renown.\n    I shall know where to find hidden treasure in every town.\n    This will spread my fame over all.\n    And whatsoever among folk may befall\n    It will be known to me just as it was.\n    More than a thousand shall run after me ere there pass\n    A month, my practice will be so sly.\n    So I will get treasure with the which none can vie.\n    My love Emma will eke love me the bet.\n    An if the Highest doth me no let,\n    Ere a year more than a thousand souls I shall have won;\n    If He otherwise wills, then my baking is done.\n\n\n\u00b6 How Emma doth a little lament her sinful life.\n\nEmma thus dwelling in Antwerp and being ware of the evil of her life,\nsince for her sake marvelous much wickedness was daily done of Moonen\u2019s\ncontriving, said with herself thus:\n\n    O memory and wit, took ye but thought\n    Upon the life that now I lead,\n    It would appear a thing of naught.\n    The brightness of Heaven ye have left and sought\n    The path of Hell, that is foul indeed.\n    Wellnigh each day doth some wight bleed\n    Or come even to his death for my sake.\n    And I wot well that Moonen doth this mischief breed.\n    He is not of the best, I undertake;\n    Though he saith little I may not him mistake:\n    He is a fiend or but little more.\n    O aunt, mine aunt, the foul words that ye spake\n    Will make of me a damned whore,\n    For whom God holds no grace in store.\n    Oh, woe is me and wellaway!\n    For any returning I bewandered too wide.\n    Mary I was wont to serve each day\n    With prayers or what else to her pay;\n    Now my devotions be wholly laid aside.\n    And eke he will me roundly chide\n    If I do cross myself, whereof he is not fain;\n    Whereby it is right easily descried\n    That he is evil, who crossing doth disdain.\n    How shall I repent? Alas, \u2019tis plain\n    That I be stept whither is no retreating.\n    Hola, yonder I have spied twain\n    To whom I yesterday did grant a merry meeting.\n    I must go forth and give them pleasant greeting.\n\nAfter this she sat her down to drink with her potmates, among the which\nMoonen so wrought that again one of them met his death. And he who did it\nwas led of Moonen beyond the city walls where at the devil\u2019s prompting he\nslew yet another, in the hope, as Moonen had told, that he should thus\npossess him of great store of money; whereat Moonen rejoiced exceedingly\nsaying:\n\n    Now by Lucifer\u2019s subtlest engine in Hell,\n    These silly folk I befool them well.\n    One to another doth tell that I am my Lord So and so.\n    All that aileth the people I fully know,\n    Wherefore after me doth go great press of folk.\n    I give them counsel as good as ever was spoke;\n    Then I round it in the ear of many a goodwife\n    How they may plague their husbands out of their life.\n    Whereon the good man getteth such gobbets to his meat\n    That ere eight days he is snug in his winding sheet.\n    This merry cheat I have more than once played\n    And thereof Lucifer, I ween, is not evil apaid.\n    630 Likewise I take my good pleasure\n    In getting folk to seek out hidden treasure.\n    Thereby one got his bane but yesterday.\n    I told him where treasure had been hid away\n    Under the stay which did his stable found:\n    I said an he would delve deep in the ground\n    He would find many a pound of good red gold.\n    The fool straightway did as I told,\n    But when he had wholly digged away\n    The pillar\u2019s foundation which was the stay\n    That held the stable firm in place,\n    Down it fell from top to base\n    And good my nuncle was buried under.\n    I shall perform still greater wonder\n    If from above I may have leave.\n    Men shall me for a god receive;\n    And Hellwards they shall pack in troops.\n\nAfter Emma and Moonen had lived wellnigh six year in Antwerp at the sign\nof the \u201cGolden Tree\u201d, where marvelous much wickedness was done of them,\nit fell out that Emma was minded once more to see her eme and likewise\nher friends in the land of Guelders, and she prayed Moonen that he should\nthereto consent and fellow her on the journey thither, whereon he spake\nthus:\n\n    Emma, to your prayer I would not say no.\n    Ye say your friends ye would liefly see?\n\n    EMMA\n\n    Yea, that I would, if ye grant it so.\n\n    MOONEN\n\n    To your prayer, my love, I would not say no.\n\n    EMMA\n\n    Mine aunt at Nimmegen, mine eme at Venlo;\n    Sin I saw them be passed years four and three.\n\n    MOONEN\n\n    Wherefore to your prayer I will not say no.\n    And these your friends ye shall straightway see.\n\n    EMMA\n\n    They know not what hath befallen me\n    Nor where I be, no more than if earth had me swallowed.\n    Ever mine eme with love hath me followed;\n    I wot full many a tear he hath wept.\n\n    MOONEN\n\n    The old shave-crown\u2019s prayers me oft have kept\n    When I was minded to rend her limb and lith.\n    Ere now I had broken her neck, but therewith\n    The old man\u2019s prayers to the lady in white\n    Have stopped me quite; wherefore, despite\n    My will, not yet is she utterly caught.\n\n    EMMA\n\n    What say ye, Moonen?\n\n    MOONEN\n\n                                    Nought, dear, nought.\n    I give you leave, as ye require,\n    To see the friends to whom is your desire.\n    Go pay the reckoning with mine host of the Tree\n    And on the morrow thine eme we shall go see\n    Or thine other friends, as ye shall request.\n    To this I am prest.\n\n    EMMA\n\n                              Then straight am I dress\u2019d\n    To ask how it stands in our account\n    And pay it all wholly.\n\n    MOONEN\n\n                                So do, and the amount\n    See that ye pay without question of the odd doit.\u2014\n    I shall get no loss from this exploit,\n    \u2019Tis no harm to visit her eme, the priest.\n    If I could catch him bare-breeched, at the least,\n    And so have him wholly at my desire,\n    I would shortly break the old shave-poll\u2019s swire.\n    Were he away, the lass were mine without fail.\n    But my purpose is wholly without avail,\n    Save only the Omnipotent\n    Giveth thereto his full consent.\n\n\n\u00b6 How Emma and Moonen journeyed to Nimmegen.\n\nThus Emma and Moonen journeyed to Nimmegen, where they be come on\nProcession Day, whereat Emma rejoiced exceedingly. And Moonen to her\nspake thus:\n\n    Now, Emma, even as ye of me prayed,\n    Hither our journey we have made\n    To Nimmegen; and \u2019tis Procession Day.\n    Here your aunt had her dwelling, as ye say.\n    Will ye go see her?\n\n    EMMA\n\n                                  Yea, so much, mayhap;\n    But for lodging I would not ask her, nor for a scrap\n    To eat nor yet a drop to drink;\n    Thereof I would not think, lest o\u2019er me she skink\n    The flood of her reproach, and entreat me once more\n    Even so shamelessly as she hath done yore.\n    \u2019Twas the foul and wicked words she spake\n    Made me to these ill courses take,\n    The which I still am in, alas!\n\n    MOONEN\n\n    I bethink me, my love and solace,\n    That to go thither will little bestead.\n    Know your aunt is three years dead.\n\n    EMMA\n\n    What say ye, dead?\n\n    MOONEN\n\n                      Yea, it is so.\n\n    EMMA\n\n    How know ye that?\n\n    MOONEN\n\n                      Enough, I know.\n\n    EMMA\n\n                        ... This is not light to bear.\n\n    MOONEN\n\n    \u2019Tis e\u2019en so.\n\n    EMMA\n\n                              Stay, what do they there?\n    Let us go look ere from hence we depart.\n    See what a press of people forth doth start.\n    Is it aught to see? Haste ye and enquire amain.\n\n    MOONEN\n\n    Nay, love, they will play somewhat on the pageant-wain.\n\n    EMMA\n\n    That do they every year on this day,\n    And as I mind, \u201cMaskeroon\u201d is the play.\n    Its goodly excellence is not lightly to be told,\n    Mine eme each year failed not it to behold.\n    Ah, Moonen, let us hear it.\n\n    MOONEN\n\n                                      \u2019Tis silly gabbling.\n    Wherefore would ye give ear to such brabbling?\n    Bah, go we to the roast meat and the wine.\n\n    EMMA\n\n    Ah, Moonen, it was wont to be so brave and fine.\n    I have heard mine eme say that for its teaching\n    The play was better than many a preaching.\n    And in these plays oft times good ensamples there be.\n    Ah, love, if ye would thereto agree\n    I would fain see it.\n\n    MOONEN\n\n                            To consent I am not glad.\u2014\n    By Lucifer\u2019s rump, I am sore adrad\n    Lest in the play she behold some virtuous condition\n    Whereof haply she may catch contrition.\n    By Lucifer, then were my high designs brought low.\n\n    EMMA\n\n    Ay, Moonen, let me hear it.\n\n    MOONEN\n\n                            Well, see that ye be not slow\n    To come when I call, else will my wrath be great.\n\nEmma besought Moonen so hardly that she might hear the play that he\nthereto consented, though sorely against his will as ye have heard. And\nthe play began thus;\n\n    MASKEROON\n\n    Brr! hierio! I, Maskeroon, Lucifer\u2019s advocate,\n    Make my appeal before the assize\n    Of Him called of men Most High and All Wise,\n    Because He showeth to the vile human race\n    More of His pity and of His grace\n    Than to us poor spirits, damned perpetually.\n    If all the sins that in the world there be\n    Were wholly done by one sole man\n    And then in heartfelt earnest he began\n    To feel remorse, straight he to grace hath won.\n    And we poor spirits, who have nought misdone,\n    Save for one brief presumptuous thought,\n    We be to the abyss down brought,\n    Hopeless in everlasting pain.\n    I, Lucifer\u2019s procurator, ask again\n    The God of mercy wherefor of His grace\n    Comes less to us than to the race\n    Of men who daily sin on every side.\n\n    GOD\n\n    My mercy is to none denied\n    Who will repent him ere he die\n    And in season confess that I\n    Am God of justice and mildheartedness.\n    But they that grow hard in wickedness\n    And will not truly them repent\n    With Lucifer in the pit they shall be shent,\n    Where is wailing and hand-wringing.\n\n    MASKEROON\n\n    Thy justice fails in many a thing,\n    Though Thou art a just God called in every land and clime.\n    In Abraham\u2019s, in Moses\u2019, and in Davids\u2019 time\n    Men might Thee indeed the just name,\n    But then didst Thou men blame and eke shame\n    And punish them for uncleanness of thought.\n    Nowadays though a child were with his mother naught,\n    Or spurned his father underfoot and him smote,\n    Yea, though one should thrust down his brother\u2019s throat\n    All the evil that in the world is brewed,\n    And then but repented him in mood,\n    Straightway to him is thine abundant grace supplied.\n\n    GOD\n\n    Wherefore was it I the death died\n    Shamefully upon the cross of tree,\n    Were it not that man, whether young or old he be,\n    Might get him mercy at the hands of my Father?\n\n    MASKEROON\n\n    Wherefore shouldst Thou be wroth the rather,\n    In as much as Thou, naked and in vain,\n    Didst in Thy shameful death suffer such pain,\n    That mankind should be clean of sin;\n    Despite the which they do harden themselves in\n    Wickedness so unseemly and fell\n    That uneath may one it reckon and tell,\n    And but to think on maketh the mind distraught.\n    Such things as under the old law were not thought\n    Men do now boldly perform them as soon.\n\n    GOD\n\n    Therein thou liest not, Maskeroon:\n    The people be indeed so hard grown in sin\n    That, if some amendment doth not shortly begin,\n    My sharp sword of justice I will presently send,\n    Which shall cut off all them that do offend,\n    And eke My plagues, which are not light to endure.\n\n    OUR LADY\n\n    My child, if mankind with plagues Thou wouldst cure\n    It were to me pure sorrow. Let Thy wrath be staid.\n    Let there for man still a respite be made;\n    Send Thou him first a sign and a token,\n    Even as erewhile Thou hast unto him spoken:\n    Earthquakes, twin suns, or a hairy star,\n    That by these portents he may know how far\n    Thou art stepped beyond the measure of Thy wrath.\n    Thus peradventure man will leave the path\n    Of sin, lest he be worse plagued to his cost.\n\n    GOD\n\n    Nay, Mother, that were but labor lost;\n    I have full oft My portents shown,\n    Whereby My wrath they might well have known;\n    Pestilence, war, and season of dearth,\n    The which should have brought repentance upon earth\n    For the sins which wrong My divinity.\n    But the worse they are plagued the worse they be,\n    Not thinking of wailful death for ever and aye.\n    \u2019Tis all: \u201cwhat care I? At the last a prayer I will say\n    And the merciful God will save me from harm.\u201d\n\nEmma hearkening to this play bethought her of her sinful life with sad\nheart, with herself saying:\n\n    Lord God, how doth my blood grow warm\n    At the words I hear spoke on yon pageant-wain.\n    These be reasons and arguments so plain\n    That pure contrition I do begin to know.\n\n    MOONEN\n\n    Well, must we stand here forever? What say ye, ho!\n    Wherefore to hear this brabbling be ye fain?\n    Let us be gone, love.\n\n    EMMA\n\n                                      Nay, it is lost pain\n    Thus to call and hale and tug at me in this way.\n    Even so long as lasteth the play\n    To make me budge a step nought will avail.\n    \u2019Tis better than a sermon.\n\n    MOONEN\n\n                                      Help, Lucifer\u2019s tail!\n    I am in despair that here she should stay,\n    Lest to repentance she catch the nearest way\n    With the foolish blether to the which she giveth heed.\n    I will bide awhile, but if she cometh not erelong with speed\n    \u2019Twill be my fists shall furnish arguments.\n\n    MASKEROON\n\n    O ruler of the heavens and the elements,\n    God that in justice sittest enthroned,\n    If but to Lucifer and the infernal synod were loaned\n    Thy will and power, then could we\n    Chastise mankind all utterly\n    Until from sinning they shall cease.\n    Thus only canst Thou win surcease\n    And they release, from the evils they do in Thy despight.\n    Thy hand of justice must them smite\n    If Thou wouldst make Thee known of men.\n\n    GOD\n\n    Maskeroon, it may not be over long till then\n    And I give thee leave to plague mankind,\n    For to good they will not be inclined\n    Or ere their stubborn necks I bend.\n\n    OUR LADY\n\n    O son, men will yet their evil ways amend.\n    Bethink Thee ere too swift Thy hand hath struck.\n    Bethink Thee on the breasts that gave Thee suck,\n    Bethink Thee on the bosom that did Thee enfold,\n    Bethink Thee on the passion Thou hast tholed,\n    Bethink Thee of the blood-offering Thou didst make.\n    Was it not all done for man his sake\n    That to Thy Father\u2019s mercy he might win?\n    Thyself hast said that if a man should sin\n    In his sole self of sins each one\n    That ever upon earth were done\n    And heartily on Thee for mercy cried,\n    Thine arms to him would open wide.\n    This is Thy word as man well wot.\n\n    GOD\n\n    Lady Mother, I have spoken, and repent Me not,\n    But I say again that if a man commit\n    All the sins whereto he could bethink him in his wit,\n    If he confess and repent he shall be of the chosen straightway;\n    For liefer than one soul should go astray\n    I would suffer all the pain twice o\u2019er\n    Which the Jews did unto Me in days of yore.\n    O man, this it behooveth thee to know.\n\nThe longer Emma hearkened to this play, even the more she bethought of\nher sins, saying thus:\n\n    Now do my tears begin to flow\n    And course adown my cheeks like rain.\n    Ah, to what contrition I do now attain\n    At hearkening to these words; O Lord of Lords,\n    Were it possible that should I turn me towards\n    Thy mercy, I might have of it some part?\n    Ere now contrition hath visited not my heart.\n    Were it possible? Alas, I fear me nay.\n    I be wandered too far out of the way,\n    Not letting reason be of my will the guide.\n    Open, O Earth, swallow me and hide,\n    For I am not worthy to tread on thee in any wise.\n\n    MOONEN\n\n    Help Modicack, how the flames start from mine eyes;\n    The lass hath got a crop full of contrition.\n    ...\n    To some merry part of the town haste we\n    And there crush a cup of wine.\n\n    EMMA\n\n                                            Nay, let be,\n    Foul fiend, be gone without any tarrying!\n    Woe\u2019s me, that ever I did such a thing\n    As summon you, God\u2019s mercy all forgot.\n    Ah, ah! repentance within me doth burn so hot\n    It will consume my heart. Alas, I swound!\n    My strength hath left me.\n\n    MOONEN\n\n            Lucifer\u2019s lights, liver and spleen confound!\n    Now may I sputter flames and howl;\n    Now runneth all my fair to foul;\n    And they who prowl in Hell will give me small acclaim.\n    Rise up in all the devils\u2019 name\n    Or with hosen and shoon into the jakes ye go.\n\n    EMMA\n\n    O Lord, have mercy upon me!\n\n    MOONEN\n\n                                      Yea, stands it so?\n    Now I perceive remorse in her doth gnaw.\n    Up into the clouds I will her draw\n    And towering high down hurl her with might and with main;\n    If she to herself do come again,\n    The whelp may think her luck is fair.\u2014\n    Here, here, ye go with me aloft in the air.\n\nAfter these words hath Moonen the devil caught up Emma in the air higher\nthan is any house or church, the which her uncle and all the people\nbeheld, wondering exceedingly and not knowing what it might mean.\n\n\n\u00b6 How Moonen cast down Emma from on high and how she was discovered to\nher uncle.\n\nWhen Moonen the devil had caught up Emma high above all the houses, he\ncast her down from above into the street as he was minded to break her\nneck, whereat the people were sore adrad. And Sir Gysbrecht, her eme, who\nhearkened also to the play, marveled what it meant and who it might be\nthat fell from so great height, saying and asking of them that stood by\nthus:\n\n    Her luck is good if her neck be not broke in twain.\n    My heart feeleth unutterable pain\n    To look on one in such array.\n    Know ye her not? Who is the woman, I pray?\n\n    A BURGHER\n\n    I would fain see if I know her, without a doubt,\n    But there be such press of folk hereabout\n    That I may nowise come her to.\n    Follow me close, and ye shall see what I will do.\n    He is a fool says I am not stout to make them give ground.\n    See ye, sir, the poor lady lieth in a swound,\n    She be gone out of herself.\n\n    THE UNCLE\n\n                                  It is small wonder so.\n    Help, all the blood of my body from top to toe\n    Be crept from me forth, as I deem.\n    The tears do from mine eyes stream;\n    My veins be dead and my color turned into pale;\n    Never thus have I felt my strength fail.\n    Ah friend, have a care of me, I you beseech.\n\n    THE BURGHER\n\n    Stay sir, what aileth you, as by your speech?\n    Ye be changed as if ye were but dead.\n\n    THE UNCLE\n\n    I would well that were my fate instead.\n    O Atropos, grant me of my life release!\n\n    THE BURGHER\n\n    Wherefore do ye thus?\n\n    THE UNCLE\n\n                                        Oh, it is my niece,\n    For the which my heart is fulfilled of sorrow.\n    For her have I searched this seven year on even and on morrow.\n    Now lieth she here with her neck broken in twain.\n    O earth, open and swallow me amain;\n    Here I would no longer tarry.\n\n    THE BURGHER\n\n    Be ye sure \u2019tis she?\n\n    THE UNCLE\n\n                        Should I not know her, marry?\n    Or mean ye that in my wit I fail?\n\n    MOONEN\n\n    Fire and brimstone, lightning and hail!\n    I befoul my tail out of pure ire;\n    But to a remedy I am none the nigher.\n    Yonder is her uncle; I am to cook this but will ye tell me how?\n    I had broken her neck long ere now,\n    But that the prayers of this holy priest\n    To make hard my way have not ceased.\n    An I might I would carry him straight to Lucifer.\n\n    THE BURGHER\n\n    Look, sir, I do see her somewhat stir.\n\n    THE UNCLE\n\n    Stir! That were the boot of all my bale.\n    \u2019Tis true, she doth stir sikerly.\n\n    EMMA\n\n                            Alas, what doth to me ail?\n    Where have I been, and be now in what place?\n    O Lord, stand I in Thy grace\n    That to Thy mercy I may come?\n    Yea, but Thy care had kept me from\n    The fiend, O Lord omnipotent,\n    In lasting torment I were shent,\n    Thrust soul and body beyond the reach\n    And scope of the Lord\u2019s realm.\n\n    THE UNCLE\n\n                                  Since ye have speech,\n    Mary, my niece, then speak to me,\n    Who so many sighs for thee\n    Have sighed and many a moan have made,\n    Nor ever my questionings have staid;\n    And now I find you in this press, as it doth seem\n    In sorry plight.\n\n    EMMA\n\n                                Ah, is it ye, mine eme?\n    Ah, would God I were in that case\n    Even now as then I was\n    When I last saw you ere my long journey was begun.\n    Ah, when my course of life I overrun\n    I fear me I am damned for aye.\n\n    THE UNCLE\n\n                                    Niece, ye err, I trow,\n    For none is lost who will not yield him so.\n    How should ye be damned? That were pity indeed.\n    How came ye hither? I would fain know with speed;\n    And ye were so high in air but now.\n    I prithee tell me thereof, if ye would allow.\n    Never saw I any so high, by my troth.\n\n    EMMA\n\n    Mine eme, I be alas full loath\n    To reckon up the tale of my aventures.\n    I gave me over wholly to the devil\u2019s lures,\n    And after I have gone about with him for wellnigh seven year.\n    I may not lightly set it all clear, but thus briefly ye shall hear\n    Whither our way of life hath us took.\n    One could well thereof write a book.\n    There is none evil with mine which may compare;\n    And at the end of all this strange fare\n    I am come hither in land my friends to behold.\n    And even now as this way we strolled\n    We saw them in the market-place here\n    Playing the play of Maskeroon, to the which I gave ear.\n    At every word which I there heard\n    I caught such a contrition that it stirred\n    Him to wrath that stood by me and he flew,\n    Even as ye saw, high with me into air.\n\n    THE UNCLE\n\n                                          Alas and harru!\n    How, niece, was it the fiend that was with you here?\n\n    EMMA\n\n    Yea, eme, and \u2019tis now well nigh seven year\n    Since I yielded me to do his will and went\n    A wandering with him.\n\n    THE UNCLE\n\n                                  Help, God omnipotent!\n    Hearing this maketh me all aghast.\n    We must drive this fiend from you at the last,\n    If God\u2019s kingdom ye would come to.\n\n    MOONEN\n\n    Ay, shave-crown, that may ye not do;\n    Ye may not me from her divide.\n    If it pleased me I would carry her hair and hide\n    Where is sulphur and pitch a plenty at the least.\n\n    THE UNCLE\n\n    Would ye, foul fiend?\n\n    MOONEN\n\n                        Yea, that I would, horson priest.\n    She is mine, she hath yielded herself all wholly,\n    And renounced the Most High, and held with me,\n    Wherefore in the furnace of hell she must burn.\n    And, horson, would ye her from me turn?\n    I will strike you down all plat.\n\n    THE UNCLE\n\n    Foul fiend, I will let you of that.\n    Here in my breviary there stand\n    Eight or ten lines writ in a fair nand\n    Which will make you grin all otherwise.\n\n    MOONEN\n\n    Ah! ah! my fell of bristles doth rise\n    At the words he readeth; I know nor what to do nor how.\n    By Modicack, if she should scape me now\n    I shall be whipped with burning lash!\n    Yea, in rage my teeth I gnash,\n    And blow sparks from mouth and ears.\n    Now in me full plain appears\n    That if the Lord\u2019s wrath we arouse in aught,\n    All we spirits may do is less than nought.\n    I fear me with this soul I need no longer tarry.\n\n    THE UNCLE\n\n    Go we, niece Mary, and I will you carry\n    To the deacon\u2019s and there make up a fire.\n    Methinks your limbs be broke, for higher\n    He flew with you than one can think and then let fall,\n    Ye must be sore hurt.\n\n    EMMA\n\n                                I count it nought at all\n    This pain, mine eme; though remedy be none.\n    More by ten thousand times I would not shun\n    Than all that pens could write for anything,\n    If only to me God\u2019s mercy would cling.\n    I care not what befalls if but one day\n    Comfort and mercy may be mine.\n\n    THE UNCLE\n\n                                Keep you in that way,\n    I promise you God\u2019s kingdom to your cure.\n    We read alday in the blessed Scripture\n    That him who on God\u2019s mercy would him cast\n    Nought so avails as repentance at the last.\n\nAfter this Sir Gysbrecht is gone with his niece to all the most learned\npriests in the town of Nimmegen, but none of them, howsoever learned or\nexpert or holy or devout, when they heard her story, durst undertake to\nabsolve her or to prescribe to her penance for her sins, the which were\nfearful and against kind, whereat both they were sore downcast.\n\n\n\u00b6 How Sir Gysbrecht journeyed to Cologne with his niece.\n\nThe next day at early morn Sir Gysbrecht made preparations as if he would\ncelebrate mass taking the precious holy sacrament in his hand and set out\nwith Emma his niece on the way to Cologne. And Moonen the devil followed\nthem from afar but he dare not approach nigh nor draw near to Emma in\nany wise on account o\u00a3 the power of the holy sacrament. Nevertheless he\nthrew sometimes the half of an oak tree or another from above at them,\nminded to break both their necks, but our Lord would not allow it for\nshe used daily to read a prayer in honor of our Blessed Lady. Thus they\ntraveled so long and much that they came to Cologne where she confessed\nto the Bishop. But there no man knew what counsel to give her for her sin\nwas so against kind and great that the Bishop had not power to absolve\nher.\n\n\n\u00b6 How Emma and her Uncle journeyed to Rome and how Emma confessed her to\nthe Pope.\n\nAfter this Emma and her eme departed them from the Bishop and leaving\nCologne journeyed to Rome, where they be come after much travail and\njourneying. And Emma has made confession to the Pope with weeping eyes,\nsaying:\n\n    O God\u2019s vice-gerent, yea, God on earth, as we be told,\n    A sinner worse than I earth doth not hold;\n    Shut out from the bar of Heaven I be.\n\n    THE POPE\n\n    Wherefore, my child?\n\n    EMMA\n\n                                      The devil\u2019s amie\n    I have been yea more than seven year\n    And with him have wandered far or near\n    Even at our will, and know ye for truth\n    Whatso man and wife do we have done in sooth.\n    Now say ye not that to fear me I do well?\n\n    THE POPE\n\n    What, child, and was it the fiend out of hell?\n    And wist ye that, when ye together went,\n    The fiend he was?\n\n    EMMA\n\n                                  Yea, father reverent.\n\n    THE POPE\n\n    How could ye with the fiend have ado\n    If ye wist \u2019twas he?\n\n    EMMA\n\n    Father, \u2019twas merry days for us two,\n    And the broad gold and all the rich fare\n    The which he gave me, be ye well ware\n    \u2019Twas these tempted me, wherefore I am now shamed.\n    There was nought in the whole world that I named\n    He did not give it me straight even as I willed.\n    But this with the sorrow whereof I now most am filled,\n    And the which hath my heart cleft clean in twain,\n    \u2019Tis that so many folk were slain\n    Whithersoever we be come in our way.\n    More than two hundred, reverend father, I say,\n    Be for my sake miserably dead,\n    One time or another.\n\n    THE POPE\n\n                                    Almighty Godhead!\n    For such misdeeds ye may well live in sorrow.\n\n    EMMA\n\n    O father, if it may be, be to me borrow\n    And give me penance or ere we part,\n    I reck not how heavy.\n\n    THE POPE\n\n                                    I scarce have heart\n    To tent so deep into the mercy of the Lord.\n    What, that ye should with the fiend be at accord!\n    Such crimes in confession I have not heard tell!\n    And furthermore by your wiles ye have sent pell-mell\n    So many the way their life they should lose!\n    I may scarce know what penance to choose\n    Heavy enough for such mortal sin.\n    To dwell with the fiend was but a bestial life to be in.\n    O Godhead, whereof doth not begin or end the grace,\n    Wilt Thou guide me as in this case,\n    Beneath the which my wit doth bow and bend!\n    O Judge enthroned in justice, do Thou send\n    Thine inspiration from on high!\n    Hola, my course I clear descry;\n    Me were full loath that damned ye be.\n    The priest was with you, summon hither to me.\n    Your penance ye shall hear without all doubt.\n\n    EMMA\n\n    Where be ye, eme?\n\n    THE UNCLE\n\n                                      I stand here without,\n    And full of care till it doth appear\n    How it shall go with her.\n\n    THE POPE\n\n                              Now ye my judgment hear:\n    It were a thing right pitiful to see\n    That any should be damned, if cure there be,\n    Nor doth God unmoved behold such things.\n    See, here be three iron rings;\n    The greatest ye shall her neck lock round,\n    The other two, without sigh or sound,\n    Lock on her arms, both fast and strong.\n    And let her bear them how so long\n    It be that they wear away and fall.\n    1080 Then shall her sins be forgiven all.\n    Nor till then shall she be of them quit.\n\n    THE UNCLE\n\n    \u2019Twill be full long, as to my wit,\n    Ere of themselves they fall to ground,\n    For they be of weight so many a pound\n    That in an hundred year they will wear never\n    A farthing thickness.\n\n    THE POPE\n\n                                  Yet may she so persever\n    Heartily in a state of penitence\n    That the rings will of themselves fall hence\n    From neck and arms and leave them bare.\n    But see ye lock them fast.\n\n    THE UNCLE\n\n                                          Father, I swear\n    They shall be locked so stout and stark,\n    If they come off \u2019twill be God\u2019s mark.\n    O priest and clerk above each earthly state,\n    With your good favor we will take our leave straight,\n    And go again our gate back to the land\n    Whence we be come.\n\n    THE POPE\n\n                                  May He whose hand\n    Dispenseth mercy soften your affliction.\n\n    EMMA\n\n    Adieu, holy Father.\n\n    THE POPE\n\n                      Daughter, go in God\u2019s protection,\n    And keep ye wholly in penitence,\n    For above with the Highest Excellence\n    Is pure penitence held more dear\n    Than ought that we may read or hear.\n\nThus hath Emma received her penance from the Pope. And her eme\nstraightway let make the rings so fast about her neck and arms that in\nher lifedays they might not be done off but by the will and the miracle\nof our dear Lord.\n\n\n\u00b6 How Emma journeyed from Rome and how she became a nun at the cloister\nof Converted Sinners at Maestricht.\n\nWhenas Emma hath put on the rings like as ye have heard she departed her\nwith her eme from Rome the city and they two journeyed so long until they\nwere come to Maestricht where Emma was holpen of her uncle to be a nun in\nthe cloister of the Converted Sinners. And after he had thereto holpen\nher he took his leave of her and journeyed to his own country where he\nlived yet twenty-four year after he had holpen his niece to come into the\ncloister, the which he visited each year so long as he lived.\n\n\n\u00b6 How the angel of God did off the rings from Emma\u2019s neck and hands.\n\nEmma dwelling in the aforesaid cloister lived so holily and did such\nstrong penance that the merciful Christ forgave her utterly her sins,\nsending his angel to her where she lay and slept, the which did off the\nrings, whereat Emma rejoiced greatly, saying:\n\n    Long nights are little to him lief\n    Who lieth sorrowful of heart;\n    His sleep is great unrest or greater grief,\n    With fearsome dreams and other such mischief.\n    Even thus I now feel sorrow\u2019s smart.\n    Who will the meaning to me impart\n    Of this my dream wherein I lay?\n    Meseemed from hell-pit I did start\n    And heavenwards was borne away.\n    There many white doves I met in the way,\n    The which my bonds struck with their wings.\n    O merciful God, what see I? Stay!\n    To Thine high grace have I won for aye?\n    Ah yea, \u2019tis true; there be my rings\n    Beside me lying. King of kings,\n    What cure art Thou for all misease!\n    No thanks suffice Thee for to please\n    In any stound.\n    O man, in whom all sin is found,\n    Hereby may ye ensample take;\n    And to His worth that knows no bound\n    Let everlasting laud and praise resound,\n    Even such as your faint voice may wake:\n    Praise ye the Lord in His temple for the Lord His sake,\n\n\n\n\n_EPILOGUE_\n\n\n    Even thus, O ye whom God loves well,\n    In days of yore these things befell\n    All truly, though some hold it for a fable.\n    But go ye to Maestricht, an ye be able,\n    And in the Converted Sinners shall ye see\n    The grave of Emma, and there all three\n    The rings be hung above her grave.\n    Thereunto stands writ in goodly stave\n    Her way of life and her penance\n    And how and when all this did chance.\n    By these tokens I hold its truth for clear.\n    She lived the space of two full year,\n    Sithens the rings were fallen away,\n    Faithful in penance, as I heard say,\n    Ever to pleasure the Highest King.\u2014\n    Take all in gree, without grutching,\n    This simple tale: \u2019twas writ for love,\n    That we may win to heavenly glory above.\n\n\n\u00b6 AMEN\n\n\n\u00b6 This Book hath been examined and approved by a learned man thereto\nappointed.","title":"A marvelous history of Mary of Nimmegen: Who for more than seven year lived and had ado with the devil","tradition":"myth-cosmogony","translated_text":null,"word_count":15141}