arge
Turquoise set in gold, in token of their gratitude, and the gem was at
once placed upon the shrine to whose sanctity they owed deliverance.

Few stories have either so romantic a beginning or so fortunate an
end, in this record of the Fierte; but the large number of prisoners
then released has its parallel, is even surpassed indeed, on two
occasions soon afterwards; for in 1522 the whole parish of the village
of Etrepagny received the Fierte as accomplices of a young ruffian
called de Maistreville; though considering that his victim was one of
their own women, their ardent support of the man against all the
officers of justice is somewhat inexplicable. In 1560, when another
whole village was pardoned, their sympathy with a fellow-labourer who
killed a servant of the Overlord is more easily intelligible. But
nearly all of the most prominent cases have a woman at the bottom of
them. One that is especially instructive as to the morals and the
manners of the public occurred in 1524.

Antoine de la Morissiere, Sieur de la Carbonnet, had, it seems,
insulted Mademoiselle d'Ailly, and beaten her so badly that she died a
short time afterwards with five of her ribs broken. So Etienne le
Monnier, her relation, resolved to avenge her, and took out a warrant
against the ruffian who had killed her. Desiring to make quite sure
that justice should not miscarry, he took some fifty gentlemen, all
armed, and accompanied the police-sergeant to the man's house. They
found de la Morissiere[61] in a somewhat compromising position, and he
did not reply to their request for admittance. Le Monnier, determined
to get him out, set fire to the roof in four places. The fellow then
cried out that he would surrender, and trusting to the presence of an
officer of the law he came down. Le Monnier at once wounded him in the
chest with a long pike, and two other relations of Mademoiselle
d'Ailly hit him over the head with clubs, "so that he fell to the
ground as one dead." But le Monnier, seeing that he still showed signs
of life, drove his dagger into his throat and finished him off. Two
accomplices were actually hanged for this crime, but de Monnier, after
paying 1200 livres to the dead man's family, and being unsuccessful in
securing the royal pardon, was given the Fierte with the rest of his
friends by the Chapterhouse of Rouen.

[Footnote 61: In the words of the manuscript the man "estoit couche
avec une femme mariee, autre que la sienne."]