A terror they were
often to the respectable burghers, for they had all the right to carry
arms; and a plague likewise, for, if they ran in debt, their creditors
were forbidden to seize their books, which, with their swords, were
generally all the property they possessed. If, moreover, anyone set up a
noisy or unpleasant trade near their lodgings, the scholars could compel
the town authorities to turn him out. They were most of them, probably,
mere boys of from twelve to twenty, living poorly, working hard,
and--those at least of them who were in the colleges--cruelly beaten
daily, after the fashion of those times; but they seem to have comforted
themselves under their troubles by a good deal of wild life out of
school, by rambling into the country on the festivals of the saints, and
now and then by acting plays; notably, that famous one which Rabelais
wrote for them in 1531: "The moral comedy of the man who had a dumb
wife;" which "joyous _patelinage_" remains unto this day in the shape of
a well-known comic song. That comedy young Rondelet must have seen
acted. The son of a druggist, spicer, and grocer--the three trades were
then combined--in Montpellier, and born in 1507, he had been destined for
the cloister, being a sickly lad. His uncle, one of the canons of
Maguelonne, near by, had even given him the revenues of a small chapel--a
job of nepotism which was common enough in those days. But his heart was
in science and medicine. He set off, still a mere boy, to Paris to study
there; and returned to Montpellier, at the age of eighteen, to study
again.

The next year, 1530, while still a scholar himself, he was appointed
procurator of the scholars--a post which brought him in a small fee on
each matriculation--and that year he took a fee, among others, from one
of the most remarkable men of that or of any age, Francois Rabelais
himself.

And what shall I say of him?--who stands alone, like Shakespeare, in his
generation; possessed of colossal learning--of all science which could be
gathered in his days--of practical and statesmanlike wisdom--of knowledge
of languages, ancient and modern, beyond all his compeers--of eloquence,
which when he speaks of pure and noble things becomes heroic, and, as it
were, inspired--of scorn for meanness, hypocrisy, ignorance--of esteem,
genuine and earnest, for the Holy Scriptures, and for the more moderate
of the Reformers who were spreading the Scriptures in Europe,--and all
t