the unlucky name of
the poor furrier of the king's robes.

"Lecornu! Gilles Lecornu!" said some.

"_Cornutus et hirsutus_, horned and hairy," another went on.

"He! of course," continued the small imp on the capital, "What are they
laughing at? An honorable man is Gilles Lecornu, brother of Master Jehan
Lecornu, provost of the king's house, son of Master Mahiet Lecornu,
first porter of the Bois de Vincennes,--all bourgeois of Paris, all
married, from father to son."

The gayety redoubled. The big furrier, without uttering a word in reply,
tried to escape all the eyes riveted upon him from all sides; but
he perspired and panted in vain; like a wedge entering the wood, his
efforts served only to bury still more deeply in the shoulders of his
neighbors, his large, apoplectic face, purple with spite and rage.

At length one of these, as fat, short, and venerable as himself, came to
his rescue.

"Abomination! scholars addressing a bourgeois in that fashion in my day
would have been flogged with a fagot, which would have afterwards been
used to burn them."

The whole band burst into laughter.

"Hola he! who is scolding so? Who is that screech owl of evil fortune?"

"Hold, I know him" said one of them; "'tis Master Andry Musnier."

"Because he is one of the four sworn booksellers of the university!"
said the other.

"Everything goes by fours in that shop," cried a third; "the four
nations, the four faculties, the four feasts, the four procurators, the
four electors, the four booksellers."

"Well," began Jean Frollo once more, "we must play the devil with
them."*

* _Faire le diable a quatre_.

"Musnier, we'll burn your books."

"Musnier, we'll beat your lackeys."

"Musnier, we'll kiss your wife."

"That fine, big Mademoiselle Oudarde."

"Who is as fresh and as gay as though she were a widow."

"Devil take you!" growled Master Andry Musnier.

"Master Andry," pursued Jean Jehan, still clinging to his capital, "hold
your tongue, or I'll drop on your head!"

Master Andry raised his eyes, seemed to measure in an instant the height
of the pillar, the weight of the scamp, mentally multiplied that weight
by the square of the velocity and remained silent.

Jehan, master of the field of battle, pursued triumphantly:

"That's what I'll do, even if I am the brother of an archdeacon!"

"Fine gentry are our people of the university, not to have caused our
privileges to be respected on such a day as t