n forsook!}

By this time the two remaining geese had picked up the beans which had
been scattered all over the floor and bereft, I suppose, of their leader,
had gone back into the temple; and I, well content with my revenge and my
booty, threw the dead goose behind the cot and bathed the trifling wound
in my leg with vinegar: then, fearing a scolding, I made up my mind to
run away and, collecting together all my belongings, started to leave the
house. I had not yet stepped over the threshold of the cell, however,
when I caught sight of OEnothea returning with an earthen vessel full of
live coals. Thereupon I retraced my steps and, throwing off my garments,
I took my stand just inside the door, as if I were awaiting her return.
She banked her fire with broken reeds, piled some pieces of wood on top,
and began to excuse her delay on the ground that her friend would not
permit her to leave until after the customary three drinks had been
taken. "But what were you up to in my absence?" she demanded. "Where
are the beans?" Thinking that I had done a thing worthy of all praise, I
informed her of the battle in all its details and, that she might not be
downcast any longer, I produced the dead goose in payment for her loss.
When the old lady laid eyes upon that, she raised such a clamor that you
would have thought that the geese had invaded the room again. Confounded
and thunderstruck at the novelty of my crime, I asked her why she was so
angry and why she pitied the goose rather than myself.

CHAPTER THE ONE HUNDRED AND THIRTY SEVENTH.

But, beating her palms together, "You villain, are you so brazen that you
can speak?" she shrieked. "Don't you know what a serious crime you've
committed? You have slaughtered the delight of Priapus, a goose, the
very darling of married women! And for fear you think that nothing
serious has happened, if the magistrates find this out you'll go to the
cross! Until this day my dwelling has been inviolate and you have
polluted it with blood! You have conducted yourself in such a manner
that any enemy I have can turn me out of the priesthood!"

She spoke, and from her trembling head she tore the snow-white hair,
And scratched her cheeks: her eyes shed floods of tears.
As when a torrent headlong rushes down the valleys drear,
Its icy fetters gone when Sprint appears,
And strikes the frozen shackles from rejuvenated earth
So down her f