d I seen a
man so well fitted with a name;--"in religion, Brother Thomas, a poor
brother of the Order of the mad St. Francis of Assisi."

"Then, Brother Thomas, how do you mean to cross this water which lies
between you and the exercise of your holy calling? Do you swim?"

"Like a stone cannon-ball, and, for all that I can find, the cursed water
has no bottom. Cross!" he snarled. "Let me see you swim."

I was glad enough to be quit of him so soon, but I noticed that, as I
stripped and packed my clothes to carry in a bundle on my head, the holy
man set his foot in the stirrup of his weapon, and was winding up his
arbalest with a windlass, a bolt in his mouth, watching at the same time
a heron that rose from a marsh on the further side of the stream. On
this bird, I deemed, he meant to try his skill with the arbalest.

"Adieu, Brother Thomas," I said, as I took the water; and in a few
strokes I was across and running up and down on the bank to get myself
dry. "Back!" came his grating voice--"back! and without your clothes,
you wine-sack of Scotland, or I shoot!" and his arbalest was levelled on
me.

I have often asked myself since what I should have done, and what was the
part of a brave man. Perchance I might have dived, and swum down-stream
under water, but then I had bestowed my bundle of clothes some little way
off, and Brother Thomas commanded it from his side of the stream. He
would have waited there in ambush till I came shivering back for hose and
doublet, and I should be in no better case than I was now. Meanwhile his
weapon was levelled at me, and I could see the bolt-point set straight
for my breast, and glittering in a pale blink of the sun. The bravest
course is ever the best. I should have thrown myself on the earth, no
doubt, and so crawled to cover, taking my chance of death rather than the
shame of obeying under threat and force. But I was young, and had never
looked death in the face, so, being afraid and astonished, I made what
seemed the best of an ill business, and, though my face reddens yet at
the thought of it, I leaped in and swam back like a dog to heel.

"Behold me," I said, making as brave a countenance as I might in face of
necessity.

"Well done, Norman Leslie de Pitcullo," he snarled, baring his yellow
teeth. "This is the obedience which the young owe to the Church. Now,
ferry me over; you are my boat."

"You will drown, man," I said. "Not while you swim."

Then, unbu