“At the said suspicious hour, with his sword at his side,(3) and dressed and accoutred in the said garments, he started from his lodging with one of the said young men.

     2 See ante, p. 24, note 8.

3 The French word is basion, which in the sixteenth century was often used to imply a sword; arquebuses and musketoons being termed basions a feu by way of distinction.  Moreover, it is expressly stated farther on that Dumesnil had a sword.—­Ed.

“In this wise Dumesnil reached the house of St. Aignan, which he found a means of entering, and gained a closet up above, near the room where the said St. Aignan and his wife slept.  St. Aignan was without thought of this, inasmuch as he was ignorant of the enterprise of the said Dumesnil, being in the living room with one Master Thomas Guerin, who had come upon business.  Now, as St. Aignan was disposing himself to go to bed, he told one of his servants, named Colas, to bring him his cas (4) and the servant having occasion to go up into a closet in which St. Aignan’s wife was sleeping, and in which the said Dumesnil was concealed, the latter, fearing that he might be recognised, suddenly came out with a drawn sword in his hand; whereupon the said Colas cried:  ‘Help!  There is a robber!’ And he declared to St. Aignan that he had seen a strange man who did not seem to be there for any good purpose; whereupon St. Aignan said to him:  ’One must find out who it is.  Is there occasion for any one to come here at this hour?’ Thereupon Colas went after the said personage, whom he found in a little alley near the courtyard behind the house; and the said personage, having suddenly perceived Colas, endeavoured to strike him on the body with his weapon; but Colas withstood him and gave him a few blows,(5) for which reason he cried out ‘Help!  Murder!’ Thereupon St. Aignan arrived, having a sword in his hand; and after him came the said Guerin.  St. Aignan, who as yet did not know Dumesnil on account of his disguise, and also because it was wonderfully dark, found him calling out:  ‘Murder!  Confession!’ By which cry the said St. Aignan knew him, and was greatly perplexed, astonished, and angered, at seeing his enemy at such an hour in his house, he having been found there, with a weapon, in the closet.  And the said St. Aignan recalling to memory the trouble and worry that Dumesnil had caused him, dealt him two or three thrusts in hot anger, and then said to him:  ’Hey!  Wretch that thou art, what hast brought thee here?  Wert thou not content with the wrong thou didst me in coming here previously?  I never did thee an ill office.’  Whereupon the said Dumesnil said:  ’It is true, I have too grievously offended you, and am too wicked; I entreat your pardon.’  And thereupon he fell to the ground as if dead; which seeing, the said St. Aignan, realising the misfortune that had happened, said not a word, but recommended himself to God and withdrew into his room, where he found his wife in bed, she having heard nothing.