such like. This was a game of which I, at least, was soon weary; I never
could play pretences. I said, "I have told you what you want to know,
Fra Palamone. It is three good leagues to Fojano. I hope you are
sufficiently recovered of your wound to attempt it." At the same time I
pushed up the brim of my hat, and looked him in the face.

He maintained his silly comedy for a little while longer, the old knave,
staring at me as if I had been a ghost, muttering names, as if to recall
mine. Then with a glad shout of, "It is, it is my Francis of old!" he
threw up his arms to Heaven and broke into doggerel--

"'Si, benedetta tu,
O Maria, Madre di Gesu,
Regina Coeli intemerata,
Atque hominum Advocata!

"O what perils by land and sea," he continued, "what racking of entrails!
What contumely, what anguish of hunger and thirst, have I not undergone
for this--for this--for this! Now I can say, Domine, nunc dimittis, with
a full heart. Now, indeed, is the crown of lilies set upon the life-work
of wayworn, sad-browed Palamone!"

Sad-browed Palamone! He threw a leg over his horse's ears, and slid to
the ground with a thud which made earth shake. He stretched out his arms
to beckon me home; and when I would not budge, he scrambled through the
briery hedge and took me, whether I would or no, into his strenuous
embrace. He wept over me as a long-lost child of his, slobbered me,
patted my head, back, breast. He held me at arm's-length to look at me
better, hugged me again as if at last he was sure. "This is verily and
indeed," he cried, "my friend and companion for many years, ardently