gives a man fancies--or the fancies give a man cold, I don't know
which."

"Have you any money?" asked the old man.

"I have one white," returned the poet, laughing. "I got it out of
a dead jade's stocking in a porch. She was as dead as Caesar, poor
wench, and as cold as a church, with bits of ribbon sticking in her
hair. This is a hard world in winter for wolves and wenches and poor
rogues like me."

"I," said the old man, "am Enguerrand de la Feuillee, seigneur se
Brisetout, bailly du Patatrac. Who and what may you be?"

Villon rose and made a suitable reverence. "I am called Francis
Villon," he said, "a poor Master of Arts of this university. I know
some Latin, and a deal of vice. I can make chansons, ballades, lais,
virelais, and roundels, and I am very fond of wine. I was born in a
garret, and I shall not improbably die upon the gallows. I may add,
my lord, that from this night forward I am your lordship's very
obsequious servant to command."

"No servant of mine," said the knight; "my guest for this evening, and
no more."

"A very grateful guest," said Villon, politely; and he drank in dumb
show to his entertainer.

"You are shrewd," began the old man, tapping his forehead, "very
shrewd; you have learning; you are a clerk; and yet you take a small