Having pillaged the town of Seuillé, they went on with the horrible
tumult to an abbey. Finding it well barred and made fast, seven
companies of foot and two hundred lances broke down the walls of the
close, and began to lay waste the vineyard. The poor devils of monks did
not know to what saint to pray in their extremity, and they made
processions and said litanies against their foes. But in the abbey at
that time was a cloister-monk named Friar John of the Trenchermen,
young, gallant, frisky, lusty, nimble, quick, active, bold, resolute,
tall, wide-mouthed, and long-nosed; a fine mumbler of matins, a fair
runner through masses, and a great scourer of vigils--to put it short, a
true monk, if ever there was one since the monking world monked a
monkery. This monk, hearing the noise that the enemy made in the
vineyard, went to see what they were doing, and perceiving that they
were gathering the grapes out of which next year's drink of the abbey
ought to be made, he grew mighty angry. "The devil take me," he cried,
"if they have not already chopped our vines so that we shall have no
drink for years to come! Did not St. Thomas of England die for the goods
of the church? If I died in the same cause should I not be a saint
likewise? However, I shall not die for them, but make other men to do
so."

Throwing off his monk's habit, he took up a cross made out of a sour
apple-tree, which was as long as a lance, and with it he laid on lustily
upon his enemies. He scattered the brains of some, and the legs and arms
of others. He broke their necks; he had off their heads; he smashed
their bones; he caved in their ribs; he impaled them, and he transfixed
them. Believe me, it was a most horrible spectacle that ever man saw.
Some died without speaking, others spoke without dying; some died while
they were speaking, others spoke while they were dying. So great was the
cry of the wounded, that the prior and all his monks came forth, and