with the others into the church, where they found that although the bell
had rung for vespers, there was not a single monk, present to say them.

5 Little masks hiding only the upper part of the face, and
called _tourets-de-nez_, were then frequently worn by ladies
of rank. Some verses by Christine de Pisan show them to have
been in vogue already in the fourteenth century. In the MS.
copy of Margaret's poem of _La Coche_ presented to the
Duchess of Etampes, the ladies in the different miniatures
are frequently shown wearing masks of the kind referred to.
Some curious particulars concerning these _tourets_ will be
found in M. Léon do Laborde's _Le Palais Mazarin et les
grandes habitations de ville et de campagne au XVIIe
Siècle_, Paris, 1846, 8vo, p. 314.--L.

The monks, indeed, had heard that the company assembled in the meadow to
tell the pleasantest tales imaginable, and being fonder of pleasure than
of their prayers, they had gone and hidden themselves in a ditch, where
they lay flat on their bellies behind a very thick hedge; and they had
there listened so eagerly to the stories that they had not heard the
ringing of the monastery bell, as was soon clearly shown, for they
returned in such great haste that they almost lacked breath to begin the
saying of vespers.

After the service, when they were asked why they had been so late and
had chanted so badly, they confessed that they had been to listen to the
tales; whereupon, since they were so desirous of hearing them, it was
granted that they might sit and listen at their ease every day behind
the hedge.