wildernesses from the cliffs of the Hebrides to the Sclavonian
marches, they put forth a power, uniformly, it must be said, for
good.

Every one knows how they appear in the old romances.--How some Sir
Bertrand or other, wearied with the burden of his sins, stumbles on
one of these Einsiedler, 'settlers alone,' and talks with him; and
goes on a wiser and a better man. How he crawls, perhaps, out of
some wild scuffle, 'all-to bebled,' and reeling to his saddlebow; and
'ever he went through a waste land, and rocks rough and strait, so
that it him seemed he must surely starve; and anon he heard a little
bell, whereat he marvelled; and betwixt the water and the wood he was
aware of a chapel, and an hermitage; and there a holy man said mass,
for he was a priest, and a great leech, and cunning withal. And Sir
Bertrand went in to him and told him all his case--how he fought Sir
Marculf for love of the fair Ellinore, and how the king bade part
them, and how Marculf did him open shame at the wineboard, and how he
went about to have slain him privily, but could not; and then how he
went and wasted Marculf's lands, house with byre, kine with corn,
till a strong woman smote him over the head with a quern-stone, and
all-to broke his brain-pan;' and so forth--the usual story of mad
passion, drink, pride, revenge.

'And there the holy man a-read him right godly doctrine, and shrived
him, and gave him an oath upon the blessed Gospels, that fight he
should not, save in his liege lord's quarrel, for a year and a day.
And there he abode till he was well healed, he and his horse.'

Must not that wild fighting Bertrand have gone away from that place a
wiser and a better man? Is it a matter to be regretted, or