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 Ranged the licentiates, and bachelors, And, out beyond, the thousand students,—gay In plumes and ruffs, or rags and disrepair,— There entered Bacharel Frei Constantino Citing the obligations; whereupon Egidio began his argument With exposition and arrangement clear, And summary abrupt and crushing, as His old experience in the courts had taught,— So free in tone and doctrine that the throng Swayed on their benches, beating noisily Great tomes together like the roll of drums. Then silence for Suarez's quodlibet; As half-reluctant, without emphasis, His cold unwavering voice proposed the plan Of his objection,—When uproarious Upon the instant, Frei Egidio In tones of thunder shouted o'er the hall,— "Nego majorem!"—the scholastic world's Unmitigated insult! How would he, Spain's boasted theologian, reply To Portugal's? The Jesuits around Suarez's rostrum marvelled, whispered, turned, And hid their faces, when they saw him bowed Silent a moment, ere descending, calm, He led them home across the jeering town. Then the mad acclamations; bells of shrine And monastery on the hills; the sweep Of robes prelatical, the cavalcade Of gorgeous nobles into Santa Cruz; The blare of trumpets, and the lanterns strung Yellow beneath the moon; the beggar throngs; The maskers down the lanes; the nightingales