Page:Gesta Romanorum - Swan - Wright - 2.djvu/331

Rh recompence, or permitting inquiry. He did this daily, and aged as he seemed to be, his pace was singularly rapid. At last, a certain knight went to these parts for the purpose of hunting; and a draught being demanded, and the horn brought, instead of restoring it to the industrious skinker as custom and urbanity required, he retained it for his own use. But the knight's feudal lord, ascertaining the truth of this matter, condemned the plunderer; and presented the horn to Henry king of England, lest he himself should be held a partaker of the crime. (90)

My beloved, the mountain is the kingdom of heaven; the forest is the world. The hunter is any worldly-minded man. The thirst and heat are divine love; the horn, mercy, which is filled at the fountain of benevolence. He who bore it is Christ; and the napkin is confession.