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 accepted, and they set out together, leaving Sir Ralph's followers at the abbey. The knight was mounted on a spirited charger; Brother Michael on a large heavy-trotting horse; and the little fat friar on a plump softpaced galloway, so correspondent with himself in size, rotundity, and sleekness, that if they had been amalgamated into a centaur, there would have been nothing to alter in their proportions.

"Do you know," said the little friar, as they wound along the banks of the stream, "the reason why lake-trout is better than river-trout, and shyer withal?"

"I was not aware of the fact," said Sir Ralph.

"A most heterodox remark," said Brother Michael: "know you not, that in all nice matters you should take the implication for absolute, and, without looking into the fact whether,