The Archer's Tale

You'll call me a damned Jew, a Christ murderer, a secret worshipper of pigs and a kidnapper of christian children.” This was all said cheerfully. “How absurd! Who would want to kidnap children, Christian or otherwise? Vile things. The only mercy of children is that they grow up, as my son has but then, tragically, they beget more children. We do not learn life's lessons.

O mundo está apodrecendo. A Igreja é corrupta e os reis são fracos. Cabe a nós fazer um mundo novo, amado por Deus, mas para fazê-lo temos de destruir o velho. Temos de tomar o poder e depois dar o poder a Deus. É por isso que estamos lutando.

Harlequin, probably derived from the old French Hellequin: a troop of the devil’s horsemen.

Put a cat to watch a flock and the wolves eat well.

The wheel of fortune that had once raised her so high had taken her into the utter depths.

Be mad enough, his father once said, and they will either lock you away or make you a saint.

They’re praying to ham bones, ham bones! The blessed pig!

St George!’ the English shouted, but the saint must have been sleeping for he gave the attackers no help.

Father Hobbe, his cassock skirts hitched up to his waist, was fighting with a quarterstaff, ramming the pole into French faces. ‘In the name of the Father,’ he shouted, and a Frenchman reeled back with a pulped eye, ‘and of the Son,’ Father Hobbe snarled as he broke a man’s nose, ‘and of the Holy Ghost!

Where’s your bowstrings?’ Thomas asked, for the priest had neither helmet nor cap. ‘I looped them round my…well, never mind. It has to be good for something other than pissing, eh? And it’s dry down there.’ Father Hobbe seemed indecently cheerful.

Remember the old saying, my lady,” he said slyly. “Put a cat to watch a flock and the wolves eat well.

Only a fool leaves cash where a servant can find it,' he said.