Upon this they confessed their guilt, and flinging themselves upon their
knees with many tears and prayers begged for mercy. This, after a decent
interval, I permitted myself to grant. "Your lives, which are forfeited,
shall be spared," I pronounced. "But punished you must be. I therefore
ordain that Simon, the smith, at once fit, nail, and properly secure a
pair of iron shoes to Andrew's heels, and that then Andrew, who by that
time will have picked up something of the smith's art, do the same to
Simon. So will you both learn to avoid such shoeing tricks for the
future."
It may well be imagined that a judgment so whimsical, and so justly
adapted to the offense, charmed all save the culprits; and in a hundred
ways the pleasure of those present was evinced, to such a degree, indeed,
that Maignan had some difficulty in restoring silence and gravity to the
assemblage. This done, however, Master Andrew was taken in hand and his
wooden shoes removed. The tools of his trade were placed before the smith,
who cast glances so piteous, first at his brother's feet and then at the
shoes on the anvil, as again gave rise to a prodigious amount of
merriment, my pages in particular well-nigh forgetting my presence, and
rolling about in a manner unpardonable at another time. However, I rebuked
them sharply, and was about to order the sentence to be carried into
effect, when the remembrance of the many pleasant simplicities which the
smith had uttered to me, acting upon a natural disposition to mercy, which
the most calumnious of my enemies have never questioned, induced me to
give the prisoners a chance of escape.
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