"
"Thou foolish old John!" quoth Aylward. "You should know better,
since I have heard that the monks of Beaulieu could squeeze a
good cup of wine from their own grapes. Know then that if these
rows were dug up the wealth of the country would be gone, and
mayhap there would be dry throats and gaping mouths in England,
for in three months' time these black roots will blossom and
snoot and burgeon, and from them will come many a good ship-load
of Medoc and Gascony which will cross the narrow seas. But see
the church in the hollow, and the folk who cluster in the
churchyard! By my hilt! it is a burial, and there is a passing
bell!" He pulled off his steel cap as he spoke and crossed
himself, with a muttered prayer for the repose of the dead.
"There too," remarked Alleyne, as they rode on again, "that which
seems to the eye to be dead is still full of the sap of life,
even as the vines were. Thus God hath written Himself and His
laws very broadly on all that is around us, if our poor dull eyes
and duller souls could but read what He hath set before us.
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