I will put someone else in charge, while he is busy, though I doubt if any will get as much work out of the lay brothers as he does; and indeed, he himself labours harder than any of them.

With any other, I should say that tucking his gown round his waist, and labouring with might and main was unseemly; but as it works off some of his superabundant energy, I do not interfere with him.'" "How ever did he become a monk, Father ?" "It seems that he was a somewhat sickly child, and his father sent him to the monastery to be taught, with a view to entering the Church.

He was quick and bright in his parts, but as his health improved he grew restless, and at fifteen refused to follow the vocation marked out for him, and returned home; where, as I have heard, he took part in various daring forays across the border.

When he was five-and-twenty, he was wounded well-nigh to death in one of these, and he took it as a judgment upon him, for deserting the Church; so he returned here, and became a lay brother.

He was a very long time, before he recovered his full strength, and before he did so he became a monk, and I believe has bitterly regretted the fact, ever since.
"Some day, I am afraid, he will break the bounds altogether, throw away his gown, assume a breast plate and steel cap, and become an unfrocked monk.