"Peace, Peterkin," she said."You mind me of the babbling of the merchant-folk, when I spurred Willebald into new roads.He had done as his father before him, and bought wool and salted fish from the English, paying with the stuffs of our Flemish looms.A good trade of small and sure profits, but I sought bigger quarries.For, mark you, there was much in England that had a value in this country of ours which no Englishman guessed.""Of what nature?" the monk asked with curiosity in his voice.
"Roman things.Once in that land of bogs and forests there were bustling Roman towns and rich Roman houses, which disappeared as every tide brought in new robbers from the sea.Yes, but not all.Much of the preciousness was hidden and the place of its hiding forgotten.Bit by bit the churls found the treasure-trove, but they did not tell their lords.They melted down jewels and sold them piecemeal to Jews for Jews' prices, and what they did not recognise as precious they wantonly destroyed.I have seen the marble heads of heathen gods broken with the hammer to make mortar of, and great cups of onyx and alabaster used as water troughs for a thrall's mongrels..
..Knowing the land, I sent pedlars north and west to collect such stuff, and what I bought for pence I sold for much gold in the Germanies and throughout the French cities.Thus Willebald amassed wealth, till it was no longer worth his while to travel the seas.We lived snug in Flanders, and our servants throughout the broad earth were busy getting us gear."The Cluniac was all interest.The making of money lay very near the heart of his Order."I have heard wondrous tales of your enterprise," he told her."I would fain know the truth.""Packman's tricks," she laughed."Nevertheless it is a good story.For Iturned my eyes to the East, whence come those things that make the pride of life.The merchants of Venice were princes, and it was in my head to make those of Bruges no worse.What did it profit that the wind turned daily the sails of our three hundred mills if we limited ourselves to common burgher wares and the narrow northern markets? We sent emissaries up the Rhine and beyond the Alps to the Venice princes, and brought hither the spices and confections of Egypt and the fruits and wines of Greece, and the woven stuffs of Asia till the marts of Flanders had the savour of Araby.