About noon
`` But with us chapmen , '' said Clement , `` he will not meddle , lest there be an end of chaffer in the town ; and verily the market is good . '' Thus they rode through the streets into the market place , which was wide and great , and the best houses of the town were therein , and so came to the hostel of the Merchants , called the Fleece , which was a big house , and goodly enough . The next morning Clement and the other chapmen went up into the Castle , bearing with them gifts out of their wares for the lord , and Clement bade Ralph keep close till he came back , and especially to keep his war-caught thrall , Bull Shockhead , safe at home , lest he be taken from him , and to clothe him in the guise of the chapman lads , and to dock his hair ; and even so Ralph did , though Bull were loath thereto . About noon the chapmen came back again well pleased ; and Clement gave Ralph a parchment from the lord , which bade all men help and let pass Ralph of Upmeads , as a sergeant of the chapmen 's guard , and said withal that now he was free to go about the town if he listed , so that he were back at the hostel of the Fleece by nightfall . So Ralph went in company with some of the sergeants and others , and looked at this and that about the town without hindrance , save that the guard would not suffer them to pass further than the bailey of the Castle . And for the said bailey , forsooth , they had but little stomach ; for they saw thence , on the slopes of the Castle-hill , tokens of the cruel justice of the said lord ; for there were men and women there , yea , and babes also , hanging on gibbets and thrust through with sharp pales , and when they asked of folk why these had suffered , they but looked at them as if astonished , and passed on without a word . So they went thence , and found the master-church , and deemed it not much fairer than it was great ; and it was nowise great , albeit it was strange and uncouth of fashion .