was not really a child, but the Devil, who had promised him that he would induce everybody to give him alms, so long as he would carry him about in the shape of a child."

CHAPTER III.

"Fictis meminerit nos jocari fabulis."

PHED. I. PROL. I.

"Let it be remembered that we sport in fabled 'stories."

OF THE

CRIMINAL INTERCOURSE OF

WITCHES WITH THE DEVIL.

The author having taken the first step in superstitions by admitting the existence of changelings, is naturally carried on a step further and enters upon the inquiry as to their parentage. Into this enquiry we have no in

tention to follow him, and shall only here and there lift the veil, which we purpose to leave over this chapter, altering and adapting the language and anecdotes so as to be more in accordance with the improved feelings of the age, without, at the same time, depriving those anecdotes of their distinguishing features.

It is lamentable to observe that the author, after having adduced seven excellent reasons against the popular superstition of his day, (which seven reasons, however, we cannot venture to transcribe,) proceeds forthwith to adduce anecdotes in support of that superstition, to the demolition of which he has devoted several pages.

We will take his first story, the authority for which he tells us is the Spaniard, Antonio Torquemada, in his Third Day's Journey, (slightly modifying and condensing it,) which is set forth to show how the Devil shamefully deceived a noble maiden at Calaris or Cagliari. This young lady, possessed of great beauty, and endowed with many virtues, amongst which, however, that of controlling her affections does not appear to have been numbered, fell in love with a cavalier in her neighbourhood, without his having betrayed any corresponding affection for her. The young lady "never told her love,"

but she allowed it to take undue possession of her, thereby, of course, giving a footing for the Devil; who, accordingly, stimulated the person of the cavalier, and introduced himself to her. After a short period he had so ingratiated himself with her that she consented to a private marriage, the Devil persuading her at the same time never to send a messenger to him, nor to recognise nor speak to him in public when they met. By these means, often as the damsel met the real cavalier, the secret was preserved for several months, and the true state of the case would never have been discovered, had not her mother hung one day around her neck some precious relic or other. Now, all good Roman Catholics know that the Devil cannot withstand a relic, and, consequently, our feigned cavalier took such a disgust to the same that he took himself off altogether; and if the relic was, as is most likely, some old Saint's bone, or rotton clout, we can hardly accuse him of fastidiousness.

Time rolled on, the lady kept her relic, the Devil kept at home, and the real cavalier fell in love in another quarter, which, of course, excited the violent rage and jealousy of her who considered herself entitled to all his love. She, therefore, broke through the Devil's injunction, and sent a message to the cavalier, earnestly

requesting him to call upon her. He, being a courteous gentleman, paid her the desired visit, although quite ignorant of what she could want with him. Of course, tears and reproaches for his shameful desertion of her were the order of the day, and, on the cavalier's protesting ignorance and innocence, the lady became more and more impetuous, refreshing, as she thought, his memory, and desiring him to publicly avow their marriage, or she would expose him to the world.

The gentleman, in utter amazement, declared that she was talking Greek to him, on which the young girl became furious, and reverted to her wedding day, reminding him of certain occurances thereon with a great deal more circumstantiality than we intend to deal in; but one point was, that it was a high festival of the Church.

The astonished cavalier replied that not only on the day in question, but for three weeks previously, so far from being in his house, or even in the city, he had been fifty miles off, which he offered to prove by unquestionable witnesses, and that, therefore, be he who he might, that had imposed himself upon her, he neither would nor could be responsible.