his secret to others he might induce the Fiend to accept them as a substitute for himself.”
“And he was by no means singular in his notions,” remarked Edgar. “The position of the two free-shooters in the opera is based on precisely the same belief.”
“We have a still stranger instance, in the popular story of the Bottle Imp,” said Maximilian, “where the mere sale of the bottle transfers all accompanying perils and advantages to the purchaser.”
“All the sexton’s endeavours to free himself proved vain,” continued Laurence. “In the spring of 1636 his master gave him some grey powder, which he was to sprinkle about the streets of Magdeburg, and thus cause a pestilence. Conscience not being quite dead, the wretched man threw the greater part of the powder into the Elbe, but the plague broke out nevertheless, and extended to the neighbouring provinces. Twenty years afterwards he was ordered by a rough voice, with which he was only too familiar, to dig up the body of an infant which had been buried in St. Peter’s churchyard on that very day, and to make from its limbs a powder, which would cause a return of the pestilence. With this order he complied, the Fiend being constantly near him, in the shape of a black rat, to give him more particular instructions. However, here his evil career came to an end, for his crime was discovered, and—we know the very day—on the 26th of October, 1657, he was broken on the wheel.”
“Good,” exclaimed Edgar; “and thus we have one of the many cases of trial for witchcraft which were the disgrace of Europe.”
LETTY DORMER.
“I would rather die!” said Letty, passionately.
“Just so, my dear; all young girls would rather die than give up an unsubstantial fancy for a profitable reality. In general, however, they do give it up, and they do not die,” answered her mother, quietly.
“Mamma, how cruel you are!” cried the girl, with a kind of angry despair in her voice.
“Because I am rational? How cruel you are, you ought rather to say, Letty, to give me so much trouble when I am acting only for your own good; and when you know that you will have to yield at last.”
“I will not yield—I will die first,” repeated Letty.
“You are very fond of that assertion, my dear; but it does not move me. I know so well that you will marry as I wish you to do, and live into quite a respectable old age. You are healthy, though you do not come of a long-lived family on one side.” She sighed—it was a conventional sigh—and then she faintly murmured, “Poor papa!”
“Oh, mamma! you are too dreadful with your cold sarcasms,” cried Letty, flinging up her hands.
“And you are too silly with your mock heroics, my dear. If you had not me to guide you into common sense, what a mess you would make of your life!”
“What a wreck you wish to make it!” cried Letty.
“Silly little girl,” said Mrs. Dormer, with compassionate contempt. “You are like a naughty child who will thrust its hand into the fire, and thinks its nurse abominably cruel because she tries to prevent it. The day will come, my dear, when you will thank me, instead of scolding me as you are doing now, that I put an end to this absurd affair with Mr. Ratcliffe, and gave you such an admirable settlement in Mr. Mounsey.”
“Admirable settlement! A man old enough to be my father—a man I hate, and that no girl could like—only with money.”
“And, having money, with all that a portionless girl can desire and more than she has a right to expect,” said Mrs. Dormer, taking up a few dropped stitches leisurely.
“Oh, I know you don’t think it necessary for a wife to love her husband,” said Letty, sarcastically.
“To begin with?—by no means, my dear,” answered her mother, with perfect good breeding and good temper. “Love comes by habit, by the fact of a pleasant home where there is no stint, and where everything goes on comfortably. One man is very much the same as another man, when you know them; and, with a moderate amount of amiability, a well-principled girl is sure to be happy if she is properly provided for.”
“Your opinions are absolutely monstrous, and I will have nothing to do with them,” said Letty, angrily.
“Only to fulfil them, little goose, when you have worked off the froth.” Mrs. Dormer returned the answer with a slight laugh; and the servant at that moment flung open the door with an air, and ushered in—“Mr. Mounsey.”
