Page:Political history of the devil upon two sticks.pdf/10

 always be covered with a fair appearance, without which it will never please. I assume whatever shape I will, and could have shewed myself to you in a finer imaginary body: but designing without any disguise, to lay myself open to you, I was willing that you should see me in a shape best suited to the opinion which the world entertains of me and my functions.

My lameness, answered the devil, is owing to a quarrel I formerly had in France with Pillardoc, the devil of Interest, about one Manceau, a man of business and one of the farmers of the revenues: he being very rich, we as warmly contested who should have the possession of him, and fought it out in the middle region of the air, from whence Pillardoc, (being the stronger of the two) threw me down to the earth, as the poets tell ye Jupiter did Vulcan: and so from the resemblance of our adventures, my comrades called me the Lame Devil, or the Devil upon Two Sticks; and that nick-name, which they gave me in rapiery, has stuck by me ever since: but though a cripple, I can yet go pretty nimbly: you shall be a witness of my agility.

But, adds he, let us end this discourse, and make haste out of the garret. It will not be long before the magician comes up to labour at the immortality of a beautiful sylph which nightly visits him; and if he should surprise us, he would not fail to commit me to the bottle from whence I came, and confine you to the same. Let us therefore, in the first place, throw away all the pieces of the broken phial, that the enchanter may not know my enlargement.

At these words the dæmon gathered up all the pieces of the broken phial, and after heaving them out at the window, come then, said he to the student, let us make the best of our way; take hold of the end of my cloak, and fear nothing. However dangerous the offer appeared to Don Cleofas, he yet chose rather to accept it, than expose himself to the resentment of the magician; wherefore he took as good