Page:The humbugs of the world - An account of humbugs, delusions, impositions, quackeries, deceits and deceivers generally, in all ages (IA humbugsworld00barnrich).djvu/308

 head-and-bloody-bones style, awaited his return to consciousness.

As he began rousing himself, they lighted some huge torches, and also set fire to some bundles of straw, and three or four rolls of brimstone, which they had placed in different parts of the cavern. The peddler rubbed his eyes, and seeing and smelling all these evidences of pandemonium, concluded he had died, and was now partaking of his final doom. But he took it very philosophically, for he complacently remarked to himself.

“In hell—just as I expected!”

A story is told of a cool old sea captain, with a virago of a wife, who met one of these artificial devils in a lonely place. As the ghost obstructed his path, the old fellow remarked:

“If you are not the devil, get out! If you are, come along with me and get supper. I married your sister!

Magic, sorcery, witchcraft, enchantment, necromancy, conjuring, incantation, soothsaying, divining, the black art, are all one and the same humbug. They show how prone men are to believe in some supernatural power,