In the course of his
confession, the Baron of Ravenswood entrusted the hermit with the
secret of this singular amour, and Father Zachary drew the necessary and
obvious consequence that his patron was enveloped in the toils of Satan,
and in danger of destruction, both to body and soul. He urged these
perils to the Baron with all the force of monkish rhetoric, and
described, in the most frightful colours, the real character and person
of the apparently lovely Naiad, whom he hesitated not to denounce as
a limb of the kingdom of darkness. The lover listened with obstinate
incredulity; and it was not until worn out by the obstinacy of the
anchoret that he consented to put the state and condition of his
mistress to a certain trial, and for that purpose acquiesced in
Zachary's proposal that on their next interview the vespers bell
should be rung half an hour later than usual. The hermit maintained
and bucklered his opinion, by quotations from Malleus Malificarum,
Sprengerus, Remigius, and other learned demonologists, that the Evil
One, thus seduced to remain behind the appointed hour, would assume her
true shape, and, having appeared to her terrified lover as a fiend of
hell, would vanish from him in a flash of sulphurous lightning.
Pages:
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114