In the struggle the
chimney was twisted in the upper part, and remained so till its total
destruction, while Satan, rinding he could not carry off his body, tore
him asunder, and carried off his soul, dashing the mutilated remains of
the miser upon the hearth beneath. The death of Scraggs dissolved the
spell which bound the witches, and their release split the tree in which
they were confined from the ground to the topmost branch.
The great uproar of this Satanic struggle aroused the neighbourhood, and
the miser's body, when it was discovered, was buried beneath the wall of
the church--neither inside nor outside the sacred edifice. Ever
afterwards the house was haunted by the apparition of old Scraggs
searching for his lost soul with groans and hideous cries, until at last
the old mansion was pulled down and its very stones were removed.
The old shattered and knarled elm alone remained to keep alive the
legend of this evil compact. The story, improbable as it may appear, no
doubt contained, as most of these stories do, the element of fact.
Possibly the old man was a miser who possessed wealth enough to become
the source of envy by some interested relations.
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