Michael Scott - Page 2

inmates of the house
were retired to bed, the landlady resorted to her darling occupation;
and, in his feigned state of indisposition, Michael had a favourable
opportunity of watching most scrupulously all her actions through the
keyhole of a door leading to the next apartment where she was. He could
see the rites and ceremonies with which the serpent was put into the
oven, along with many mysterious ingredients. After which the
unsuspicious landlady placed the dish by the fireside, where lay the
distressed traveller, to stove till the morning.

Once or twice in the course of the night the "wife of the change-house,"
under the pretence of inquiring for her sick lodger, and administering to
him some renovating cordials, the beneficial effects of which he
gratefully acknowledged, took occasion to dip her finger in her saucepan,
upon which the cock, perched on his roost, crowed aloud. All Michael's
sickness could not prevent him considering very inquisitively the
landlady's cantrips, and particularly the influence of the sauce upon the
crowing of the cock. Nor could he dissipate some inward desires he felt
to follow her example. At the same time, he suspected that Satan had a
hand in the pie, yet he thought he would like very much to be at the
bottom of the concern; and thus his reason and his curiosity clashed
against each other for the space of several hours. At length passion, as
is too often the case, became the conqueror. Michael, too, dipped his
finger in the sauce, and applied it to the tip of his tongue, and
immediately the cock perched on the _spardan_ announced the circumstance
in a mournful clarion. Instantly his mind received a new light to which
he was formerly a stranger, and the astonished dupe of a landlady now
found it her interest to admit her sagacious lodger into a knowledge of
the remainder of her secrets.

Endowed with the knowledge of "good and evil," and all the "second
sights" that can be acquired, Michael left his lodgings in the morning,
with the philosopher's stone in his pocket. By daily perfecting his
supernatural attainments, by new series of discoveries, he became more
than a match for Satan himself. Having seduced some thousands of Satan's
best workmen into his employment, he trained them up so successfully to
the architective business, and inspired them with such industrious
habits, that he was more than sufficient for all the architectural work
of the empire. To establish this assertion, we need only refer to some
remains of his workmanship still existing north of the Grampians, some of
them, stupendous bridges built by him in one short night, with no other
visible agents than two or three workmen.

On one occasion work was getting