sometimes like bees, Like man, or angel, black dog, or black crow:— Nor is it wondrous that it should be so. A sorry juggler can bewilder thee; And ’faith, I think I know more craft than he.”

“But why,” inquired the Sumner, “must ye don So many shapes, when ye might stick to one?”  “We suit the bait unto the fish,” quoth he. “And why,” quoth t’other, “all this slavery?”  “For many a cause, Sir Sumner,” quoth the fiend; “But time is brief—the day will have an end; And here jog I, with nothing for my ride; Catch we our fox, and let this theme abide: For, brother mine, thy wit it is too small To understand me, though I told thee all; And yet, as toucheth that same slavery, A devil must do God’s work, ’twixt you and me; For without Him, albeit to our loathing, Strong as we go, we devils can do nothing; Though to our prayers, sometimes, He giveth leave Only the body, not the soul, to grieve. Witness good Job, whom nothing could make wrath; And sometimes have we power to harass both; And, then again, soul only is possest, And body free; and all is for the best. Full many a sinner would have no salvation, Gat it he not by standing our temptation: Though God He knows, ’twas far from our intent To save the man:—his howl was what we meant. Nay, sometimes we be servants to our foes: Witness the saint that pulled my master’s nose; And to the apostle servant eke was I.”  “Yet tell me,” quoth this Sumner, “faithfully, Are the new shapes ye take for your intents Fresh every time, and wrought of elements?”  “Nay,” quoth the fiend, “sometimes they be disguises; And sometimes in a corpse a devil rises, And speaks as sensibly, and fair, and well, As did the Pythoness to Samuel: And yet will some men say, it was not he! Lord help, say I, this world’s divinity. Of one thing make thee sure; that thou shalt know, Before we part, the shapes we wear below. Thou shalt—I jest thee not—the Lord forbid! Thou shalt know more than ever Virgil did, Or Dante’s self. So let us on, sweet brother, And stick, like right warm souls, to one another: I’ll never quit thee, till thou quittest me.”

“Nay,” quoth the Sumner, “that can never be; I am a man well known, respectable; And though thou wert the very lord of hell, Hold thee I should as mine own plighted brother: Doubt not we’ll stick right fast, each to the other: And, as we think alike, so will we thrive: We twain will be the merriest devils alive. Take thou what’s given; for that’s thy mode, God wot; And I will take, whether ’tis given or not. And if that either winneth more than t’other, Let him be true, and share it with his brother.”

“Done,” quoth the fiend, whose eyes in secret glowed; And 

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