After he had given up the swallowing baulk, another, far more feasible, arose and formed itself more clearly. There appeared before his mind's eye a young, round naïve face, fresh to the world, an awkward figure, the whole standing out against the background of known poverty. It was the figure of McTaggart, the journalist. A wicked glint illumined the Professor's eye. "Oh! Baleful, hellish light, thus to suffuse The inactive optic, wontedly so dulled, But now with evil purpose all inflamed!" as Milton has it in the matter of the fish-god, Dagon. He made no excuses for himself. He recked nothing of the young man's ruin. He plunged heartily and heavily into sin. As his colleague the Professor of Pastoral Theology had once finely quoted in his Luther Commemoration Lecture, "_Si peccas pecca fortiter_." It is generally held by the more liberal school among theologians that man acting of his own free will is not mastered by an external evil impulse, but may well submit to it. So it was with Cousin William on this never-to-be-forgotten occasion of his chief downfall. A Minor Devil happened at that moment to be wandering rather emptily through Paulings, seeking what he might devour. He was hungry, poor spirit; he had eaten nothing since he had left his own place at midnight and he had got lost in the fog all morning. He had almost caught a small housemaid, but she had slipped away through the efforts of her patron saint, sweet Millicent, and left him perfectly ravenous. It was almost noon and devils are not built for fasting. Judge then his joy at coming, by pure chance, upon this evil old man. He almost jumped out of his black fiendish skin for joy to perceive the flashing violet light which surrounds, in the eyes of supernatural beings, the head of a wicked man. He spotted it first from a corner of the hall where he had just come out of a corridor. He rubbed his hands together and even flapped his clawed wings in his excitement. He flew up to the Professor and began pouring all sorts of excellent suggestions into his ear--his left ear. Young McTaggart could play billiards ... the Professor had heard them say that ... young McTaggart was probably proud of his billiards ... he could be got to go round the table exhibiting his billiards. He would take off his coat before exhibiting his billiards. And when the coat was once off, and its owner's eye was concentrated on the billiard table ... oh, then!... The Devil, who can see through walls, gently shepherded his pupil into the little room next the library where the overflow of books was kept. That door, with horrid smile, the old conspirator opened; and there, indeed, he found the youth, looking miserably enough out of the window with his hands in his trousers pockets. He had slunk into that inhospitable fireless den in order to be free for a while from the terrors of high society.