the villagers that Deford was the absolute controller of spirits, and the unlimited master of demons. As a dealer in forbidden things, he was now still more carefully avoided. Had Felix here thrown away his honesty, for he began to feel the undeserved reputation he was acquiring, and issued from his cloister publicly to practice his incantations, he could have performed wonders before the eyes of the villagers not surpassed in splendor by any accredited to his masters: but he preferred to continue his studies and his conjurations as if unconscious of the opinions entertained concerning him. This only had the effect of increasing the consternation of the villagers still more. His name at once became an object of dread to the credulous, and a subject of terror to the old women, who soon made it the fright of the nursery. Recollections of old and marvelous stories were rapidly revived, and for some time nothing seemed to be known or talked of in the village but terrible tales. There was scarcely a man or woman to be found who had not recently seen a ghost or been troubled by some fearful spectre, for all which Felix had to bear the blame. Amongst these, the most conspicuous was the sharp-visaged old maid, who now saw more ghosts and phantoms than there had been Gods in the heathen Pantheons, and pointed to this fact as a full and triumphant verification of the opinions she had first expressed concerning him. To billet an army upon a town is always attended with great confusion, and necessarily with no little terror; but she accused him of something more awful still. She unhesitatingly affirmed that he had filled the village with spirits and devils, to trouble the repose of its people; but an incredulous fellow, perhaps moved by a malicious disposition, insisted that such could not possibly have been the case, otherwise she could not have been secure for a single moment. No nook or corner could be found where ghost or goblin had not been. The street had become the dancing ground of the tenants of darkness, and the limits of the village the general theatre for their sports and evil practices, and all through the incantations of the conjuror. Every bare spot which had refused to yield as abundantly as its neighbor, brought a curse upon poor Felix; every strange mark discovered was regarded as a sure indication of superhuman agency, and every odd foot-print afforded a monstrous theme for conjecture. Singular noises began to be heard in the air: some exulting and merry--others plaintive and melancholy. Confusion seized the cattle, the horses became as stubborn as the women, the dogs kept up a continual howl and fight, and night was rendered hideous by caterwauls. The pigs and chickens were no less rebellious, the noisy fowls became more noisy and restless, and the barn yards resembled perfect Babels. The crow of the cock was no longer the morning signal of the approach of day, for it was heard at all hours of the night.