could not bring them to any confession, all continuing steadfast in their denials, till at last some of them burst out into tears, and their confession agreed with what the children said; and these expressed their abhorrence of the fact, and begged pardon, adding that the devil, whom they called _Locyta_, had stopped the mouths of some of them, so loath was he to part with his prey, and had stopped the ears of others. And being now gone from them, they could no longer conceal it, for they had now perceived his treachery.' The Elfdale witches were induced to announce--'We of the province of Elfdale do confess that we used to go to a gravel-pit which lies hard by a cross-way, and there we put on a vest over our heads, and then danced round; and after this ran to the cross-way and called the devil thrice, first with a still voice, the second time somewhat louder, and the third time very loud, with these words, "Antecessor, come and carry us to Blockula." Whereupon immediately he used to appear, but in different habits; but for the most part we saw him in a grey coat and red and blue stockings.[154] He had a red beard, a high-crowned hat with linen of divers colours wrapt about it, and long garters about upon his stockings. Then he asked us whether we would serve him with soul and body. If we were content to do so, he set us on a beast which he had there ready, and carried us over churches and high walls, and after all he came to a green meadow where Blockula lies [the Brockenberg in the Hartz forest, as Scott conjectures]. We procured some scrapings of altars and filings of church clocks, and then he gave us a horn with a salve in it, wherewith we do anoint ourselves, and a saddle, with a hammer and a wooden nail thereby to fix the saddle. Whereupon we call upon the devil, and away we go.' [154] Accommodating himself to modern refinement, the devil usually discards the antiquated horns, hoofs, and tail; and if, as Dr. Mede supposed, 'appearing in human shape, he has always a deformity of some uncouth member or other,' such inconvenient appendages are disguised as much as possible. As Goethe's Mephistopheles explains to his witch: 'Culture, which renders man less like an ape, Has also licked the devil into shape.'