From behind some wool comes a devil, in the shape of a black man, with half-cocked, squinting eyes, and the barbed or forked tip of his tail just seen below his coat skirts. Devil:—"My dear, here I am, come at your call, ready to do all you wish for very little pay. Only agree to go with me at the end of three long years, and for all that time I'll do your spinning and knitting and everything else you wish for, and even then, if you can tell me my name at three times asking, you may go or stay, till another time." Duffy:—"Well, I don't mind much: anything for a change. What ded'e say you were called?" Devil, winking:—"You have only to prick your arm and draw blood to sign our agreement you know." Duffy:—"My word is as good as my mark. Spin and knit for me if you will; and I'll have, that while, a courant in the orchard and a dance at the mill." In leaving, Duffy says:—"Bolt the door, that no one may see who is doing the work." "Stop and let me take the measure of your foot," says the devil, in stringing the wheel as handy as if he had been used to spinning all his life. Father Christmas comes before the curtain and says:—"Good[5] people, you see that Duffy wans't at all scared at the Bucca-boo's appearance, because in old times people were so much used to dealings with the devil—women especially—that they didn't mind him. Duffy is now gone off by the outer door and stair, to merrily pass the day; and old Jone, hearing a rumble all through the house, thinks her to be busy at work." Duffy passes a great part of her time at Trove Mill, near at hand; where a crowd of women high and low, meet to take their turn at grinding, serging, &c. Whilst some work others tell stories, sing, or dance on the green, near which grew many old oaks, sycamores, and elms, in a place still called the rookery, a little above. There was a great friendship between Duffy and Old Betty, who worked the mill, because this old dame, having long had strange dealings, saw at once, by a stocking Duffy pretended to be knitting, that a stitch was always down and that the work was none of hers. In the evening, Duffy hearing, when she came in, the devil still spinning, thought she would see him at work and try to learn something. Looking through the latch-hole she saw what she took to be a woman, seated, and spinning with a small treddle-turn such as is used for spinning thread, and the wool-turn (with a wheel as large as that of a coach) put aside. When she looked around she knew that it was only the devil dressed in clothes like what she wore. He had on a loose bed-gown, petticoat, and towser (large coarse apron or wrapper,) with a nackan (large 'kerchief) thrown loosely over his head and shoulders. As Duffy entered, he turned around and said, "How are'e, my dear? Here I am, you see, busy at work for'e. See what I've already spun," he continued, pointing to a heap of balls in the corner, and skeins of yarn hanging on the walls.