red that we might be proceeding too precipitately," said
another.

"It is written, 'the devils believe,'" said a third: "the Holy Father,
therefore, is not a heretic at any rate."

"Brethren," said Anno, "this affair, as our brother Benno well remarks,
doth indeed call for mature deliberation. I therefore propose that, instead
of smothering his Holiness with cushions, as originally contemplated, we
immure him for the present in the dungeon adjoining hereunto, and, after
spending the night in meditation and prayer, resume the consideration of
the business tomorrow morning."

"Informing the officials of the palace," said Benno, "that his Holiness has
retired for his devotions, and desires on no account to be disturbed."

"A pious fraud," said Anno, "which not one of the Fathers would for a
moment have scrupled to commit."

The Cardinals accordingly lifted the still insensible Lucifer, and bore him
carefully, almost tenderly, to the apartment appointed for his detention.
Each would fain have lingered in hopes of his recovery, but each felt that
the eyes of his six brethren were upon him: and all, therefore, retired
simultaneously, each taking a key of the cell.

Lucifer regained consciousness almost immediately afterwards. He had the
most confused idea of the circumstances which had involved him in his
present scrape, and could only say to himself that if they were the usual
concomitants of the Papal dignity, these were by no means to his taste, and
he wished he had been made acquainted with them sooner. The dungeon was not
only perfectly dark, but horribly cold, and the poor devil in his present
form had no latent store of infernal heat to draw upon. His teeth
chattered, he shivered in every limb, and felt devoured with hunger and
thirst. There is much probability in the assertion of some of his
biographers that it was on this occasion that he invented ardent spirits;
but, even if he did, the mere conception of a glass of brandy could only
increase his sufferings. So the long January night wore wearily on, and
Lucifer seemed likely to expire from inanition, when a key turned in the
lock, and Cardinal Anno cautiously glided in, bearing a lamp, a loaf, half
a cold roast kid, and a bottle of wine.

"I trust," he said, bowing courteously, "that I may be excused any slight
breach of etiquette of which I may render myself culpable from the
difficulty under which I labour of determining whether, under present
circumstanc