esiastical authorities looked at each other. "That
graceless knave of a sacristan!" said the Mayor.

"He hath indeed of late strangely neglected his charge," said a priest.

"Poor man, I doubt his wits are touched," charitably added another.

"What!" exclaimed the bishop, who was very active, very fussy, and a great
stickler for discipline. "This important church, so renowned for its three
miraculous bells, confided to the tender mercies of an imbecile rogue who
may burn it down any night! I will look to it myself without losing a
minute."

And in spite of all remonstrances, off he started. The keys were brought,
the doors flung open, the body of the church thoroughly examined, but
neither in nave, choir, or chancel could the slightest trace of the
sacristan be found.

"Perhaps he is in the belfry," suggested a chorister.

"We'll see," responded the bishop, and bustling nimbly up the ladder, he
emerged into the open belfry in full moonlight.

Heavens! what a sight met his eye! The sacristan and the devil sitting
_vis-a-vis_ close by the miraculous bell, with a smoking can of hot spiced
wine between them, finishing a close game of cribbage.

"Seven," declared Euschemon.

"And eight are fifteen," retorted the demon, marking two.

"Twenty-three and pair," cried Euschemon, marking in his turn.

"And seven is thirty."

"Ace, thirty-one, and I'm up."

"It _is_ up with you, my friend," shouted the bishop, bringing his crook
down smartly on Euschemon's shoulders.

"Deuce!" said the devil, and vanished into his bell.

When poor Euschemon had been bound and gagged, which did not take very
long, the bishop briefly addressed the assembly. He said that the accounts
of the bell which had reached his ears had already excited his
apprehensions. He had greatly feared that all could not be right, and now
his anxieties were but too well justified. He trusted there was not a man
before him who would not suffer his flocks and his crops to be destroyed by
tempest fifty times over rather than purchase their safety by unhallowed
means. What had been done had doubtless been done in ignorance, and could
be made good by a mulct to the episcopal treasury. The amount of this he
would carefully consider, and the people of Epinal might rest assured that
it should not be too light to entitle them to the benefit of a full
absolution. The bell must go to his cathedral city, there to be examined
and reported on by the exorcists and inqui