s if nothing had happened. After the first shock of dismay
they unanimously rushed to the door, but found it bolted on the
outside. There was no other exit, and no means of giving an alarm. In
this emergency the demeanour of the Italian Cardinals set a bright
example to their ultramontane colleagues. "_Bisogna pazienzia_," they
said, as they shrugged their shoulders. Nothing could exceed the
mutual politeness of Cardinals Anno and Benno, unless that of the two
who had sought to poison each other. The Frenchman was held to have
gravely derogated from good manners by alluding to this circumstance,
which had reached his ears while he was under the table: and the
Englishman swore so outrageously at the plight in which he found
himself that the Italians then and there silently registered a vow
that none of his nation should ever be Pope, a maxim which, with one
exception, has been observed to this day.

Lucifer, meanwhile, had repaired to Silvester, whom he found arrayed
in all the insignia of his dignity; of which, as he remarked, he
thought his visitor had probably had enough.

"I should think so indeed," replied Lucifer. "But at the same time I
feel myself fully repaid for all I have undergone by the assurance of
the loyalty of my friends and admirers, and the conviction that it is
needless for me to devote any considerable amount of personal
attention to ecclesiastical affairs. I now claim the promised boon,
which it will be in no way inconsistent with thy functions to grant,
seeing that it is a work of mercy. I demand that the Cardinals be
released, and that their conspiracy against thee, by which I alone
suffered, be buried in oblivion."

"I hoped you would carry them all off," said Gerbert, with an
expression of disappointment.

"Thank you," said the Devil. "It is more to my interest to leave them
where they are."

So the dungeon-door was unbolted, and the Cardinals came forth,
sheepish and crestfallen. If, after all, they did less mischief than
Lucifer had expected from them, the cause was their entire
bewilderment by what had passed, and their utter inability to
penetrate the policy of Gerbert, who henceforth devoted himself even
with ostentation to good works. They could never quite satisfy
themselves whether they were speaking to the Pope or to the Devil, and
when under the latter impression habitually emitted propositions which
Gerbert justly stigmatized as rash, temerarious, and scandalous. They
plagued h