“Did you not see sparks of our fire in the tongues of the swearers and of the scolds, when seeking to get their husbands home? Was there not plenty of the unquenchable fire in the mouth of the drunkard, and in the eyes of the brawler? And could you not perceive something of the infernal cold in the lovingness of the spendthrift, and in your own civility to your customers, whilst any thing remained with them—in the drollery of the buffoons, in the praise of the envious and the backbiter, in the promises of the wanton, or in the shanks of the good companions freezing beneath your tables? Art thou unacquainted with Hell, when the house thou didst keep was Hell? Go, hell-dog, to thy punishment.”
At this moment appeared ten devils with their burdens, which they cast upon the fiery floor, puffing terribly. “What have you there?” said Lucifer. “We have brought,” said one of the fiendish carriers, “five things which were called kings the day before yesterday.” (I looked attentively and
beheld in one of them old Louis of France.) “Fling them here,” said the king; whereupon they were flung to the other crowned heads, under the feet of Lucifer.
It was not long before I heard the sound of a brazen trumpet, and a crying of room! room! room! After waiting a little time, what should be coming but a drove of sessions folk, the devils carrying six lumps of justices and a thousand of their fry—consisting of lawyers, attornies, clerks, recorders, bailiffs, catchpoles, and pettifoggers of the courts. I was surprised that none of them attempted to cross-question; but they perceived that the matter was gone against them too far, and so, not one of these learned disputers opened his mouth; only a pettifogger of the courts said, that he would lay a plaint of false imprisonment against Lucifer. “You shall now have cause enough to complain,” said the Fiend, “and yet never have an opportunity of seeing a court with your eyes.” Then, putting on his red cap, Lucifer, with an arrogant, insufferable look, said, “take the justices to the dungeon of Pontius Pilate and Mr. Bradshaw, who condemned king Charles. Parch the lawyers in company with the murderers of Sir Edmund Bury Godfrey, [100] and their double-tongued brethren, who dispute with one another, for no other purpose than to be the ruin of any one who comes betwixt them. Let them greet that provident lawyer—for they will find him here—who offered on his death bed a thousand pounds for a clear conscience. Let them greet him, and ask, whether he is now willing to give any thing more. Roast them with their own parchment and papers; hang the pettifoggers above them, with their nostrils downwards, in the
roasting chimneys, to receive the smoke, and to see whether they can get their belly-full of law. As for the recorders, let them be cast among the forestallers, who detain the corn or buy it up and mix it, and then sell the unsound for double the price of the pure corn; just as the former demand double the fees for wrong, which were formerly given for right. As for the catchpoles, leave them at liberty to hunt vermin; or send them to the world, among the dingles and brakes, to seize the debtors of the infernal crown—for what devil among you will do the work better than they?” At this moment twenty devils with packs on their shoulders, like Scotchmen, mounted before the throne of Despair, and what had they got, on enquiry, but gipsies. “Ho!” said Lucifer, “how did ye know the fortunes of others so well, without knowing that your own fortune was leading ye to this prison.” But the gipsies said not a word in reply, being confounded at beholding faces here more ugly than their own. “Hurl them into our deepest dungeon,” said Lucifer, to the fiends, “and don’t starve them; we have here neither cats nor rush-lights to give them, but let them have a toad between them, every ten thousand years, provided they are quiet, and do not deafen us with their gibberish and clibberty clabber.” Next to these there came, I should imagine, about thirty husbandmen. Every one was surprised to see so many of them, people of their honest calling seldom coming to Hell; but they were not from the same neighbourhood, nor for the same offences. Some were for raising the markets; many for refusing to pay tithes, and cheating the minister of his rights; others for leaving their work, to follow gentry a hunting, and breaking their legs in endeavouring to leap with them; some for working on Sundays; some for carrying their sheep and cattle, in their
heads to church, instead of musing on the Word; others for roguish bargains. When Lucifer began to question them, oh! they were all as pure as gold; none was aware of having committed any thing which deserved such a lot. You will not believe what a crafty excuse every one had to conceal his fault, notwithstanding he was in Hell on account of it, and this was only done out of malice, to thwart Lucifer and to endeavour to make the righteous Judge, who had damned them appear unjust. But you would have been yet more surprised at the dexterity with which the Arch Fiend laid bare their crimes, and answered their vain excuses home. But when these were receiving the last infernal sentence, there came forty scholars before the court, mounted on capering devils, more ugly, if possible, than Lucifer himself. And when the scholars heard the husbandmen arguing, they began to excuse themselves the more confidently. But, oh! how ready the old Serpent was at answering them too, notwithstanding their craft, and their learning.
But as it was my fortune to hear similar disputations at another tribunal, I will there give the history of the whole, in one mass; and will at present relate to you what I next saw. Scarcely had Lucifer uttered judgment upon these people, and sent them, for the cool impertinence of their reasons, to the vast sheet, in the country of the eternal ice, the teeth of the wretches beginning to chatter before they saw their prison, when Hell began once more, to resound awfully with terrible blows, harsh blustering thunders, and every sound of war. I could see Lucifer turn black, and become like a statue; at this moment, in rushed a little crooked, horned devil, panting and shivering. “What is the matter?” said Lucifer. “The most perilous to you of all matters since Hell
has been Hell,” said the imp; “all the extremes of the kingdom of Darkness, have broken out against you, and against one another; particularly those who had any old field in common. They are now at it, tooth and nail, so that it is impossible to tear them from each other.
“The soldiers are at loggerheads with the physicians, for carrying on their trade of slaughter; there is a swarm of usurers at loggerheads with the lawyers, for seeking to spoil their trade; the jurymen and the duffers are pummelling the gentlemen, for swearing and cursing without necessity; whereas, swearing and cursing formed part of their trade; the harlots, and their associates, and millions of other old friends and acquaintances, have fallen out, and are all in shatters.
“But worse than all, is the contest between the old misers and their own children, for dissipating their wealth and their money. ‘Our property,’ say the pigtails, ‘cost us much pain, whilst we were upon the earth, and is causing us immense suffering here for ever, yet ye have flung it all away at ducks and drakes.’ And the children, on the other hand, are cursing and tearing the old skin-flints, most furiously, charging their fathers with being the authors of their misery, by leaving them twenty times too much, to distract them with pride and dissipation; whereas, a little, with a blessing, might have made them happy in both their states of existence.” “Well,” said Lucifer, “enough! enough! we have more need of arms than words. Sirrah, this hubbub is owing to some great neglect; go back, and pry into every watch, and discover who has been neglectful; and what dangerous characters have been permitted to escape, for there are some evils abroad, that are not known.” Away