rself visited by the devil, who was permitted to punish her
for her infidelity to the marriage-bed, she uttered a scream, and began
to repeat her pater noster with a loud voice. Her lover, finding himself
under the necessity of retiring, started up, and, stung with the most
violent pangs of rage and disappointment, ran directly to the spot from
whence this diabolical noise seemed to proceed. There encountering the
ass he discharged such a volley of blows at him and his rider, that the
creature carried him off at a round trot, and they roared in unison all
the way. Having thus cleared the room of such disagreeable company,
he went back to his mistress, and assuring her that this was only some
foolish prank of Pallet, took his leave, with a promise of returning
after the quiet of the inn should be re-established.

In the mean time, the noise of the bourrique, the cries of the painter,
and the lady's scream, had alarmed the whole house; and the ass, in the
precipitation of his retreat, seeing people with lights before him, took
shelter in the apartment for which he was at first designed, just as
the Levite, aroused at the uproar, had quitted his dulcinea, and was
attempting to recover his own chamber unperceived. Seeing himself
opposed by such an animal, mounted by a tall, meagre, lantern-jawed
figure, half naked, with a white nightcap upon his head which added to
the natural paleness of his complexion,--the Jew was sorely troubled in
mind and believing it to be an apparition of Balaam and his ass, flew
backward with a nimble pace, and crept under the bed, where he lay,
concealed. Mr. Jolter and the priest, who were the foremost of those
who had been aroused by the noise, were not unmoved when they saw such a
spectacle rushing into the chamber, whence the lady of pleasure began
to shriek. The governor made a full halt, and the Capuchin discovered no
inclination to proceed. They were, however, by the pressure of the crowd
that followed them, thrust forward to the door, through which the
vision entered; and there Jolter, with great ceremony, complimented his
reverence with the pas, beseeching him to walk in. The mendicant was
too courteous and humble to accept this pre-eminence, and a very earnest
dispute ensued; during which, the ass, in the course of his circuit,
showed himself and rider, and in a trice decided the contest; for,
struck with this second glimpse, both at one instant sprang backward
with such force, as overtur