," said they, "is Beelzebub now, the
devil who went out of Madeline?" "I see him plainly at Gauffridi's
ear."
Have you had shame and horror enough? We should like further to know
what the poor wretch said, when put to the torture. Both the ordinary
and the extraordinary forms were used upon him. His revelations must
undoubtedly have thrown light on the curious history of the nunneries.
Those tales the Parliament stored up with greediness, as weapons that
might prove serviceable to itself; but it retained them "under the
seal of the Court."
The inquisitor Michaelis, who was fiercely assailed in public for an
excess of animosity so closely resembling jealousy, was summoned by
his order to a meeting at Paris, and never saw the execution of
Gauffridi, who was burnt alive four days afterwards, 30th April, 1611,
at Aix.
The name of the Dominicans, damaged by this trial, was not much
exalted by another case of _possession_ got up at Beauvais in such a
way as to ensure them all the honours of a war, the account of which
they got printed in Paris. Louisa's devil having been reproached for
not speaking Latin, the new demoniac, Denise Lacaille, mingled a few
words of it in her gibberish. They made a plenty of noise about her,
often displayed her in the midst of a procession, and even carried her
from Beauvais to Our Lady of Liesse. But the matter kept quite cool.
This Picard pilgrimage lacked the horror, the dramatic force of the
affair at Sainte-Baume. This Lacaille, for all her Latin, had neither
the burning eloquence, nor the mettle, nor the fierce rage, that
marked the woman of Provence. The only end of all her proceedings was
to amuse the Huguenots.
What became of the two rivals, Madeline and Louisa? The former, or at
least her shadow, was kept on Papal ground, for fear of her being led
to speak about so mournful a business. She was never shown in public,
save in the character of a penitent. She was taken out among the poor
women to cut wood, which was afterwards sold for alms; the parents,
whom she had brought to shame, having forsworn and forsaken her.
Louisa, for her part, had said during the trial: "I shall make no
boast about it. The trial over, I shall soon be dead." But this was
not to be. Instead of dying, she went on killing others. The
murdering devil within her waxed stormier than ever. She set about
revealing to the inquisitors the names, both Christian and surnames,
of all whom she fancied to have any
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