pel, do
I hurt you with my hand? How does it happen that at one time you can
bear it and at another time not?' 'Oh, yes,' said she, 'I can bear the
hand well, but take away what you have under your hand, otherwise you
will destroy me.' 'God forbid!' said the Dean; 'but tell me what is on
your head?' Then answered the evil one: 'Look you, wait a little!'
(here followed an examination as before), and at last the evil spirit
said what it was. Thereupon the Dean proceeded: 'But I wish to know yet
one thing, whether you are alone, or have any companions with you?' 'I
am alone,' said the evil one. 'What is your name?' 'I am called
_Spielfleck_,' said the evil one. 'Oh, that is nothing, you have never
in the beginning told me the truth; I must bring it out of you
perforce, you shall acquaint me with your right name, for I must and
shall know it.' Then the exorcism began again, till the evil one was
constrained to say, _Schwamm_.[71] Thereupon the watchers and nurses
exclaimed: 'Oh that is truly his right name, it is what she has always
called him.' Then the Dean answered: 'Well-a-day! God grant we may soon
lay hold of Schwamm, and send him down to Lucifer in hell, that he may
wipe his shoes with him.' The evil one: 'Oh no, no, spare me.' Upon
this my brother called on me, Herr Magister Sixtus, to draw near and
hold the napkin, containing the most holy and revered sacrament, on her
head, and commanded at the same time that all her chains should be
unloosed and done away with; whereupon many were much afeared. He
himself had his cope, stole, and books brought to him, and having thus
dressed and prepared himself, when the poor woman was loosened from all
her shackles, he took an old red stole in his hand and said: 'Behold,
_Schwamm_! I now come to thee in the name of the Father, the Son, and
the Holy Ghost. This threefold, indissoluble, godly bond shall now bind
thee down in the abyss of hell, so that you shall never more throughout
all eternity do any detriment or injury, either to persons, or cattle,
or any other creature.' He took both her hands, wound the stole three
times round her, and commanded the evil one, by the great power and
dignity of that which lay on the poor woman's head, to give up all
further struggle. Thereupon the Dean turned himself towards the people,
of whom there was such a multitude, that the room, windows, barn, and
streets were all quite full, and spoke to them:--

"At the conclusion of the holy prayer