held many confessionals. Then thinking
over all his good works, he thought it about time to cease his
apostolic labours, the more so, as he possessed about one hundred
thousand crowns earned by the sweat of his body. From that day he only
confessed ladies of high lineage, and did it very well. So that it was
said at Court that in spite of the efforts of the best young clerks
there was still no one but the Canon of St. Pierre-aux-Boeufs to
properly bleach the soul of a lady of condition. Then at length the
canon became by force of nature a fine nonagenarian, snowy about the
head, with trembling hands, but square as a tower, having spat so much
without coughing, that he coughed now without being able to spit; no
longer rising from his chair, he who had so often risen for humanity;
but drinking dry, eating heartily, saying nothing, but having all the
appearance of a living Canon of Notre Dame. Seeing the immobility of
the aforesaid canon; seeing the stories of his evil life which for
some time had circulated among the common people, always ignorant;
seeing his dumb seclusion, his flourishing health, his young old age,
and other things too numerous to mention--there were certain people
who to do the marvellous and injure our holy religion, went about
saying that the true canon was long since dead, and that for more than
fifty years the devil had taken possession of the old priest's body.
In fact, it seemed to his former customers that the devil could only
by his great heat have furnished these hermetic distillations, that
they remembered to have obtained on demand from this good confessor,
who always had le diable au corps. But as this devil had been
undoubtedly cooked and ruined by them, and that for a queen of twenty
years he would not have moved, well-disposed people and those not
wanting in sense, or the citizens who argued about everything, people
who found lice in bald heads, demanded why the devil rested under the
form of a canon, went to the Church of Notre Dame at the hours when
the canons usually go, and ventured so far as to sniff the perfume of
the incense, taste the holy water, and a thousand other things. To
these heretical propositions some said that doubtless the devil wished
to convert himself, and others that he remained in the shape of the
canon to mock at the three nephews and heirs of this said brave
confessor and make them wait until the day of their own death for the
ample succession of this uncle, to