n
filled up the hole with earth. Now came the Devil into the garden and
asked, 'Well, did you get the key? and how is it with the candle? where
is it?' 'The candle?' said the merchant. 'Yes, the candle.' 'Ha, ha, ha!
it is not yet burnt out,' answered the merchant, laughing, 'and will not
be burnt out for the next fifty years; it lies there a hundred fathoms
deep in the earth.' When the Devil heard this he screamed awfully, and
went off with a most intolerable stench." [119]

One day a fowler, who was a terrible bungler and could n't hit a bird
at a dozen paces, sold his soul to the Devil in order to become a
Freischutz. The fiend was to come for him in seven years, but must be
always able to name the animal at which he was shooting, otherwise the
compact was to be nullified. After that day the fowler never missed his
aim, and never did a fowler command such wages. When the seven years
were out the fowler told all these things to his wife, and the twain hit
upon an expedient for cheating the Devil. The woman stripped herself,
daubed her whole body with molasses, and rolled herself up in a
feather-bed, cut open for this purpose. Then she hopped and skipped
about the field where her husband stood parleying with Old Nick.
"there's a shot for you, fire away," said the Devil. "Of course I'll
fire, but do you first tell me what kind of a bird it is; else our
agreement is cancelled, Old Boy." There was no help for it; the
Devil had to own himself nonplussed, and off he fled, with a whiff of
brimstone which nearly suffocated the Freischutz and his good woman.
[120]

In the legend of Gambrinus, the fiend is still more ingloriously
defeated. Gambrinus was a fiddler, who, being jilted by his sweetheart,
went out into the woods to hang himself. As he was sitting on the bough,
with the cord about his neck, preparatory to taking the fatal plunge,
suddenly a tall man in a green coat appeared before him, and offered
his services. He might become as wealthy as he liked, and make his
sweetheart burst with vexation at her own folly, but in thirty years
he must give up his soul to Beelzebub. The bargain was struck, for
Gambrinus thought thirty years a long time to enjoy one's self in, and
perhaps the Devil might get him in any event; as well be hung for a
sheep as for a lamb. Aided by Satan, he invented chiming-bells and
lager-beer, for both of which achievements his name is held in grateful
remembrance by the Teuton. No sooner had the H