At last, he said,
the engine seemed to melt away from his finger, and he received a
sudden thwack upon his shoulders, as if discharged by the arm of
a giant, which overthrew him in an instant upon the floor.
The priest, hearing this strange account, pulled out of one of his
pouches a piece of consecrated candle, which he lighted immediately,
and muttered certain mysterious conjurations. Jolter, imagining
that Pallet was drunk, shook his head, saying, he believed the
spirit was nowhere but in his own brain. The physician for once
condescended to be a wag, and, looking towards one of the beds,
observed, that, in his opinion, the painter had been misled by
the flesh, and not by the spirit. The fair Fleming lay in silent
astonishment and affright; and her fellow in order to acquit herself
of all suspicion, exclaimed with incredible volubility against
the author of this uproar, who, she did not doubt, had concealed
himself in the apartment with a view of perpetuating some wicked
attempt upon her precious virtue, and was punished and prevented
by the immediate interposition of heaven.
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