At
last the family became so accustomed to the Devil, "that they were no
more afraid to keep up the Clash" (chatter) "with the Foul Fiend than to
speak to each other." They were like the Wesleys, who were so familiar
with the fiend Jeffrey, that haunted their home.
The Minister, with a few of the gentry, heard of their unholy friendship,
and paid Campbell a visit. "At their first coming in the Devil says:
'_Quum Literarum_ is good Latin.'" These are the first words of the
Latin rudiments which scholars are taught when they go to the Grammar
School. Then they all prayed, and a Voice came from under the bed:
"Would you know the Witches of Glenluce?" The Voice named a few,
including one long dead. But the Minister, with rare good sense,
remarked that what Satan said was not evidence.
Let it be remarked that "the lad Tom" had that very day "come back with
the Minister." The Fiend then offered terms. "Give me a spade and
shovel, and depart from the house for seven days, and I will make a
grave, and lie down in it, and trouble you no more." Hereon Campbell,
with Scottish caution, declined to give the Devil the value of a straw.
The visitors then hunted after the voice, observing that some of the
children were in bed. They found nothing, and then, as the novelists
say, "a strange thing happened."
There appeared a naked hand and an arm, from the elbow down, beating upon
the floor till the house did shake again.
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