“In reckoning up the several devils’ names
    That were his lackeys”?

Of the twenty devils mentioned by Shakspere, four only belong to the class of greater devils.  Hecate, the principal patroness of witchcraft, is referred to frequently, and appears once upon the scene.[1] The two others are Amaimon and Barbazon, both of whom are mentioned twice.  Amaimon was a very important personage, being no other than one of the four kings.  Ziminar was King of the North, and is referred to in “Henry VI.  Part I.;"[2] Gorson of the South; Goap of the West; and Amaimon of the East.  He is mentioned in “Henry IV.  Part I.,"[3] and “Merry Wives."[4] Barbazon also occurs in the same passage in the latter play, and again in “Henry V."[5]—­a fact that does to a slight extent help to bear out the otherwise ascertained chronological sequence of these plays.  The remainder of the devils belong to the second class.  Nine of these occur in “King Lear,” and will be referred to again when the subject of possession is touched upon.[6]

[Footnote 1:  It is perhaps worthy of remark that in every case except the allusion in the probably spurious Henry VI., “I speak not to that railing Hecate,” (I Hen.  VI.  III. ii. 64), the name is “Hecat,” a di-syllable.]

[Footnote 2:  V. iii. 6.]

[Footnote 3:  II. iv. 370.]

[Footnote 4:  II. ii. 311.]

[Footnote 5:  II. i. 57.  Scot, p. 393.]

[Footnote 6:  sec. 65.]

39. (ii.) It would appear that each of the greater devils, on the rare occasion upon which he made his appearance upon earth, assumed a form peculiar to himself; the lesser devils, on the other hand, had an ordinary type, common to the whole species, with a capacity for almost infinite variation and transmutation which they used, as will be seen, to the extreme perplexity and annoyance of mortals.  As an illustration of the form in which a greater devil might appear, this is what Scot says of the questionable Balam, above mentioned:  “Balam cometh with three heads, the first of a bull, the second of a man, and the third of a ram.  He hath a serpent’s taile, and flaming eies; riding upon a furious beare, and carrieng a hawke on his fist."[1] But it was the lesser devils, not the greater, that came into close contact with humanity, who therefore demand careful consideration.

[Footnote 1:  p. 361.]

40.  All the lesser devils seem to have possessed a normal form, which was as hideous and distorted as fancy could render it.  To the conception of an angel imagination has given the only beautiful appendage the human body does not possess—­wings; to that of a devil it has added all those organs of the brute creation that are most hideous or most harmful.  Advancing civilization has almost exterminated the belief in a being with horns, cloven hoofs, goggle eyes, and scaly tail, that was held up to many yet living as the avenger of childish disobedience in their