10. On the mice
Lascivious wives, and also unmarried women who have thought nothing of prostitution, live in two places; some further forward in the western region and others further back. There live all those who know how to ingratiate themselves with men by the pretence of affection. By this means they acquire the lascivious love of some man, caring not at all whether their affections are good or bad. Those who live further forward were deceitful and sly, clever enough to spy out the nature, mind, inclination, and desire of the men they wished to entice; particularly clever at robbing a man of his wealth so that they might for a while live in luxury. They live there in caves; everything there smells foul, and where they live smells like places where there are mice. When seen by angels they even appear like large mice. I heard some people who were in their caves say that there was a smell of mice, and that these women's places were smelly and dirty, but that they knew how to make themselves beautiful by imagination, and to adorn their places with various fittings. But they could only do this for a few moments, for as soon as their imagination flags, the appearances cease and then everything is foul. It is also said that they delight in that foulness and dirt; the more the deeper they are. The reason for their delight is due to the correspondence with such a life. I saw these women many times, even when by imagination they made themselves appear beautiful; they then appeared magnificently dressed and lovely in face; but as soon as their imaginative thought was removed, which is effected by a good spirit or an angel, they look as ugly as devils, some black, some horribly flame-coloured, some like corpses. I also often saw what looked like large mice with long tails; that was the appearance of their lusts. The extraordinary thing is that there are some spirits of either sex who appear from their passions like cats. Those mice are afraid of them just as mice on earth are afraid of cats. Those who appear like cats are those who have paid no heed to religious matters, apart from merely hearing of them without retaining anything of them. I saw that there were in their caves wives of noble birth, in fact, of men who belonged to the loftiest nobility. But all there are set to work, and none of them can come out or be permitted to escape, because they surpass other spirits in slyness, and enter into men s affections secretly and allure their minds. They are particularly clever at this, so they are shut up so closely that eventually they dare not so much as poke a finger out.