The owls fly out in strange The owl was awake in the white moon-
affright;
shine;

The columns of the evergreen palaces
Are split and shattered;

I saw her at rest in her downy nest, And she stared at me with her broad, bright eyne.

The roots creak, and stretch, and groan;

And ruinously overthrown,

The trunks are crushed and shattered By the fierce blast's unconquerable

stress.

Over each other crack and crash they all
In terrible and intertangled fall;
And through the ruins of the shaken
mountain

The airs hiss and howl

It is not the voice of the fountain,
Nor the wolf in his midnight prowl.

Dost thou not hear?

Strange accents are ringing
Aloft, afar, anear?

Chorus.

Honour her, to whom honour is due,
Old mother Baubo, honour to you!
An able sow, with old Baubo upon her,
Is worthy of glory, and worthy of honour!
The legion of witches is coming behind,
Darkening the night, and outspeeding
the wind-

A Voice. Which way comest thou?

A Voice.

The witches are singing!
The torrent of a raging wizard song
Streams the whole mountain along.
Chorus of Witches.

The stubble is yellow, the corn is green,

Now to the Brocken the witches go; The mighty multitude here may be seen

Gathering, wizard and witch, below. Sir Urian is sitting aloft in the air;

Hey over stock! and hey over stone ! 'Twixt witches and incubi, what shall be done?

Tell it who dare! tell it who dare!

A Voice.

Voices above. Upon a sow-swine, whose farrows were Come with us, come with us, from nine,

Felsensee.

Old Baubo rideth alone.

Voices.

And you may now as well take your
course on to Hell,

Since you ride by so fast on the head-
long blast.
A Voice.
She dropt poison upon me as I past.
Here are the wounds-

Over Ilsenstein;

Chorus of Witches.

Come away! come along!
The way is wide, the way is long,
But what is that for a Bedlam throng?
Stick with the prong, and scratch with
the broom.

The child in the cradle lies strangled at
home,

And the mother is clapping her hands.-
Semichorus of Wizards I.

We glide in Like snails when the women are all away;

And from a house once given over to

sin

Woman has a thousand steps to stray.
Semichorus II.

A thousand steps must a woman take,
Where a man but a single spring will
make.

Voices below.

With what joy would we fly through the upper sky!

We are washed, we are 'nointed, stark

naked are we ;

But our toil and our pain are for ever in vain.

Both Choruses.

The wind is still, the stars are fled,
The melancholy moon is dead;
The magic notes, like spark on spark,
Drizzle, whistling through the dark.
Come away!

Voices below.
Stay, oh stay!

Voices above.

Out of the crannies of the rocks,
Who calls?

Voices below.

Oh, let me join your flocks!
I, three hundred years have striven
To catch your skirt and mount to
Heaven,-

And still in vain. Oh, might I be
With company akin to me!
Both Choruses.

There is a true witch element about
us;

Take hold on me, or we shall be
Where are you?

divided:-
----

Faust (from a distance).
Mephistopheles.

What!

I must exert my authority in the

house.

Place for young Voland! pray make way, good people.

Take hold on me, doctor, and with one step

Some on a ram and some on a prong, On poles and on broomsticks we flutter along;

Forlorn is the wight who can rise not to-night.

A Half-Witch below.

I have been tripping this many an Something attracts me in those bushes.

hour:

Then every trough will be boat enough;
With a rag for a sail we can sweep
through the sky,
Who flies not to-night, when means he
to fly?

Here!

Both Choruses. We cling to the skirt, and we strike on the ground;

Let us escape from this unpleasant crowd:

They are too mad for people of my

sort.

Just there shines a peculiar kind of light

Are the others already so far before?
No quiet at home, and no peace abroad!
And less methinks is found by the road.
Chorus of Witches.
Come onward, away! aroint thee, 'Twere a wise feat indeed to wander

out

Witch - legions thicken around and
around;

Wizard-swarms cover the heath all over.
[They descend.
Mephistopheles.
What thronging, dashing, raging, rust-
ling;

What whispering, babbling, hissing,
bustling;

What glimmering, spurting, stinking,
burning,
As Heaven and Earth were overturning.

Come

This way we shall slip down there in a minute.

aroint!

A witch to be strong must anoint Into the Brocken upon May-day night, And then to isolate oneself in scorn, Disgusted with the humours of the time.

anoint

Mephistopheles.

Faust. Spirit of Contradiction! Well, lead on

See yonder, round a many-coloured flame

A merry club is huddled altogether:
Even with such little people as sit

there

One would not be alone.
Faust.
Would that I were
Up yonder in the glow and whirling
smoke,

Where the blind million rush impetu-
ously
To meet the evil ones; there might I
solve

Yet

Many a riddle that torments me!
Mephistopheles.
Many a riddle there is tied anew
Inextricably. Let the great world
rage!

We will stay here safe in the quiet dwell- I could not, if I would, mask myself ings.

here.

'Tis an old custom.
built
Their own small world in the great world
of all.

I see young witches naked there, and old ones

Men have ever Come now, we'll go about from fire to fire:

Wisely attired with greater decency.
Be guided now by me, and you shall
buy

Get used

I hear them tune their instruments-one

must

to this damned scraping. Come, I'll lead you Among them; and what there you do and see,

As a fresh compact 'twixt us two shall

be.

You ought to be with the young rioters

A pound of pleasure with a dram of Right in the thickest of the revelry— But every one is best content at home.

trouble.

General.

Who dare confide in right or a just claim?

So much as I had done for them! and

now

With women and the people 'tis the

same,

Youth will stand foremost ever,—age may go

To the dark grave unhonoured.

How say you now? this space is wide enough

--

Look forth, you cannot see the end of
it-
An hundred bonfires burn in rows, and

I'll be the pimp, and you shall be the lover.

[To some old Women, who are sitting round a heap of glimmering coals. Old gentlewomen, what do you do out here?

do you

Minister.

Nowadays People assert their rights: they go too far;

But as for me, the good old times I

praise;

they

Who throng around them seem innumerable:

Dancing and drinking, jabbering, making love,

And cooking, are at work. Now tell me, friend,

What is there better in the world than this?

Faust. In introducing us,

assume

The character of wizard or of devil?

Mephistopheles. In truth, I generally
go about

In strict incognito; and yet one likes
To wear one's orders upon gala days.

Will seize, whilst all things are whirled
round and round,

I have no ribbon at my knee; but A spoke of Fortune's wheel, and keep

here

our ground.

Then we were all in all, 'twas something worth

One's while to be in place and wear

a star;

That was indeed the golden age on earth.

Parvenu.
We too are active, and we did and do
What we ought not, perhaps; and yet

we now

At home, the cloven foot is honourable.
See you that snail there?-she comes

Who
creeping up,
And with her feeling eyes hath smelt | And
out something.

Author. now can taste a treatise of deep

sense

ponderous volume? 'tis impertin

ence

To write what none will read, therefore will I

Lilith, the first

To please the young and thoughtless people try.

Mephistopheles (who at once appears to have grown very old). I find the people ripe for the last day, Since I last came up to the wizard She will not ever set him free again. mountain; Faust.

Beware of her fair hair, for she excels
All women in the magic of her locks;
And when she winds them round a
young man's neck,

There sit a girl and an old woman-
they

And as my little cask runs turbid now,
So is the world drained to the dregs.
Pedlar-witch.
Look here,
Gentlemen; do not hurry on so fast
And lose the chance of a good penny-
worth.

Seem to be tired with pleasure and
with play.

I have a pack full of the choicest wares
Of every sort, and yet in all my bundle
Is nothing like what may be found on
earth;

Nothing that in a moment will make
rich

Men and the world with fine malicious mischief

There is no dagger drunk with blood; no bowl

From which consuming poison may be

drained

By innocent and healthy lips; no jewel, The price of an abandoned maiden's shame;

loose,

Or stabs the wearer's enemy in the back;
No-

The torrent of the crowd sweeps over us :
You think to impel, and are yourself
impelled.

Faust. Who is that yonder?
Mephistopheles.

It is

Lilith.

Faust.

Who?

Mark her well.

Mephistopheles.
wife of Adam.

No sword which cuts the bond it cannot With you I feel that if required, Such still within my garden grow.

Mephistopheles.

There is no rest to-night for any one:
When one dance ends another is begun;
Come, let us to it. We shall have rare

fun.

[FAUST dances and sings with a girl, and MEPHISTOPHELES with an old Woman.

What is this cursed multitude about?

Mephistopheles.

Have we not long since proved to

Gossip, you know little of these times. What has been, has been; what is done, is past,

demonstration

That ghosts move not on ordinary feet? They shape themselves into the innova- But these are dancing just like men and tions

women.

They breed, and innovation drags us with it.

Faust.

I had once a lovely dream
In which I saw an apple tree,
Where two fair apples with their gleam

To climb and taste attracted me.
The Girl.

She with apples you desired
From Paradise came long ago:

Procto-Phantasmist.

The Girl. What does he want then
at our ball?
Faust.
Oh! he
Is far above us all in his conceit:
Whilst we enjoy, he reasons of enjoyment;
And any step which in our dance we
tread,

If it be left out of his reckoning,
Is not to be considered as a step.

There are few things that scandalise Who sang so sweetly to you in the

him not:

dance?

And when you whirl round in the circle now,

As he went round the wheel in his old Sprang from her mouth. mill,

That was all

Mephistopheles.
right, my friend:

Be it enough that the mouse was not

He says that you go wrong in all
respects,

Especially if you congratulate him
Upon the strength of the resemblance.
Procto-Phantasmist.
Fly!
Vanish! Unheard-of impudence! What,
still there!

In this enlightened age too, since you
have been

Mephistopheles. What? Faust. Seest thou not a pale, Fair girl, standing alone, far, far away? Proved not to exist!-But this infernal She drags herself now forward with slow

brood

steps,

Will hear no reason and endure no rule. And seems as if she moved with shackled feet:

Are we so wise, and is the pond still haunted?

How long have I been sweeping out this rubbish

Of superstition, and the world will not
Come clean with all my pains!—it is a

case

Unheard of!
The Girl.

teasing us so. Procto-Phantasmist. I tell you, spirits,

to your faces now, That I should not regret this despotism Of spirits, but that mine can wield it

Faust. A red mouse in the middle of her singing

Then leave off It freezes up the blood of man; and they Who meet its ghastly stare are turned to stone,

Like those who saw Medusa.

not.

To-night I shall make poor work of it, Yet I will take a round with you, and hope

Before my last step in the living dance
To beat the poet and the devil together.
Mephistopheles. At last he will sit
down in some foul puddle;
That is his way of solacing himself;
Until some leech, diverted with his

gray.

Do not disturb your hour of happiness
With close consideration of such trifles.
Faust. Then saw I-

I cannot overcome the thought that she
Is like poor Margaret.
Mephistopheles.

Let it be

pass on

No good can come of it—it is not well
To meet it-it is an enchanted phantom,
A lifeless idol; with its numbing look,

Faust.
Oh, too true!
Her eyes are like the eyes of a fresh

corpse Which no beloved hand has closed, alas! That is the breast which Margaret yielded to me

Those are the lovely limbs which I enjoyed!

Mephistopheles. It is all magic, poor

deluded fool!

She looks to every one like his first love.
Faust. Oh, what delight! what woe!
I cannot turn

gravity,

Cures him of spirits and the spirit to- My looks from her sweet piteous coun

gether.

tenance.

[To FAUST, who has seceded from How strangely does a single blood-red the dance.

line,

Why do you let that fair girl pass from Not broader than the sharp edge of a knife,

you,