The Girl. What does he want then at our ball?

Faust.

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 consider'd as a step.

There are few things that scandalize him not:
And when you whirl round in the circle now,
As he went round the wheel in his old mill,
He says that you go wrong in all respects,
Especially if you congratulate him

Upon the strength of the resemblance.

Brocto-Phant.

Fly!

Oh! he

Vanish! Unheard of impudence! What, still there
In this enlighten'd age too, since you have been
Proved not to exist! But this infernal brood
Will hear no reason and endure no rule.

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. Then leave off teasing us so.

Brocto-Phant. I tell you, spirits, to your faces now, That I should not regret this despotism

Of spirits, but that mine can wield it 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.

Meph. At last he will sit down in some foul puddle; That is his way of solacing himself;

Until some leech, diverted with his gravity,

Cures him of spirits and the spirit together.

[To FAUST, who has seceded from the dance.

Why do you let that fair girl pass from you,
Who sung so sweetly to you in the dance?

Faust. A red mouse in the middle of her singing
Sprung from her mouth.

Meph.

That was all right, my friend,

Be it enough that the mouse was not grey.

Do not disturb your hour of happiness
With close consideration of such trifles.

Faust. Then saw I

Meph..

Faust.

What?

Seest thou not a pale,

Fair girl, standing alone, far, far away?

She drags herself now forward with slow steps,
And seems as if she moved with shackled feet:
I cannot overcome the thought that she

Is like poor Margaret.

Meph.
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,
It freezes up the blood of man; and they

Who meet its ghastly stare are turn'd to stone,
Like those who saw Medusa.

Faust.

Oh, too true!

Her eyes are like the eyes of a fresh corpse

Which no beloved hand has closed, alas!

That is the heart which Margaret yielded to me—
Those are the lovely limbs which I enjoy'd !

Meph. 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 My looks from her sweet piteous countenance. How strangely does a single blood-red line, Not broader than the sharp edge of a knife, Adorn her lovely neck!

Meph.

Ay, she can carry

Her head under her arm upon occasion;
Perseus has cut it off for her. These pleasures
End in delusion.-Gain this rising ground,

It is as airy here as in a [

And if I am not mightily deceived,

I see a theatre-What may this mean?

Attendant. Quite a new piece, the last of seven, for 'tis The custom now to represent that number.

'Tis written by a Dilettante, and

The actors who perform are Dilettanti;
Excuse me, gentlemen; but I must vanish,
I am a Dilettante curtain-lifter.

FRAGMENTS.*

I.

SUMMER AND WINTER.

T was a bright and cheerful afternoon,
Towards the end of the sunny month of June,
When the north wind congregates in crowds
The floating mountains of the silver clouds
From the horizon-and the stainless sky
Opens beyond them like eternity.

All things rejoiced beneath the sun; the weeds,
The river, and the corn-fields, and the reeds ;
The willow leaves that glanced in the light breeze,
And the firm foliage of the larger trees.

It was a winter, such as when birds do die
In the deep forests; and the fishes lie
Stiffen'd in the translucent ice, which makes
Even the mud and slime of the warm lakes

*Printed in "The Keepsake," 1829.

A wrinkled clod, as hard as brick; and when,
Among their children, comfortable men
Gather about great fires, and yet feel cold,
Alas! then for the homeless beggar old!

II.

THE TOWER OF FAMINE.*

MID the desolation of a city,

Which was the cradle, and is now the grave Of an extinguish'd people; so that pity Weeps o'er the shipwrecks of oblivion's wave, There stands the Tower of Famine. It is built Upon some prison homes, whose dwellers rave

With bread, and gold, and blood: pain, link'd to guilt, Agitates the light flame of their hours,

Until its vital oil is spent or spilt:

There stands the pile, a tower amid the towers
And sacred domes; each marble-ribbed roof,
The brazen-gated temples, and the bowers
Of solitary wealth; the tempest-proof
Pavilions of the dark Italian air,

Are by its presence dimm’d—they stand aloof,

And are withdrawn--so that the world is bare,
As if a spectre wrapt in shapeless terror
Amid a company of ladies fair

Should glide and glow, till it became a mirror
Of all their beauty, and their hair and hue,
The life of their sweet eyes, with all its error,
Should be absorb'd, till they to marble grew.

* At Pisa there still exists the prison of Ugolino, which goes by the name of "La Torre della Fame:" in the adjoining building the galley slaves are confined. It is situated near the Ponte al Mare on the Arno.

O you not hear the Aziola cry?
Methinks she must be nigh,"

Said Mary, as we sate

In dusk, ere stars were lit, or candles brought;
And I, who thought

This Aziola was some tedious woman,
Ask'd, "Who is Aziola?" How elate

I felt to know that it was nothing human,
No mockery of myself to fear or hate:
And Mary saw my soul,

And laugh'd, and said, “Disquiet yourself not ; 'Tis nothing but a little downy owl."

Sad Aziola! many an eventide

Thy music I had heard

By wood and stream, meadow and mountain-side,

And fields and marshes wide,

Such as nor voice, nor lute, nor wind, nor bird, The soul ever stirr'd;

Unlike, and far sweeter than them all.

Sad Aziola! from that moment I

Loved thee and thy sad cry.