about face till his wife and children crept behind the bed for fear. But he was a good man and would not hurt a fly, and the next day "la grande nation" would be safe in the cupboard, and he mending away at his watches and eating Mecklenburg dumplings dipped in the fat of Mecklenburg bacon.

Well, while the watchmaker was buttoning on his leggings and putting on his bearskin, Miller Voss sat drinking with the Frenchman, both working well at the Amtshauptmann's red wine, and the Frenchman clinked glasses with the Miller and said: "À vous!" and the Miller then took his glass, drank, and said: "Pooh, pooh!" and then the Miller clinked glasses with the Frenchman, and the Frenchman thanked him and said : Serviteur," and then the Miller drank again and said: “Rasc'lly cur!" And in this way they went on drinking and talking French together.

66

Gradually they became more and more friendly, and the Frenchman put his sword in its sheath, and before very long they were in each other's arms. At this moment a cough was heard under the corner window, and my father stole out and gave the watchmaker directions what he was to do. But the Herr Amtshauptmann kept walking up and down, wondering what the Duke would say to all this if he were to see it, and said to the Miller: "Miller, don't give in, I will not forget you." And the Miller did not give in, but drank sturdily on.

Meanwhile the watchmaker went stealthily back again through the Schloss garden, and when he came on to the road leading up to the Schloss, he slapped himself on the breast and drew himself up to his full height, for he was now "grande nation" again, and he marched in at the Schloss gate in military style, which suited him well, for he was a fine-looking fellow. The six Chasseurs, who were standing by their horses, looked at him and whispered together, and one of them went after him and demanded whence he came and whither he was going. But Droz looked scornfully over his shoulder at him and answered him sharply and shortly in French that he was the quartermaster of the seventy-third Regiment, and that it would be up from Malchin in half an hour, and he must first of all speak to "Monsieur le Baillif." The Chasseur turned pale, and as Droz began to talk about marauders and related how his Captain had had a couple shot the day before, first one and then another jumped on to his horse, and although a few did chatter together for a moment or two and pointed to the

Schloss, yet none of them felt inclined to stay any longer, and almost before you could lift your finger, the courtyard was empty. And we boys stood at the Brandenburg gate and watched the six French Chasseurs as they floundered about in the mud, for it was just the season for the Mecklenburg roads, being the spring and the thaw having just set in.

WALPURGIS NIGHT.

BY GOETHE.

(From "Faust.")

[JOHANN WOLFGANG Goethe was born August 28, 1749; went to Leipsic University in 1759; shortly after began to write dramas and songs; in 1771 took a doctor's degree at Strasburg and became an advocate at Frankfort; wrote "Götz von Berlichingen" in 1771, as also "The Wanderer" and "The Wanderer's Storm Song"; settled in Wetzlar for law practice in 1772, but had to fly on account of a love intrigue; in 1773 wrote "Prometheus," some farce satires, the comedy "Erwin and Elmira," and began "Faust"; "The Sorrows of Young Werther" and "Clavigo" in 1774; in 1775 settled in Weimar, became a privy councilor to the duke, and a most useful public official; studied and made valuable discoveries in natural science; began "Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship" in 1777; wrote "Iphigenia" in prose 1779, in verse 1786; completed "Egmont" in 1787, and "Tasso" in 1789; was director of the court theater at Weimar, 1791; 1794-1805 was associated with Schiller, and they conducted the literary review Horen together; he finished "Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship" in 1796, "Hermann and Dorothea," 1797, "Elective Affinities," 1809, "Doctrine of Color," 1810, and his autobiography, "Fancy and Truth," 1811. In 1815 he issued the "Divan of East and West," a volume of poems; in 1821 "Wilhelm Meister's Wanderjähre," a mélange of various pieces put together by his secretary. In 1831 he finished the second part of "Faust." He died March 22, 1832.]

Scene: The Hartz Mountains, a desolate country.

Mephistopheles

Would you not like a broomstick? As for me,
I wish I had a good stout ram to ride;

For we are still far from the appointed place.

Faust

This knotted staff is help enough for me,
Whilst I feel fresh upon my legs. What good
Is there in making short a pleasant way?
To creep along the labyrinths of the vales,
And climb those rocks, where ever-babbling springs

Precipitate themselves in waterfalls,
Is the true sport that seasons such a path.
Already Spring kindles the birchen spray,
And the hoar pines already feel her breath:
Shall she not work also within our limbs ?
Mephistopheles-

Nothing of such an influence do I feel:
My body is all wintry, and I wish

The flowers upon our path were frost and snow:
But see! how melancholy rises now,

Dimly uplifting her belated beam,

The blank unwelcome round of the red moon;

And gives so bad a light, that every step

One stumbles 'gainst some crag. With your permission,
I'll call an Ignis Fatuus to our aid;

I see one yonder burning jollily.

?

Halloo, my friend! may I request that you
Would favor us with your bright company
Why should you blaze away there to no purpose?
Pray be so good as light us up this way!

Ignis Fatuus

With reverence be it spoken, I will try
To overcome the lightness of my nature:
Our course, you know, is generally zigzag.
Mephistopheles-

Ha ha! your worship thinks you have to deal
With men.
Go straight on, in the Devil's name,
Or I shall puff your flickering life out!

Ignis Fatuus

I see you are the master of the house;

I will accommodate myself to you.

Well!

Only consider that to-night this mountain

Is all enchanted, and if Jack-o'-lantern

Shows you his way, though you should miss your own,
You ought not to be too exact with him.

*

Mephistopheles

Now vigorously seize my skirt, and gain
This pinnacle of isolated crag!

One may observe with wonder from this point,
How Mammon glows among the mountains.

Faust

And strangely through the solid depth below
A melancholy light, like the red dawn,
Shoots from the lowest gorge of the abyss

Ay!

Of mountains, lightening hitherward; there rise
Pillars of smoke, here clouds float gently by;
Here the light burns soft as the enkindled air,
Or the illumined dust of golden flowers;
And now it glides like tender colors spreading;
And now bursts forth in fountains from the earth;
And now it winds, one torrent of broad light,
Through the far valley with a hundred veins;
And now once more within that narrow corner
Masses itself into intensest splendor.

And near us, see! sparks spring out of the ground,
Like golden sand scattered upon the darkness;
The pinnacles of that black wall of mountains
That hems us in, are kindled.

Mephistopheles

Faust

Rare, in faith!
Does not Sir Mammon gloriously illuminate
His palace for this festival? it is

A pleasure which you had not known before.
I spy the boisterous guests already.

The children of the wind rage in the air!

With what fierce strokes they fall upon my neck! Mephistopheles

Cling tightly to the old ribs of the crag!
Beware! for if with them thou warrest

In their fierce flight toward the wilderness,

Their breath will sweep thee into dust, and drag
Thy body to a grave in the abyss.

A cloud thickens the night.

Hark! how the tempest crashes through the forest!
The owls fly out in strange affright;

The columns of the evergreen palaces
Are split and shattered;

The roots creak, and stretch, and groan;
And ruinously overthrown,

The trunks are crushed and scattered
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

Mephistopheles

Aloft, afar, anear;

The witches are singing!

The torrent of a raging wizard song
Streams the whole mountain along.

They descend.

What thronging, dashing, raging, rustling:
What whispering, babbling, hissing, bustling;
What glimmering, spurting, stinking, burning,
As Heaven and Earth were overturning.
There is a true witch element about us!
Take hold on me, or we shall be divided:-
Where are you?

Faust [from a distance] -- Here!

Mephistopheles

Faust

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

Let us escape from this unpleasant crowd!
They are too mad for people of my sort.
Just there shines a peculiar kind of light-
Something attracts me in those bushes. Come
This way we shall slip down there in a minute.

Spirit of Contradiction! Well, lead on!
'Twere a wise feat indeed to wander out
Into the Brocken upon May-day night,
And then to isolate oneself in scorn,
Disgusted with the humors of the time.
Mephistopheles-

See yonder, round a many-colored 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 impetuously
To meet the Evil Ones; there might I solve
Many a riddle that torments me!

Mephistopheles

Many a riddle there is tied anew

Yet

Inextricably. Let the great world rage!

We will stay here safe in the quiet dwellings.