First to the devil the instrument!

After it to the devil the player!

MEPHISTOPHEles.

Aye, smash goes the guitar! there's no more to be said.

VALENTINE.

Aye, smash it goes, and now smash

MEPHISTOPHELES.

goes your head!

Now doctor, do just as I tell you! Out
At once cold steel!* stick to me, do not shrink.
Lunge you !-I parry.†

VALENTINE.

Parry that!

MEPHISTOPHELES.

And that!

VALENTINE.

No doubt.

* Flederwisch, a cant word for sword.

+ It is the custom in German duels for the seconds to parry, or, if fought with broadswords, to guard. Hence Valentine takes Mephistopheles' personal interference in the encounter as a matter of course.

T

MEPHISTOPHEeles.

Of course.

VALENTINE.

The devil fights, I think.

But what is this? my hand's already lame.

Give point!

MEPHISTOPHEles.

VALENTINE falls.

Oh, Christ!

MEPHISTOPHEles.

Now is the lubber tame!

But now, away! we must at once be gone,
The howl of murder swells the gathering cry ;
With mere police crime I can well get on,

But deal not half so well with felony.*

* Blutbann, criminal judicature extending to capital cases. This passage seems to refer to the limitation imposed upon Satan in the Book of Job with respect to life. Though Mephistopheles is mainly instrumental in procuring the death of Margaret's brother, child, mother, and herself, he takes none with his own hand.

MARTHA at the window.

Without! without!

MARGARET at the window.

Bring here a light!

MARTHA as above.

They scuffle and riot, they shout and fight.

THE PEOPLE.

Here's one dead!

MARTHA coming out.

Are the murderers gone?

MARGARET coming out.

Who lies there?

THE PEOPLE.

'Tis thy mother's son.

MARGARET.

Almighty God! what misery!

VALENTINE.

I die,-that's spoken easily;

More easily is done.

Why do ye, women, howl and shriek ?
Come here, and list to what I speak.

[They all gather round him.

My Margaret, young thou art, but thou
Art not discreet enough, and now

Behavest not aright;

In confidence I whisper thee,
That if thou wilt a harlot be,
Be it at once outright.

MARGARET.

Brother! Oh God! what dost thou say?

VALENTINE.

Leave our Lord God from out the play.
What's done is done, for all our woe,
And as things can go they will go.
First, on the sly, with one begin,
Then plenty more come trooping in ;
And when a dozen have lain with thee,
Common to the whole town thou❜lt be.

When shame is born, how secretly

The bantling in the world appears; The mantle of obscurity

Is wrapped about her head and ears.

Glad would they kill her; still she grows,
And higher still her head doth bear;
In open day unveiled then goes,

And yet is not a whit more fair.
The more disgust her charms excite,
The more she bares them to the light.

The time I see already, when
Each well-conditioned citizen,

As from a tainted corpse, will shrink
From thee, thou strumpet, in the street.
Oh, how thy conscious heart will sink,
The looks they cast on thee to meet.
No more to wear a golden chain,

Nor near the altar take thy place;
No more at balls, thy bosom vain
Shall flutter at thy collar's lace.
In some dark hole of misery,

With beggars and with cripples hide;
And even if God should pardon thee,
On earth thy curse shall still abide.

MARTHA.

Commend thy soul to heavenly grace; Not foul-mouthed, thus, thy Maker face.

VALENTINE.

Did strength to reach thee but remain,