“Avaunt, thou devil’s brood!” cried the student Anselmus, full of fury; “it was thou alone and thy hellish arts that brought me to the sin which I must now expiate.  But I bear it all patiently; for only here can I be, where the kind Serpentina encircles me with love and consolation.  Hear it, thou beldam, and despair!  I bid defiance to thy power; I love Serpentina, and none but her forever; I will not be Hofrat, will not look at Veronica, who by thy means entices me to evil.  Can the green Snake not be mine, I will die in sorrow and longing.  Take thyself away, thou vile rook!  Take thyself away!”

The crone laughed till the chamber rung:  “Sit and die then,” cried she, “but now it is time to set to work; for I have other trade to follow here.”  She threw off her black cloak, and so stood in hideous nakedness; then she ran round in circles, and large folios came tumbling down to her; out of these she tore parchment leaves, and, rapidly patching them together in artful combination and fixing them on her body, in a few instants she was dressed as if in strange party-colored scale harness.  Spitting fire, the black Cat darted out of the ink-glass, which was standing on the table, and ran mewing toward the crone, who shrieked in loud triumph and along with him vanished through the door.

Anselmus observed that she went toward the azure chamber, and directly he heard a hissing and storming in the distance; the birds in the garden were crying; the Parrot creaked out:  “Help! help!  Thieves! thieves!” That moment the crone returned with a bound into the room, carrying the Golden Pot on her arm, and, with hideous gestures, shrieking wildly through the air; “Joy! joy, little son!—­Kill the green Snake!  To her, son!  To her!”

Anselmus thought he heard a deep moaning, heard Serpentina’s voice.  Then horror and despair took hold of him; he gathered all his force, he dashed violently, as if nerve and artery were bursting, against the crystal; a piercing clang went through the room, and the Archivarius in his bright damask nightgown was standing in the door.

“Hey, hey! vermin!—­Mad spell!—­Witchwork!—­Hither, holla!” So shouted he; then the black hair of the crone started up like bristles; her red eyes glanced with infernal fire, and clenching together the peaked fangs of her ample jaws, she hissed:  “Hiss, at him!  Hiss, at him!  Hiss!” and laughed and haw-hawed in scorn and mockery, and pressed the Golden Pot firmly toward her, and threw out of it handfuls of glittering earth on the Archivarius; but as it touched the nightgown the earth changed into flowers, which rained down on the ground.  Then the lilies of the nightgown flickered and flamed up; and the Archivarius caught these lilies blazing in sparky fire and dashed them on the witch; she howled for agony, but still as she leapt aloft and shook her harness of parchment the lilies went out and fell away into ashes.