Realist.  To me, of all life’s woes and plagues,
Substance is most provoking,
For the first time I feel my legs
Beneath me almost rocking.

Supernaturalist.  I’m overjoyed at being here,
And even among these rude ones;
For if bad spirits are, ’tis clear,
There also must be good ones.

Skeptic.  Where’er they spy the flame they roam,
And think rich stores to rifle,
Here such as I are quite at home,
For Zweifel rhymes with Teufel.[45]

Leader of the music.  Grass-hid cricket, frogs in trees,
You cursed dilettanti! 
Fly-snouts and gnats’-noses, peace! 
Musicians you, right jaunty!

The Clever ones.  Sans-souci we call this band
Of merry ones that skip it;
Unable on our feet to stand,
Upon our heads we trip it.

The Bunglers.  Time was, we caught our tit-bits, too,
God help us now! that’s done with! 
We’ve danced our leathers entirely through,
And have only bare soles to run with.

Jack-o’lanterns.  From the dirty bog we come,
Whence we’ve just arisen: 
Soon in the dance here, quite at home,
As gay young sparks we’ll glisten.

Shooting star.  Trailing from the sky I shot,
Not a star there missed me: 
Crooked up in this grassy spot,
Who to my legs will assist me?

The solid men.  Room there! room there! clear the ground! 
Grass-blades well may fall so;
Spirits are we, but ’tis found
They have plump limbs also.

Puck.  Heavy men! do not, I say,
Like elephants’ calves go stumping: 
Let the plumpest one to-day
Be Puck, the ever-jumping.

Ariel.  If the spirit gave, indeed,
If nature gave you, pinions,
Follow up my airy lead
To the rose-dominions!

Orchestra [pianissimo].  Gauzy mist and fleecy cloud
Sun and wind have banished. 
Foliage rustles, reeds pipe loud,
All the show has vanished.

     DREARY DAY.[46]

     Field.

     FAUST. MEPHISTOPHELES.

Faust.  In wretchedness!  In despair!  Long hunted up and down the earth, a miserable fugitive, and caught at last!  Locked up as a malefactor in prison, to converse with horrible torments—­the sweet, unhappy creature!  Even to this pass! even to this!—­Treacherous, worthless spirit, and this thou hast hidden from me!—­Stand up here—­stand up!  Roll thy devilish eyes round grimly in thy head!  Stand and defy me with thy intolerable presence!  Imprisoned!  In irretrievable misery!  Given over to evil spirits and to the judgment of unfeeling humanity, and me meanwhile thou lullest in insipid dissipations, concealest from me her growing anguish, and leavest her without help to perish!

Mephistopheles.  She is not the first!