Straight curses and
shrieks through the chamber resound,
Shrieks mingled with
laughter; the walls shake around;
The groaning roof threatens
to fall;
Loud bellows the thunder,
blue lightnings still flash;
The casements they clatter;
chains rattle; doors clash,
And flames spread their
waves through the hall.
The clamour increases,
the portals expand!
O’er the pavement’s
black marble now rushes a band
Of demons, all dropping
with gore,
In visage so grim, and
so monstrous in height,
That Carloman screams,
as they burst on his sight,
And sinks without sense
on the floor.
Not so his fell uncle:—he
sees that the throng
Impels, wildly shrieking,
a female along,
And well the sad spectre
he knows!
The demons with curses
her steps onwards urge;
Her shoulders, with
whips formed of serpents, they scourge,
And fast from her wounds
the blood flows.
“Oh! welcome!”
she cried, and her voice spoke despair;
“Oh! welcome,
Sir Osric, the torments to share,
Of which thou hast made
me the prey.
Twelve years have I
languished thy coming to see;
Ulrilda, who perished
dishonoured by thee
Now calls thee to anguish
away!
“Thy passion once
sated, thy love became hate;
Thy hand gave the draught
which consigned me to fate,
Nor thought I death
lurked in the bowl:
Unfit for the grave,
stained with lust, swelled with pride,
Unblessed, unabsolved,
unrepenting, I died,
And demons straight
seized on my soul.
“Thou com’st,
and with transport I feel my breast swell:
Full long have I suffered
the torments of hell,
And now shall its pleasures
be mine!
See, see, how the fiends
are athirst for thy blood!
Twelve years has my
panting heart furnished their food.
Come, wretch, let them
feast upon thine!”
She said, and the demons
their prey flocked around;
They dashed him, with
horrible yell, on the ground,
And blood down his limbs
trickled fast;
His eyes from their
sockets with fury they tore;
They fed on his entrails,
all reeking with gore,
And his heart was Ulrilda’s
repast.
But now the grey cock
told the coming of day!
The fiends with their
victim straight vanished away,
And Carloman’s
heart throbbed again;
With terror recalling
the deeds of the night,
He rose, and from Falkenstein
speeding his flight,
Soon reached his paternal
domain.
Since then, all with
horror the ruins behold;
No shepherd, though
strayed be a lamb from his fold,
No mother, though lost
be her child,
The fugitive dares in
these chambers to seek,
Where fiends nightly
revel, and guilty ghosts shriek
In accents most fearful
and wild!