LORELEI
"Ich weiss nicht, was soll bedeuten,
Dass ich so traurig bin;
Ein Märchen aus alten Zeiten,
Das kommt mir aus dem Sinn.
....
Die schonste Jungfrau sitzet
Dort oben wunderbar,
Ihr gold'nes Geschmeide blitzet,
Sie kämmt Ihr gold'nes Haar.
Sie kämmt es mit gold'nem Kamme,
Und singt ein Lied dabei;
Das bat eine wundersame,
Gewaltige Melodei."—Heine.
In every land, North and South, East and West, from sea to sea, myth and legend hand down to us as cruel and malignant creatures, who ceaselessly seek to slay man's body and to destroy his soul, the half-human children of the restless sea and of the fiercely running streams.
In Scotland and in Australia, in every part of Europe, we have tales of horrible formless things which frequent lonely rivers and lochs and marshes, and to meet which must mean Death. And equal in malignity with them, and infinitely more dangerous, are the beautiful beings who would seem to claim descent from Lilith, the soulless wife of Adam.
Such were the sirens who would have compassed the
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