That I, and I alone, of maidens was adored.
And that my killing glance into his soul had bored.
Oh, faithless! Didst not vow without me thou couldst not
A single moment live? Some demon must have got
His clutches on thee, sure; for the eight days are past
Which thou didst swear to me thine absence would but last.
| · | · | · | · | · |
Thou ne'er shall married be, if not upon this day!
I can’t—I won't hear this—dark spirit, hence—away!
Enter Mettè.What new misfortune now betokens yonder screech?
Speak! Oh, my beating heart!
Gretè.Let not my words impeach
Him I still love! Listen, and tremble, friend! While I
Sat here and slept, a dark and horrid face drew nigh—
A demon’s, without doubt—black locks waved o’er its nose,
And breaking suddenly upon my calm repose,
It roared into my ear—oh, words fraught with dismay!—
Thou ne'er shall married be, if not upon this day!
Mettè. But dreams may sometimes err, and tell a lying tale.
Gretè, Dreams that give dreadful warning ne’er are known to fail.
Mettè. Yet, even granting that, a dream to be all right
Must take place in one’s bed, and midst the hours of night;
But in the day—and only on a chair—
Gretè. In vain
Wouldst thou my spirits flatter into peace again.
Notwithstanding this doleful assertion, the dreamer closes with her friend’s proposal to fetch Mr. Mads, the tailor’s hitherto unlucky rival, and put him up to marrying her at once, so as to avert the fate denounced by the dark vision. She agrees, in these words:
Do what thou thinkest best—to thee I leave it all;
Alack! my soul is wrapt in a funereal pall!
Mads makes his appearance forthwith, and harangues for some time on his late despair, and how he had entertained the idea of stabbing himself, and had got a knife all ready; but, upon second thoughts, had put off the catastrophe. She at length interrupts him, and brings him to the point, without much circumlocution, by telling him:
There is no time to lose; if I'm to wed with thee.
It must be—now or never.
Of course he accepts, in a short rhapsody, and then tells her,
I'll gallop off in haste, to put on better clothes—
But I shall soon be back to take the bridegroom’s oaths.
While the obliging swain has gone to make his wedding-toilet, and Gretè has been indulging in a short soliloquy, the missing tailor, Johan, arrives, is well received notwithstanding her recent arrangement with Mads, and delights her by the assurance that
Moments are like days, and hours like years of life.
Until the happy time when I may call thee wife.
She has now two strings to her bow; the threats of her supernatural visitant will, indeed, be as null and void as any other "baseless fabric of a dream," so she forthwith invites her admirer to the altar on that very
