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Let it work on! the grave will keep it down!
Ashes are feeble foes: it is more easy

To baffle such, than countermine a mole,

Which winds its blind but living path beneath you.

Yet hear me still!-If you condemn me, yet
Remember who hath taught me once too often
To listen to him! Who proclaim'd to me

That there were crimes made venial by the occasion?
That passion was our nature? that the goods
Of heaven waited on the goods of fortune?
Who show'd me his humanity secured
By his nerves only? Who deprived me of
All power to vindicate myself and race

In

open day? By his disgrace which stamp'd (It might be) bastardy on me, and on Himself a felon's brand! The man who is At once both warm and weak, invites to deeds He longs to do, but dare not. Is it strange That I should act what you could think? We have done With right or wrong, and now must only ponder Upon effects, not causes. Stralenheim, Whose life I saved, from impulse, as, unknown, I would have saved a peasant's or a dog's, I slew, Known as our foe-but not from vengeance. Was a rock in our way, which I cut through, As doth the bolt, because it stood between us And our true destination-but not idly. As stranger I preserved him, and he owed me His life; when due, I but resumed the debt. He, you, and I stood o'er a gulf, wherein I have plunged our enemy. You kindled first The torch-you show'd the path: now trace me that Of safety-or let me !

SIEGENDORF.

I have done with life!
ULRIC.

He

Let us have done with that which cankers life-
Familiar feuds and vain recriminations
Of things which cannot be undone. We have

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Am I awake? are these my father's halls?
And yon-my son? My son! mine who have ever
Abhorr'd both mystery and blood, and yet

Am plunged into the deepest hell of both!

I must be speedy, or more will be shed-
The Hungarian's!-Ulric-he hath partisans,
It seems. I might have guess'd as much. Oh fool'
Wolves prowl in company. He hath the key
(As I too) of the opposite door which leads
Into the turret. Now then! or once more
To be the father of fresh crimes-no less
Than of the criminal! Ho! Gabor! Gabor!

[Exit into the turret, closing the door after him.

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GABOR.

I know too wellAnd knew it ere yourself, unhappy sire! Fareweil

Where will you go? I would not serd you
Without protection.

forth

ULRIC.
Leave that unto me.
[Exit GABOR.
I am not alone; nor merely the vain heir
SIEGENDORF (solus and listening).
He hath clear'd the staircase. Ah! I hear Of your domains: a thousand, ay, ten thousand
Swords, hearts, and hands, are mine.
The door sound loud behind him! he is safe!
Safe!-Oh, my father's spirit!-I am faint-

[He leans down upon a stone seat, near the wall
of the tower, in a drooping posture.

Enter ULRIC, with others armed, and with weapons
drawn.

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SIEGENDORF.

The foresters! With whom the Hungarian found you first at Frank fort?

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Let us hear no more

Of this: he must be found. You have not let him
Escape?

SIEGENDORF.

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To a demon!

That you have given birth

IDA (taking ULRIC's hand).
Who shall dare say this of Ulric?

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The Deformed Transformed;

A DRAMA.

ADVERTISEMENT.

I love, or at the least, I loved you: nothing,
Save you, in nature, can love aught like me.
You nursed me-do not kill me.

BERTHA.

This production is founded partly on the story of a Novel, called "The Three Brothers," published many years ago, from which M. G. Lewis's "Wood Demon" was also taken and partly on the "Faust" of the great Goethe. The present publication contains the first two Parts only, and the opening chorus of the third. The That monstrous sport of nature. But get hence, rest may perhaps appear hereafter.

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Yes-I nursed thee
Because thou wert my first-born, and I knew not
If there would be another unlike thee,

And gather wood!

ARNOLD.

I will: but when I bring it,
Speak to me kindly, Though my brothers are
So beautiful and lusty, and as free

As the free chase they follow, do not spurn me:
Our milk has been the same.

BERTHA.

As is the hedgehog's
Which sucks at midnight from the wholesome dam
Of the young bull, until the milkinaid finds
The nipple next day sore and udder dry.
Call not thy brothers brethren! call me not
Mother; for if I brought thee forth, it was
As foolish hens at times hatch vipers, by
Sitting upon strange eggs. Out, urchin, out!
[Exit BERTHA,

ARNOLD (solus).

Oh mother!-She is gone, and I must do
Her bidding-wearily but willingly

I would fulfil it, could I only hope

A kind word in return. What shall I do?

[ARNOLD begins to cut wood: in doing this he
wounds one of his hands.

My labour for the day is over now.
Accursed be this blood that flows so fast;

For double curses will be my meed now

At home. What home? I have no home, no kin,
No kind-nor made like other creatures, or

To share their sports or pleasures. Must I bleed too,
Like them? Oh that each drop which falls to earth
Would rise a snake to sting them as they have stung me!
Or that the devil, to whom they liken me,
Would aid his likeness! If I must partake
His form, why not his power? Is it because
I have not his will too? For one kind word
From her who bore me, would still reconcile me
Even to this hateful aspect. Let me wash
The wound.

[ARNOLD goes to a spring, and soops to wash
his hand he starts back.

They are right; and Nature's mirror shows me
What she hath made me. I will not look on it
Again, and scarce dare think on 't. Hideous wreten
That I am! The very waters mock me with
My horrid shadow-like a demon placed
Deep in the fountain to scare back the cattle
From drinking therein.
[He pauses
And shall I live on,

A burthen to the earth, myself, and shame
Unto what brought me into life? Thou blood,
Which flowest so freely from a scratch, let me
Try if thou wilt not in a fuller stream
Pour forth my woes for ever with thyself
On earth, to which I will restore at once
This hateful compound of her atoms, and
Resolve back to her elements, and take
The shape of any reptile save myself,

And make a world for myriads of new worms!
This knife! now let me prove if it will sever
This wither'd slip of nature's nightshade-my
Vile form-from the creation, as it hath
The green bough from the forest.

STRANGER.

Unless you keep company

With him (and you seem scarce used to such high
Society), you can't tell how he approaches;
And for his aspect, look upon the fountain,
And then on me, and judge which of us twain
Looks likest what the boors believe to bc
Their cloven-footed terror.

ARNOLD.

Do you dare

To taunt me with my born deformity ?

STRANGER.

Were I to taunt a buffalo with this
Cloven foot of thine, or the switt dromedary

[ARNOLD places the knife in the ground, with With thy sublime of humps, the unimals

the point upwards.

Now 't is set,

me,

And I can fall upon it. Yet one glance
On the fair day, which sees no foul thing like
Myself, and the sweet sun, which warm'd
In vain. The birds-how joyously they sing!
So let them, for I would not be lamented:
But let their merriest notes be Arnold's knell ;
The falling leaves my monument; the murmur
Of the near fountain my sole elegy.
Now, knife, stand firmly, as I fain would fall!

but

[As he rushes to throw himself upon the knife, his eye is suddenly caught by the fountain,

which seems in motion.

The fountain moves without a wind: but shall
The ripple of a spring change my resolve?
No. Yet it moves again! the waters stir,
Not as with air, but by some subterrane
And rocking power of the internal world.
What's here? A mist! no more?—

[A cloud comes from the fountain. He stands
gazing upon it; it is dispelled, and a tall
black man comes towards him.

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Would revel in the compliment. And yet

Both beings are more swift, more strong, more mighty
In action and endurance than thyself,

And all the fierce and fair of the same kind
With thee. Thy form is natural: 't was only
Nature's mistaken largess to bestow

The gifts which are of others upon man.

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STRANGER.

Not I. Why should I mock What all are mocking? That's poor sport, methinks. To talk to thee in human language (for

Thou canst not yet speak mine), the forester
Hunts not the wretched coney, but the boar,
Or wolf, or lion, leaving paltry game

To petty burghers, who leave once a-year
Their walls, to fill their household caldrons with
Such scullion prey. The meanest gibe at thee,-
Now I can mock the mightiest.

ARNOLD.

Then waste not

Thy time on me: I seek thee not.

Are not far from me.

STRANGER.

Your thoughts Do not send me back:

I am not so easily recall'd to do Good service.

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Shapes with you, if you will, since yours so irks you; Or form you to your wish in any shape.

ARNOLD.

Oh! then you are indeed the demon, for Nought else would wittingly wear mine.

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STRANGER.

1 This is a well-known German superstition-a gigantic Such was the curled son of Clinias;-wouldst thou

ha low produced by reflection on the Brocken.

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