And the firm floor glows and rustles,
Merry sound the horns and fiddles;
Like a woof of strange enchantment,
All within the hall is whirling.
"Leave me, leave me, Don Ramiro!"
All is waving and revolving.
Don Ramiro still repeateth,
"At thy bidding I came hither."
"In the name of God, begone then!"
Clara shrieked, with steadfast accent.
And the word was scarcely spoken,
When Ramiro had evanished.
Clara stiffens! deathly pallid,
Numb with cold, with night encompassed.
In a swoon the lovely creature
To the shadowy realm is wafted.
But the misty slumber passes,
And at last she lifts her eyelids.
Then again from sheer amazement
Her fair eyes at once she closes.
For she sees she hath not risen,
Since the dance's first beginning.
Still she sits beside the bridegroom,
And he speaks with anxious question.
"Say, why waxed thy cheek so pallid?
Wherefore filled thine eyes with shadows?"
"And Ramiro?" stammers Clara,
And her tongue is glued with horror.
But with deep and serious furrows
Is the bridegroom's forehead wrinkled.
"Lady, ask not bloody tidings—
Don Ramiro died this morning."