Margaret [with a lamp]. It seems so close, so sultry here.
[She opens the window.]
Yet it isn't so very warm out there,
I feel—I know not how—oh dear!
I wish my mother 'ld come home, I declare!
I feel a shudder all over me crawl—
I'm a silly, timid thing, that's all!
[She begins to sing, while undressing.]
There was a king in Thulè,
To whom, when near her grave,
The mistress he loved so truly
A golden goblet gave.
He cherished it as a lover,
He drained it, every bout;
His eyes with tears ran over,
As oft as he drank thereout.
And when he found himself dying,
His towns and cities he told;
Naught else to his heir denying
Save only the goblet of gold.
His knights he straightway gathers
And in the midst sate he,
In the banquet hall of the fathers
In the castle over the sea.
There stood th' old knight of liquor,
And drank the last life-glow,
Then flung the holy beaker
Into the flood below.
He saw it plunging, drinking
And sinking in the roar,
His eyes in death were sinking,
He never drank one drop more.
[She opens the press, to put away her clothes,
and discovers the casket.]
How in the world came this fine casket here?
I locked the press, I'm very clear.
I wonder what's inside! Dear me! it's very queer!
Perhaps 'twas brought here as a pawn,
In place of something mother lent.
Here is a little key hung on,
A single peep I shan't repent!
What's here? Good gracious! only see!
I never saw the like in my born days!
On some chief festival such finery
Might on some noble lady blaze.
How would this chain become my neck!
Whose may this splendor be, so lonely?
[She arrays herself in it, and steps before the glass.]
Could I but claim the ear-rings only!
A different figure one would make.
What's beauty worth to thee, young blood!
May all be very well and good;
What then? 'Tis half for pity's sake
They praise your pretty features.
Each burns for gold,
All turns on gold,—
Alas for us! poor creatures!
PROMENADE.
FAUST [going up and down in thought.] MEPHISTOPHELES to him.
Mephistopheles. By all that ever was jilted! By all the infernal fires! I wish I knew something worse, to curse as my heart desires!