Know ye the fiend that is crueller far
Than the gaunt gray herds of the forest are?
Swiftly vanish the wild fleet tracks
Before the rifle and woodman's axe:
But hark to the coming of unseen feet,
Pattering by night through the city street!
Each wolf that dies in the woodland brown
Lives a spectre and haunts the town.
By square and market they slink and prowl,
In lane and alley they leap and howl.
All night they snuff and snarl before
The poor patched window and broken door.
They paw the clapboards and claw the latch,
At every crevice they whine and scratch.
Their tongues are subtle and long and thin,
And they lap the living blood within.
Icy keen are the teeth that tear,
Red as ruin the eyes that glare.
Children crouched in corners cold
Shiver in tattered garments old,