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 two first parts only, and the opening chorus of the third. The rest may perhaps appear hereafter.

But as thou hast-hence, hence-and do thy best!
That back of thine may bear its burthen; 'tis

More high, if not so broad as that of others.

Arn. It bears its burthen; but, my heart!
Will it

Sustain that which you lay upon it, mother?
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!

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

That monstrous sport of nature. But get hence,
And gather wood!

Arn.
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.
Bert.
As is the hedgehog's,
Which sucks at midnight from the wholesome dam
Of the young bull, until the milkmaid 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.
Arn. [solus.] Oh, mother!-She is gone, and I
Her bidding;-wearily but willingly [must do

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-not 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
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.

[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 me, but
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 fallen leaves my monument; the murmur
Of the near fountain my sole elegy.
Now, knife, stand firmly, as I fain would fall!

[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 shal
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 eternal 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.

Your form is man's, and yet

You may be devil.
Stran.
So many men are that
Which is so call'd or thought, that you may add me
To which you please, without much wrong to either.
But come: you wish to kill yourself;—pursue
Your purpose.

Arn.

You have interrupted me.

Stran. What is that resolution which can e'er
Be interrupted? If I be the devil

You deem, a single moment would have made you
Mine, and for ever, by your suicide;

[Arnold goes to a spring, and stoops to wash his And yet my coming saves you
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 wretch
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 burden to the earth, myself, and shame
Unto what brought me into life! Thou blood,
Which flow'st 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.

Arn.

I said not
You were the demon, but that your approach
Was like one.

Stran.
With him (and you seem scarce used to such high
Society), you can't tell how he approaches;

Unless you keep company

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 be
Their cloven-footed terror.

Arn.

Do you dare you

To taunt me with my born deformity?
Stran. Were I to taunt a buffalo with this
Cloven foot of thine, or the swift dromedary
With thy sublime of humps, the animals
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: 'twas only
Nature's mistaken largess to bestow

The gifts which are of others upon man.

[foot,

Arn. Give me the strength then of the buffalo's

[Arnold places the knife in the ground, with the When he spurs high the dust, beholding his point upwards.

Now 'tis set.

Near enemy; or let me have the long
And patient swiftness of the desert-ship,

Stran.

Arn. Whose blood then?
Stran.

Not in your own.

Let him pass;

His aspect may be fair, but suits me not.
Stran. Then you are far more difficult to please

We will talk of that hereafter. Than Cato's sister, or than Brutus's mother,

But I'll be moderate with you, for I see

Great things within you. You shall have no bond
But your own will, no contract save your deeds.
Are you content?

Arn.

I take thee at thy word.

Stran. Now then!

A little of your blood.

Or Cleopatra at sixteen-an age

When love is not less in the eye than heart.
But be it so! Shadow, pass on!

[The phantom of Julius Cæsar disappears.
Arn.
And can it
Be, that the man who shook the earth is gone,

The Stranger approaches the fountain, and And left no footstep?
turns to Arnold.
Stran.
There you err. His substance
Left graves enough, and woes enough, and fame
More than enough to track his memory;
But for his shadow, 'tis no more than yours,
Except a little longer and less crook'd

Arn.
For what?
Stran. To mingle with the magic of the waters,
And make the charm effective.

Arn. [holding out his wounded arm). Take it all.
Stran. Not now. A few drops will suffice for this
[The Stranger takes some of Arnold's blood in
his hand, and casts it into the fountain.
Shadows of beauty!

Shadows of power!

l' the sun. Behold another 1

[A second phantom passes.

on the

This is a well known German superstition-a gigantic shadow produced by reflection Brocken.