There beside the glowing hearth Sat Uraka with a comb, Toiling o'er her swollen pug;-- Him she quickly flung aside As we entered. First my couch She prepared, then bent to loose From my feet the _espardillos_,-- Footgear comfortless and rude! Helped me to disrobe,--she drew Off my pantaloons which clung To my legs as close and tight As the friendship of a fool. "Oh, a dressing-gown! I'd give Six-and-thirty kings," I cried, "For a dry one!"--as my shirt, Wringing wet, began to steam. Shivering, with chattering teeth, There I stood beside the hearth, Till the fire drowsed me quite, Then upon the straw I sank. Sleepless but with blinking eyes Peered I at the witch who crouched By the fire with her son's Body spread upon her lap. Upright at her side the pug Stood, and in his clumsy paws, Very cleverly and tight, Held aloft a little jar. From this did Uraka take Reddish fat and salved therewith Swift Lascaro's ribs and breast With her thin and trembling hands. And she hummed a lullaby In a high and nasal tone As she rubbed him with the salve 'Midst the crackling of the fire. Sere and bony like a corpse Lay the son upon the lap Of his mother; opened wide Stared his pale and tragic eyes. Is he really dead, this man? Kept alive by mother-love? Nightly by the witch-fat potent Salved into a magic life? Oh, that strange, strange fever-sleep! In which all my limbs grew stiff As if fettered, yet each sense, Overwrought, waked horribly! How that smell of hellish herbs Plagued me! Musing in my woe, Long I thought where had I once Smelled such odours?--but in vain. How the wind within the flue Wrought me terror! Like the sobs Of some parchèd soul it rang-- Or some well-remembered voice! But these stuffed birds standing guard On a board above my head, These grim birds tormented me Far beyond all other things! Slowly, gruesomely they moved Their accursèd wings and bent Low to me with monstrous bills, Bills like human noses huge. Where had I such noses seen? Well, mayhap in Hamburg once, Or in Frankfort's ghetto dim; Memory smote me harshly then. But at last did slumber quite Overcome me and in place Of such waking phantoms crept Wholesome and unbroken dreams. And within my dream the hut Quickly to a ball-room changed, High on lofty pillars borne And illumed by chandeliers. There invisible musicians Played from "Robert le Diable" That atrocious dance of nuns As I promenaded there. But at last the portals wide Open and with stately step Slowly in the hall appear Guests most wonderful and strange.