Brander. [_striking the table_] Gentlemen, hear! only attend to me, You'll see that I know how to live. If love-sick people here there be, To honor them, I'm bound to give A song brimful of the most melting passion. I'll sing a ditty of the newest fashion! Give ear! and with full swell sonorous, Let each and all ring forth the chorus! [_He sings._] In a pantry-hole there lived a rat, On bacon and on butter, It had a paunch as round and fat As Doctor Martin Luther. The cook placed poison in its way, It felt as straitened all the day, As if it had love in its body. Chorus. [_shouting_] As if it had love in its body. Brander. It ran within, it ran without, And sipped in every puddle; And scratched and gnawed, but bettered not The fever of its noddle. With many a twinge it tossed and tossed, Seemed ready to give up the ghost, As if it had love in its body. Chorus. As if it had love in its body. Brander. It left its hole for very pain, Into the kitchen crawling, And snuffling there with might and main, Upon the earth lay sprawling. The cook she laughed when she saw it die; "It squeaks," quoth she, "with its latest sigh, As if it had love in its body." Chorus. As if it had love in its body. Siebel. How the hard-hearted boys rejoice! As if it were a trade so choice To teach the rats and mice to die! Brander. Rats find great favor in your eyes. Altmayer. The oily paunch! the bald pate! he Has eyes of sorrow for the creature: For why? he could not fail to see In the swoll'n rat his own best feature! Scene II. _Enter_ /Faust/ _and_ /Mephistopheles/. Mephistopheles. First thing of all I bring you here, Into a company of jolly cheer, That you may learn how men contrive Without much thought or care to live. These fellows feast their lives away In a continual holiday; With little wit and much content Their narrow round of life is spent, As playful kittens oft are found To chase their own tails round and round. So live they on from day to day, As long as headache keeps away, And by no anxious thought are crossed, While they get credit from the host. Brander. These gentlemen are strangers; in their face One reads they lack the breeding of the place; They're not an hour arrived, I warrant thee. Frosch. There you are right!--Leipzig's the place, I say! It is a little Paris in its way. Siebel. What, think you, may the strangers be? Frosch. Leave that to me!--I'll soon fish out the truth. Fill me a bumper till it overflows, And then I'll draw the worms out of their nose, As easily as 'twere an infant's tooth. To me they seem to be of noble blood, They look so discontented and so proud.