Accursèd tassel! of all my repose It robb’d me all the night through; It hung over head, like Damocles’ sword, And threaten’d to pierce me right through! A serpent’s head it often appear’d, And I heard its hissing mysterious: “In the fortress thou art, and canst not escape”-- A position especially serious! “O would that I were”--I thought with a sigh,-- “Of my peaceable home a sharer, “With my own dear wife in Paris once more, “In the Faubourg-Poissonière!” I felt that a Something oftentimes Was over my forehead stealing, Just like a Censor’s chilly hand, And all my thoughts congealing. Gendarmes, in the dresses of corpses conceal’d, In white and ghostly confusion Surrounded my bed, while a rattling of chains I heard, to swell the illusion. Alas! the spectres carried me off, And at length with amazement I found me Beside a precipitous wall of rocks, And there they firmly had bound me. Detestable tassel, so dirty and foul! Again it appear’d before me, But now in the shape of a vulture with claws And black wings hovering o’er me. And now like the well-known eagle it seem’d And grasp’d me, and breathing prevented; It ate the liver out of my breast, While sadly I groan’d and lamented. Long time I lamented, when crow’d the cock, And the feverish vision faded; Perspiring in bed at Minden I lay, To a tassel the bird was degraded. I travell’d with post-horses on, And free breath presently drew I On the domain of Bückeburg, As by my feelings knew I. CAPUT XIX. O Danton, great was thy mistake, And thy error was paid for dearly! One can carry away one’s fatherland On the soles of one’s feet, pretty nearly. Of the princely domain of Bückeburg One half to my boots clung in patches; In all my life I never have seen A place that in filth its match is. At the town of Bückeburg shortly I stopp’d, To see the ancestral castle Whence my grandfather came; my grandmother though Of Hamburg was part and parcel. I got to Hanover just at noon, And there had my boots clean’d neatly, And afterwards went to visit the town; When I travel, I do it completely. By heavens, how spruce the place appear’d! No mud in its streets was lying; Many handsome buildings there I saw, In massive splendour vying.[59] I was mostly charm’d by a very large square, Surrounded by houses superior; There lives the king and his palace there stands, Of a really handsome exterior,-- (The palace I mean.) On each side of the door A sentry-box had its station; Redcoats with muskets there kept guard, Of threat’ning and wild reputation.