They all have ducks’ feet, but object much to show it; And fancy that nobody else can know it; Their sorrow’s so deep and hard to bear, That to teaze them about it I never could dare. Alas! we all, like those dwarfs full of feeling, We all have something that needs concealing; No Christians, we fancy, have ever descried Where we our ducks’ feet so carefully hide. Salamanders for me had never attractions, I learnt very little respecting their actions From other wood spirits. They pass’d me by night Like fleeting shadows, mysteriously light. They are thin as a spindle, and long as a baby, With breeches and waistcoats tight-fitting as may be, Of scarlet colours, embroider’d with gold; Their faces are sickly and yellow and old. A golden crown, with rubies all over, The head of each of their number doth cover; The whole of these vain conceited elves Quite absolute monarchs consider themselves. That they are not burnt in the fire is truly A great piece of art, I acknowledge it duly; And yet the uninflammable wight Is far from being a true fire-sprite. The sharpest woodspirits are mandrakes however; Short legs have these bearded mannikins clever; They have old men’s faces, the length of a span, But whence they proceed, is a secret to man. When head over heels in the moonlight they tumble, They remind one of roots in their nature quite humble; But as my welfare they always have sought, Their origin really to me matters nought. In small acts of witchcraft they gave me instructions, How to exorcise flames, ply the birds with seductions, And also to pluck on Midsummer night The root that makes one invisible quite. They taught me the stars and strange signs--how astraddle To ride on the winds without any saddle, And Runic sentences, able to call The dead from out of their silent graves all. They also taught me the whistle mysterious That serves to deceive the woodpecker serious, And makes him give us the spurge, to show Where secret treasures are hidden below. The words that ’tis needful for people to mutter When digging for treasure, they taught me to utter; But all in vain, for I ne’er got by heart The treasure-digger’s wonderful art. For money in fact I then cared not a tittle, My wants were soon satisfied, being but little; I possess’d many castles in Spain’s fair land, The income from which came duly to hand. O charming time, when the heaven’s high arches With fiddles were hung, when elfin marches And nixes’ dances and cobolds’ glad play My story-drunk heart enchanted all day! O charming time, when into auspicious Triumphal arches the foliage delicious Appear’d to be twining! I wander’d around, My brow, like a victor’s, with laurel-wreath crown’d.