I notice no such thing, I vow! 
’Tis winter still within my body: 
Upon my path I wish for frost and snow. 
How sadly rises, incomplete and ruddy,
The moon’s lone disk, with its belated glow,
And lights so dimly, that, as one advances,
At every step one strikes a rock or tree! 
Let us, then, use a Jack-o’-lantern’s glances: 
I see one yonder, burning merrily. 
Ho, there! my friend!  I’ll levy thine attendance: 
Why waste so vainly thy resplendence? 
Be kind enough to light us up the steep!

WILL-O’-THE-WISP

My reverence, I hope, will me enable
To curb my temperament unstable;
For zigzag courses we are wont to keep.

MEPHISTOPHELES

Indeed? he’d like mankind to imitate! 
Now, in the Devil’s name, go straight,
Or I’ll blow out his being’s flickering spark!

WILL-O’-THE-WISP

You are the master of the house, I mark,
And I shall try to serve you nicely. 
But then, reflect:  the mountain’s magic-mad to-day,
And if a will-o’-the-wisp must guide you on the way,
You mustn’t take things too precisely.

FAUST, MEPHISTOPHELES, WILL-O’-THE-WISP

(in alternating song)

     We, it seems, have entered newly
     In the sphere of dreams enchanted. 
     Do thy bidding, guide us truly,
     That our feet be forwards planted
     In the vast, the desert spaces! 
     See them swiftly changing places,
     Trees on trees beside us trooping,
     And the crags above us stooping,
     And the rocky snouts, outgrowing,—­
     Hear them snoring, hear them blowing! 
     O’er the stones, the grasses, flowing
     Stream and streamlet seek the hollow. 
     Hear I noises? songs that follow? 
     Hear I tender love-petitions? 
     Voices of those heavenly visions? 
     Sounds of hope, of love undying! 
     And the echoes, like traditions
     Of old days, come faint and hollow.

     Hoo-hoo!  Shoo-hoo!  Nearer hover
     Jay and screech-owl, and the plover,—­
     Are they all awake and crying? 
     Is’t the salamander pushes,
     Bloated-bellied, through the bushes? 
     And the roots, like serpents twisted,
     Through the sand and boulders toiling,
     Fright us, weirdest links uncoiling
     To entrap us, unresisted: 
     Living knots and gnarls uncanny
     Feel with polypus-antennae
     For the wanderer.  Mice are flying,
     Thousand-colored, herd-wise hieing
     Through the moss and through the heather!

     And the fire-flies wink and darkle,
     Crowded swarms that soar and sparkle,
     And in wildering escort gather!