nor moister
    Than a too-long-opened oyster,
    Save when at noon his paunch grew mutinous
    For a plate of turtle green and glutinous)
    “Only a scraping of shoes on the mat? 
    Anything like the sound of a rat
    Makes my heart go pit-a-pat!”

V.

    “Come in!”—­the Mayor cried, looking bigger: 
    And in did come the strangest figure! 
    His queer long coat from heel to head
    Was half of yellow and half of red,
    And he himself was tall and thin,
    With sharp blue eyes, each like a pin,
    And light loose hair, yet swarthy skin
    No tuft on cheek nor beard on chin,
    But lips where smile went out and in;
    There was no guessing his kith and kin: 
    And nobody could enough admire
    The tall man and his quaint attire. 
    Quoth one:  “It’s as my great-grandsire,
    Starting up at the Trump of Doom’s tone,
    Had walked this way from his painted tombstone!”

VI.

    He advanced to the council-table: 
    And, “Please your honours,” said he, “I’m able,
    By means of a secret charm, to draw
    All creatures living beneath the sun,
    That creep or swim or fly or run,
    After me so as you never saw! 
    And I chiefly use my charm
    On creatures that do people harm,
    The mole and toad and newt and viper;
    And people call me the Pied Piper.” 
    (And here they noticed round his neck
    A scarf of red and yellow stripe,
    To match with his coat of the self-same cheque;
    And at the scarf’s end hung a pipe;
    And his fingers they noticed were ever straying
    As if impatient to be playing
    Upon his pipe, as low it dangled
    Over his vesture so old-fangled.)
    “Yet,” said he, “poor Piper as I am,
    In Tartary I freed the Cham,
    Last June, from his huge swarms of gnats,
    I eased in Asia the Nizam
    Of a monstrous brood of vampyre-bats: 
    And as for what your brain bewilders,
    If I can rid your town of rats
    Will you give me a thousand guilders?”
    “One? fifty thousand!”—­was the exclamation
    Of the astonished Mayor and Corporation.

VII.

    Into the street the Piper stept,
      Smiling first a little smile,
    As if he knew what magic slept
      In his quiet pipe the while;
    Then, like a musical adept,
    To blow the pipe his lips he wrinkled,
    And green and blue his sharp eyes twinkled,
    Like a candle-flame where salt is sprinkled;
    And ere three shrill notes the pipe uttered,
    You heard as if an army muttered;
    And the muttering grew to a grumbling;
    And the grumbling grew to a mighty rumbling;
    And out of the houses the