Hans, Axel, and crowd
Come, there’s an honest fellow.  Ay, now, pay! 
—­There’s a good friend.—­And would I had the same. 
—­One thousand guilders? 
  —­No, too much. 
    —­No, no.

Kurt
Pay jugglers?—­With a rope apiece!

Jacobus
  Why—­so—­

Piper
They are my friends; and they shall share with me. 
’T is time that Hamelin reckoned us for men;
—­Hath ever dealt with us as we were vermin. 
Now have I rid you of the other sort—­
Right you that score!—­

Kurt
These outcasts!

Piper
[hotly]
  Say you so? 
Michael, my man!  Which of you here will try
With glass or fire, with him?

Michael
[sullenly]
  No, no more glass, to-day!

Piper
Then fire and sword!
[They back away.]
  So!—­And there’s not one man
In Hamelin, here, so honest of his word. 
Stroller!  A pretty choice you leave us.—­Quit
This strolling life, or stroll into a cage! 
What do you offer him?  A man eats fire—­
Swords, glass, young April frogs—­

Children
  Do it again! 
Do it again!

Piper
You say to such a man,—­
‘Come be a monk!  A weaver!’ Pretty choice. 
Here’s Cheat-the-Devil, now.

Peter the Cobbler
But what’s his name?

Piper
He doesn’t know.  What would you?  Nor do I.
But for the something he has seen of life,
Making men merry, he ’d know something more! 
The gentlest devil ever spiked Lost Souls
Into Hell-mouth,—­for nothing-by-the-day!

Old Ursula
[with her ear-trumpet]
Piper, why do you call him Cheat-the-Devil?

Piper
Because his deviltry is all a cheat:—­
He is no devil,—­but a gentle heart! 
—­Friend Michael here hath played the Devil, betimes,
Because he can so bravely breathe out fire. 
He plied the pitchfork so we yelped for mercy,—­
He reckoned not the stoutness of his arm!—­
But Cheat-the-Devil here,—­he would not hurt
Why—­Kurt the Syndic—­thrusting him in hell.
                              [Laughter.

Cheat-the-devil
[unhappily]
No, no—­I will not hurt him!

Piper
[soothingly to him]
  Merry, boy!
[To the townsfolk]
And,—­if ye will have reasons, good,—­ye see,—­
I want—­one thousand guilders.

Jacobus
 In all surety,
Payment you’ll have, my man, But—­

Hans the Butcher
  As to ’s friends,—­
An that yon Devil be as feat wi’ his hands
As he be slow o’ tongue, why, I will take him
For prentice.  Wife,—­now that would smack o’ pride!

Peter the Cobbler
I’ll take this fellow that can swallow fire,
He’s somewhat old for me.  But he can learn
My trade.—­A pretty fellow!