Hark! you must get the girl for me!
Mephistopheles.
Which one?
Faust.
She’s just gone by.
Mephistopheles.
What! she?
She’s only now come from confession,
Where she received a full remission.
I slinked close by the box, and heard
The simple damsel’s every word;
’Tis a most guileless thing, that goes
For very nothing to the priest.
My power does not extend to those.
Faust.
Yet she is fourteen years of age at least.
Mephistopheles.
You speak like Jack the debauchee,
Who thinks each sweet flow’r grows for me;
As if his wish sufficed alone
To make each priceless pearl his own:
But ’tis not so; and cannot be.
Faust.
My good Sir Knight of pedantry,
Lay not thou down the law to me!
And this, for good and all, be told,
Unless, this very night, I hold
The sweet young maid in my embrace,
’Tis the last time that you shall see my face.
Mephistopheles.
Bethink thee!—what with here, and what with there,
The thing requires no little care.
Full fourteen days must first be spent,
To come upon the proper scent.
Faust.
Had I but seven good hours of rest,
The devil’s aid I’d ne’er request,
To mould this fair young creature to my bent.
Mephistopheles.
You speak as if you were a Frenchman born;
But though the end be good, we must not scorn
The means; what boots the mere gratification?
It is the best half of the recreation,
When, up and down, and to and fro,
The pretty doll, through every kind
Of fiddle-faddle sweet flirtation,
You knead out first, and dress up to your mind—
As many an Italian tale can show.
Faust.
I need no tricks to whet my zest.
