Operas Every Child Should Know

Slowly Faust awakened; His first word was "Marguerite!" Then he looked about him in a daze.

"What a dream! What a dream!" he murmured. "I saw an angel in human form."

"Nay, she was a woman," said the Devil. "Rise and follow me, and I will show her to thee in her home. Hello! Here comes along a party of jolly students and soldiers. They will pass her home. We'll move along with them, join their shouts and songs, and presently we shall arrive at her house." Faust, all trembling with the thought that at last he had found that which was to make his life worth living, joined the crowd and followed. The soldiers boisterously sang a fine chorus as they went. No sooner had they finished than the students began their song. It was all in Latin and seemed to Faust to echo that life which had once been his. Then the soldiers and students joined in the jollity and sang together.

This fun lasted what to Faust seemed too long a time. He was impatient to see and speak with the dear maiden Marguerite; and at last, his wish was to be granted. The Devil set him down without ceremony in the young girl's house. There, where she lived, where her meagre belongings were about, he sang rapturously of her. He went about the room, looking at her chair, her basket of work, the place where she should sleep, examining all with rapture. Then the Devil said in an undertone:

"She is coming! hide thyself, and frighten her not." Then he hid Faust behind some curtains and took himself off with the parting advice:

"Have a care not to frighten her, or thou wilt lose her. Now make the most of thy time." Faust's heart beat so with love that he feared to betray himself.

Then Marguerite entered. She was as lovely as a dream. She was simple and gentle, and very young and innocent. She had never seen any one outside her little village. She was so good that she could fairly tell by instinct if evil influences were about her. She no sooner entered the chamber than she was aware of something wrong. She felt the presence of the evil one who had but just gone. She paused and murmured to herself:

"The air is very sultry," and she felt stifled. "I am trembling like a little child. I think it is the dream I had last night" (for the Devil had given her a dream as he had given Faust, and in it she had seen her future husband). "I think it is because I expect every moment since my dream, to see the one who is to love and cherish me the rest of my life." The simple folk of Marguerite's time believed in dreams and portents of all kinds.

There she sat in her chair and recalled how handsome the lover of her dream was, and how truly she already loved him. Then she decided to go to bed, and while she was folding her few things, putting her apron away, combing out her long and beautiful hair, she sang an old Gothic song, of the King of Thule:

[Listen]

There was a king in Thule
Was faithful till the grave
To whom his mistress, dying,
A golden goblet gave.
Naught was to him more precious,
He drained it at ev'ry bout.
His eyes with tears ran over
As oft as he drank thereout.

When came his time of dying,
The towns in his land he told;
Naught else to his heir denying
Except the goblet of gold.
He sat at the royal banquet,
With his knights of high degree,
In the lofty hall of his fathers,
In the castle by the sea.

There stood the old carouser,
And drank the last life-glow,
And hurled the hallow'd goblet
Into the tide below.
He saw it plunging and filling,
And sinking deep in the sea,
Then his eyelids fell forever,
And never more drank he.

There was a King once in Thule,
Faithful was he – to the grave.

Then the Devil, who was watching all, summoned his imps. This time they took the form of Will-o'-the-wisps.

"Come! dance and confuse this maiden, and see what we can do to help this lovesick Faust," he cried to them, and at once they began a wonderful dance. Marguerite watched them entranced, and by the time Faust appeared from the folds of the curtains she was half dazed and confused by the unreal spectacle she had seen. Then she recognized the handsome fellow as the one she had seen in her dream.

"I have seen thee in my dreams," she said, "and thou wert one who loved me well." Faust, entranced with her beauty and goodness, promised to love her forever; and as he embraced her, the Devil suddenly popped in.

"Hasten," he cried. "We must be off."

"Who is this man?" Marguerite cried in affright.

"A brute," Faust declared, knowing well the devilishness of his pretended friend in whose company he travelled.

"Nay! I am your best friend. Be more courteous," the Devil cautioned, smiling.

"I expect I am intruding," he continued. "But really I came to save this angel of a girl. Our songs have awakened all the neighbours round, and they are running hither like a pack of hounds to see what is going on. They know this pretty girl has a young man in here talking with her, and already they are calling for her old gossip of a mother. When her mother comes ye will catch it finely. So come along."

"Death and Hell!" Faust cried, not knowing how near he was to both.

"There is no time for that. Just come along. You and the young woman will have plenty of time hereafter to see each other. But just now we must be off."

"But she – "

"It will go hard with her if we are found here, so ye had better come on, if only for her sake."

"But, return, return," Marguerite cried, looking tenderly at Faust.

"I shall return, never to leave thee," he cried, and then, interrupted by the noise made by men and women in the street, who were coming to find out what he was doing there, Faust left hurriedly. Every night thereafter for a time they met, and Marguerite was persuaded by the Devil to give her old mother a sleeping potion to keep her from surprising them. Then one day the Devil again lured Faust away.

"Now thou shalt never see her again," the Devil said to himself, gloating over the sorrow Faust was sure to feel; and away they fled, the Devil sure of tempting Faust anew.

After that Marguerite, left quite alone, watched sadly, each day for the return of her lover, but alas! he never came. One night while she was leaning out of her casement, the villagers were singing of the return of the army.

"Alas, they are all making merry, soldiers and students, as on the night when I first saw my lover, but he is no longer among them." And then sadly she closed her window and kept her lonely vigil, ever hoping for his return.

Away in a cavern, in the depths of the forest, was Faust. He had never returned to Marguerite's village, and neither had he known any peace of mind. He had immediately found other pleasures which had for a time made him forget her, and then, when he was far away and it was too late to return, he desired again to be with her. Now, sitting apart in the wood, mourning, the Devil came to him.

"How about that constant love of thine? Do ye never think of that poor child Marguerite, lonely and far away, awaiting thee month after month?"

"Be silent and do not torture me, fiend," Faust cried bitterly.

"Oh I have a lot to tell thee," the Black Prince replied. "I have been saving news for thee. Dost thou remember how, on those nights when thou didst go to see that good maiden, she was told to give her old mother a sleeping draught, that she might sleep soundly while ye billed and cooed? Well, when ye were gone, Marguerite still expected ye, and continued to give the draught, and one night the old dame slept forever, and I tell thee that draught killed her. Now thy Marguerite is going to be hanged for it." Upon hearing that, Faust nearly died with horror.

"What is it ye tell me?" he cried. "My God! This is not true."

"All right. All right. Believe it or not, it is the same to me – and to her – because that poor maid is about to die for killing her mother."

"Thou shalt save her, or I shall kill – " But he stopped in his fury, knowing that none could kill the Devil. He wrung his hands in despair.

"Now if thou wilt keep thyself a bit civil, I may save her for thee, but don't forget thy manners."