ed at me spitefully from the mirror. 'In the name of all the
devils, whence come you, you accursed dog?' yelled O'Malley behind me.
I turned round, and saw my Paul Talkebarth, who was standing in the
door-way, and whose handsome face was reflected in the magic mirror.
The major, wild with rage, flew at honest Paul; yet, before I could get
between them, O'Malley stood close to him, perfectly motionless, and
Paul availed himself of the opportunity to make a prolix apology;
saying, how he had looked for me, how he had found the door open, how
he had walked in, &c. 'Begone, rascal,' said O'Malley at last, in a
quieter tone, and when I added, 'Go, good Paul, I will return home
directly;' the Eulenspiegel departed quite terrified and confounded.

"I had held the doll fast in my hand, and O'Malley assured me, that it
was owing to this circumstance alone, that all our labour had not been
in vain. Talkebarth's ill-timed intrusion had, however, delayed the
completion of the work for a long time. He advised me to turn off that
faithful servant, but this I had not the heart to do. Moreover, he
assured me that the elementary spirit which had shown me such favour,
was nothing less than a salamander, as indeed, he suspected, when he
cast my horoscope and found that Mars stood in the first house. I now
come again to moments of which you can have but a slight notion, as
words are incapable of describing them. The Devil Amor, Biondetta--all
was forgotten; I thought only of my Teraphim. For whole hours I could
look at the doll, as it lay on the table before me, and the glow of
love that streamed through my veins seemed then, like the heavenly fire
of Prometheus, to animate the little figure which grew up as in ardent
longing. But this form vanished as soon as I had thought it, and the
unspeakable anguish which cut through my heart, was associated with a
strange indignation, that impelled me to fling the doll away from me as
a miserable ridiculous toy. Yet when I grasped it, an electric shock
seemed to dart through all my limbs, and I felt as if a separation from
the talisman of love would annihilate me. I will openly confess to you
that my passion, although the proper object of it was an elementary
spirit, was directed among all sorts of equivocal dreams towards
objects in the miserable world that surrounded me, so that my excited
fancy made now this, now that lady, the representative of the coy
salamander that eluded my embrace