Coppola threw the
figure across his shoulder, and, laughing shrilly and horribly, ran
hastily down the stairs, the figure's ugly feet hanging down and
banging and rattling like wood against the steps. Nathanael was
stupefied;--he had seen only too distinctly that in Olimpia's pallid
waxed face there were no eyes, merely black holes in their stead; she
was an inanimate puppet. Spalanzani was rolling on the floor; the
pieces of glass had cut his head and breast and arm; the blood was
escaping from him in streams. But he gathered his strength together by
an effort.

"After him--after him! What do you stand staring there for?
Coppelius--Coppelius--he's stolen my best automaton--at which I've
worked for twenty years--staked my life upon it--the clock-work--
speech--movement--mine--your eyes--stolen your eyes--damn him--curse
him--after him--fetch me back Olimpia--there are the eyes." And now
Nathanael saw a pair of bloody eyes lying on the floor staring at him;
Spalanzani seized them with his uninjured hand and threw them at him,
so that they hit his breast Then madness dug her burning talons into
him and swept down into his heart, rending his mind and thoughts to
shreds. "Aha! aha! aha! Fire-wheel--fire-wheel! Spin round, fire-wheel!
merrily, merrily! Aha! wooden doll! spin round, pretty wooden doll!"
and he threw himself upon the Professor, clutching him fast by the
throat. He would certainly have strangled him had not several people,
attracted by the noise, rushed in and torn away the madman; and so they
saved the Professor, whose wounds were immediately dressed. Siegmund,
with all his strength, was not able to subdue the frantic lunatic, who
continued to scream in a dreadful way, "Spin round, wooden doll!" and
to strike out right and left with his doubled fists. At length the
united strength of several succeeded in overpowering him by throwing
him on the floor and binding him. His cries passed into a brutish
bellow that was awful to hear; and thus raging with the harrowing
violence of madness, he was taken away to the madhouse.

Before continuing my narration of what happened further to the
unfortunate Nathanael, I will tell you, indulgent reader, in case you
take any interest in that skilful mechanician and fabricator of
automata, Spalanzani, that he recovered completely from his wounds. He
had, however, to leave the university, for Nathanael's fate had created
a great sensation; and the opinion was pretty generally