pressure, and
expanded, till the breast of the captive could move and heave.

The torment of his situation became less and less, and he saw clearly
that Serpentina still loved him, and that it was she alone, who
had rendered his confinement in the crystal tolerable. He disturbed
himself no more about his frivolous companions in misfortune, but
directed all his thoughts and meditations on the gentle Serpentina.
Suddenly, however, there arose on the other side a dull, croaking,
repulsive murmur. Ere long he could observe that it proceeded from an
old coffee-pot, with half-broken lid, standing over against him on a
little shelf. As he looked at it more narrowly, the ugly features of
a wrinkled old woman by degrees unfolded themselves; and in a few
moments, the Apple-wife of the Black Gate stood before him. She
grinned and laughed at him, and cried with screeching voice: "Ey, Ey,
my pretty boy, must thou lie in limbo now? To the crystal thou hast
run; did I not tell thee long ago?"

"Mock and jeer me; do, thou cursed witch!" said the student Anselmus.
"Thou art to blame for it all; but the Salamander will catch thee,
thou vile Parsnip!"

"Ho, ho!" replied the crone, "not so proud, good ready-writer! Thou
hast smashed my little sons to pieces, thou hast burnt my nose; but I
must still like thee, thou knave, for once thou wert a pretty fellow;
and my little daughter likes thee too. Out of the crystal thou wilt
never come unless I help thee; up thither I cannot clamber; but my
cousin gossip the Rat, that lives close above thee, will gnaw in two
the shelf on which thou standest; thou shalt jingle down, and I catch
thee in my apron, that thy nose be not broken, or thy fine sleek face
at all injured; then I will carry thee to Mam'sell Veronica, and thou
shalt marry her when thou art Hofrat."

"Avaunt, thou devil's brood!" cried the student Anselmus, full of
fury; "it was thou alone and thy hellish arts that brought me to the
sin which I must now expiate. But I bear it all patiently; for only
here can I be, where the kind Serpentina encircles me with love and
consolation. Hear it, thou beldam, and despair! I bid defiance to
thy power; I love Serpentina, and none but her forever; I will not
be Hofrat, will not look at Veronica, who by thy means entices me
to evil. Can the green Snake not be mine, I will die in sorrow and
longing. Take thyself away, thou vile rook! Take thyself away!"

The crone laughed till the chamber rung: