No More Learning

_Mephistopheles_. In Padua lies our departed brother,
In the churchyard of St. Anthony,
In a cool and quiet bed lies sleeping,
In a sacred spot's eternal keeping.

_Martha_. And this was all you had to bring me?

_Mephistopheles_. All but one weighty, grave request!
"Bid her, when I am dead, three hundred masses sing me! "
With this I have made a clean pocket and breast.

_Martha_. What! not a medal, pin nor stone?
Such as, for memory's sake, no journeyman will lack,
Saved in the bottom of his sack,
And sooner would hunger, be a pauper--

_Mephistopheles_. Madam, your case is hard, I own!
But blame him not, he squandered ne'er a copper.
He too bewailed his faults with penance sore,
Ay, and his wretched luck bemoaned a great deal more.

_Margaret_. Alas! that mortals so unhappy prove!
I surely will for him pray many a requiem duly.

_Mephistopheles_. You're worthy of a spouse this moment; truly
You are a child a man might love.

_Margaret_. It's not yet time for that, ah no!

_Mephistopheles_. If not a husband, say, meanwhile a beau.
It is a choice and heavenly blessing,
Such a dear thing to one's bosom pressing.

_Margaret_. With us the custom is not so.

_Mephistopheles_. Custom or not!