But the student Anselmus, as the spirit of the punch mounted
into his head, felt all the images of those wondrous things, which for
some time he had experienced, again coming through his mind. He
saw the Archivarius in his damask nightgown, which glittered like
phosphorus; he saw the azure room, the golden palm-trees; nay, it now
seemed to him as if he must still believe in Serpentina; there was a
fermentation, a conflicting tumult in his soul. Veronica handed him
a glass of punch; and in taking it, he gently touched her hand.
"Serpentina! Veronica!" sighed he to himself. He sank into deep
dreams; but Registrator Heerbrand cried quite aloud: "A strange old
gentleman, whom nobody can fathom, he is and will be, this Archivarius
Lindhorst. Well, long life to him! Your glass, Herr Anselmus!"
Then the student Anselmus awoke from his dreams, and said, as he
touched glasses with Registrator Heerbrand "That proceeds, respected
Herr Registrator, from the circumstance that Archivarius Lindhorst
is in reality a Salamander, who wasted in his fury the Spirit-prince
Phosphorus' garden, because the green Snake had flown away from him."
"How? What?" inquired Conrector Paulmann.
"Yes," continued the student Anselmus; "and for this reason he is now
forced to be a Royal Archivarius, and to keep house here in Dresden
with his three daughters, who, after all, are nothing more than little
gold-green Snakes, that bask in elder-bushes, and traitorously sing,
and seduce away young people, like so many sirens.
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