This poem was written to amuse little Willie Macready who was ill and
wished a poem for which he could make illustrations. There are many
legends that deal with the refusal of a reward promised to a magician
for some stipulated service. Mr. Berdoe (_Browning Cyclopædia_, p. 339)
says that the story given here is based on an account by Verstegan in
his _Restitution of Decayed Intelligence_ (1634). Verstegan gives
"Bunting" as the name of the piper; the town, as Hamelin in Brunswick on
the Weser; and the mountain into which the children were led as the
Köppenberg.