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THEKLA, LADY NEUBRUNN.

THEKLA (falls on LADY NEUBRUNN'S neck). Now, gentle Neubrunn, show me the affection Which thou hast ever promised-prove thyself My own true friend and faithful fellow-pilgrim.

And where This night we must away!

Where is You have not told me all.
CAPTAIN (after a pause).

This morning
We buried him. Twelve youths of noblest birth
Did bear him to interment; the whole army
Follow'd the bier. A laurel deck'd his coffin;
The sword of the deceased was placed upon it,
In mark of honor, by the Rhinegrave's self.
Nor tears were wanting; for there are among us
Many, who had themselves experienced
The greatness of his mind, and gentle manners;
All were affected at his fate. The Rhinegrave
Would willingly have saved him; but himself
Made vain the attempt 'tis said he wish'd to die.

NEUBRUNN (to THEKLA, who has hidden her coun

tenance). Look up, my dearest lady

THEKLA.

CAPTAIN.

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Is now the only place, Where life yet dwells for me: detain me not! Where is his grave? Come and make preparations: let us think

At Neustadt, lady; in a cloister church

Are his remains deposited, until

We can receive directions from his father.

THEKLA.

What is the cloister's name?

CAPTAIN.

Saint Catherine's.

THEKLA.

And how far is it thither?

CAPTAIN.

Near twelve leagues.

THEKLA.

And which the way?

CAPTAIN.

You go by Tirschenreit

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And Falkenberg, through our advanced posts.

THEKLA.

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Is their commander?

CAPTAIN.

Colonel Seckendorf.

NEUBRUNN.

This rough tempestuous night

THEKLA.

Had he a soft bed

[THEKLA steps to the table, and takes a ring from Under the hoofs of his war-horses?

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[Exit LADY NEUBRUNN. omitted without injury to the play.

COUNTESS.

At a banquet-he and Illo. WALLENSTEIN (rises and strides across the saloon).

COUNTESS.

Thou speakest

Of Piccolomini. What was his death?

The night's far spent. Betake thee to thy chamber. The courier had just left thee as I came.

COUNTESS.

Bid me not go, O let me stay with thee!
WALLENSTEIN (moves to the window).

There is a busy motion in the Heaven,
The wind doth chase the flag upon the tower,
Fast sweep the clouds, the sickle* of the moon,
Struggling, darts snatches of uncertain light.
No form of star is visible! That one

White stain of light, that single glimmering yonder,

Is from Cassiopeia, and therein

Is Jupiter. (A pause). But now

The blackness of the troubled element hides him!

[He sinks into profound melancholy, and looks

vacantly into the distance.

COUNTESS (looks on him mournfully, then grasps his hand).

What art thou brooding on?

WALLENSTEIN.

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[WALLENSTEIN by a motion of his hand makes

signs to her to be silent.
Turn not thine eyes upon the backward view,
Let us look forward into sunny days.
Welcome with joyous heart the victory,
Forget what it has cost thee. Not to-day,
For the first time, thy friend was to thee dead;
To thee he died, when first he parted from thee.

WALLENSTEIN.

This anguish will be wearied down,* I know;
What pang is permanent with man? From the highest
As from the vilest thing of every day
He learns to wean himself: for the strong hours
Conquer him. Yet I feel what I have lost
In him. The bloom is vanish'd from my life.
For O! he stood beside me, like my youth,
Transform'd for me the real to a dream,
Clothing the palpable and the familiar
With golden exhalations of the dawn.
Whatever fortunes wait my future toils,
The beautiful is vanish'd and returns not.

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To-day I dreamt that I was seeking thee
In thy own chamber. As I enter'd, lo!

The word "moon-sickle," reminds me of a passage in Har-
ris, as quoted by Johnson, under the word "falcated." "The It was no more a chamber: the Chartreuse

enlightened part of the moon appears in the form of a sickle or
reaping-hook, which is while she is moving from the conjunc-
tion to the opposition, or from the new moon to the full: but
from full to a new again, the enlightened part appears gibbous,
and the dark falcated."

At Gitschin 't was, which thou thyself hast founded, Well, it has lasted long enough. Here give it.

The words "wanken" and "schweben" are not easily translated. The English words, by which we attempt to render them, are either vulgar or pedantic, or not of sufficiently general application. So "der Wolken Zug"-The Draft, the Procession of clouds. The Masses of the Clouds sweep onward in swift stream.

* A very inadequate translation of the original. Verschmerzen werd' ich diesen Schlag, das weiss ich, Denn was verschmerzte nicht der Mensch!

LITERALLY.

I shall grieve down this blow, of that I'm conscious:
What does not man grieve down?

And where it is thy will that thou shouldst be Interr'd.

WALLENSTEIN.

Thy soul is busy with these thoughts.

COUNTESS.

What! dost thou not believe that oft in dreams A voice of warning speaks prophetic to us?

WALLENSTEIN.

There is no doubt that there exist such voices.
Yet I would not call them

Voices of warning that announce to us
Only the inevitable. As the sun,
Ere it is risen, sometimes paints its image
In the atmosphere, so often do the spirits
Of great events stride on before the events,
And in to-day already walks to-morrow.
That which we read of the fourth Henry's death
Did ever vex and haunt me like a tale
Of my own future destiny. The king

Felt in his breast the phantom of the knife,
Long ere Ravaillac arm'd himself therewith.
His quiet mind forsook him: the phantasma
Started him in his Louvre, chased him forth
Into the open air: like funeral knells
Sounded that coronation festival;

And still with boding sense he heard the tread
Of those feet that even then were seeking him
Throughout the streets of Paris.

COUNTESS.

And to thee

The voice within thy soul bodes nothing?

WALLENSTEIN.

Be wholly tranquil.

COUNTESS.

And another time

WALLENSTEIN.

I hear a boisterous music! and the Castle Is lighted up. Who are the revellers?

GORDON.

There is a banquet given at the Castle
To the Count Tertsky, and Field Marshal Illo.

WALLENSTEIN.

In honor of the victory-This tribe
Can show their joy in nothing else but feasting.

[Rings. The GROOM OF THE CHAMBER enters Unrobe me. I will lay me down to sleep. [WALLENSTEIN takes the keys from GORDON

So we are guarded from all enemies,
And shut in with sure friends.
For all must cheat me, or a face like this

[Fixing his eye on GORDON.

Was ne'er a hypocrite's mask.

[The GROOM OF THE CHAMBER takes off his mantle, collar, and scarf.

WALLENSTEIN.

Take care-what is that?

GROOM OF THE CHAMBER.

The golden chain is snapped in two.

WALLENSTEIN.

[He takes and looks at the chain.

"Twas the first present of the Emperor.
He hung it round me in the war of Friule,
He being then Archduke; and I have worn it
Till now from habit-

Nothing. From superstition, if you will. Belike,

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It was to be a Talisman to me;

And while I wore it on my neck in faith,
It was to chain to me all my life long
The volatile fortune, whose first pledge it was.
Well, be it so! Henceforward a new fortune
Must spring up for me; for the potency

Of this charm is dissolved.

GROOM OF THE CHAMBER retires with the vest-
ments. WALLENSTEIN rises, takes a stride
across the room, and stands at last before
GORDON in a posture of meditation.

How the old time returns upon me! I
Behold myself once more at Burgau, where
We two were Pages of the Court together.
We oftentimes disputed: thy intention
Was ever good; but thou wert wont to play
The Moralist and Preacher, and wouldst rail at me-

That I strove after things too high for me,
Giving my faith to bold unlawful dreams,
And still extol to me the golden mean.
-Thy wisdom hath been proved a thriftless friend
To thy own self. See, it has made thee early
A superannuated man, and (but
That my munificent stars will intervene)
Would let thee in some miserable corner
Go out like an untended lamp.

GORDON.

My Prince!

With light heart the poor fisher moors his boat, And watches from the shore the lofty ship Stranded amid the storm.

WALLENSTEIN.

Art thou already

In harbor then, old man? Well! I am not.

SENI.

Flee ere the day-break!

Trust not thy person to the Swedes!

WALLENSTEIN.

What now

The unconquer'd spirit drives me o'er life's billows;
My planks still firm, my canvas swelling proudly.
Hope is my goddess still, and Youth my inmate;
And while we stand thus front to front almost,
I might presume to say, that the swift years
Have pass'd by powerless o'er my unblanch'd hair.

[He moves with long strides across the Saloon, and
remains on the opposite side over-against
GORDON.

Who now persists in calling Fortune false ?
To me she has proved faithful, with fond love
Took me from out the common ranks of men,
And like a mother goddess, with strong arm
Carried me swiftly up the steps of life.
Nothing is common in my destiny,
Nor in the furrows of my hand. Who dares
Interpret then my life for me as 't were
One of the undistinguishable many?
True, in this present moment I appear
Fallen low indeed; but I shall rise again.
The high flood will soon follow on this ebb;
The fountain of my fortune, which now stops
Repress'd and bound by some malicious star,
Will soon in joy play forth from all its pipes.

GORDON.

And yet remember I the good old proverb,
"Let the night come before we praise the day."
I would be slow from long-continued fortune
To gather hope: for Hope is the companion
Given to the unfortunate by pitying Heaven;
Fear hovers round the head of prosperous men:
For still unsteady are the scales of fate.

WALLENSTEIN (smiling).

Is in thy thoughts?

SENI (with louder voice). Trust not thy person to these Swedes.

WALLENSTEIN.

What is it then?

SENI (still more urgently). O wait not the arrival of these Swedes! An evil near at hand is threatening thee From false friends. All the signs stand full of horror' Near, near at hand the net-work of perditionYea, even now 'tis being cast around thee!

WALLENSTEIN.

Baptista, thou art dreaming!-Fear befools then

SENI.

Believe not that an empty fear deludes me. Come, read it in the planetary aspects; Read it thyself, that ruin threatens thee From false friends!

WALLENSTEIN.

From the falseness of my friends

Has risen the whole of my unprosperous fortunes. The warning should have come before. At present I need no revelation from the stars

To know that.

SENI

Come and see! trust thine own eyes'

A fearful sign stands in the house of life-
An enemy; a fiend lurks close behind
The radiance of thy planet-O be warn'd!

I hear the very Gordon that of old
Was wont to preach to me, now once more preaching; Deliver not thyself up to these heathens,

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