In servitude, o'er something still more servile;
And vice in misery affecting still

A tatter'd splendour. What a state of being!
In Tuscany, my own dear sunny land,
Our nobles were but citizens and merchants
Like Cosmo. We had evils, but not such
As these; and our all-ripe and gushing valleys
Made poverty more cheerful, where each herb
Was in itself a meal, and every vine

Rain'd, as it were, the beverage which makes glad
The heart of man; and the ne'er unfelt sun
(But rarely clouded, and when clouded, leaving
His warmth behind in memory of his beams)
Makes the worn mantle, and the thin robe, less
Oppressive than an emperor's jewell'd purple.
But, here! the despots of the north appear
To imitate the ice-wind of their clime,
Searching the shivering vassal through his rags,
To wring his soul-as the bleak elements

His form. And 't is to be amongst these sovereigns
My husband pants! and such his pride of birth-
That twenty years of usage, such as no
Father, born in a humble state, could nerve
His soul to persecute a son withal,

Hath changed no atom of his early nature;
But I, born nobly also, from my father's
Kindness was taught a different lesson. Father!
May thy long-tried and now rewarded spirit
Look down on us and our so long desired
Ulric! I love my son, as thou didst me!
What's that? Thou, Werner! can it be and thus.

Enter WERNER hastily, with the knife in his hand, by the secret pannel, which he closes hurriedly after him.

WERNER (not at first recognising her). Discover'd! then I'll stab--(recognising her). Ah! Josephine,

Why art thou not at rest?

JOSEPHINE.

What rest? My God!

What doth this mean?

WERNER (showing a rouleau).
Here's gold-gold, Josephine,

IDENSTEIN.

None whatever.

JOSEPHINE.

FRITZ.

Be not so quick: the honour of the corps,

Which forms the baron's household, 's unimpeach'd,
From steward to scullion, save in the fair way
Of peculation; such as in accompts,
Weights, measures, larder, cellar, buttery,
Where all men take their prey; as also in
Postage of letters, gathering of rents,
Purveying feasts, and understanding with
The honest trades who furnish noble masters :
But for your petty, picking, downright thievery,
We scorn it as we do board-wages: then
Had one of our folks done it, he would not
Have been so poor a spirit as to hazard

His neck for one rouleau, but have swoop'd all;
Also the cabinet, if portable.

Search empty pockets; also, to arrest
All gipsies, and ill-clothed and sallow people.
Prisoners we 'll have at least, if not the culprit;
And for the baron's gold-if 't is not found,
At least he shall have the full satisfaction
Of melting twice its substance in the raising
The ghost of this rouleau. Here's alchymy
For your lord's losses!

Where?

FRITZ.

He hath found a better. IDENSTEIN.

FRITZ.

In a most immense inheritance. The late Count Siegendorf, his distant kinsman, Is dead near Prague, in his castle, and my lord Is on his way to take possession.

No heir?

Long from the world's eye, aud perhaps the world.
A prodigal son, beneath his father's ban
For the last twenty years; for whom his sire
Refused to kill the fatted calf; and, therefore,
If living, he must chew the husks still.
The baron would find means to silence him,
Were he to re-appear: he's politic,

But

IDENSTEIN.

Was there no cause assign'd?

FRITZ.

Plenty, no doubt, Some averr'd

And none perhaps the true one.

It was to seek his parents; some, because
The old man held his spirit in so strictly
(But that could scarce be, for he doted on him):
A third believed he wish'd to serve in war,

But peace being made soon after his departure,
He might have since return'd, were that the motive;
A fourth set charitably have surmised,

As there was something strange and mystic in him,
That in the wild exuberance of his nature,

He had join'd the black bands, who lay waste Lusatia,
The mountains of Bohemia and Silesia,
Since the last years of war had dwindled into
A kind of general condottiero system

Of bandit warfare; each troop with its chief,
And all against mankind.

IDENSTEIN.

That cannot be.

A young heir, bred to wealth and luxury,
To risk his life and honours with disbanded
Soldiers and desperadoes!

FRITZ.

Heaven best knows!

But there are human natures so allied

Unto the savage love of enterprise,

That they will seek for peril as a pleasure.
I've heard that nothing can reclaim your Indian,
Or tame the tiger, though their infancy
Were fed on milk and honey. After all,
Your Wallenstein, your Tilly and Gustavus,
Your Bannier, and your Torstenson and Weimar,
Were but the same thing upon a grand scale;
And now that they are gone, and peace proclaim'd,
They who would follow the same pastime must
Pursue it on their own aceount. Here comes
The baron, and the Saxon stranger, who
Was his chief aid in yesterday's escape,
But did not leave the cottage by the Oder
Until this morning.

Enter STRALENHEIM and ULRIC.

STRALENHEIM.

Since you have refused

All compensation, gentle stranger, save
Inadequate thanks, you almost check even them,
Making me feel the worthlessness of words,
And blush at my own barren gratitude,
They seem so niggardly, compared with what
Your courteous courage did in my behalf.

ULRIC.

I pray you press the theme no further.

STRALENHEIM.

But

Can I not serve you? You are young, and of

That mould which throws out heroes; fair in favour;
Brave, I know, by my living now to say so,
And, doubtlessly, with such a form and heart,
Would look into the fiery eyes of war,
As ardently for glory as you dared

An obscure death to save an unknown stranger
In an as perilous but opposite element.
You are made for the service: I have served;

Have rank by birth and soldiership, and friends
of peace

Who shall be yours. T is true, this pause
Favours such views at present scantily;
But 't will not last, men's spirits are too stirring;
And, after thirty years of conflict, peace

Is but a petty war, as the times show us

In every forest, or a mere arm'd truce.

War will reclaim his own; and, in the mean time,
You might obtain a post, which would ensure
A higher soon, and, by my influence, fail not
To rise. I speak of Brandenburgh, wherein
I stand well with the elector; in Bohemia,
Like you, I am a stranger, and we are now
Upon its frontier.

ULRIC.

Come on, old oracle, expound thy riddle!

[Exit with IDENSTEIN and FRITZ. STRALENHEIM (solus).

A stalwart, active, soldier-looking stripling;
Handsome as Hercules ere his first labour,
And with a brow of thought beyond his years
When in repose, till his eye kindle up

In answering yours. I wish I could engage him;
I have need of some such spirits near me now,
For this inheritance is worth a struggle:

And though I am not the man to yield without one,
Neither are they who now rise up between me
And my desire. The boy, they say, 's a bold one:
But he hath play'd the truant in some hour

Of freakish folly, leaving fortune to
Champion his claims: that's well. The father, whom
For years I've track'd, as does the blood-hound, never
In sight, but constantly in scent, had put me
To fault, but here I have him, and that 's better.

It must be he! All circumstance proclaims it;
And careless voices, knowing not the cause
Of

my inquiries, still confirm it-Yes! The man, his bearing, and the mystery

Of his arrival and the time; the account, too,
The intendant gave (for I have not beheld her)
Of his wife's dignified but foreign aspect :
Besides the antipathy with which we met,

As snakes and lions shrink back from each other
By secret instinct that both must be foes
Deadly, without being natural prey to either;
All-all-confirm it to my mind: however,
We'll grapple, ne'ertheless. In a few hours
The order comes from Frankfort, if these waters
Rise not the higher (and the weather favours
Their quick abatement), and I'll have him safe
Within a dungeon, where he may avouch

His real estate and name; and there 's no harm done,
Should he prove other than I deem. This robbery
(Save for the actual loss) is lucky also:

He's poor, and that 's suspicious--he's unknown,