The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Volume 04

SCENE VI

An officer enters. The others as before.

OFFICER. My lord, the Prince will instantly appear.ELECTOR. Good, then! Let him come in.OFFICER. Two minutes, sir!  He but delayed a moment on the way  To beg a porter ope the graveyard gate.ELECTOR. The graveyard?OFFICER. Ay, my sovereign.ELECTOR. But why?OFFICER. To tell the truth, my lord, I do not know.  It seemed he wished to see the burial-vault  That your behest uncovered for him there.

[The commanders group themselves and talk together.]

ELECTOR. No matter! When he comes, let him come in!

[He steps to the table again and glances at the papers.]

TRUCHSZ. The watch is bringing in Prince Homburg now.

SCENE VII

Enter the PRINCE OF HOMBURG. An officer and the watch. The others as before.

ELECTOR. Young Prince of mine, I call you to my aid!  Here's Colonel Kottwitz brings this document  In your behalf, look, in long column signed  By hundred honorable gentlemen.  The army asks your liberty, it runs,  And will not tolerate the court's decree.  Come, read it and inform yourself, I beg.

[He hands him the paper.]

THE PRINCE (casts a glance at the document, turns and  looks about the circle of officers).  Kottwitz, old friend, come, let me clasp your hand!  You give me more than on the day of battle  I merited of you. But now, post-haste,  Go, back again to Arnstein whence you came,  Nor budge at all. I have considered it;  The death decreed to me I will accept!

[He hands over the paper to him.]

KOTTWITZ (distressed).  No, nevermore, my Prince! What are you saying?HOHENZOLL. He wants to die—TRUCHSZ. He shall not, must not die!VARIOUS OFFICERS (pressing forward).  My lord Elector! Oh, my sovereign! Hear us!THE PRINCE. Hush! It is my inflexible desire!  Before the eyes of all the soldiery  I wronged the holy code of war; and now  By my free death I wish to glorify it.  My brothers, what's the one poor victory  I yet may snatch from Wrangel worth to you  Against the triumph o'er the balefullest  Of foes within, that I achieve at dawn—  The insolent and disobedient heart.  Now shall the alien, seeking to bow down  Our shoulders 'neath his yoke, be crushed; and, free,  The man of Brandenburg shall take his stand  Upon the mother soil, for it is his—  The splendor of her meads alone for him!KOTTWITZ (moved).  My son! My dearest friend! What shall I name you?TRUCHSZ. God of the world!KOTTWITZ. Oh, let me kiss your hand!

[They press round him.]

THE PRINCE (turning toward the ELECTOR).  But you, my liege, who bore in other days  A tenderer name I may no longer speak,  Before your feet, stirred to my soul, I kneel.  Forgive, that with a zeal too swift of foot  I served your cause on that decisive day;  Death now shall wash me clean of all my guilt.  But give my heart, that bows to your decree,  Serene and reconciled, this comfort yet:  To know your breast resigns all bitterness—  And, in the hour of parting, as a proof,  One favor more, compassionately grant.ELECTOR. Young hero, speak! What is it you desire?  I pledge my word to you, my knightly honor,  It shall be granted you, whate'er it be!THE PRINCE. Not with your niece's hand, my sovereign,  Purchase the peace of Gustaf Karl! Expel,  Out of the camp, expel the bargainer  Who made this ignominious overture.  Write your response to him in cannon-shots!ELECTOR (kissing his brow).  As you desire then. With this kiss, my son,  That last appeal I grant. Indeed, wherein  Now have we need of such a sacrifice  That war's ill-fortune only could compel?  Why, in each word that you have spoken, buds  A victory that strikes the foeman low!  I'll write to him, the plighted bride is she  Of Homburg, dead because of Fehrbellin;  With his pale ghost, before our flags a-charge,  Let him do battle for her, on the field!

[He kisses him again and draws him to his feet.]

THE PRINCE. Behold, now have you given me life indeed!  Now every blessing on you I implore  That from their cloudy thrones the seraphim  Pour forth exultant over hero-heads.  Go, and make war, and conquer, oh, my liege,  The world that fronts you—for you merit it!ELECTOR. Guards! Lead the prisoner back to his cell!

SCENE VIII

NATALIE and the ELECTRESS appear in the doorway, followed by ladies-in-waiting. The others as before.

NATALIE. Mother! Decorum! Can you speak that word?  In such an hour there's none but just to love him—  My dear, unhappy love!THE PRINCE (turning). Now I shall go!TRUCHSZ (holding him).  No, nevermore, my Prince!

[Several officers step in his way.]

THE PRINCE. Take me away!HOHENZOLL. Liege, can your heart—THE PRINCE (tearing himself free).                                    You tyrants, would you drag me  In fetters to my execution-place?  Go! I have closed my reckoning with this world.

[He goes out under guard.]

NATALIE (on the ELECTRESS' breast).  Open, O earth, receive me in your deeps.  Why should I look upon the sunlight more?

SCENE IX

The persons, as in the preceding scene, with the exception of the PRINCE OF HOMBURG.

MARSHAL. God of earth! Did it have to come to that?

[The ELECTOR speaks in a low voice to an officer.]

KOTTWITZ (frigidly).  My sovereign, after all that has occurred  Are we dismissed?ELECTOR. Not for the present, no!  I'll give you notice when you are dismissed!

[He regards him a moment straightly and steadily; then takes the papers which the page has brought him from the table and turns to the FIELD-MARSHAL.]

  This passport, take it, for Count Horn the Swede.  Tell him it is my cousin's wish, the Prince's,  Which I have pledged myself to carry out.  The war begins again in three days' time!

[Pause. He casts a glance at the death warrant.]

  Judge for yourselves, my lords. The Prince of Homburg  Through disobedience and recklessness  Of two of my best victories this year  Deprived me, and indeed impaired the third.  Now that he's had his schooling these last days  Come, will you risk it with him for a fourth?KOTTWITZ and TRUCHSZ (helter-skelter).  What, my adored—my worshipped—What, my liege?—ELECTOR. Will you? Will you?KOTTWITZ. Now, by the living God,  He'd watch you standing on destruction's brink  And never twitch his sword in your behalf,  Or rescue you unless you gave command.ELECTOR (tearing up the death warrant).  So, to the garden! Follow me, my friends!

SCENE X

The Castle with the terrace leading down into the garden, as in ACT I. It is night, as then.—The PRINCE OF HOMBURG, with bandaged eyes, is led in through the lower garden-wicket, by CAPTAIN STRANZ. Officers with the guard. In the distance one can hear the drumming of the death-march.

THE PRINCE. All art thou mine now, immortality!  Thou glistenest through the veil that blinds mine eyes  With that sun's glow that is a thousand suns.  I feel bright pinions from my shoulders start;  Through mute, ethereal spaces wings my soul;  And as the ship, borne outward by the wind,  Sees the bright harbor sink below the marge,  Thus all my being fades and is submerged.  Now I distinguish colors yet and forms,  And now—all life is fog beneath my feet.

[The PRINCE seats himself on the bench which stands about the oak in the middle of the open space. The CAPTAIN draws away from him and looks up toward the terrace.]

  How sweet the flowers fill the air with odor!  D'you smell them?STRANZ (returning to him). They are gillyflowers and pinks.THE PRINCE. How come the gillyflowers here?STRANZ. I know not.  It must have been some girl that planted them.  Come, will you have a bachelor's button?THE PRINCE. Thanks!  When I get home I'll have it put in water.

SCENE XI

The ELECTOR with the laurel-wreath, about which the golden chain is twined, the ELECTRESS, PRINCESS NATALIE, FIELD-MARSHAL DÖRFLING, COLONEL KOTTWITZ, HOHENZOLLERN, GOLZ, and others. Ladies-in-waiting, officers and boys bearing torches appear on the castle terrace. HOHENZOLLERN steps to the balustrade and with a handkerchief signals to CAPTAIN STRANZ, whereupon the latter leaves the PRINCE OF HOMBURG and speaks a few words with the guards in the background.

THE PRINCE. What is the brightness breaking round me, say!STRANZ (returning to him).  My Prince, will you be good enough to rise?THE PRINCE. What's coming?STRANZ. Nothing that need wake your fear.  I only wish to free your eyes again.THE PRINCE. Has my ordeal's final hour struck?STRANZ (as he draws the bandage from the PRINCE's eyes).  Indeed! Be blest, for well you merit it!

[The ELECTOR gives the wreath, from which the chain is hanging, to the PRINCESS, takes her hand and leads her down from the terrace. Ladies and gentlemen follow. Surrounded by torches, the PRINCESS approaches the PRINCE, who looks up in amazement; sets the wreath on his head, the chain about his neck and presses his hand to her breast. The PRINCE tumbles in a faint.]

NATALIE. Heaven! The joy has killed him!HOHENZOLLERN (raising him). Help, bring help!ELECTOR. Let him be wakened by the cannons' thunder!

[Artillery fire. A march. The Castle is illuminated.]

KOTTWITZ. Hail, hail, the Prince of Homburg!OFFICERS. Hail, hail, hail!ALL. The victor of the field of Fehrbellin!

[Momentary silence.]

THE PRINCE. No! Say! Is it a dream?KOTTWITZ. A dream, what else?SEVERAL OFFICERS. To arms! to arms!TRUCHSZ. To war!DÖRFLING. To victory!ALL. In dust with all the foes of Brandenburg!

1

Permission Porter & Coates, Philadelphia.

2

Permission Porter & Coates, Philadelphia.

3

Ten o'clock.

4

Of Jupiter Tonans.

5

The body in the Pantheon, the head in Saint Luke's church.

6

Strassburg.

7

The hall of the Pantheon seems too low, because a part of its steps is hidden by the rubbish.

8

This opening in the roof is twenty-seven feet in diameter.

9

The Pole-star, as well as other northern constellations, stands lower in the south.

10

The German texts read: Reben, vines. But the conjecture Raben as the correct reading may be permitted.—ED.

11

Permission The Macmillan Co., New York, and G. Bell & Sons, Ltd., London.

12

This appropriate expression was, if we mistake not, first used by M. Adam Müller in his Lectures on German Science and Literature. If, however, he gives himself out as the inventor of the thing itself, he is, to use the softest word, in error. Long before him other Germans had endeavored to reconcile the contrarieties of taste of different ages and nations, and to pay due homage to all genuine poetry and art. Between good and bad, it is true, no reconciliation is possible.

13

This difficulty extends also to France; for it must not be supposed that a literal translation can ever be a faithful one. Mrs. Montague has done enough to prove how wretchedly even Voltaire, in his rhymeless Alexandrines, has translated a few passages from Hamlet and the first act of Julius Cæsar.

14

It begins with the words: A mind reflecting ages past, and is subscribed I.M.S.

15

Lessing was the first to speak of Shakespeare in a becoming tone; but he said, unfortunately, a great deal too little of him, as in the time when he wrote the Dramaturgie this poet had not yet appeared on our stage. Since that time he has been more particularly noticed by Herder in the Blätter von deutscher Art und Kunst; Goethe, in Wilhelm Meister; and Tieck, in "Letters on Shakespeare" (Poetisches Journal, 1800), which break off, however, almost at the commencement.

16

The English work with which foreigners of every country are perhaps best acquainted is Hume's History; and there we have a most unjustifiable account both of Shakespeare and his age. "Born in a rude age, and educated in the lowest manner, without any instruction either from the world or from books." How could a man of Hume's acuteness suppose for a moment that a poet, whose characters display such an intimate acquaintance with life, who, as an actor and manager of a theatre, must have come in contact with all descriptions of individuals, had no instruction from the world? But this is not the worst; he goes even so far as to say, "a reasonable propriety of thought he cannot for any time uphold." This is nearly as offensive as Voltaire's "drunken savage."—TRANS.

17

In my lectures on The Spirit of the Age.

  O, for my sake do you with fortune chide    The guilty goddess of my harmless deeds,  That did not better for my life provide    Than public means which public manners breeds.

And in the following:

Your love and pity doth the impression fill, which vulgar scandal stamp'd upon my brow.]

18

In one of his sonnets he says:

19

  And make those flights upon the banks of Thames,  That so did take Eliza and our James!

20

This is perhaps not uncommon still in some countries.

The Venetian Director Medebach, for whose company many of Goldoni's Comedies were composed, claimed an exclusive right to them.—TRANS.

21

Twelfth Night, or What You Will—Act iii., scene 2.

22

As You Like It.

23

In one of the commendatory poems in the first folio edition:

  And on the stage at half sword parley were  Brutus and Cassius.

24

In the first volume of Charakteristiken und Kritiken, published by my brother and myself.

25

A contemporary of the poet, the author of the already-noticed poem, (subscribed I.M.S.), tenderly felt this when he said:

  Yet so to temper passion that our ears  Take pleasure in their pain, and eyes in tears  Both smile and weep.

26

In Hamlet's directions to the players. Act iii., scene 2.

27

See Hamlet's praise of Yorick. In Twelfth Night, Viola says:

  This fellow is wise enough to play the fool,  And to do that well craves a kind of wit;  He must observe their mood on whom he jests,  The quality of the persons, and the time;  And like the haggard, check at every feather  That comes before his eye. This is a practice  As full of labor as a wise man's art:  For folly that he wisely shows is fit,  But wise men's folly fall'n quite taints their wit.—AUTHOR.

The passages from Shakespeare, in the original work, are given from the author's masterly translation. We may be allowed, however, to observe that the last line—

"Doch wozu ist des Weisen Thorheit nutz?"

literally, Of what use is the folly of the wise?—does not convey the exact meaning of Shakespeare.—TRANS.

28

"Since the little wit that fools have was silenced, the little foolery that wise men have makes a greater show."—As You Like It, Act I, scene 2.

29

Charles the Bold, of Burgundy, is known to have frequently boasted that he wished to rival Hannibal as the greatest general of all ages. After his defeat at Granson, his fool accompanied him in his hurried flight, and exclaimed, "Ah, your Grace, they have for once Hanniballed us!" If the Duke had given an ear to this warning raillery, he would not so soon afterward have come to a disgraceful end.

30

I shall take the opportunity of saying a few words respecting this species of drama when I come to speak of Ben Jonson.

31

Here follows, in the original, a so-called "Allegory of Impudence."—TRANSLATOR'S NOTE.

32

Here follows in the original a biographic sketch called "Apprenticeship of Manhood."—TRANSLATOR'S NOTE.

33

Permission Porter & Coates, Philadelphia.

34

Translator: Charles Wharton Stork. From Spiritual Songs (1799).

35

Translator: Charles Wharton Stork. From Spiritual Songs (1799).

36

Translator: Charles Wharton Stork.

37

Permission Porter & Coates, Philadelphia.