The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries - LightNovelsOnl.com
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NEUBR.
So much as she has suffer'd too already; Your tender mother--Ah! how ill prepared For this last anguis.h.!.+
THEKLA.
Woe is me! my mother!
_[Pauses.]_
Go instantly.
NEUBRUNN.
But think what you are doing!
THEKLA.
What _can_ be thought, already has been thought.
NEUBR.
And being there, what purpose you to do?
THEKLA.
There a Divinity will prompt my soul.
NEUBR.
Your heart, dear lady, is disquieted!
And this is not the way that leads to quiet.
THEKLA.
To a deep quiet, such as he has found.
It draws me on, I know not what to name it, Resistless does it draw me to his grave.
There will my heart be eased, my tears will flow.
O hasten, make no further questioning!
There is no rest for me till I have left These walls--they fall in on me--a dim power Drives me from hence--Oh mercy! What a feeling!
What pale and hollow forms are those! They fill, They crowd the place! I have no longer room here!
Mercy! Still more! More still! The hideous swarm, They press on me; they chase me from these walls-- Those hollow, bodiless forms of living men!
NEUBR.
You frighten me so, lady, that no longer I dare stay here myself. I go and call Rosenberg instantly. [Exit LADY NEUBRUNN.]
SCENE XII
THEKLA.
His spirit 'tis that calls me: 'tis the troop Of his true followers, who offer'd up Themselves to avenge his death: and they accuse me Of an ign.o.ble loitering--_they_ would not Forsake their leader even in his death--_they_ died for him, And shall I live?-- For me too was that laurel-garland twined That decks his bier. Life is an empty casket.
I throw it from me. O! my only hope To die beneath the hoofs of trampling steeds-- That is the lot of heroes upon earth!
[_Exit_ THEKLA.[33]]
[_The Curtain drops._]
SCENE XIII
THEKLA, LADY NEUBRUNN, _and_ ROSENBERG
NEUBR.
He is here lady, and he will procure them.
THEKLA.
Wilt thou provide us horses, Rosenberg?
ROSENB.
I will, my lady.
THEKLA.
And go with us as well?
ROSENB.
To the world's end, my lady.
THEKLA.
But consider, Thou never canst return unto the Duke.
ROSENB.
I will remain with thee.
THEKLA.
I will reward thee, And will commend thee to another master, Canst thou unseen conduct us from the castle?
ROSENB.
