tfERNEE. 549
ACT 1.
SCENE I.
The Hall of a decayed Palace t near a small tenon, onthe northern frontier of Silesia—the night tem-pestuous.
WEBNEB and JOSEPHINE, his wife.
Jos. My love, be calmer!
Wer. I am calm.
Jos. To me—
Yes, but not to thyself: thy pace is hurried,
And no one walks a chamber like to oursWith steps like thine when his heart is at rest.Were it a garden, I should deem thee happy,
And stepping with thjB bee from flower to flower;But here!
Wer. ’Tis chill; the tapestry lets throughThe wind to which it waves ; my blood is frozen.Jos. Ah, no!
Wer. (smiling). Why! wouldst thou have it so ?Jos. I would
Have it a healthful current.
Wer. Let it flow
Until ’tis spilt or check’d—how soon I care not.Jos. And am I nothing in tliy heart ?
Wer. All—all.
Jos. Then canst thou wish for that which mustbreak mine ?
Wer. ( approaching her slowly). But for thee Ihad been—no matter what,
But much of good and evil: what I amThou knowest; what I might or should havebeen,
‘Thou knowest not: but still I love thee, norShall aught divide us.
[Werner walks oil abruptly, and then ap-proaches Josephine.
The storm of the nightPerhaps affects me ,* I’zn a thing of feelings,
And have of late been sickly, as, alas!
Thou kuow'st by sufferings more than mine, mylove!
In watching me.
Jos. To see thee well is much—
To sec thee happy-
Wer. Where hast thou seen such ?
Let me be wretched with the rest!
Jos. But think
How many in this hour of tempest shiverBeneath the biting wind and heavy rain.
Whose every drop bows them down nearer earth,Which hath no chamber for them save beneathHer surface.
Wer. And that’s not the worst; who caresFor c ham bers ? rest is all. The wretches whomThou namest—ay, the wind howls round them,and
The dull and dropping rain saps in tlieir bonesThe creeping marrow. I have been a soldier,
A hunter, and a traveller, and amA beggar, and should know the thing thoutalk st of.
Jos. And art thou not now shelter d from themall? ,
Wer. Yes. And from these alone.
jos. And that is something.
Wer. True—to a peasant.
Jos. Should the nobly born
Be thankless for that refuge which their habitsOf early delicacy render more
Needful than to the peasant, when the ebbOf fortune leaves them on the shoals of- life ?
Wer. It is not that, theu kuow’st it is not; weHave borne all this, IT1 not say patiently,
Except in thee; but we have borne it.
Jos. , Well ?
Wer. Something beyond our outward sufferings
(though
These were enough to gnaw into our souls)
Hath stung me oft, and, more than ever, note.When, but for this untoward sickness, whichSeized me upon this desolate frontier, andHath wasted, not alone my strength, but means,And leaves us—no! this is beyond me I—butFor this I had been happy, thou been happy—
The splendour of my rank sustain’d, my name,
My father’s name, been still upheld; and, moreThan those-
Jos. (abruptly). My son—our son—our Ulric,Been clasp’d again in these long-empty arms,
And all a mother’s hunger satisfied.
Twelve years ! he was but eight then: beautifulHe was, and beautiful Jie must be now,
My Ulric! iny adored !
Wer. I have been full oft
The chase of Fortune; now she hath o’ertakenMy spirit where it cannot turn at bay,
Sick, poor, and lonely.
Jos. Lonely! my dear husband ?
Wer. Or worse; involving all I love, in thisFar worse than solitude. Alone, 1 had died,
And ail been over in a nameless grave.
Jos. And I had not outlived thee; but praylake
Comfort 1 We have struggled long; and theywho strive
With Fortune win or weary her at last,
So that they find the goal or cease to feelFurther. Take comfort; we shall find our boy,Wer. We were in sight of him, of everythingWhich could bring compensation for past sorrow—And to be baffled thus!
Jos. We are not baffled.
Wer. Arc we not penniless ?
Jos. We ne’er were wealthy.
Wer. But I was born to wealth, and rank, andpower;
Enjoy’d them, loved them, and, alas! abusedthem,
And forfeited them by my father’s wrath,
In my o’er-fervent youth: but for the abuseLoug sufferings have atoned. My father’s deathLeft the path open, yet not without snares.
This cold and creeping kinsman, who so longKept liis eye upon me, as the shake uponThe fluttering bird, hath ere this time outsteptme,
Become the master of my rights, and lordOf that which lifts him up to princes inDominion and domain.
Joe. Who knows? our son
May have return’d hack to his grandsire, andEven now uphold thy rights for thee ?
Wer. 'Tis hopeless.
Since his strange disappearance from my father’s,Entailing, as it were, my sins uponHimself, no tidings have reveal d his course.
I parted with him to his grandsire, onThe promise that his anger would stop shortOf the third generation: but Heaven seemsTo claim her stern prerogative, and visitUpon my boy bis father’s faults and follies.