JOACHIM, JABEL, _and_ AMARANTHA, _children of_ MATILDA, _by_ ROGERO. _Children of_ CASIMERE _and_ CECILIA, _with their respective Nurses_. Several Children; Fathers and Mothers unknown. THE SCENE LIES IN THE TOWN OF WEIMAR, AND THE NEIGHBOURHOOD OF THE ABBEY OF QUEDLINBURGH. _Time, from the Twelfth to the present Century._ PROLOGUE. (_In character._) Too long the triumphs of our early times, With civil discord, and with regal crimes, Have stain'd these boards; while Shakespeare's pen has shown Thoughts, manners, men, to modern days unknown. Too long have Rome and Athens been the rage; [_Applause._ And classic buskins soil'd a British stage. To-night our bard, who scorns pedantic rules, His plot has borrow'd from the German schools; --The German schools--where no dull maxims bind The bold expansion of the electric mind. Fix'd to no period, circled by no space, He leaps the flaming bounds of time and place: Round the dark confines of the forest raves, With _gentle_ robbers[204] stocks his gloomy caves; Tells how prime ministers[205] are shocking things, And _reigning dukes_ as bad as tyrant kings; How to _two_ swains[206] _one_ nymph her vows may give, And how _two_ damsels with _one_ lover live! Delicious scenes!--such scenes _our_ bard displays, Which, crown'd with German, sue for British, praise. Slow are the steeds, that through Germania's roads With hempen rein the slumbering post-boy goads; Slow is the slumbering post-boy, who proceeds Through deep sands floundering, on those tardy steeds; More slow, more tedious, from his husky throat Twangs through the twisted horn the struggling note. These truths confess'd--Oh! yet, ye travell'd few, Germania's _plays_ with eyes unjaundiced view! View and approve!--though in each passage fine The faint translation[207] mock the genuine line; Though the nice ear the erring sight belie, For _U twice dotted_ is pronounced like _I_; [_Applause._ Yet oft the scene shall Nature's fire impart, Warm _from_ the breast, and glowing _to_ the heart! Ye travell'd few, attend! On _you_ our bard Builds his fond hope! Do you his genius guard! [_Applause._ Nor let succeeding generations say-- A British audience _damn'd_ a German play. [_Loud and continued applauses._ [_Flash of lightning_.--_The ghost of_ PROLOGUE'S GRANDMOTHER, _by the father's side, appears to soft music, in a white tiffany riding-hood_. PROLOGUE _kneels to receive her blessing, which she gives in a solemn and affecting manner, the audience clapping and crying all the while_.--_Flash of lightning_.--PROLOGUE _and his_ GRANDMOTHER _sink through the trap-door_. * * * * * ACT I.--SCENE I.