_Countess._ Enjoy your fortune and felicity! Forget the world around you. Meantime, friendship Shall keep strict vigils for you, anxious, active. 65 Only be manageable when that friendship Points you the road to full accomplishment. How long may it be since you declared your passion? _Max._ This morning did I hazard the first word. _Countess._ This morning the first time in twenty days? 70 _Max._ 'Twas at that hunting-castle, betwixt here And Nepomuck, where you had joined us, and-- That was the last relay of the whole journey! In a balcony we were standing mute, And gazing out upon the dreary field: 75 Before us the dragoons were riding onward, The safe-guard which the Duke had sent us--heavy The inquietude of parting lay upon me, And trembling ventured I at length these words: This all reminds me, noble maiden, that 80 To-day I must take leave of my good fortune. A few hours more, and you will find a father, Will see yourself surrounded by new friends, And I henceforth shall be but as a stranger, Lost in the many--'Speak with my aunt Tertsky!' 85 With hurrying voice she interrupted me. She faltered. I beheld a glowing red Possess her beautiful cheeks, and from the ground Raised slowly up her eye met mine--no longer Did I control myself. [_The PRINCESS THEKLA appears at the door, and remains standing, observed by the COUNTESS, but not by PICCOLOMINI._ With instant boldness 90 I caught her in my arms, my mouth touched hers; There was a rustling in the room close by; It parted us--'Twas you. What since has happened, You know. _Countess._ And is it your excess of modesty; Or are you so incurious, that you do not 95 Ask me too of my secret? _Max._ Of your secret? _Countess._ Why, yes! When in the instant after you I stepped into the room, and found my niece there, What she in this first moment of the heart Ta'en with surprise-- _Max._ Well? 100 FOOTNOTES: [642:1] All this is terribly childish, at least appears so to an _English_ lover. Besides it is modern French Comedy--for which, by the by, we want a word to distinguish it from the _toto caelo_ different Comedy which Shakespere and his contemporaries worked up into their Tragedy with such felicity of action and reaction. _MS. R_. [644:1] I am doubtful whether this be the dedication of the cloister or the name of one of the city gates, near which it stood. I have translated it in the former sense; but fearful of having made some blunder, I add the original--Es ist ein Kloster hier _zur Himmelspforte_. LINENOTES: _Max (peeping in on the stage shyly)._ 1800, 1828, 1829. [7] thanks] thank 1800, 1828, 1829.