[Footnote 32: This soliloquy, which, according to the former arrangement; constituted the whole of Scene IX., and concluded the Fourth Act, is omitted in all the printed German editions. It seems probable that it existed in the original manuscript from which Mr. Coleridge translated.--Ed.] [Footnote 33: The soliloquy of Thekla consists in the original of six-and-twenty lines, twenty of which are in rhymes of irregular recurrence. I thought it prudent to abridge it. Indeed the whole scene between Thekla and Lady Neubrunn might, perhaps have been omitted without injury to the play.--C.] [Footnote 34: These four lines are expressed in the original with exquisite felicity-- Am Himmel ist geschäftige Bewegung. Des Thurmes Fahne jagt der Wind, schnell geht Der Wolken Zug, die _Mondessichel wankt_, Und durch die Nacht zuckt ungewisse Helle. The word "moon-sickle," reminds me of a passage in Harris, as quoted by Johnson, under the word "falcated." "The enlightened part of the moon appears in the form of a sickle or reaping-hook, which is while she is moving from the conjunction to the opposition, or from the new moon to the full: but from full to a new again, the enlightened part appears gibbous, and the dark _falcated_." The words "wanken" and "schweben" are not easily translated. The English words, by which we attempt to render them, are either vulgar or pedantic, or not of sufficiently general application. So "der Wolken Zug"--literally, The Draft, the Procession of clouds; freely--The Masses of the Clouds sweep onward in swift _stream_.] [Footnote 35: A very inadequate translation of the original-- Verschmerzen werd' ich diesen Schlag, das weiss ich, Denn was verschmerzte nicht der Mensch! LITERALLY. I shall _grieve down_ this blow, of that I'm conscious: What does not man grieve down?] * * * * * INTRODUCTION TO WILLIAM TELL BY WILLIAM H. CARRUTH, PH.D. Professor of Comparative Literature, Leland Stanford University