C. Wal. I tell you, monk, if she were not healthier by God's making than ever she will be by yours, her charity would be by this time double-distilled selfishness; the mouths she fed, cupboards to store good works in; the backs she warmed, clothes-horses to hang out her wares before God; her alms not given, but fairly paid, a halfpenny for every halfpenny-worth of eternal life; earth her chess-board, and the men and women on it merely pawns for her to play a winning game—puppets and horn-books to teach her unit holiness—a private workshop in which to work out her own salvation. Out upon such charity!

Con. God hath appointed that our virtuous deeds Each merit their rewards.

C. Wal. Go to—go to. I have watched you and your crew, how you preach up selfish ambition for divine charity and call prurient longings celestial love, while you blaspheme that very marriage from whose mysteries you borrow all your cant. The day will come when every husband and father will hunt you down like vermin; and may I live to see it.

Con. Out on thee, heretic!

C. Wal. [drawing]. Liar! At last?

C. Pama. In God's name, sir, what if the Princess find us?

C. Wal. Ay—for her sake. But put that name on me again, as you do on every good Catholic who will not be your slave and puppet, and if thou goest home with ears and nose, there is no hot blood in Germany.

[They move towards the cottage.]

Con. [alone]. Were I as once I was, I could revenge: But now all private grudges wane like mist In the keen sunlight of my full intent; And this man counts but for some sullen bull Who paws and mutters at unheeding pilgrims His empty wrath: yet let him bar my path, Or stay me but one hour in my life-purpose, And I will fell him as a savage beast, God's foe, not mine. Beware thyself, Sir Count!

[Exit. The Counts return from the Cottage.]

C. Pama. Shortly she will return; here to expect her Is duty both, and honour. Pardon me— Her humours are well known here? Passers by Will guess who 'tis we visit?

C. Wal. Very likely.

C. Pama. Well, travellers see strange things—and do them too. Hem! this turf-smoke affects my breath: we might Draw back a space.

C. Wal. Certie, we were in luck, Or both our noses would have been snapped off By those two she-dragons; how their sainthoods squealed To see a brace of beards peep in! Poor child! Two sweet companions for her loneliness!

C. Pama. But ah! what lodging! 'Tis at that my heart bleeds! That hut, whose rough and smoke-embrowned spars Dip to the cold clay floor on either side! Her seats bare deal!—her only furniture Some earthen crock or two! Why, sir, a dungeon Were scarce more frightful: such a choice must argue Aberrant senses, or degenerate blood!

C. Wal. What? Were things foul?

C. Pama. I marked not, sir.

C. Wal. I did. You might have eat your dinner off the floor.

C. Pama. Off any spot, sir, which a princess' foot Had hallowed by its touch.

C. Wal. Most courtierly. Keep, keep those sweet saws for the lady's self. [Aside] Unless that shock of the nerves shall send them flying.

C. Pama. Yet whence this depth of poverty? I thought You and her champions had recovered for her Her lands and titles.

C. Wal. Ay; that coward Henry Gave them all back as lightly as he took them: Certie, we were four gentle applicants— And Rudolph told him some unwelcome truths— Would God that all of us might hear our sins, As Henry heard that day!

C. Pama. Then she refused them?

C. Wal. 'It ill befits,' quoth she, 'my royal blood, To take extorted gifts; I tender back By you to him, for this his mortal life, That which he thinks by treason cheaply bought; To which my son shall, in his father's right, By God's good will, succeed. For that dread height May Christ by many woes prepare his youth!'

C. Pama. Humph!

C. Wal. Why here—no, 't cannot be—

C. Pama. What hither comes Forth from the hospital, where, as they told us, The Princess labours in her holy duties? A parti-coloured ghost that stalks for penance? Ah! a good head of hair, if she had kept it A thought less lank; a handsome face too, trust me, But worn to fiddle-strings; well, we'll be knightly—

[As Elizabeth meets him.]

Stop, my fair queen of rags and patches, turn Those solemn eyes a moment from your distaff, And say, what tidings your magnificence Can bring us of the Princess?

Eliz. I am she.

[Count Pama crosses himself and falls on his knees.]

C. Pama. O blessed saints and martyrs! Open, earth! And hide my recreant knighthood in thy gulf! Yet, mercy, Madam! for till this strange day Who e'er saw spinning wool, like village-maid, A royal scion?

C. Wal. [kneeling]. My beloved mistress!

Eliz. Ah! faithful friend! Rise, gentles, rise, for shame; Nay, blush not, gallant sir. You have seen, ere now, Kings' daughters do worse things than spinning wool, Yet never reddened. Speak your errand out.

C. Pama. I from your father, Madam—

Eliz. Oh! I divine; And grieve that you so far have journeyed, sir, Upon a bootless quest.

C. Pama. But hear me, Madam— If you return with me (o'erwhelming honour! For such mean bodyguard too precious treasure) Your father offers to you half his wealth; And countless hosts, whose swift and loyal blades From traitorous grasp shall vindicate your crown.

Eliz. Wealth? I have proved it, and have tossed it from me: I will not stoop again to load with clay. War? I have proved that too: should I turn loose On these poor sheep the wolf whose fangs have gored me, God's bolt would smite me dead.

C. Pama. Madam, by his gray hairs he doth entreat you.

Eliz. Alas! small comfort would they find in me! I am a stricken and most luckless deer, Whose bleeding track but draws the hounds of wrath Where'er I pause a moment. He has children Bred at his side, to nurse him in his age— While I am but an alien and a changeling, Whom, ere my plastic sense could impress take Either of his feature or his voice, he lost.

C. Pama. Is it so? Then pardon, Madam, but your father Must by a father's right command—

Eliz. Command! Ay, that's the phrase of the world: well—tell him, But tell him gently too—that child and father Are names, whose earthly sense I have forsworn, And know no more: I have a heavenly spouse, Whose service doth all other claims annul.

C. Wal. Ah, lady, dearest lady, be but ruled! Your Saviour will be there as near as here.

Eliz. What? Thou too, friend? Dost thou not know me better? Wouldst have me leave undone what I begin? [To Count Pama] My father took the cross, sir: so did I: As he would die at his post, so will I die: He is a warrior: ask him, should I leave This my safe fort, and well-proved vantage-ground, To roam on this world's flat and fenceless steppes?

C. Pama. Pardon me, Madam, if my grosser wit Fail to conceive your sense.

Eliz. It is not needed. Be but the mouthpiece to my father, sir; And tell him—for I would not anger him— Tell him, I am content—say, happy—tell him I prove my kin by prayers for him, and masses For her who bore me. We shall meet on high. And say, his daughter is a mighty tree, From whose wide roots a thousand sapling suckers, Drink half their life; she dare not snap the threads, And let her offshoots wither. So farewell. Within the convent there, as mine own guests, You shall be fitly lodged. Come here no more.

C. Wal. C. Pama. Farewell, sweet Saint! [Exeunt.]

Eliz. May God go with you both. No! I will win for him a nobler name, Than captive crescents, piles of turbaned heads, Or towns retaken from the Tartar, give. In me he shall be greatest; my report Shall through the ages win the quires of heaven To love and honour him; and hinds, who bless The poor man's patron saint, shall not forget How she was fathered with a worthy sire. [Exit.]

SCENE III

Night. Interior of Elizabeth's hut. A leprous boy sleeping on a Mattress. Elizabeth watching by him.]

Eliz. My shrunk limbs, stiff from many a blow, Are crazed with pain. A long dim formless fog-bank, creeping low, Dulls all my brain.

I remember two young lovers, In a golden gleam. Across the brooding darkness shrieking hovers That fair, foul dream.

My little children call to me, 'Mother! so soon forgot?' From out dark nooks their yearning faces startle me, Go, babes! I know you not!

Pray! pray! or thou'lt go mad. . . . . . The past's our own: No fiend can take that from us! Ah, poor boy! Had I, like thee, been bred from my black birth-hour In filth and shame, counting the soulless months Only by some fresh ulcer! I'll be patient— Here's something yet more wretched than myself. Sleep thou on still, poor charge—though I'll not grudge One moment of my sickening toil about thee, Best counsellor—dumb preacher, who dost warn me How much I have enjoyed, how much have left, Which thou hast never known. How am I wretched? The happiness thou hast from me, is mine, And makes me happy. Ay, there lies the secret— Could we but crush that ever-craving lust For bliss, which kills all bliss, and lose our life, Our barren unit life, to find again A thousand lives in those for whom we die. So were we men and women, and should hold Our rightful rank in God's great universe, Wherein, in heaven and earth, by will or nature, Nought lives for self—All, all—from crown to footstool— The Lamb, before the world's foundations slain— The angels, ministers to God's elect— The sun, who only shines to light a world— The clouds, whose glory is to die in showers— The fleeting streams, who in their ocean-graves Flee the decay of stagnant self-content— The oak, ennobled by the shipwright's axe— The soil, which yields its marrow to the flower— The flower, which feeds a thousand velvet worms, Born only to be prey for every bird— All spend themselves for others: and shall man, Earth's rosy blossom—image of his God— Whose twofold being is the mystic knot Which couples earth and heaven—doubly bound As being both worm and angel, to that service By which both worms and angels hold their life— Shall he, whose every breath is debt on debt, Refuse, without some hope of further wage Which he calls Heaven, to be what God has made him? No! let him show himself the creature's lord By freewill gift of that self-sacrifice Which they perforce by nature's law must suffer. This too I had to learn (I thank thee, Lord!), To lie crushed down in darkness and the pit— To lose all heart and hope—and yet to work. What lesson could I draw from all my own woes— Ingratitude, oppression, widowhood— While I could hug myself in vain conceits Of self-contented sainthood—inward raptures— Celestial palms—and let ambition's gorge Taint heaven, as well as earth? Is selfishness For time, a sin—spun out to eternity Celestial prudence? Shame! Oh, thrust me forth, Forth, Lord, from self, until I toil and die No more for Heaven and bliss, but duty, Lord, Duty to Thee, although my meed should be The hell which I deserve!

[Sleeps.]

[Two women enter.]

1st Woman. What! snoring still? 'Tis nearly time to wake her To do her penance.

2d Woman. Wait a while, for love: Indeed, I am almost ashamed to punish A bag of skin and bones.

1st Woman. 'Tis for her good: She has had her share of pleasure in this life With her gay husband; she must have her pain. We bear it as a thing of course; we know What mortifications are, although I say it That should not.

2d Woman. Why, since my old tyrant died, Fasting I've sought the Lord, like any Anna, And never tasted fish, nor flesh, nor fowl, And little stronger than water.

1st Woman. Plague on this watching! What work, to make a saint of a fine lady! See now, if she had been some labourer's daughter, She might have saved herself, for aught he cared; But now—

2d Woman. Hush! here the master comes: I hear him.—

[Conrad enters.]

Con. My peace, most holy, wise, and watchful wardens! She sleeps? Well, what complaints have you to bring Since last we met? How? blowing up the fire? Cold is the true saint's element—he thrives Like Alpine gentians, where the frost is keenest— For there Heaven's nearest—and the ether purest— [Aside] And he most bitter.

2d Woman. Ah! sweet master, We are not yet as perfect as yourself.

Con. But how has she behaved?

1st Woman. Just like herself— Now ruffling up like any tourney queen; Now weeping in dark corners; then next minute Begging for penance on her knees.

2d Woman. One trick's cured; That lust of giving; Isentrude and Guta, The hussies, came here begging but yestreen, Vowed they were starving.

Con. Did she give to them?

2d Woman. She told them that she dared not.

Con. Good. For them, I will take measures that they shall not want: But see you tell her not: she must be perfect.

1st Woman. Indeed, there's not much chance of that a while. There's others, might be saints, if they were young, And handsome, and had titles to their names, If they were helped toward heaven, now—

Con. Silence, horse-skull! Thank God, that you are allowed to use a finger Towards building up His chosen tabernacle.

2d Woman. I consider that she blasphemes the means of grace.

Con. Eh? that's a point, indeed.

2d Woman. Why, yesterday, Within the church, before a mighty crowd, She mocked at all the lovely images, And said 'the money had been better spent On food and clothes, instead of paint and gilding: They were but pictures, whose reality We ought to bear within us.'

Con. Awful doctrine!

1st Woman. Look at her carelessness, again—the distaff Or woolcomb in her hands, even on her bed. Then, when the work is done, she lets those nuns Cheat her of half the price.

2d Woman. The Aldenburgers.

Con. Well, well, what more misdoings? [aside] Pah! I am sick on't. [Aloud] Go sit, and pray by her until she wakes.

]The women retire. Conrad sits down by the fire.]

I am dwindling to a peddling chamber-chaplain, Who hunts for crabs and ballads in maids' sleeves, I, who have shuffled kingdoms. Oh! 'tis easy To beget great deeds; but in the rearing of them— The threading in cold blood each mean detail, And furzebrake of half-pertinent circumstance— There lies the self-denial.

Women [in a low voice]. Master! sir! look here!

Eliz. [rising]. Have mercy, mercy, Lord!

Con. What is it, my daughter? No—she answers not— Her eyeballs through their sealed lids are bursting, And yet she sleeps: her body does but mimic The absent soul's enfranchised wanderings In the spirit-world.

Eliz. Oh! she was but a worldling! And think, good Lord, if that this world is hell, What wonder if poor souls whose lot is fixed here, Meshed down by custom, wealth, rank, pleasure, ignorance, Do hellish things in it? Have mercy, Lord; Even for my sake, and all my woes, have mercy!

Con. There! she is laid again—Some bedlam dream. So—here I sit; am I a guardian angel Watching by God's elect? or nightly tiger, Who waits upon a dainty point of honour To clutch his prey, till it shall wake and move? We'll waive that question: there's eternity To answer that in. How like a marble-carven nun she lies Who prays with folded palms upon her tomb, Until the resurrection! Fair and holy! O happy Lewis! Had I been a knight— A man at all—What's this? I must be brutal, Or I shall love her: and yet that's no safeguard; I have marked it oft: ay—with that devilish triumph Which eyes its victim's writhings, still will mingle A sympathetic thrill of lust—say, pity.

Eliz. [awaking]. I am heard! She is saved! Where am I? What! have I overslept myself? Oh, do not beat me! I will tell you all— I have had awful dreams of the other world.

1st Woman. Ay! ay! a fine excuse for lazy women, Who cry nightmare with lying on their backs.

Eliz. I will be heard! I am a prophetess! God hears me, why not ye?

Con. Quench not the Spirit: If He have spoken, daughter, we must listen.

Eliz. Methought from out the red and heaving earth My mother rose, whose broad and queenly limbs A fiery arrow did impale, and round Pursuing tongues oozed up of nether fire, And fastened on her: like a winter-blast Among the steeples, then she shrieked aloud, 'Pray for me, daughter; save me from this torment, For thou canst save!' And then she told a tale; It was not true—my mother was not such— O God! The pander to a brother's sin!

1st Woman. There now? The truth is out! I told you, sister, About that mother—

Con. Silence, hags! what then?

Eliz. She stretched her arms, and sank. Was it a sin To love that sinful mother? There I lay— And in the spirit far away I prayed; What words I spoke, I know not, nor how long; Until a small still voice sighed, 'Child, thou art heard:' Then on the pitchy dark a small bright cloud Shone out, and swelled, and neared, and grew to form, Till from it blazed my pardoned mother's face With nameless glory! Nearer still she pressed, And bent her lips to mine—a mighty spasm Ran crackling through my limbs, and thousand bells Rang in my dizzy ears—And so I woke.

Con. 'Twas but a dream.

Eliz. 'Twas more! 'twas more! I've tests: From youth I have lived in two alternate worlds, And night is live like day. This was no goblin! 'Twas a true vision, and my mother's soul Is freed by my poor prayers from penal files, And waits for me in bliss.

Con. Well—be it so then. Thou seest herein what prize obedience merits. Now to press forwards: I require your presence Within the square, at noon, to witness there The fiery doom—most just and righteous doom— Of two convicted and malignant heretics, Who at the stake shall expiate their crime, And pacify God's wrath against this land.

Eliz. No! no! I will not go!

Con. What's here? Thou wilt not? I'll drive thee there with blows.

Eliz. Then I will bear them, Even as I bore the last, with thankful thoughts Upon those stripes my Lord endured for me. Oh, spare them, sir! poor blindfold sons of men! No saint but daily errs,—and must they burn, Ah, God! for an opinion?

Con. Fool! opinions? Who cares for their opinions? 'Tis rebellion Against the system which upholds the world For which they die: so, lest the infection spread, We must cut off the members, whose disease We'd pardon, could they keep it to themselves.

[Elizabeth weeps.]

Well, I'll not urge it,—Thou hast other work— But for thy petulant words do thou this penance: I do forbid thee here, to give henceforth Food, coin, or clothes, to any living soul. Thy thriftless waste doth scandalise the elect, And maim thine usefulness: thou dost elude My wise restrictions still: 'Tis great, to live Poor, among riches; when thy wealth is spent, Want is not merit, but necessity.

Eliz. Oh, let me give! That only pleasure have I left on earth!

Con. And for that very cause thou must forego it, And so be perfect. She who lives in pleasure Is dead, while yet she lives; grace brings no merit When 'tis the express of our own self-will. To shrink from what we practise; do God's work In spite of loathings; that's the path of saints. I have said. [Exit with the women.]

Eliz. Well! I am freezing fast—I have grown of late Too weak to nurse my sick; and now this outlet, This one last thawing spring of fellow-feeling, Is choked with ice—Come, Lord, and set me free. Think me not hasty! measure not mine age, O Lord, by these my four-and-twenty winters. I have lived three lives—three lives. For fourteen years I was an idiot girl: Then I was born again; and for five years, I lived! I lived! and then I died once more;— One day when many knights came marching by, And stole away—we'll talk no more of that. And so these four years since, I have been dead, And all my life is hid with Christ in God. Nunc igitur dimittas, Domine, servam tuam.

SCENE IV

The same. Elizabeth lying on straw in a corner. A crowd of women round her. Conrad entering.

Con. As I expected— A sermon-mongering herd about her death-bed, Stifling her with fusty sighs, as flocks of rooks Despatch, with pious pecks, a wounded brother. Cant, howl, and whimper! Not an old fool in the town Who thinks herself religious, but must see The last of the show and mob the deer to death. [Advancing] Hail! holy ones! How fares your charge to-day?

Abbess. After the blessed sacrament received, As surfeited with those celestial viands, And with the blood of life intoxicate, She lay entranced: and only stirred at times To eructate sweet edifying doctrine Culled from your darling sermons.

Woman. Heavenly grace Imbues her so throughout, that even when pricked She feels no pain.

Con. A miracle, no doubt. Heaven's work is ripe, and like some more I know, Having begun in the spirit, in the flesh She's now made perfect: she hath had warnings, too, Of her decease; and prophesied to me, Three weeks ago, when I lay like to die, That I should see her in her coffin yet.

Abbess. 'Tis said, she heard in dreams her Saviour call her To mansions built for her from everlasting.

Con. Ay, so she said.

Abbess. But tell me, in her confession Was there no holy shame—no self-abhorrence For the vile pleasures of her carnal wedlock?

Con. She said no word thereon: as for her shrift, No Chrisom child could show a chart of thoughts More spotless than were hers.

Nun. Strange, she said nought; I had hoped she had grown more pure.

Con. When, next, I asked her, How she would be interred; 'In the vilest weeds,' Quoth she, 'my poor hut holds; I will not pamper When dead, that flesh, which living I despised. And for my wealth, see it to the last doit Bestowed upon the poor of Christ.'

2d Woman. O grace!

3d Woman. O soul to this world poor, but rich toward God!

Eliz. [awaking]. Hark! how they cry for bread! Poor souls! be patient! I have spent all— I'll sell myself for a slave—feed them with the price. Come, Guta! Nurse! We must be up and doing! Alas! they are gone, and begging! Go! go! They'll beat me, if I give you aught: I'll pray for you, and so you'll go to Heaven. I am a saint—God grants me all I ask. But I must love no creature. Why, Christ loved— Mary he loved, and Martha, and their brother— Three friends! and I have none! When Lazarus lay dead, He groaned in spirit, And wept—like any widow—Jesus wept! I'll weep, weep, weep! pray for that 'gift of tears.' They took my friends away, but not my eyes, Oh, husband, babes, friends, nurse! To die alone! Crack, frozen brain! Melt, icicle within!

Women. Alas! sweet saint! By bitter pangs she wins Her crown of endless glory!

Con. But she wins it! Stop that vile sobbing! she's unmanned enough Without your maudlin sympathy.

Eliz. What? weeping? Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for me— Weep for yourselves.

Women. We do, alas! we do! What are we without you? [A pause.]

Woman. Oh, listen, listen! What sweet sounds from her fast-closed lips are welling, As from the caverned shaft, deep miners' songs?

Eliz. [in a low voice]. Through the stifling room Floats strange perfume; Through the crumbling thatch The angels watch, Over the rotting roof-tree. They warble, and flutter, and hover, and glide, Wafting old sounds to my dreary bedside, Snatches of songs which I used to know When I slept by my nurse, and the swallows Called me at day-dawn from under the eaves. Hark to them! Hark to them now— Fluting like woodlarks, tender and low— Cool rustling leaves—tinkling waters— Sheepbells over the lea— In their silver plumes Eden-gales whisper— In their hands Eden-lilies—not for me—not for me— No crown for the poor fond bride! The song told me so, Long, long ago, How the maid chose the white lily; But the bride she chose The red red rose, And by its thorn died she. Well—in my Father's house are many mansions— I have trodden the waste howling ocean-foam, Till I stand upon Canaan's shore, Where Crusaders from Zion's towers call me home, To the saints who are gone before.

Con. Still on Crusaders? [Aside.]

Abbess. What was that sweet song, which just now, my Princess, You murmured to yourself?

Eliz. Did you not hear A little bird between me and the wall, That sang and sang?

Abbess. We heard him not, fair Saint.

Eliz. I heard him, and his merry carol revelled Through all my brain, and woke my parched throat To join his song: then angel melodies Burst through the dull dark, and the mad air quivered Unutterable music. Nay, you heard him.

Abbess. Nought save yourself.

Eliz. Slow hours! Was that the cock-crow?

Woman. St. Peter's bird did call.

Eliz. Then I must up— To matins, and to work—No, my work's over. And what is it, what? One drop of oil on the salt seething ocean! Thank God, that one was born at this same hour, Who did our work for us: we'll talk of Him: We shall go mad with thinking of ourselves— We'll talk of Him, and of that new-made star, Which, as he stooped into the Virgin's side, From off His finger, like a signet-gem, He dropped in the empyrean for a sign. But the first tear He shed at this His birth-hour, When He crept weeping forth to see our woe, Fled up to Heaven in mist, and hid for ever Our sins, our works, and that same new-made star.

Woman. Poor soul! she wanders!

Con. Wanders, fool? her madness Is worth a million of your paters, mumbled At every station between—

Eliz. Oh! thank God Our eyes are dim! What should we do, if he, The sneering fiend, who laughs at all our toil, Should meet us face to face?

Con. We'd call him fool.

Eliz. There! There! Fly, Satan, fly! 'Tis gone!

Con. The victory's gained at last! The fiend is baffled, and her saintship sure! O people blest of Heaven!

Eliz. O master, master, You will not let the mob, when I lie dead, Make me a show—paw over all my limbs— Pull out my hair—pluck off my finger-nails— Wear scraps of me for charms and amulets, As if I were a mummy, or a drug? As they have done to others—I have seen it— Nor set me up in ugly naked pictures In every church, that cold world-hardened wits May gossip o'er my secret tortures? Promise— Swear to me! I demand it!

Con. No man lights A candle, to be hid beneath a bushel: Thy virtues are the Church's dower: endure All which the edification of the faithful Makes needful to be published.

Eliz. O my God! I had stripped myself of all, but modesty! Dost Thou claim yet that victim? Be it so. Now take me home! I have no more to give Thee! So weak—and yet no pain—why, now naught ails me! How dim the lights burn! Here— Where are you, children? Alas! I had forgotten. Now I must sleep—for ere the sun shall rise, I must begone upon a long, long journey To him I love.

Con. She means her heavenly Bridegroom— The Spouse of souls.

Eliz. I said, to him I love. Let me sleep, sleep. You will not need to wake me—so—good-night.

[Folds herself into an attitude of repose. The scene closes.]



ACT V



SCENE I. A.D. 1235.

A Convent at Marpurg. Cloisters of the infirmary. Two aged monks sitting.

1st Monk. So they will publish to-day the Landgravine's canonisation, and translate her to the new church prepared for her. Alack, now, that all the world should be out sight-seeing and saint- making, and we laid up here, like two lame jackdaws in a belfry!

2d Monk. Let be, man—let be. We have seen sights and saints in our time. And, truly, this insolatio suits my old bones better than processioning.

1st Monk. 'Tis pleasant enough in the sun, were it not for the flies. Look—there's a lizard. Come you here, little run-about; here's game for you.

2d Monk. A tame fool, and a gay one—Munditiae mundanis.

1st Monk. Catch him a fat fly—my hand shaketh.

2d Monk. If one of your new-lights were here, now, he'd pluck him for a fiend, as Dominic did the live sparrow in chapel.

1st Monk. There will be precious offerings made to-day, of which our house will get its share.

2d Monk. Not we; she always favoured the Franciscans most.

1st Monk. 'Twas but fair—they were her kith and kin. She lately put on the habit of their third minors.

2d Monk. So have half the fine gentlemen and ladies in Europe. There's one of your new inventions, now, for letting grand folks serve God and mammon at once, and emptying honest monasteries, where men give up all for the Gospel's sake. And now these Pharisees of Franciscans will go off with full pockets—

1st Monk. While we poor publicans—

2d Monk. Shall not come home all of us justified, I think.

1st Monk. How? Is there scandal among us?

2d Monk. Ask not—ask not. Even a fool, when he holds his peace, is counted wise. Of all sins, avoid that same gossiping.

1st Monk. Nay, tell me now. Are we not like David and Jonathan? Have we not worked together, prayed together, journeyed together, and been soundly flogged together, more by token, any time this forty years? And now is news so plenty, that thou darest to defraud me of a morsel?

2d Monk. I'll tell thee—but be secret. I knew a man hard by the convent [names are dangerous, and a bird of the air shall carry the matter], one that hath a mighty eye for a heretic, if thou knowest him.

1st Monk. Who carries his poll screwed on over-tight, and sits with his eyes shut in chapel?

2d Monk. The same. Such a one to be in evil savour—to have the splendour of the pontifical countenance turned from him, as though he had taken Christians for Amalekites, and slain the people of the Lord.

1st Monk. How now?

2d Monk. I only speak as I hear: for my sister's son is chaplain, for the time being, to a certain Archisacerdos, a foreigner, now lodging where thou knowest. The young mail being hid, after some knavery, behind the arras, in come our quidam and that prelate. The quidam, surly and Saxon—the guest, smooth and Italian; his words softer than butter, yet very swords: that this quidam had 'exceeded the bounds of his commission—launched out into wanton and lawless cruelty—burnt noble ladies unheard, of whose innocence the Holy See had proof—defiled the Catholic faith in the eyes of the weaker sort—and alienated the minds of many nobles and gentlemen'—and finally, that he who thinketh he standeth, were wise to take heed lest he fall.

1st Monk. And what said Conrad?

2d Monk. Out upon a man that cannot keep his lips! Who spake of Conrad? That quidam, however, answered nought, but—how 'to his own master he stood or fell'—how 'he laboured not for the Pope but for the Papacy'; and so forth.

1st Monk. Here is awful doctrine! Behold the fruit of your reformers! This comes of their realised ideas, and centralisations, and organisations, till a monk cannot wink in chapel without being blinded with the lantern, or fall sick on Fridays, for fear of the rod. Have I not testified? Have I not foretold?

2d Monk. Thou hast indeed. Thou knowest that the old paths are best, and livest in most pious abhorrence of all amendment.

1st Monk. Do you hear that shout? There is the procession returning from the tomb.

2d Monk. Hark to the tramp of the horse-hoofs! A gallant show, I'll warrant!

1st Monk. Time was, now, when we were young bloods together in the world, such a roll as that would have set our hearts beating against their cages!

2d Monk. Ay, ay. We have seen sport in our day; we have paraded and curvetted, eh? and heard scabbards jingle? We know the sly touch of the heel, that set him on his hind legs before the right window. Vanitas vanitatum—omnia vanitas! Here comes Gerard, Conrad's chaplain, with our dinner.

[Gerard enters across the court.]

1st Monk. A kindly youth and a godly, but—reformation-bitten, like the rest.

2d Monk. Never care. Boys must take the reigning madness in religion, as they do the measles—once for all.

1st Monk. Once too often for him. His face is too, too like Abel's in the chapel-window. Ut sis vitalis metuo, puer!

Ger. Hail, fathers. I have asked permission of the prior to minister your refection, and bring you thereby the first news of the pageant.

1st Monk. Blessings on thee for a good boy. Give us the trenchers, and open thy mouth while we open ours.

2d Monk. Most splendid all, no doubt?

Ger. A garden, sir, Wherein all rainbowed flowers were heaped together; A sea of silk and gold, of blazoned banners, And chargers housed; such glorious press, be sure, Thuringen-land ne'er saw.

2d Monk. Just hear the boy! Who rode beside the bier?

Ger. Frederic the Kaiser, Henry the Landgrave, brother of her husband; The Princesses, too, Agnes, and her mother; And every noble name, sir, at whose war-cry The Saxon heart leaps up; with them the prelates Of Treves, of Coln, and Maintz—why name them all? When all were there, whom this our fatherland Counts worthy of its love.

1st Monk. 'Twas but her right. Who spoke the oration?

Ger. Who but Conrad?

2d Monk. Well— That's honour to our house.

1st Monk. Come, tell us all.

2d Monk. In order, boy: thou hast a ready tongue.

Ger. He raised from off her face the pall, and 'Lo!' He cried, 'that saintly flesh which ye of late With sacrilegious hands, ere yet entombed, Had in your superstitious selfishness Almost torn piecemeal. Fools! Gross-hearted fools! These limbs are God's, not yours: in life for you They spent themselves; now till the judgment-day By virtue of the Spirit embalmed they lie— Touch them who dare. No! Would you find your Saint, Look up, not down, where even now she prays Beyond that blazing orb for you and me. Why hither bring her corpse? Why hide her clay In jewelled ark beneath God's mercy-seat— A speck of dust among these boundless aisles, Uprushing pillars, star-bespangled roofs, Whose colours mimic Heaven's unmeasured blue, Save to remind you, how she is not here, But risen with Him that rose, and by His blaze Absorbed, lives in the God for whom she died? Know her no more according to the flesh; Or only so, to brand upon your thoughts How she was once a woman—flesh and blood, Like you—yet how unlike! Hark while I tell ye.'

2d Monk. How liked the mob all this? They hate him sore.

Ger. Half awed, half sullen, till his golden lips Entranced all ears with tales so sad and strange, They seemed one life-long miracle: bliss and woe, Honour and shame—her daring—Heaven's stern guidance, Did each the other so outblaze.

1st Monk. Great signs Did wait on her from youth.

2d Monk. There went a tale Of one, a Zingar wizard, who, on her birthnight, He here in Eisenach, she in Presburg lying, Declared her natal moment, and the glory Which should befall her by the grace of God.

Ger. He spoke of that, and many a wonder more, Melting all hearts to worship—how a robe Which from her shoulders, at a royal feast, To some importunate as alms she sent, By miracle within her bower was hung again: And how on her own couch the Incarnate Son In likeness of a leprous serf, she laid: And many a wondrous tale till now unheard; Which, from her handmaid's oath and attestation, Siegfried of Maintz to far Perugia sent, And sainted Umbria's labyrinthine hills, Even to the holy Council, where the Patriarchs Of Antioch and Jerusalem, and with them A host of prelates, magnates, knights, and nobles, Decreed and canonised her sainthood's palm.

1st Monk. Mass, they could do no less.

Ger. So thought my master— For 'Thus,' quoth he, 'the primates of the Faith Have, in the bull which late was read to you, Most wisely ratified the will of God Revealed in her life's splendour; for the next count— These miracles wherewith since death she shines— Since ye must have your signs, ere ye believe, And since without such tests the Roman Father Allows no saints to take their seats in heaven, Why, there ye have them; not a friar, I find, Or old wife in the streets, but counts some dozens Of blind, deaf, halt, dumb, palsied, and hysterical, Made whole at this her tomb. A corpse or two Was raised, they say, last week: Will that content you? Will that content her? Earthworms! Would ye please the dead, Bring sinful souls, not limping carcases To test her power on; which of you hath done that? Has any glutton learnt from her to fast? Or oily burgher dealt away his pelf? Has any painted Jezebel in sackcloth Repented of her vanities? Your patron? Think ye, that spell and flame of intercession, Melting God's iron will, which for your sakes She purchased by long agonies, was but meant To save your doctors' bills? If any soul Hath been by her made holier, let it speak!'

2d Monk. Well spoken, Legate! Easier asked than answered.

Ger. Not so, for on the moment, from the crowd Sprang out a gay and gallant gentleman Well known in fight and tourney, and aloud With sobs and blushes told, how he long time Had wallowed deep in mire of fleshly sin, And loathed, and fell again, and loathed in vain; Until the story of her saintly grace Drew him unto her tomb; there long prostrate With bitter cries he sought her, till at length The image of her perfect loveliness Transfigured all his soul, and from his knees He rose new-born, and, since that blessed day, In chastest chivalry, a spotless knight, Maintains the widow's and the orphan's cause.

1st Monk. Well done! and what said Conrad?

Ger. Oh, he smiled, As who should say, ''Twas but the news I looked for.' Then, pointing to the banners borne on high, Where the sad story of her nightly penance Was all too truly painted—'Look!' he cried, ''Twas thus she schooled her soft and shuddering flesh To dare and suffer for you!' Gay ladies sighed, And stern knights wept, and growled, and wept again. And then he told her alms, her mighty labours, Among God's poor, the schools wherein she taught; The babes she brought to the font, the hospitals Founded from her own penury, where she tended The leper and the fever-stricken serf With meanest office; how a dying slave Who craved in vain for milk she stooped to feed From her own bosom. At that crowning tale Of utter love, the dullest hearts caught fire Contagious from his lips—the Spirit's breath Low to the earth, like dewy-laden corn, Bowed the ripe harvest of that mighty host; Knees bent, all heads were bare; rich dames aloud Bewailed their cushioned sloth; old foes held out Long parted hands; low murmured vows and prayers Gained courage, till a shout proclaimed her saint, And jubilant thunders shook the ringing air, Till birds dropped stunned, and passing clouds bewept With crystal drops, like sympathising angels, Those wasted limbs, whose sainted ivory round Shed Eden-odours: from his royal head The Kaiser took his crown, and on the bier Laid the rich offering; dames tore off their jewels— Proud nobles heaped with gold and gems her corse Whom living they despised: I saw no more— Mine eyes were blinded with a radiant mist— And I ran here to tell you.

1st Monk. Oh, fair olive, Rich with the Spirit's unction, how thy boughs Rain balsams on us!

2d Monk. Thou didst sell thine all— And bought'st the priceless pearl!

1st Monk. Thou holocaust of Abel, By Cain in vain despised!

2d Monk. Thou angels' playmate Of yore, but now their judge!

Ger. Thou alabaster, Broken at last, to fill the house of God With rich celestial fragrance!

[Etc. etc., ad libitum.]

SCENE II

A room in a convent at Mayence. Conrad alone.

Con. The work is done! Diva Elizabeth! And I have trained one saint before I die! Yet now 'tis done, is't well done? On my lips Is triumph: but what echo in my heart? Alas! the inner voice is sad and dull, Even at the crown and shout of victory. Oh! I had hugged this purpose to my heart, Cast by for it all ruth, all pride, all scruples; Yet now its face, that seemed as pure as crystal, Shows fleshly, foul, and stained with tears and gore! We make, and moil, like children in their gardens, And spoil with dabbled hands, our flowers i' the planting. And yet a saint is made! Alas, those children! Was there no gentler way? I know not any: I plucked the gay moth from the spider's web; What if my hasty hand have smirched its feathers? Sure, if the whole be good, each several part May for its private blots forgiveness gain, As in man's tabernacle, vile elements Unite to one fair stature. Who'll gainsay it? The whole is good; another saint in heaven; Another bride within the Bridegroom's arms; And she will pray for me!—And yet what matter? Better that I, this paltry sinful unit, Fall fighting, crushed into the nether pit, If my dead corpse may bridge the path to Heaven, And damn itself, to save the souls of others. A noble ruin: yet small comfort in it; In it, or in aught else—— A blank dim cloud before mine inward sense Dulls all the past: she spoke of such a cloud— I struck her for't, and said it was a fiend— She's happy now, before the throne of God— I should be merry; yet my heart's floor sinks As on a fast day; sure some evil bodes. Would it were here, that I might see its eyes! The future only is unbearable! We quail before the rising thunderstorm Which thrills and whispers in the stifled air, Yet blench not, when it falls. Would it were here!

[Pause.]

I fain would sleep, yet dare not: all the air Throngs thick upon me with the pregnant terror Of life unseen, yet near. I dare not meet them, As if I sleep I shall do—I again? What matter what I feel, or like, or fear? Come what God sends. Within there—Brother Gerard!

[Gerard enters.]

Watch here an hour, and pray.—The fiends are busy. So—hold my hand. [Crosses himself.] Come on, I fear you not. [Sleeps.]

[Gerard sings.]

Qui fugiens rnundi gravia Contempsit carnis bravia, Cupidinisque somnia, Lucratur, perdens, omnia.

Hunc gestant ulnis angeli, Ne lapis officiat pedi; Ne luce timor occupet, Aut nocte pestis incubet.

Huic coeli lilia germinant; Arrisus sponsi permanent; Ac nomen in fidelibus Quam filiorum medius. [Sleeps.]

. . . . .

Conrad [awaking]. Stay! Spirits, stay! Art thou a hell-born phantasm, Or word too true, sent by the mother of God? Oh, tell me, queen of Heaven! O God! if she, the city of the Lord, Who is the heart, the brain, the ruling soul Of half the earth; wherein all kingdoms, laws, Authority, and faith do culminate, And draw from her their sanction and their use; The lighthouse founded on the rock of ages, Whereto the Gentiles look, and still are healed; The tree whose rootlets drink of every river, Whose boughs drop Eden fruits on seaward isles; Christ's seamless coat, rainbowed with gems and hues Of all degrees and uses, rend, and tarnish, And crumble into dust! Vanitas vanitatum, omnia vanitas! Oh! to have prayed, and toiled—and lied—for this! For this to have crushed out the heart of youth, And sat by calm, while living bodies burned! How! Gerard; sleeping! Couldst thou not watch with me one hour, my son?

Ger. [awaking]. How! have I slept? Shame on my vaporous brain! And yet there crept along my hand from thine A leaden languor, and the drowsy air Teemed thick with humming wings—I slept perforce. Forgive me (while for breach of holy rule Due penance shall seem honour) my neglect.

Con. I should have beat thee for't, an hour agone— Now I judge no man. What are rules and methods? I have seen things which make my brain-sphere reel: My magic teraph-bust, full-packed, and labelled, With saws, ideas, dogmas, ends, and theories, Lies shivered into dust. Pah! we do squint Each through his loophole, and then dream, broad heaven Is but the patch we see. But let none know; Be silent, Gerard, wary.

Ger. Nay—I know nought Of that which moves thee: though I fain would ask—

Con. I saw our mighty Mother, Holy Church, Sit like a painted harlot: round her limbs An oily snake had coiled, who smiled, and smiled, And lisped the name of Jesus—I'll not tell thee: I have seen more than man can see, and live: God, when He grants the tree of knowledge, bans The luckless seer from off the tree of life, Lest he become as gods, and burst with pride; Or sick at sight of his own nothingness, Lie down, and be a fiend: my time is near: Well—I have neither child, nor kin, nor friend, Save thee, my son; I shall go lightly forth. Thou knowest we start for Marpurg on the morrow? Thou wilt go with me?

Ger. Ay, to death, my master; Yet boorish heretics, with grounded throats, Mutter like sullen bulls; the Count of Saym, And many gentlemen, they say, have sworn A fearful oath: there's danger in the wind.

Con. They have their quarrel; I was keen and hasty: Gladio qui utitur, peribit gladio. When Heaven is strong, then Hell is strong: Thou fear'st not?

Ger. No! though their name were legion! 'Tis for thee Alone I quake, lest by some pious boldness Thou quench the light of Israel.

Con. Light? my son! There shall no light be quenched, when I lie dark. Our path trends outward: we will forth to-morrow. Now let's to chapel; matin bells are ringing. [Exeunt.]

SCENE III

A road between Eisenach and Marpurg. Peasants waiting by the roadside. Walter of Varila, the Count of Saym, and other gentlemen entering on horseback.

Gent. Talk not of honour—Hell's aflame within me: Foul water quenches fire as well as fair; If I do meet him he shall die the death, Come fair, come foul: I tell you, there are wrongs The fumbling piecemeal law can never touch, Which bring of themselves to the injured, right divine, Straight from the fount of right, above all parchments, To be their own avengers: dainty lawyers, If one shall slay the adulterer in the act, Dare not condemn him: girls have stabbed their tyrants, And common sense has crowned them saints; yet what— What were their wrongs to mine? All gone! All gone! My noble boys, whom I had trained, poor fools, To win their spurs, and ride afield with me! I could have spared them—but my wife! my lady! Those dainty limbs, which no eyes but mine— Before that ruffian mob—Too much for man! Too much, stern Heaven!—Those eyes, those hands, Those tender feet, where I have lain and worshipped— Food for fierce flames! And on the self-same day— The day that they were seized—unheard—unargued— No witness, but one vile convicted thief— The dog is dead and buried: Well done, henchmen! They are not buried! Pah! their ashes flit About the common air; we pass them—breathe them! The self-same day! If I had had one look! One word—one single tiny spark of word, Such as two swallows change upon the wing! She was no heretic: she knelt for ever Before the blessed rood, and prayed for me. Art sure he comes this road?

C. Saym. My messenger Saw him start forth, and watched him past the crossways. An hour will bring him here.

C. Wal. How! ambuscading? I'll not sit by, while helpless priests are butchered. Shame, gentles!

C. Saym. On my word, I knew not on't Until this hour; my quarrel's not so sharp, But I may let him pass: my name is righted Before the Emperor, from all his slanders; And what's revenge to me?

Gent. Ay, ay—forgive and forget— The vermin's trapped—and we'll be gentle-handed, And lift him out, and bid his master speed him, Him and his firebrands. He shall never pass me.

C. Wal. I will not see it; I'm old, and sick of blood. She loved him, while she lived; and charged me once, As her sworn liegeman, not to harm the knave. I'll home: yet, knights, if aught untoward happen, And you should need a shelter, come to me: My walls are strong. Home, knaves! we'll seek our wives, And beat our swords to ploughshares—when folks let us.

[Exeunt Count Walter and suite.]

C. Saym. He's gone, brave heart!—But—sir, you will not dare? The Pope's own Legate—think—there's danger in't.

Gent. Look, how athwart yon sullen sleeping flats That frowning thunder-cloud sails pregnant hither;— And black against its sheeted gray, one bird Flags fearful onward—'Tis his cursed soul! Now thou shalt quake, raven!—The self-same day!— He cannot 'scape! The storm is close upon him! There! There! the wreathing spouts have swallowed him! He's gone! and see, the keen blue spark leaps out From crag to crag, and every vaporous pillar Shouts forth his death-doom! 'Tis a sign, a sign!

[A heretic preacher mounts a stone. Peasants gather round him.]

These are the starved unlettered hinds, forsooth, He hunted down like vermin—for a doctrine. They have their rights, their wrongs; their lawless laws, Their witless arguings, which unconscious reason Informs to just conclusions. We will hear them.

Preacher. My brethren, I have a message to you: therefore hearken with all your ears—for now is the day of salvation. It is written, that the children of this world are in their generation wiser than the children of light—and truly: for the children of this world, when they are troubled with vermin, catch them—and hear no more of them. But you, the children of light, the elect saints, the poor of this world rich in faith, let the vermin eat your lives out, and then fall down and worship them afterwards. You are all besotted— hag-ridden—drunkards sitting in the stocks, and bowing down to the said stocks, and making a god thereof. Of part, said the prophet, ye make a god, and part serveth to roast—to roast the flesh of your sons and of your daughters; and then ye cry, 'Aha, I am warm, I have seen the fire;' and a special fire ye have seen! The ashes of your wives and of your brothers cleave to your clothes,—Cast them up to Heaven, cry aloud, and quit yourselves like men!

Gent. He speaks God's truth! We are Heaven's justicers! Our woes anoint us kings! Peace—Hark again!—

Preacher. Therefore, as said before—in the next place—It is written, that there shall be a two-edged sword in the hand of the saints. But the saints have but two swords—Was there a sword or shield found among ten thousand in Israel? Then let Israel use his fists, say I, the preacher! For this man hath shed blood, and by man shall his blood be shed. Now behold an argument,—This man hath shed blood, even Conrad; ergo, as he saith himself, ye, if ye are men, shall shed his blood. Doth he not himself say ergo? Hath he not said ergo to the poor saints, to your sons and your daughters, whom he hath burned in the fire to Moloch? 'Ergo, thou art a heretic'—'Ergo, thou shalt burn.' Is he not therefore convicted out of his own mouth? Arise, therefore, be valiant—for this day he is delivered into your hand!

[Chanting heard in the distance.]

Peasant. Hush! here the psalm-singers come!

[Conrad enters on a mule, chanting the Psalter, Gerard following.]

Con. My peace with you, my children!

1st Voice. Psalm us no psalms; bless us no devil's blessings: Your balms will break our heads. [A murmur rises.]

2d Voice. You are welcome, sir; we are a-waiting for you.

3d Voice. Has he been shriven to-day?

4th Voice. Where is your ergo, Master Conrad? Faugh! How both the fellows smell of smoke!

5th Voice. A strange leech he, to suck, and suck, and suck, And look no fatter for't!

Old Woman. Give me back my sons!

Old Man. Give me back the light of mine eyes, Mine only daughter! My only one! He hurled her over the cliffs! Avenge me, lads; you are young!

4th Voice. We will, we will: why smit'st him not, thou with the pole-axe?

3d Voice. Nay, now, the first blow costs most, and heals last; Besides, the dog's a priest at worst.

C. Saym. Mass! How the shaveling rascal stands at bay! There's not a rogue of them dare face his eye! True Domini canes! 'Ware the bloodhound's teeth, curs!

Preacher. What! Are ye afraid? The huntsman's here at last Without his whip! Down with him, craven hounds! I'll help ye to't. [Springs from the stone.]

Gent. Ay, down with him! Mass, have these yelping boors More heart than I? [Spurs his horse forward.]

Mob. A knight! a champion!

Voice. He's not mortal man! See how his eyes shine! 'Tis the archangel! St. Michael come to the rescue! Ho! St. Michael!

[He lunges at Conrad. Gerard turns the lance aside, and throws his arms round Conrad.]

Ger. My master! my master! The chariot of Israel and the horses thereof! Oh call down fire from Heaven!

[A peasant strikes down Gerard. Conrad, over the body.]

Alas! my son! This blood shall cry for vengeance Before the throne of God!

Gent. And cry in vain! Follow thy minion! Join Folquet in hell!

[Bears Conrad down on his lance-point.]

Con. I am the vicar of the Vicar of Christ: Who touches me doth touch the Son of God.

[The mob close over him.]

O God! A martyr's crown! Elizabeth! [Dies.]



NOTES TO ACT 1



The references, unless it be otherwise specified, are to the Eight Books concerning Saint Elizabeth, by Dietrich the Thuringian; in Basnage's Canisius, Vol. IV. p. 113 (Antwerp; 1725).

Page 21. Cf. Lib. I. section 3. Dietrich is eloquent about her youthful inclination for holy places, and church doors, even when shut, and gives many real proofs of her 'sanctae indolis,' from the very cradle.

P. 22. 'St. John's sworn maid.' Cf. Lib. I. section 4. 'She chose by lot for her patron, St. John the protector of virginity.'

Ibid. 'Fit for my princess.' Cf. Lib. I. section 2. 'He sent with his daughter vessels of gold, silver baths, jewels, pillows all of silk. No such things, so precious or so many, were ever seen in Thuringen-land.'

P. 23. 'Most friendless.' Cf. Lib. I. sections 5, 6. 'The courtiers used bitterly to insult her, etc. Her mother and sister- in-law, given to worldly pomp, differed from her exceedingly;' and much more concerning 'the persecutions which she endured patiently in youth.'

Ibid. 'In one cradle.' Cf. Lib. I. section 2. 'The princess was laid in the cradle of her boy-spouse,' and, says another, 'the infants embraced with smiles, from whence the bystanders drew a joyful omen of their future happiness.'

Ibid. 'If thou love him.' Cf. Lib. I. section 6. 'The Lord by His hidden inspiration so inclined towards her the heart of the prince, that in the solitude of secret and mutual love he used to speak sweetly to her heart, with kindness and consolation, and was always wont, on returning home, to honour her with presents, and soothe her with embraces.' It was their custom, says Dietrich, to the last to call each other in common conversation 'Brother' and 'Sister.'

P. 24. 'To his charge.' Cf. Lib. I. section 7. 'Walter of Varila, a good man, who, having been sent by the prince's father into Hungary, had brought the blessed Elizabeth into Thuringen-land.'

P. 25. 'The blind archer, Love.' For information about the pagan orientalism of the Troubadours, the blasphemous bombast by which they provoked their persecution in Provence, and their influence on the Courts of Europe, see Sismondi, Lit. Southern Europe, Cap. III.- VI.

P. 27. 'Stadings.' The Stadings, according to Fleury, in A.D. 1233, were certain unruly fenmen, who refused to pay tithes, committed great cruelties on religious of both sexes, worshipped, or were said to worship, a black cat, etc., considered the devil as a very ill-used personage, and the rightful lord of themselves and the world, and were of the most profligate morals. An impartial and philosophic investigation of this and other early continental heresies is much wanted.

P. 37. 'All gold.' Cf. Lib. I. section 7, for Walter's interference and Lewis's answer, which I have paraphrased.

P. 38. 'Is crowned with thorns.' Cf. Lib. I. section 5, for this anecdote and her defence, which I have in like manner paraphrased.

P. 39. 'Their pardon.' Cf. Lib. I section 3, for this quaint method of self-humiliation.

Ibid. 'You know your place.' Cf. Lib. I. section 6. 'The vassals and relations of her betrothed persecuted her openly, and plotted to send her back to her father divorced. . . . Sophia also did all she could to place her in a convent. . . . She delighted in the company of maids and servants, so that Sophia used to say sneeringly to her, "You should have been counted among the slaves who drudge, and not among the princes who rule."'

P. 41. 'Childish laughter.' Cf. Lib. I. section 7. 'The holy maiden, receiving the mirror, showed her joy by delighted laughter;' and again, II. section 8, "They loved each other in the charity of the Lord, to a degree beyond all belief.'

Ibid. 'A crystal clear.' Cf. Lib. I. section 7.

P. 43. 'Our fairest bride.' Cf. Lib. I. section 8. 'No one henceforth dared oppose the marriage by word or plot, . . . and all mouths were stopped.'



NOTES TO ACT II



Pp. 45-49. Cf. Lib. II. sections 1, 5, 11, et passim.

Hitherto my notes have been a careful selection of the few grains of characteristic fact which I could find among Dietrich's lengthy professional reflections; but the chapter on which this scene is founded is remarkable enough to be given whole, and as I have a long-standing friendship for the good old monk, who is full of honest naivete and deep-hearted sympathy, and have no wish to disgust all my readers with him, I shall give it for the most part untranslated. In the meantime those who may be shocked at certain expressions in this poem, borrowed from the Romish devotional school, may verify my language at the Romish booksellers, who find just now a rapidly increasing sale for such ware. And is it not after all a hopeful sign for the age that even the most questionable literary tastes must nowadays ally themselves with religion—that the hotbed imaginations which used to batten on Rousseau and Byron have now risen at least as high as the Vies des Saints and St. Francois de Sales' Philothea? The truth is, that in such a time as this, in the dawn of an age of faith, whose future magnificence we may surely prognosticate from the slowness and complexity of its self-developing process, spiritual 'Werterism,' among other strange prolusions, must have its place. The emotions and the imaginations will assert their just right to be fed—by foul means if not by fair; and even self-torture will have charms after the utter dryness and life-in-death of mere ecclesiastical pedantry. It is good, mournful though it be, that a few, even by gorging themselves with poison, should indicate the rise of a spiritual hunger—if we do but take their fate as a warning to provide wholesome food before the new craving has extended itself to the many. It is good that religion should have its Werterism, in order that hereafter Werterism may have its religion. But to my quotations—wherein the reader will judge how difficult it has been for me to satisfy at once the delicacy of the English mind and that historic truth which the highest art demands.

'Erat inter eos honorabile connubium, et thorus immaculatus, non in ardore libidmis, sed in conjugalis sanctimoniae castitate. For the holy maiden, as soon as she was married, began to macerate her flesh with many watchings, rising every night to pray; her husband sometimes sleeping, sometimes conniving at her, often begging her, in compassion to her delicacy, not to afflict herself indiscreetly, often supporting her with his hand when she prayed.' ('And,' says another of her biographers, 'being taught by her to pray with her.') 'Great truly, was the devotion of this young girl, who, rising from the bed of her carnal husband, sought Christ, whom she loved as the true husband of her soul.

'Nor certainly was there less faith in the husband who did not oppose such and so great a wife, but rather favoured her, and tempered her fervour with over-kind prudence. Affected, therefore, by the sweetness of this modest love, and mutual society, they could not bear to be separated for any length of time or distance. The lady, therefore, frequently followed her husband through rough roads, and no small distances, and severe wind and weather, led rather by emotions of sincerity than of carnality: for the chaste presence of a modest husband offered no obstacle to that devout spouse in the way of praying, watching, or otherwise doing good.'

Then follows the story of her nurse waking Lewis instead of her, and Lewis's easy good-nature about this, as about every other event of life. 'And so, after these unwearied watchings, it often happened that, praying for an excessive length of time, she fell asleep on a mat beside her husband's bed, and being reproved for it by her maidens, answered: "Though I cannot always pray, yet I can do violence to my own flesh by tearing myself in the meantime from my couch."'

'Fugiebat oblectamenta carnalia, et ideo stratum molliorem, et viri contubernium secretissimum, quantum licuit, declinavit. Quem quamvis praecordialis amoris affectu deligeret, querulabatur tamen dolens, quod virginalis decorem floris non meruit conservare. Castigabat etiam plagis multis, et lacerabat diris verberibus carnem puella innocens et pudica.

'In principio quidem diebus quadragesimae, sextisque feriis aliis occultas solebat accipere disciplinas, laetam coram hominibus se ostentrans. Post vero convalescens et proficiens in gratia, deserto dilecti thoro surgens, fecit se in secreto cubiculo per ancillarum manus graviter saepissime verberari, ad lectumque mariti reversa hilarem se exhibuit et jocundam.

'Vere felices conjuges, in quorum consortio tanta munditia, in colloquio pudicitia reperta est. In quibus amor Christi concupiscentiam extinxit, devotio refrenavit petulantiam, fervor spiritus excussit somnolentiam, oratio tutavit conscientiam, charitas benefaciendi facultatem tribuit et laetitiam!'

P. 58. 'In every scruple.' Cf. Lib. III. section 9, how Lewis 'consented that Elizabeth his wife should make a vow of obedience and continence at the will of the said Conrad, salva jure matrimonii.'

P. 59. 'The open street.' Cf. Lib. II. section 11. 'On the Rogation days, when certain persons doing contrary to the decrees of the saints are decorated with precious and luxurious garments, the Princess, dressed in serge and barefooted, used to follow most devoutly the Procession of the Cross and the relics of the Saints, and place herself always at sermon among the poorest women; knowing (says Dietrich) that seeds cast into the valleys spring up into the richest crop of corn.'

P. 60. 'The poor of Christ.' Cf. Lib. II. sections 6, 11, et passim. Elizabeth's labours among the poor are too well known throughout one half at least of Christendom, where she is, par excellence, the patron of the poor, to need quotations.

P. 61. 'I'll be thy pupil.' Cf. Lib. II section 4. 'She used also, by words and examples, to oblige the worldly ladies who came to her to give up the vanity of the world, at least in some one particular.'

P. 62. 'Conrad enters.' Cf. Lib. III. section 9, where this story of the disobeyed message and the punishment inflicted by Conrad for it is told word for word.

P. 66. 'Peaceably come by.' Cf. Lib. II. section 6.

P. 67. 'Bond-slaves.' Cf. Note 11.

P. 69. 'Elizabeth passes.' Cf. Lib. II. section 5. 'This most Christian mother, impletis purgationis suae diebus, used to dress herself in serge, and, taking in her arms her new-born child, used to go forth secretly, barefooted, by the difficult descent from the castle, by a rough and rocky road to a remote church, carrying her infant in her own arms, after the example of the Virgin Mother, and offering him upon the altar to the Lord with a taper' (and with gold, says another biographer).

P. 71. 'Give us bread.' Cf. Lib. III. section 6. 'A.D. 1225, while the Landgrave was gone to Italy to the Emperor, a severe famine arose throughout all Almaine; and lasting for nearly two years, destroyed many with hunger. Then Elizabeth, moved with compassion for the miserable, collected all the corn from her granaries, and distributed it as alms for the poor. She also built a hospital at the foot of the Wartburg, wherein she placed all those who could not wait for the general distribution. . . . She sold her own ornaments to feed the members of Christ. . . . Cuidam misero lac desideranti, ad mulgendum se praebuit!'—See p. 153.

P 80. 'Ladies' tenderness.' Cf. Lib. III. section 8. 'When the courtiers and stewards complained on his return of the Lady Elizabeth's too great extravagance in almsgiving, "Let her alone," quoth he, "to do good, and to give whatever she will for God's sake, only keep Wartburg and Neuenberg in my hands."'

P. 87. 'A crusader's cross.' Cf. Lib. IV. section 1. 'In the year 1227 there was a general "Passagium" to the Holy Land, in which Frederick the Emperor also crossed the seas' (or rather did not cross the seas, says Heinrich Stero, in his annals, but having got as far as Sicily, came back again—miserably disappointing and breaking up the expedition, whereof the greater part died at the various ports—and was excommunicated for so doing); 'and Lewis, landgrave of the Thuringians, took the cross likewise in the name of Jesus Christ, and . . . did not immediately fix the badge which he had received to his garment, as the matter is, lest his wife, who loved him with the most tender affection, seeing this, should be anxious and disturbed, . . . but she found it while turning over his purse, and fainted, struck down with a wonderful consternation.'

P. 90. 'I must be gone.' Cf. Lib. IV. section 2. A chapter in which Dietrich rises into a truly noble and pathetic strain. 'Coming to Schmalcald,' he says, 'Lewis found his dearest friends, whom he had ordered to meet him there, not wishing to depart without taking leave of them.'

Then follows Dietrich's only poetic attempt, which Basnage calls a 'carmen ineptum, foolish ballad,' and most unfairly, as all readers should say, if I had any hope of doing justice in a translation to this genial fragment of an old dramatic ballad, and its simple objectivity, as of a writer so impressed (like all true Teutonic poets in those earnest days) with the pathos and greatness of his subject that he never tries to 'improve' it by reflections and preaching at his readers, but thinks it enough just to tell his story, sure that it will speak for itself to all hearts:—

Quibus valefaciens cum moerore Commisit suis fratribus natos cum uxore: Matremque deosculatos filiali more, Vix eam alloquitur cordis prae dolore, Illis mota viscera, corda tremuerunt, Dum alter in alterius colla irruerunt, Expetentes oscula, quae vix receperunt Propter multitudines, quae eos compresserunt. Mater tenens filiuin, uxorque maritum, In diversa pertrahunt, et tenent invitum, Fratres cum militibus velut compeditum Stringunt, nec discedere sinunt expeditum. Erat in exercitu maximus tumultus, Cum carorum cernerent alternari vultus. Flebant omnes pariter, senex et adultus, Turbae cum militibus, cultus et incultus. Eja! Quis non plangeret, cum videret flentes Tot honestos nobiles, tam diversas gentes, Cum Thuringis Saxones illuc venientes, Ut viderent socios suos abscedentes. Amico luctamine cuncti certavere, Quis eum diutius posset retinere; uidam collo brachiis, quidam inhaesere Vestibus, nec poterat cuiguam respondere, Tandem se de manibus eximens suorum Magnatorum socius et peregrinorum, Admixtus tandem, caetui cruce signatorum Non visurus amplius terram. Thuringorum!

Surely there is a heart of flesh in the old monk which, when warmed by a really healthy subject, can toss aside Scripture parodies and professional Stoic sentiment, and describe with such life and pathos, like any eye-witness, a scene which occurred, in fact, two years before his birth.

'And thus this Prince of Peace, 'he continues, 'mounting his horse with many knights, etc. . . . about the end of the month of June, set forth in the name of the Lord, praising him in heart and voice, and weeping and singing were heard side by side. And close by followed, with saddest heart, that most faithful lady after her sweetest prince, her most loving spouse, never, alas! to behold him more. And when she was going to return, the force of love and the agony of separation forced her on with him one day's journey: and yet that did not suffice. She went on, still unable to bear the parting, another full day's journey. . . . At last they part, at the exhortations of Rudolph the Cupbearer. What groans, think you, what sobs, what struggles, and yearnings of the heart must there have been? Yet they part, and go on their way. . . . The lord went forth exulting, as a giant to run his course; the lady returned lamenting, as a widow, and tears were on her cheeks. Then putting off the garments of joy, she took the dress of widowhood. The mistress of nations, sitting alone, she turned herself utterly to God—to her former good works, adding better ones.'

Their children were 'Hermann, who became Landgraf; a daughter who married the Duke of Brabant; another, who, remaining in virginity, became a nun of Aldenburg, of which place she is Lady Abbess until this day.'



NOTES TO ACT III.



P. 94. 'On the freezing stone.' Cf. Lib. II. section 5. 'In the absence of her husband she used to lay aside her gay garments, conducted herself devoutly as a widow, and waited for the return of her beloved, passing her nights in watchings, genuflexions, prayers, and disciplines.' And again, Lib. IV. section 3, just quoted.

P. 96. 'The will of God.' Cf. Lib. IV. section 6. 'The mother-in- law said to her daughter-in-law, "Be brave, my beloved daughter; nor be disturbed at that which hath happened by divine ordinance to thy husband, my son." Whereto she answered boldly, "If my brother is captive, he can be freed by the help of God and our friends." "He is dead," quoth the other. Then she, clasping her hands upon her knees, "The world is dead to me, and all that is pleasant in the world." Having said this, suddenly springing up with tears, she rushed swiftly through the whole length of the palace, and being entirely beside herself, would have run on to the world's end, usque quaque, if a wall had not stopped her; and others coming up, led her away from the wall to which she had clung.

Ibid. 'Yon lion's rage.' Cf. Lib. III. section 2. 'There was a certain lion in the court of the Prince; and it came to pass on a time that rising from his bed in the morning, and crossing the court dressed only in his gown and slippers, he met this lion loose and raging against him. He thereon threatened the beast with his raised fist, and rated it manfully, till laying aside its fierceness, it lay down at the knight's feet, and fawned on him, wagging its tail.' So Dietrich.

Pp. 99-100, 103-108. Cf. Lib. IV. section 7.

'Now shortly after the news of Lewis's death, certain vassals of her late husband (with Henry, her brother-in-law) cast her out of the castle and of all her possessions. . . . She took refuge that night in a certain tavern, . . . and went at midnight to the matins of the "Minor Brothers." . . . And when no one dare give her lodging, took refuge in the church. . . . And when her little ones were brought to her from the castle, amid most bitter frost, she knew not where to lay their heads. . . . She entered a priest's house, and fed her family miserably enough, by pawning what she had. There was in that town an enemy of hers, having a roomy house. . . . Whither she entered at his bidding, and was forced to dwell with her whole family in a very narrow space, . . . her host and hostess heaped her with annoyances and spite. She therefore bade them farewell, saying, "I would willingly thank mankind if they would give me any reason for so doing." So she returned to her former filthy cell.'

P. 100. 'White whales' bone' (i.e. the tooth of the narwhal); a common simile in the older poets.

P. 104. 'The nuns of Kitzingen.' Cf. Lib. V. section 1. 'After this, the noble Lady the Abbess of Kitzingen, Elizabeth's aunt according to the flesh, brought her away honourably to Eckembert, Lord Bishop of Bamberg.'

P. 106. 'Aged crone.' Cf. Lib. IV. section 8, where this whole story is related word for word.

P. 109. 'I'd mar this face.' Cf. Lib. V. section 1. 'If I could not,' said she, 'escape by any other means, I would with my own hands cut off my nose, that so every man might loathe me when so foully disfigured.'

P. 110. 'Botenstain.' Cf. ibid. 'The bishop commanded that she should be taken to Botenstain with her maids, until he should give her away in marriage.'

P. 111. 'Bear children.' Ibid. 'The venerable man, knowing that the Apostle says, "I will that the younger widows marry and bear children," thought of giving her in marriage to some one—an intention which she perceived, and protested on the strength of her "votum continentiae."'

P. 113. 'The tented field.' All records of the worthy Bishop on which I have fallen, describe him as 'virum militia strenuissimum,' a mighty man of war. We read of him, in Stero of Altaich's Chronicle, A.D. 1232, making war on the Duke of Carinthia destroying many of his castles and laying waste a great part of his land; and next year, being seized by some bailiff of the Duke's, and keeping that Lent in durance vile. In a A.D. 1237 he was left by the Emperor as 'vir magnaminus et bellicosus,' in charge of Austria, during the troubles with Duke Frederick; and died in 1240.

P 115. 'Lewis's bones.' Cf. Lib. V. section 3.

P 118. 'I thank thee.' Cf. Lib. V. section 4. 'What agony and love there was then in her heart, He alone can tell who knows the hearts of all the sons of men. I believe that her grief was renewed, and all her bones trembled, when she saw the bones of her beloved separated one from another (the corpse had been dug up at Otranto, and boiled.) But though absorbed in so great a woe, at last she remembered God, and recovering her spirit said—(Her words I have paraphrased as closely as possible.)

Ibid. 'The close hard by.' Cf. Lib. V section 4.



NOTES TO ACT IV



P 120. 'Your self imposed vows.' Cf. Lib. IV. section I. 'On Good Friday, when the altars were exhibited bare in remembrance of the Saviour who hung bare on the cross for us, she went into a certain chapel, and in the presence of Master Conrad, and certain Franciscan brothers, laying her holy hands on the bare altar, renounced her own will, her parents, children, relations, "et omnibus hujus modi pompis," all pomps of this kind (a misprint, one hopes, for mundi) in imitation of Christ, and "omnmo se exuit et nudavit," stripped herself utterly naked, to follow Him naked, in the steps of poverty.'

P 123. 'All worldly goods.' A paraphrase of her own words.

P 124. 'Thine own needs.' But when she was going to renounce her possessions also, the prudent Conrad stopped her. The reflections which follow are Dietrich's own.

P 125. 'The likeness of the fiend' etc. I have put this daring expression into Conrad's mouth, as the ideal outcome of the teaching of Conrad's age on this point—and of much teaching also which miscalls itself Protestant, in our own age. The doctrine is not, of course, to be found totidem verbis in the formularies of any sect— yet almost all sects preach it, and quote Scripture for it as boldly as Conrad—the Romish Saint alone carries it honestly out into practice.

P 126. 'With pine boughs.' Cf. Lib. VI. section 2. 'Entering a certain desolate court she betook herself, "sub gradu cujusdam caminatae," to the projection of a certain furnace, where she roofed herself in with boughs. In the meantime in the town of Marpurg, was built for her a humble cottage of clay and timber.'

Ibid. 'Count Pama.' Cf. Lib. VI. section 6.

P 127. 'Isentrudis and Guta.' Cf. Lib. VII. section 4. 'Now Conrad as a prudent man, perceiving that this disciple of Christ wished to arrive at the highest pitch of perfection, studied to remove all which he thought would retard her, and therefore drove from her all those of her former household in whom she used to solace or delight herself. Thus the holy priest deprived this servant of God of all society, that so the constancy of her obedience might become known, and occasion might be given to her for clinging to God alone.'

P 128. 'A leprous boy.' Cf. Lib. VI. section 8.

She had several of these proteges, successively, whose diseases are too disgusting to be specified, on whom she lavished the most menial cares. All the other stories of her benevolence which occur in these two pages are related by Dietrich.

Ibid. 'Mighty to save.' Cf. Lib. VII. section 7. When we read amongst other matters, how the objects of her prayers used to become while she was speaking so intensely hot, that they not only smoked, and nearly melted, but burnt the fingers of those who touched them: from whence Dietrich bids us 'learn with what an ardour of charity she used to burn, who would dry up with her heat the flow of worldly desire, and inflame to the love of eternity.'

P 130. 'Lands and titles'. Cf. Lib. V. section 7,8.

P 131. 'Spinning wool.' Cf. Lib. VI. section 6. 'And crossing himself for wonder, the Count Pama cried out and said, "Was it ever seen to this day that a king's daughter should spin wool?" All his messages from her father (says Dietrich) were of no avail.

P 135. 'To do her penance.' Cf. Lib. VII. section 4. 'Now he had placed with her certain austere women, from whom she endured much oppression patiently for Christ's sake who, watching her rigidly, frequently reported her to her master for having transgressed her obedience in giving some thing to the poor, or begging others to give. And when thus accused she often received many blows from her master, insomuch that he used to strike her in the face, which she earnestly desired to endure patiently in memory of the stripes of the Lord.'

P 136. 'That she dared not.' Cf. Lib. VII. section 4. 'When her most intimate friends, Isentrudis and Guta (whom another account describes as in great poverty), 'came to see her, she dared not give them anything even for food, nor, without special licence, salute them.'

P 137. 'To bear within us.' 'Seeing in the church of certain monks who "professed poverty" images sumptuously gilt, she said to about twenty four of them, "You had better to have spent this money on your own food and clothes, for we ought to have the reality of these images written in our hearts." And if any one mentioned a beautiful image before her she used to say, 'I have no need of such an image. I carry the thing itself in my bosom."'

Ibid. 'Even on her bed.' Cf. Lib. VI sections 5, 6.

P 139. 'My mother rose.' Cf. Lib. VI section 8. 'Her mother, who had been long ago' (when Elizabeth was nine years old) 'miserably slain by the Hungarians, appeared to her in her dreams upon her knees, and said, "My beloved child! pray for the agonies which I suffer; for thou canst." Elizabeth waking, prayed earnestly, and falling asleep again, her mother appeared to her and told her that she was freed, and that Elizabeth's prayers would hereafter benefit all who invoked her.' Of the causes of her mother's murder the less that is said the better, but the prudent letter which the Bishop of Gran sent back when asked to join in the conspiracy against her is worthy notice. 'Reginam occidere nolite timere bonum est. Si omnes consentiunt ego non contradico.' To be read as a full consent, or as a flat refusal, according to the success of the plot.

P. 140. 'Any living soul.' Dietrich has much on this point, headed, 'How Master Conrad exercised Saint Elizabeth in the breaking of her own will. . . . And at last forbad her entirely to give alms; whereon she employed herself in washing lepers and other infirm folk. In the meantime she was languishing, and inwardly tortured with emotions of compassion.'

I may here say that in representing Elizabeth's early death as accelerated by a 'broken heart' I have, I believe, told the truth, though I find no hint of anything of the kind in Dietrich. The religious public of a petty town in the thirteenth century round the deathbed of a royal saint would of course treasure up most carefully all incidents connected with her latter days; but they would hardly record sentiments or expressions which might seem to their notions to derogate in anyway from her saintship. Dietrich, too, looking at the subject as a monk and not as a man, would consider it just as much his duty to make her death-scene rapturous as to make both her life and her tomb miraculous. I have composed these last scenes in the belief that Elizabeth and all her compeers will be recognised as real saints, in proportion as they are felt to have been real men and women.

P. 142. 'Eructate sweet doctrine.' The expressions are Dietrich's own.

Ibid. 'In her coffin yet.' Cf. Lib. VIII. section I.

Ibid. 'So she said.' Cf. Ibid.

Ibid. 'The poor of Christ.' 'She begged her master to distribute all to the poor, except a worthless tunic in which she wished to be buried. She made no will: she would have no heir beside Christ' (i.e. the poor).

P. 143. 'Martha, and their brother,' etc.

I have compressed the events of several days into one in this scene. I give Dietrich's own account, omitting his reflections. 'When she had been ill twelve days and more one of her maids sitting by her bed heard in her throat a very sweet sound, . . . and saying, "Oh, my mistress, how sweetly thou didst sing!" she answered, "I tell thee, I heard a little bird between me and the wall sing merrily; who with his sweet song so stirred me up that I could not but sing myself."'

Again, section 3. 'The last day she remained till evening most devout, having been made partaker of the celestial table, and inebriated with that most pure blood of life, which is Christ. The word of truth was continually on her lips, and opening her mouth of wisdom, she spake of the best things, which she had heard in sermons; eructating from her heart good words, and the law of clemency was heard on her tongue. She told from the abundance of her heart how the Lord Jesus condescended to console Mary and Martha at the raising again of their brother Lazarus, and then, speaking of His weeping with them over the dead, she eructated the memory of the abundance of the Lord's sweetness, affectu et effectu (in feeling and expression?). Certain religious person who were present, hearing these words, fired with devotion by the grace which filled her lips, melted into tears. To whom the saint of God, now dying, recalled the sweet words of her Lord as He went to death, saying, "Daughters of Jerusalem," etc. Having said this she was silent. A wonderful thing. Then most sweet voices were heard in her throat, without any motion of her lips; and she asked of those round, "Did ye not hear some singing with me?" "Whereon none of the faithful are allowed to doubt," says Dietrich, "when she herself heard the harmony of the heavenly hosts," etc. etc. . . . From that time till twilight she lay, as if exultant and jubilant, showing signs of remarkable devotion, till the crowing of the cock. Then, as if secure in the Lord, she said to the bystanders, "What should we do if the fiend showed himself to us?" And shortly afterwards, with a loud and clear voice, "Fly! fly!" as if repelling the daemon.'

'At the cock-crow she said, "Here is the hour in which the Virgin brought forth her child Jesus and laid him in a manger. . . . Let us talk of Him, and of that new star which he created by his omnipotence, which never before was seen." "For these" (says Montanus in her name) "are the venerable mysteries of our faith, our richest blessings, our fairest ornaments: in these all the reason of our hope flourishes, faith grows, charity burns."'

The novelty of the style and matter will, I hope, excuse its prolixity with most readers. If not, I have still my reasons for inserting the greater part of this chapter.

P. 145. ' I demand it.' How far I am justified in putting such fears into her mouth the reader may judge. Cf. Lib. VIII. section 5. 'The devotion of the people demanding it, her body was left unburied till the fourth day in the midst of a multitude.' . . .

'The flesh,' says Dietrich, 'had the tenderness of a living body, and was easily moved hither and thither at the will of those who handled it . . . . And many, sublime in the valour of their faith, tore off the hair of her head and the nails of her fingers ("even the tips of her ears, et mamillarum papillas," says untranslatably Montanus of Spire), and kept them as relics.' The reference relating to the pictures of her disciplines and the effect which they produced on the crowd I have unfortunately lost.

P. 146. 'And yet no pain.' Cf. Lib. VIII section 4. 'She said, "Though I am weak I feel no disease or pain," and so through that whole day and night, as hath been said, having been elevated with most holy affections of mind towards God, and inflamed in spirit with most divine utterances and conversations, at length she rested from jubilating, and inclining her head as if falling into a sweet sleep, expired.'

P. 147. 'Canonisation.' Cf. Lib. VIII. section 10. If I have in the last scene been guilty of a small anachronism, I have in this been guilty of a great one. Conrad was of course a prime means of Elizabeth's canonisation, and, as Dietrich and his own 'Letter to Pope Gregory the Ninth' show, collected, and pressed on the notice of the Archbishop of Maintz, the miraculous statements necessary for that honour. But he died two years before the actual publication of her canonisation. It appeared to me that by following the exact facts I must either lose sight of the final triumph, which connects my heroine for ever with Germany and all Romish Christendom, and is the very culmination of the whole story, or relinquish my only opportunity of doing Conrad justice, by exhibiting the remaining side of his character.

I am afraid that I have erred, and that the most strict historic truth would have coincided, as usual, with the highest artistic effect, while it would only have corroborated the moral of my poem, supposing that there is one. But I was fettered by the poverty of my own imagination, and 'do manus lectoribus.'

Ibid. 'Third Minors.' The order of the Third Minors of St. Francis of Assisi was in invention of the comprehensive mind of that truly great man, by which 'worldlings' were enabled to participate in the spiritual advantages of the Franciscan rule and discipline without neglect or suspension of their civic and family duties. But it was an institution too enlightened for its age; and family and civic ties were destined for a far nobler consecration. The order was persecuted and all but exterminated by the jealousy of the Regular Monks, not, it seems, without papal connivance. Within a few years after its foundation it numbered amongst its members the noblest knights and ladies of Christendom, St. Louis of France among the number.