brimming glorious cup
For which my parched heart pants. I will consider.

PRIOR.
Pardon me now, if I break off our talk.
Let all rest as it stands until the dawn.
I have many orisons before the light.

NORDMANN.
Good-night, true friend. Devote a prayer to me.
(Aside.) I will outwit you, serpent, though you glide
Athwart the dark, noiseless and swift as fate.
[Exit].

SCENE II.

On the road to Nordhausen. Moonlit, rocky landscape. On the
right between high, white cliffs a narrow stream spanned by a
wooden bridge. Thick bushes and trees. Enter PRINCE WILLIAM
and PAGE.

PRINCE WILLIAM.
Is this the place where we shall find fresh steeds?
Would I had not dismounted!

PAGE.
Nay, sir; beyond
The Werra bridge the horses wait for us.
These rotten planks would never bear their weight.

PRINCE WILLIAM.
When I am Landgrave these things shall be cared for.
This is an ugly spot for travellers
To loiter in. How swift the water runs,
Brawling above our voices. Human cries
Would never reach Liborius' convent yonder,
Perched on the sheer, chalk cliff. I think of peril,
From my excess of joy. My spirit chafes,
She that would breast broad-winged the air, must halt
On stumbling mortal limbs. Look, thither, boy,
How the black shadows of the tree-boles stripe
The moon-blanched bridge and meadow.

PAGE.
Sir, what's that?
Yon stir and glitter in the bush?

PRINCE WILLIAM.
The moon,
Pricking the dewdrops, plays fantastic tricks
With objects most familiar. Look again,
And where thou sawst the steel-blue flicker glint,
Thou findst a black, wet leaf.

PAGE.
No, no! O God!
Your sword, sir! Treason!
[Four armed masked men leap from out the bush, seize, bind, and
overmaster, after a brief but violent resistance, the Prince and
his servant.]

PRINCE WILLIAM.
Who are ye, villains? lying
In murderous ambush for the Prince of Meissen?
If you be knights, speak honorably your names,
And I will combat you in knightly wise.
If ye be robbers, name forthwith your ransom.
Let me but speed upon my journey now.
By Christ's blood! I beseech you, let me go!