.

BOURGOGNINO. That is unfortunate! For this night's business thou art
five years too young. Who is thy father?

BERTHA. The truest citizen in Genoa.

BOURGOGNINO. Gently, boy! That name belongs alone to the father of my
betrothed bride. Dost thou know the house of Verrina?

BERTHA. I should think so.

BOURGOGNINO (eagerly). And knowest thou his lovely daughter?

BERTHA. Her name is Bertha.

BOURGOGNINO. Go, quickly! Carry her this ring. Say it shall be our
wedding-ring; and tell her the blue crest fights bravely. Now farewell!
I must hasten yonder. The danger is not yet over. (Some houses are seen
on fire.)

BERTHA (in a soft voice). Scipio!

BOURGOGNINO (struck with astonishment). By my sword! I know that voice.

BERTHA (falling upon his neck). By my heart! I am well known here.

BOURGOGNINO. Bertha! (Alarm-bells sound in the suburbs--a tumult--
BOURGOGNINO and BERTHA embrace, and are lost in the crowd.) [NOTE]

[NOTE] In lieu of this scene Schiller substituted the following, during
his stay at Leipzig in 1786, for the use of the theatre there:--

A subterranean vault, lighted by a single lamp. The background
remains quite dark. BERTHA is discovered sitting on a stone in
the foreground; a black veil covers her face. After a pause she
rises and walks to and fro.

BERTHA. Still no sound? No sign of human footstep? No approach of
my deliverers. Horrible suspense! Fearful and hopeless as that of
one buried alive beneath the sod of the churchyard. And for what dost
thou sit, poor deceived one? An inviolable oath immures thee in this
dungeon. Gianettino Doria must fall, and Genoa be free, or Bertha left
to pine away her miserable existence, such was my father's oath.
Fearful prison-house to which there is no key but the death-groan of a
well-guarded tyrant. (Looking round the vault) How awful is this
stillness! terrible as the silence of the grave! How fearfully the
darkness creeps from yonder vaults! My lamp, too, is flickering in its
socket. (Walking up and down energetically). Oh, come, come, my
beloved, 'tis horrible to die here. (A pause--then she starts up and
rushes to and fro wringing her hands to deep despair.) He has forsaken
me. He has broken his oath. He has forgotten his Bertha. The living
think not of the dead, and this vault is my tomb. Hope no more, wretched
one. Hope flourishes only where the eye of the Almighty pervades--into
this dungeon it never penetrates. (Again a pause;