and still kept silence. She had never
looked more beautiful.

"Will you deny the truth? Are you afraid, you, a daughter of the
Amelungs?"

The girl proudly raised her eyes.

"I am not afraid and I do not deny the truth. Yes, I love."

"And whom, unhappy girl?"

"Not even a god could force me to tell that!"

She looked so decided that Amalaswintha did not attempt to learn more.

"Well," she said, "my daughter has no common nature. So I demand of you
what is uncommon: to sacrifice all to the highest."

"Mother, I cherish a noble dream in my heart. To me it is the highest.
To it I will sacrifice all."

"Mataswintha," said the Queen, "how unqueenly! See, God has blessed you
above thousands with beauty of body and mind. You are born to be a
queen."

"I will be a queen of love. All praise my beauty. I have proposed to
myself, loving and beloved, happy and bestowing happiness, to be a true
woman!"

"A woman? is that all your ambition?"

"It is. Oh, would it had been yours!"

"And the realm is nothing to you, the grandchild of Theodoric? Your
nation, the Goths, are they of no account?"

"No, mother," said Mataswintha quietly; "it grieves me, it almost makes
me ashamed, but I cannot pretend what I do not feel. The word 'Goth'
arouses no sentiment in me. Perhaps it is not my fault; you have always
despised these Goths and valued these 'barbarians' lightly; that was my
first impression; it is enduring. And I hate this crown, this kingdom
of the Goths; it has taken the place of my father, of my brother, and
of myself in your heart! The Gothic crown has never been anything to me
but a hated and inimical power."

"Oh, my child, woe to me if I am guilty of this! If you will not do it
for the sake of our kingdom, oh, do it for my sake! I am lost without
these Woelfungs. Do it for the sake of my love!" And she took her
daughter's hand.

Mataswintha drew back with a bitter smile:

"Mother, do not blaspheme that holy name! Your love? You have never
loved me. Nor my brother, nor my father."

"My child! What should I have loved if not you?"

"The crown, mother, and the hated monarchy! How often have you repulsed
me before Athalaric's birth, because I was a girl, and you wished for a
crown-prince. Think of my father's grave and of----"

"Cease!" cried Amalaswintha.

"And Athalaric? Have you ever loved him? Have you not rather loved his
right to the throne? Oh, how often have we poor children wept, when we
sought