The Death of Wallenstein Part 53

[An OFFICER enters, and brings a letter with the great seal.

GORDON steps forward and meets him.

What is this It is the imperial seal.

[He reads the address, and delivers the letter to OCTAVIO with a look of reproach, and with an emphasis on the word.

To the Prince Piccolomini.

[OCTAVIO, with his whole frame expressive of sudden anguish, raises his eyes to heaven.

The Curtain drops.

FOOTNOTES.

[1] A great stone near Luetzen, since called the Swede's Stone, the body of their great king having been found at the foot of it, after the battle in which he lost his life.

[2] Could I have hazarded such a Germanism as the use of the word afterworld for posterity,--"Es spreche Welt und Nachwelt meinen Namen"--might have been rendered with more literal fidelity: Let world and afterworld speak out my name, etc.

[3] I have not ventured to affront the fastidious delicacy of our age with a literal translation of this line,

werth Die Eingeweide schaudernd aufzuregen.

[4] Anspessade, in German, Gefreiter, a soldier inferior to a corporal, but above the sentinels. The German name implies that he is exempt from mounting guard.

[5] I have here ventured to omit a considerable number of lines. I fear that I should not have done amiss had I taken this liberty more frequently. It is, however, inc.u.mbent on me to give the original, with a literal translation.

"Weh denen, die auf Dich vertraun, an Dich Die sichre Huette ihres Glueckes lehnen, Gelockt von deiner geistlichen Gestalt.

Schnell unverhofft, bei naechtlich stiller Weile, Gaehrts in dem tueckschen Feuerschlunde, ladet, Sich aus mit tobender Gewalt, und weg Treibt ueber alle Pflanzungen der Menschen Der wilde Strom in grausender Zerstoerung."

WALLENSTEIN.

"Du schilderst deines Vaters Herz. Wie Du's Beschreibst, so ist's in seinem Eingeweide, In dieser schwarzen Heuchlers Brust gestaltet.

Oh, mich hat Hoellenkunst getaeuscht! Mir sandte Der Abgrund den verflecktesten der Geister, Den Luegenkundigsten herauf, und stellt' ihn Als Freund an meiner Seite. Wer vermag Der Hoelle Macht zu widersthn! Ich zog Den Basilisken auf an meinem Busen, Mit meinem Herzblut naehrt' ich ihn, er sog Sich schwelgend voll an meiner Liebe Bruesten, Ich hatte nimmer Arges gegen ihn, Weit offen liess ich des Gedankens Th.o.r.e, Und warf die Schluessel weiser Vorsicht weg, Am Sternenhimmel," etc.

LITERAL TRANSLATION.

"Alas! for those who place their confidence on thee, against thee lean their secure hut of their fortune, allured by thy hospitable form. Suddenly, unexpectedly, in a moment still as night, there is a fermentation in the treacherous gulf of fire; it discharges itself with raging force, and away over all the plantations of men drives the wild stream in frightful devastation."

WALLENSTEIN.--"Thou art portraying thy father's heart; as thou describest, even so is it shaped in its entrails, in this black hypocrite's breast. Oh, the art of h.e.l.l has deceived me! The abyss sent up to me the most the most spotted of the spirits, the most skilful in lies, and placed him as a friend by my side. Who may withstand the power of h.e.l.l? I took the basilisk to my bosom, with my heart's blood I nourished him; he sucked himself glutfull at the b.r.e.a.s.t.s of my love. I never harbored evil towards him; wide open did I leave the door of my thoughts; I threw away the key of wise foresight. In the starry heaven, etc." We find a difficulty in believing this to have been written by Schiller.

[6] This is a poor and inadequate translation of the affectionate simplicity of the original--

Sie alle waren Fremdlinge, Du warst Das Kind des Hauses.

Indeed the whole speech is in the best style of Ma.s.singer.

O si sic omnia!

[7] It appears that the account of his conversion being caused by such a fall, and other stories of his juvenile character, are not well authenticated.

[8] We doubt the propriety of putting so blasphemous a statement in the mouth of any character.--T.

[9] [This soliloquy, which, according to the former arrangement, const.i.tuted the whole of scene ix., and concluded the fourth act, is omitted in all the printed German editions. It seems probable that it existed in the original ma.n.u.script from which Mr. Coleridge translated.--ED.]

[10] The soliloquy of Thekla consists in the original of six-and-twenty lines twenty of which are in rhymes of irregular recurrence. I thought it prudent to abridge it. Indeed the whole scene between Thekla and Lady Neubrunn might, perhaps, have been omitted without injury to the play.--C.

[11] These four lines are expressed in the original with exquisite felicity:--

Am Himmel ist geschaeftige Bewegung.

Des Thurmes Fahne jagt der Wind, schnell geht Der Wolken Zug, die Mondessichel w.a.n.kt Und durch die Nacht zuckt ungewisse h.e.l.le.

The word "moon-sickle" reminds me of a pa.s.sage in Harris, as quoted by Johnson, under the word "falcated." "The enlightened part of the moon appears in the form of a sickle or reaping-hook, which is while she is moving from the conjunction to the opposition, or from the new moon to the full: but from full to a new again the enlightened part appears gibbous, and the dark falcated."

The words "w.a.n.ken" and "schweben" are not easily translated. The English words, by which we attempt to render them, are either vulgar or antic, or not of sufficiently general application. So "der Wolken Zug"--The Draft, the Procession of Clouds. The Ma.s.ses of the Clouds sweep onward in swift stream.

[12] A very inadequate translation of the original:--

Verschmerzen werd' ich diesen Schlag, das weiss ich, Denn was verschmerzte nicht der Mensch!

LITERALLY.

I shall grieve down this blow, of that I'm conscious: What does not man grieve down?