s. A peasant and his wife are sitting at a table, at work._

GENTLEMAN-IN-WAITING.
God greet you, honest folk! Can you make room
To shelter guests beneath your roof?

PEASANT. Indeed!
Gladly, indeed!

THE WIFE. And may one question, whom?

GENTLEMAN-IN-WAITING.
The highest lady in the land, no less.
Her coach broke down outside the village gates,
And since we hear the victory is won
There'll be no need for farther journeying.

BOTH (_rising_).
The victory won? Heaven!

GENTLEMAN-IN-WAITING. What! You haven't heard?
The Swedish army's beaten hip and thigh;
If not forever, for the year at least
The Mark need fear no more their fire and sword!--
Here comes the mother of our people now.

SCENE IV

_The_ ELECTRESS, _pale and distressed, enters with the_ PRINCESS
NATALIE, _followed by various ladies-in-waiting. The others as
before._

ELECTRESS (_on the threshold_).
Bork! Winterfeld! Come! Let me have your arm.

NATALIE (_going to her_).
Oh, mother mine!

LADIES-IN-WAITING. Heavens, how pale! She is faint.

[_They support her._]

ELECTRESS. Here, lead me to a chair, I must sit down.
Dead, said he--dead?

NATALIE. Mother, my precious mother!

ELECTRESS. I'll see this bearer of dread news myself.

SCENE V

CAPTAIN VON MOeRNER _enters, wounded, supported by two troopers. The
others._

ELECTRESS. Oh, herald of dismay, what do you bring?

MOeRNER. Oh, precious Madam, what these eyes of mine
To their eternal grief themselves have seen!

ELECTRESS. So be it! Tell!

MOeRNER. The Elector is no more.

NATALIE. Oh, heaven
Shall such a hideous blow descend on us?

[_She hides her face in her hands._]

ELECTRESS. Give me report of how he came to fall--
And, as the bolt that strikes the wanderer,
In one last flash lights scarlet-bright the world,
So be your tale. When you are done, may night
Close down upon my head.

MOeRNER (_approaching her, led by the two troopers_).
The Prince of Homburg,
Soon as the enemy, hard pressed by Truchsz,
Reeling broke cover, had brought up his troops
To the attack of Wrangel on the plain;
Two lines he'd pierced and, as they broke, destroyed,
When a strong earthwork hemmed his way; and thence
So murderous a fire on him beat
That, like a field of grain, his cavalry,
Mowed to the earth, went down; twixt bush and hill
He needs must halt to