lf securely bless--
Now my own trespass doth appear!
Yet ah!--what urg'd me to transgress,
God knows, it was so sweet, so dear!

ZWINGER

_Inclosure between the City-wall and the Gate. (In the niche of the wall a
devotional image of the Mater dolorosa, with flower-pots before it.)_

MARGARET (_putting fresh flowers in the pots_)

Ah, rich in sorrow, thou,
Stoop thy maternal brow,
And mark with pitying eye my misery!
The sword in thy pierced heart,
Thou dost with bitter smart
Gaze upwards on thy Son's death agony.
To the dear God on high
Ascends thy piteous sigh,
Pleading for his and thy sore misery.

Ah, who can know
The torturing woe,
The pangs that rack me to the bone?
How my poor heart, without relief,
Trembles and throbs, its yearning grief
Thou knowest, thou alone!

Ah, wheresoe'er I go,
With woe, with woe, with woe,
My anguish'd breast is aching!
When all alone I creep,
I weep, I weep, I weep,
Alas! my heart is breaking!

The flower-pots at my window
Were wet with tears of mine,
The while I pluck'd these blossoms
At dawn to deck thy shrine!

When early in my chamber
Shone bright the rising morn,
I sat there on my pallet,
My heart with anguish torn.

Help! from disgrace and death deliver me!
Ah! rich in sorrow, thou,
Stoop thy maternal brow,
And mark with pitying eye my misery!

NIGHT. STREET BEFORE MARGARET'S DOOR

VALENTINE (_a soldier_, MARGARET's _brother_)

When seated 'mong the jovial crowd,
Where merry comrades boasting loud
Each named with pride his favorite lass,
And in her honor drain'd his glass;
Upon my elbows I would lean,
With easy quiet view the scene,
Nor give my tongue the rein, until
Each swaggering blade had talked his fill.
Then smiling I my beard would stroke,
The while, with brimming glass, I spoke;
"Each to his taste!--but to my mind,
Where in the country will you find,
A maid, as my dear Gretchen fair,
Who with my sister can compare?"
Cling! clang! so rang the jovial sound!
Shouts of assent went circling round;
Pride of her sex is she!--cried some;
Then were the noisy boasters dumb.

And now!--I could tear out my hair,
Or dash my brains out in despair!--
Me every scurvy knave may twit,
With stinging jest and taunting sneer!
Like skulking debtor I must sit,
And sweat each casual word to hear!
And though I smash'd them one and all,--
Yet them I could not liars call.
Who comes this way? who's sneaking here?
If I