radiant tears! Thou tender cruelty!
Gay smiling martyrdom! Shall I forbid thee?
Limit thy depth by mine own shallowness?
Thy courage by my weakness? Where thou darest,
I'll shudder and submit. I kneel here spell-bound
Before my bleeding Saviour's living likeness
To worship, not to cavil: I had dreamt of such things,
Dim heard in legends, while my pitiful blood
Tingled through every vein, and wept, and swore
'Twas beautiful, 'twas Christ-like--had I thought
That thou wert such:--

Eliz. You would have loved me still?

Lewis. I have gone mad, I think, at every parting
At mine own terrors for thee. No; I'll learn to glory
In that which makes thee glorious! Noble stains!
I'll call them rose leaves out of paradise
Strewn on the wreathed snows, or rubies dropped
From martyrs' diadems, prints of Jesus' cross
Too truly borne, alas!

Eliz. I think, mine own,
I am forgiven at last?

Lewis. To-night, my sister--
Henceforth I'll clasp thee to my heart so fast
Thou shalt not 'scape unnoticed.

Eliz [laughing] We shall see--
Now I must stop those wise lips with a kiss,
And lead thee back to scenes of simpler bliss.

SCENE II

A Chamber in the Castle. Elizabeth--the Fool
Isentrudis--Guta singing.

High among the lonely hills,
While I lay beside my sheep,
Rest came down and filled my soul,
From the everlasting deep.

Changeless march the stars above,
Changeless morn succeeds to even;
Still the everlasting hills,
Changeless watch the changeless heaven.

See the rivers, how they run,
Changeless toward the changeless sea;
All around is forethought sure,
Fixed will and stern decree.

Can the sailor move the main?
Will the potter heed the clay?
Mortal! where the spirit drives,
Thither must the wheels obey.

Neither ask, nor fret, nor strive:
Where thy path is, thou shall go.
He who made the streams of time
Wafts thee down to weal or woe.

Eliz. That's a sweet song, and yet it does not chime
With my heart's inner voice. Where had you it, Guta?

Guta. From a nun who was a shepherdess in her youth--sadly plagued
she was by a cruel stepmother, till she fled to a convent and found
rest to her soul.

Fool. No doubt; nothing so pleasant as giving up one's will in
one's own way. But she might have learnt all that without taking
cold on the hill-tops.

Eliz. Where then, Fool?

Fool. At any market-cross where two or three rogues are together,
who have neither grace to mend, nor courage t