ue. Ortrud had remained with her through the night, and had
continued to say so many things which had aroused her curiosity and
fear, that she was thinking more and more of the fact that she knew
nothing whatever of her knight.

"She is a slanderer! Do not heed her!" all cried to Elsa.

"What is his race? Where are his lands? He is an adventurer!" the
sorceress continued to shout bitterly, each word sinking deep into
Elsa's heart. But she roused herself and suddenly began to cry out
against Ortrud, and to say how good and noble the knight was and how
tenderly she loved him.

"When he might have killed your husband yet he spared his life; that
was a sign of his great nobleness of heart!" she declared, trying to
forget Ortrud's words and to convince herself.

When the excitement was at its height and Elsa nearly fainting with
fright and grief, and her ladies crowding about her, the palace doors
again opened, the trumpeters came out, and began to blow their blasts,
while the King, Lohengrin, and the Saxon nobles and counts came in a
procession from the Palas as Elsa and her women had come from the
Kemenate.

_Scene V_

All hailed Lohengrin as Guardian of Brabant, and Elsa threw herself
passionately into his arms. At once he saw that something had
happened.

"What is it?" he asked.

"What is all this strife?" the King demanded, looking about upon the
scene. Then Lohengrin saw Ortrud.

"Horror! What is this wicked woman doing here beside thee?"

"Shelter me against her wrath!" Elsa pleaded. "I harboured her last
night, because she was weeping outside my door, and now she has tried
to drive my happiness from me." Lohengrin looked fixedly at Ortrud and
bade her begone.

"She hath filled thy heart with doubts, dear Elsa," he said, half
reproachfully and full of fear, because he saw a change in the maid.
She wept, and he drew her into the church, while the King and his
train turned toward the church also. Frederick then confronted the
King.

"O great King and deluded Princess! Ye have all done me a grievous
wrong. I accuse this stranger of undoing me with magic. I confront him
here and demand his name and land! If he has naught to fear or to be
ashamed of, let him speak." Everyone was full of hatred for Frederick,
but at the same time, the challenge had a kind of justice in it and
all were troubled.

"It is not thou who can humble me, base knave," Lohengrin answered,
looking contemptuously at Frederick. "It