a,
Unscathed by scorching war. It lies so near
The strongest city, Prague, that fire and sword
Have skimmed it lightly: so that now, besides
Its own exuberance, it bears double value
Confronted with whole realms far and near
Made deserts.

_Ulr._ You describe it faithfully.

_Stral._ Aye--could you see it, you would say so--but,
As I have said, you shall.

_Ulr._ I accept the omen. 380

_Stral._ Then claim a recompense from it and me,
Such as _both_ may make worthy your acceptance
And services to me and mine for ever.

_Ulr._ And this sole, sick, and miserable wretch--
This way-worn stranger--stands between you and
This Paradise?--(As Adam did between
The devil and his)--[_Aside_].

_Stral._ He doth.

_Ulr._ Hath he no right?

_Stral._ Right! none. A disinherited prodigal,
Who for these twenty years disgraced his lineage
In all his acts--but chiefly by his marriage, 390
And living amidst commerce-fetching burghers,
And dabbling merchants, in a mart of Jews.

_Ulr._ He has a wife, then?

_Stral._ You'd be sorry to
Call such your mother. You have seen the woman
He _calls_ his wife.

_Ulr._ Is she not so?

_Stral._ No more
Than he's your father:--an Italian girl,
The daughter of a banished man, who lives
On love and poverty with this same Werner.

_Ulr._ They are childless, then?

_Stral._ There is or was a bastard,
Whom the old man--the grandsire (as old age 400
Is ever doting) took to warm his bosom,
As it went chilly downward to the grave:
But the imp stands not in my path--he has fled,
No one knows whither; and if he had not,
His claims alone were too contemptible
To stand.--Why do you smile?

_Ulr._ At your vain fears:
A poor man almost in his grasp--a child
Of doubtful birth--can startle a grandee!

_Stral._ All's to be feared, where all is to be gained.

_Ulr._ True; and aught done to save or to obtain it. 410

_Stral._ You have harped the very string next to my heart[185].
I may depend upon you?

_Ulr._ 'Twere too late