be, has not been induced to favour us with a second edition; but we are stepping ultra crepidam.

We find Goetz, and the iron hand which furnished his popular cognomen, in full activity at the opening of the drama. A conspiracy has been formed against him by the Bishop of Bamberg, and others; and one of the most active of its instruments is a certain Lord of Weislingen, once the bosom friend of Goetz's youth, and almost the lover of his sister, but now estranged from him and his, by intrigues and the vile turns of this world's affairs. This man, lying in wait for Goetz in the Forest of Haslach, is, with his attendants, overpowered by the valour of the ironhanded Baron, and we soon have him making his appearance as a prisoner in Goetz's parnal castle of Jaxthausen. Before d his captor arrive, we are aled a glimpse of Goetz's wife, siste, and child, engaged in the quiet domestic pursuits of the time, and this preparation has an admirable effect.

Enter GOETZ, WEISLINGEN, HANS, and other Cavaliers, as from horseback. Goetz. (Laying his helmet and sword on a table.) Unclasp my armour, and give me my doublet.-Ease will refresh me.Brother Martin said well-You have put us out of wind, Weislingen! [Weislingen answers nothing, but paces up and down.]

Goetz. Be of good heart!-Come, unarm yourself!-Where are your clothes? Not lost, I hope, in the scuffle ?-(To the attendants) Go, ask his servants; open the trunks and see that nothing is missing-or I can lend you some of mine.

Weis. Let me remain as I am—it is all

one.

Goetz. I can give you a handsome clean doublet, but it is only oflinen. It has grown too little for me-I had it on at the marriage of the Lord Palsgrave, when your Bishop was so incensed at me.-About a fortnight before, I had sunk two of his vessels upon the Maine-I was going up stairs to the venison in the inn at Heidelberg, with Francis of Seckingen. Before you get quite up, there is a landing-place with iron rails-there stood the Bishop, and gave Frank his hand as he passed, and the like to me that was close behind him. I laughed in my sleeve, and went to the Landgrave of Hanau, who was always my noble friend, and told him, “ The Bishop has given me his hand, but I wot well he did not know me." The Bishop heard me, for I was speaking loud-He came to us angrily, and said, True, I gave thee my

hand, because I knew thee not indeed." To which I answered, "I marked that, my Lord, and so take your shake of the hand back again." The manikin's neck grew red room and complained to the Palsgrave Lewis as a crab for spite, and he went up the and the Princes of Nassau.-But we have had much to do together since that.

Weis. I wish you would leave me to myself!

Goetz. Why so?-I entreat you be at rest. You are in my power, and I will not misuse it.

Weis. That I am little anxious about

Your duty as a knight prescribes your

conduct.

boy?

Goetz. After dinner.

Charles. And I know something else.

Goetz. What may that be?

Charles. Jaxthausen is a village and castle upon the Jaxt, which has appertain ed in property and heritage, for two hun dred years, to the Lords of Berlichingen.'

Goetz. Do you know the Lord of Berlichingen? (Charles stares at him.) With all his extensive learning, he does not know his own father.-Whom does Jaxthausen belong to ?

Charles. Jaxthausen is a village and castle upon the Jaxt

Goetz. I did not ask about that I knew every path, pass, and ford about the place, before ever I knew the name of the village, castle, or river. Is your mother in the kitchen?

Charles. Yes, papa! They are dressing a lamb, with nice white turnips. Goetz. Do you know that too, Jack Turnspit ?

Charles. And my aunt is roasting an ap ple for me to eat after dinner.

Goetz. Can't you eat it raw?

Charles. It tastes better roasted.

Goetz. You must have a tid-bit, must you?-Weislingen, I will be with you immediately.-I go to see my wife. Come, Charles.

Charles. Who is that man? Goetz. Bid him welcome. Tell him to be cheerful.

Charles. There's my hand, man! Be cheerful-for the dinner will be ready

soon.

Weis. (Takes up the child, and kisses him.) Happy boy! that knowest no worse evil than the delay of dinner.-May you live to have much joy in your son, Berlichingen!

Goetz. Where there is most light, the shades are deepest. Yet I thank God for him. We'll see what they are about.

[Exit with Charles and Servants. Weis. O that I could but wake, and find this all a dream!-In the power of Berlichingen!-of him from whom I had so far detached myself-whose remem brance I shunned like fire-whom I hoped to overpower!-And he still the old truehearted Goetz!-O Adelbert! could'st thou recall the days when we played as children, and drove the mimic chase round this hall; then thou lovedst him, prizedst him, as thy soul! Who can be near him and hate him? Alas! I am not here such as I was. Happy days! ye are gone-There, in his chair by the chimney, sat old Berlichingen, while we played around him, and loved each other like cherubs!-How anxious will be the Bishop and all my friends!-Well; I wot the whole country will sympathize with my misfortune. But what does it avail? Can that reflection give me the peace after which I struggle?

Re-enter GOETZ with wine and beakers.

Goetz. We'll take a glass till dinner is ready. Come, sit down-think yourself at home! Consider you are once more the guest of Goetz. It is long since we have sat side by side, and emptied a flagon together. [Fills.] Come-A light heart!

Weis. Those times are over.

Goetz. God forbid! We shall hardly find more pleasant days than those which we spent together at the Margrave's court -when we were inseparable night and day. I think with pleasure on the days of my youth.-Do you remember the battle I had with the Polander, and how I broke his frizzled pate for him?

Weis. It was at table; and he struck at you with a knife.

Goetz. However, I came off conqueror and you had a quarrel upon the account with his comrade-We always stuck together like brave boys-[Fills and hands it to Weislingen.] I shall never forget how the Margrave used to call us Castor and Pollux. It does me good to think of it.

Weis. The Bishop of Wurtzburg called us so first.

Goetz. That bishop was a learned clerk, and withal so gentle-I shall remember as long as I live how he used to caress us, praise our union, and describe the good fortune of the man who has an adopted brother in a friend.

Weis. No more of that.

Goetz. Does it displease you? I know nothing more delightful after fatigue, than to talk over old stories. Indeed, when I recall to mind how we were almost the same being, body and soul, and how I thought we were to continue so all our lives Was not that my sole comfort when this hand was shot away at Landshut, and when you nursed and tended me like a brother? I hoped Adelbert would in future be my right hand-And now----

Weis. Alas!

Goetz. Hadst thou followed me when I wished thee to go to Brabant with me, all would have remained well. But then that unhappy turn for court-dangling seized thee, and thy coquetting and flirting with idle women. I always to ee, when thou would'st mix with thesunging, begging court-sycophants, and

ertain

them with gossiping about unlucky matches, and seduced girls, and ch trash as they are interested about-I always told thee, Adelbert, thou wilt become a rogue.

Weis. Why all this?

Goetz. Would to God I could forget it, or that it were otherwise!-Art thou not as free, and as nobly born, as any in Germany, independent, holding under the Emperor alone and dost thou not crouch amongst vassals?--What is the Bishop to thee? Allow he is thy neighbour, and can do thee a shrewd turn, hast thou not an arm, and friends to requite him in kind? Art thou ignorant of the noble situation of a free knight, who rests only upon God, the Emperor, and himself, that thou canst bear thus to crawl at the footstool of a selfish, malicious priest.

Weis. Let me speak.

Goetz. What canst thou say?

Weis. You look upon the princes, as the wolf upon the shepherd. And yet canst thou blame them for uniting in the defence of their own territories and property? Are they a moment secure from the unruly chivalry of your free knights, who plunder their vassals upon the very high roads, and sack their castles and towns? While upon the frontiers the public enemy threaten to overrun the lands of our dear Emperor, and, while he needs their assistance they can scarce sustain their own security is it not our good genius which at this moment suggests a mean of bringing peace to Germany, of securing the administration of justice, and giving to great and small, the blessings of quiet? For this purpose is our confederacy; and dost thou blame us for securing the protection of the powerful princes our neighbours, instead

of relying on that of the Emperor, who is so far removed from us, and is hardly able to protect himself?

Goetz. Yes, yes, I understand you. Weislingen, were the princes as you paint them, we should be all agreed-all at peace and quiet: yes, every bird of prey naturally likes to eat its plunder undisturbed. The general weal! They will hardly acquire untimely grey hairs in studying for that. -And with the Emperor they play a fine game. Every day comes some new adviser, and gives his opinion. The Emperor means well, and would gladly put things to rights -but because a great man can soon give an order, and by a single word put a thousand hands into motion, he therefore thinks his orders will be as speedily accomplished. Then come ordinances upon ordinances, contradictory of each other, while the princes all the while obey those only which serve their own interest, and help them to press under their footstool their less power ful neighbours-and all the while they talk of the quiet and peace of the empire!I will be sworn, many a one thanks God in his heart that the Turk keeps the Emperor

from looking into these affairs.

Weis. You view things your own way. Goetz. So does every one. The question is, which is the right light in which they should be regarded ?-And your plans are of the darkest.

Weis. You may say what you will, I am your prisoner.

Goetz. When your conscience is free, so are you. But we talked of the general tranquillity. I stood as a boy of sixteen with the Margrave at an Imperial Diet. What harangues the princes made! And worst of all, your spiritual allies. The Bishop rung into the Emperor's ears his regard for justice, till one wondered again. And now he has imprisoned a page of mine, at the very time when our quarrels were all accommodated, and I thought of nothing less. Is not all betwixt us settled? What is his business with the boy?

Weis. It was done without his know ledge.

Goetz. Then why does he not release him?

Weis. He has not borne himself as he should do.

Goetz. Not as he should do! By my honour, he has done as he should do, as surely as he was imprisoned both with your knowledge and the Bishop's. Do you think I am come into the world this very day, that I cannot see the tendency of all this?

Weis. Your suspicions do us injustice. Goetz. Weislingen, shall I tell you the truth? Inconsiderable as I am, I am a thorn in your eyes, and Selbiss and Seckingen are no less so, while we retain our firm resolution to die, sooner than to thank any one but God for the air we breathe, or pledge our faith and homage to any one but

the Emperor. Hence they goad me from every quarter, blacken my character with the Emperor, and among my friends and neighbours, and spy about for advantage against me. They would fain take me out of the way; that was the reason for imprisoning the page whom I had dispatched for intelligence: And you now say he did not bear himself as he should do, because he would not betray my secrets. And thou, Weislingen, art their tool!

Weis. Berlichingen

Goetz. No more about it I am an enemy to long explanations; they deceive either the maker or the hearer, and, for the most part, both.

Weislingen is thus thrown once gen's lovely sister, Maria; and the more into the society of Berlichinreader may easily guess the result. The following scene, however, is too full of merit to be omitted. We know of few modern attempts to pourtray the open-hearted simplicity of old manners, by half so successful.

Maria. You love me, you say-Alas! I am perhaps but too much inclined to believe it.

Weis. Why not believe what I feel so well, that I am entirely thine? (Embraces her.)

Maria. (Softly.) I gave you one kiss for earnest, but you must encroach no farther.

Weis. You are too strict, Maria !—Innocent love is pleasing in the sight of Hea

ven.

Maria. It may be so. But I must not build upon what you say; for I have been taught that caresses are as strong as fetters, and that damsels, when they love, are weaker than Sampson when he lost his locks. Weis. Who taught you so?

Maria. The abbess of my convent. Till my seventeenth year I was with her; and only with you, for the first time, have I ceased to regret her company. She had loved, and could tell- -She had a most affectionate heart.-Oh! she was an excellent woman!

Weis. Then you resemble her—(Takes her hand.)-What would become of me were I to lose you?

Maria. That, I hope, is not likely to happen. But you must away.

Weis. I know it, dearest, and I will. Well do I feel what a treasure I have purchased by this sacrifice !-Now, blessed be your brother, and the day on which he undertook to seize me!

Maria. His heart overflowed with hope for you and himself. Farewell,' he said; I go to recover my friend.'

Weis. That has he done. Would that I had studied the arrangement and security of my property, instead of neglecting it, and dallying at that worthless Court!-then could'st thou have been instantly mine. Maria. Delay enhances pleasure.

Weis. Say not so, Maria, lest I dread that thy feelings are less keen than mine. True, I deserved punishment, deserved to lose every glimpse of this heavenly prospect. But now! to be wholly thine; to live only in thee, and in thy circle of friends far removed from the world; to live for the enjoyment of all the raptures which two hearts can bestow. What is the favour of princes-what applauses of the universe_ to such simple, yet unequalled felicity? Many have been my hopes and wishes; henceforth I am equally above both.

Enter GOETZ.

Goetz. Your page is returned already; he can scarcely bring out a word for hunger and fatigue. My wife has ordered the poor knave to be taken care of. This much I have picked out-the Bishop will not give up my boy-an imperial commission is to be granted, under which all matters are to be adjusted. But be it as he will, Adelbert, you are free. Pledge me but your hand, that you will neither give open nor underhand assistance to my avowed enemies.

Weis. Here I grasp thy hand. From this moment be our union and friendship as firm and unalterable as a primary law of nature!-Let me take this hand also-(Takes Maria's hand)—and with it the possession of this lovely lady.

Goetz. Dare I promise for you? Maria. (Timidly.) If-if it is your wish....

Goetz. By good luck our wishes will not differ on this point. Thou needst not blush the glance of thy eye betrays thee. Well, then, Weislingen, join hands, and I say Amen! My friend and brother!--I thank thee, sister; thou spin'st more than flax, for thou hast drawn a thread which can fetter this wandering bird of paradise. Yet thou lookst not quite open, Adelbert. What ails thee?-I am fully happy! What I but hoped in a dream I now see with my eyes, and feel as if I still dreamed. Now my vision is out. I thought tonight, that, in token of reconciliation, I gave thee this iron hand; and that you held it so fast that it broke away from my arm. I started, and awoke. Had I but dreamed a little longer, I should have seen how thou didst make me a new living hand. You must away this instant, to put in order thy castle and property. That damned Court has detained you long from both.I must call my wife Elizabeth!

Maria. How transported is my brother!

Weis. Yet I am still more so. Goetz. (To Maria.) You will have pleasant quarters.

Maria. They say Franconia is a fine country.

Weis. And I may venture to say that my castle lies in the most delicious part of it.

Goetz. That thou mayst, and I will swear to it. Look you, here flows the Mayne, around a hill clothed with corn-fields and vineyards, its top crowned with a Gothic castle-then the river makes a sharp turn, and glides round behind the very rock on which it stands. The windows of the great hall look perpendicularly down upon the river-a prospect which would detain one for hours.

Enter ELIZABETH.
Eli. What would'st thou ?

Goetz. You, too, must give your hand, and say, God bless you!-They are a pair.

Eli. So soon?

Goetz. But not unexpected.

Eli. May ye ever love each other with the same affection as now-and as your love, so be your happiness.

Weis. Amen! On that condition I ensure it.

Goetz. The bridegroom, my dear, must perforce away for awhile; for this great event makes it needful for him to settle some concerns at home. He must bid adieu to the Bishop's court, in order that that connexion may be broken off by degrees. Then he must rescue his property from the hands of some selfish stewards; and-But cóme, sister-come, Elizabeth, his squire has, perhaps, some private message to him.

Weis. None but what you may hear.

Goetz. Needless :- Franconians and Swabians! now that you are one of us, we may bid their Mightinesses the princes defiance to their beard.

[Exeunt Goetz, Elizabeth, Maria. Weis. (Alone.) God in heaven! And canst thou have reserved such happiness for one so unworthy? It is too much for my heart. How meanly I depended upon wretched fools, whom I thought I was governing by superiority of intrigue, subservient to the glance of homage-demanding princes!-Goetz, my faithful Goetz, thou hast restored me to myself-and my beloved Maria has completed my reformation. I feel free, as if brought from a dungeon into the open air. Bamberg will I never more see will snap all the shameful bands that have connected it and me. My heart rejoices, never more to undergo the degradation of struggling for boons that may be refused-He alone is great and happy who fills his own station of independence, and has neither to command nor to obey.

Weislingen makes fine resolutions, but he does not keep them. Goetz restores him to his freedom, and then

permits, or rather requests him, to go to Bamberg, there to arrange his private affairs, and break off his connexion with the Bishop in a respectful style, previous to his marriage with Maria. To Bamberg Weislingen goes; -but there new temptations, as well as old, await him. A beautiful, artful, and worthless dame, of high rank, the widow lady of Walldorf, admires him, and resolves, partly from this motive, and partly from views of interest, to bind him, per fas aut nefas, in the chains of her fascination. The Bishop is at hand, meantime, with flatteries and with dispensations-he persuades the weak-minded man that there is more evil in keeping than in breaking the engagement under which he had come while a prisoner at Jaxthausen. In a word, Adelbert yields, marries Lady Walldorf-is once more the enemy of Goetz, and, as a natural consequence of his conscious ingratitude, his enmity soon becomes the deadliest and the most determined of all against which our hero has to contend.

The Emperor is persuaded to send his troops against Berlichingen. Weislingen heads a formidable army, and leads it to Jaxthausen. Goetz assaults them in detachments on their way, and comes off victor in many bloody skirmishes-in regard to which, we must quote one passage, chiefly on account of its being, in so far as we know, the first example of that particular species of narrative, which has since been carried to its utmost perfection in the famous description of the siege of Front-de-Bouf's Castle, in Ivanhoe, given through one person stationed at a window to others, who do not see anything beyond the walls of a dungeon.

The scene of the following affair is the high-road to Jaxthausen. On one side there is an eminence, with a ruined watch-tower-on the other, the forest stretches wide over the valley-the Imperialists enter on their marchdrums beating and colours flyingwhen, behold, Goetz is seen stationed on a rising-ground almost immediately in front of them. [Selbiss and Lerse are two of Berlichingen's chief friends and allies.

Captain. He halts upon the high road! That's too impudent. He shall repent it What! not to fear the torrent that bursts loose upon him!

Officer. You will not run upon iron pikes? He looks as if he means to plant the first that comes upon him in the mire, VOL. XVI.

[A loud alarm, with shouts and firing for some minutes-Selbiss is borne in wounded by two troopers.

Sel. Leave me here, and hasten to Goetz. First Trooper. Let us stay. You need our aid.

Sel. Get one of you on the watch-tower, and tell me how it goes.

1st Troop. How shall I get up? 2d Troop. Get upon my shoulder; you can then reach the ruined part.

[First trooper gets up into the tower. 1st Troop. Alas! alas! Sel. What seest thou?

1st Troop. Your cavaliers fly to the hill. Sel. Hellish cowards! I would that they stood, and I had a ball through my head! Ride one of you full speed-Curse, and thunder them back to the field.-Seest thou [Exit second Trooper. Troop. I see the three black feathers in the midst of the tumult.

Goetz?

Sel. Swim, brave swimmer-I lie here. Troop. A white plume-Whose is that? Sel. The Captain.

Troop. Goetz gallops upon him-Crash! down he goes!

Sel. The Captain?
Troop. Yes.

Sel. Brave! brave!

Troop. Alas, alas !-I see Goetz no more. Sel. Then die, Selbiss !

Troop. A dreadful tumult where he stood. George's blue plume vanishes too. Sel. Climb higher. Seest thou Lerse? Troop. No; everything is in confusion. Sel. No further come down. How do Seckingen's men bear themselves?

Troop. So so-one of them flies to the wood-another-another-a whole troopGoetz is lost!

Sel. Come down-tell me no more. Troop. I cannot-Bravo! Bravo! I see Goetz-I see George-I see Lerse. Sel. On horseback?

Troop. Aye, aye, high on horsebackVictory! victory! They fly! Sel. The Imperialists? 3 C