COUNTESS.

She will accommodate her soul to that
Which is and must be.  I do know your mother;
The far-off future weighs upon her heart
With torture of anxiety; but is it
Unalterably, actually present,
She soon resigns herself, and bears it calmly.

THEKLA.

O my foreboding bosom!  Even now,
E’en now ’tis here, that icy hand of horror! 
And my young hope lies shuddering in its grasp;
I knew it well—­no sooner had I enter’d,
An heavy ominous presentiment
Reveal’d to me that spirits of death were hovering
Over my happy fortune.  But why think I
First of myself?  My mother!  O my mother!

COUNTESS.

Calm yourself!  Break not out in vain lamenting! 
Preserve you for your father the firm friend,
And for yourself the lover, all will yet
Prove good and fortunate.

THEKLA.

Prove good!  What good? 
Must we not part?—­part ne’er to meet again?

COUNTESS.

He parts not from you!  He cannot part from you.

THEKLA.

Alas for his sore anguish!  It will rend
His heart asunder.

COUNTESS.

If indeed he loves you,
His resolution will be speedily taken.

THEKLA.

His resolution will be speedily taken—­
O do not doubt of that!  A resolution! 
Does there remain one to be taken?

COUNTESS.

Hush,
Collect yourself!  I hear your mother coming.

THEKLA.

How shall I bear to see her?

COUNTESS.

Collect yourself.

SCENE III

To them enter the DUCHESS

DUCHESS (to the COUNTESS).

Who was here, sister?  I heard someone talking,
And passionately too.

COUNTESS.

Nay! there was no one.

DUCHESS.

I am grown so timorous, every trifling noise
Scatters my spirits, and announces to me
The footstep of some messenger of evil. 
And you can tell me, sister, what the event is? 
Will he agree to do the Emperor’s pleasure,
And send the horse-regiments to the Cardinal? 
Tell me, has he dismiss’d Von Questenberg
With a favorable answer?

COUNTESS.

No, he has not.

DUCHESS.

Alas! then all is lost!  I see it coming,
The worst that can come!  Yes, they will depose him;
The accursed business of the Regensburg diet
Will all be acted o’er again!

COUNTESS.

No! never! 
Make your heart easy, sister, as to that.

[THEKLA, in extreme agitation, throws herself upon her mother, and enfolds her in her arms, weeping.]

DUCHESS.