ELECTOR.  That’s what it pleases you to presuppose! 
  I sent out Colonel Hennings, as you know,
  To pounce upon and seize the knot of bridges
  Held by the Swedes to cover Wrangel’s rear. 
  If you’d not disobeyed my order, look,
  Hennings had carried out the stroke as planned—­
  In two hours’ time had set afire the bridges,
  Planted his forces firmly on the Rhyn,
  And Wrangel had been crushed with stump and stem
  In ditches and morasses, utterly.

KOTTWITZ.  It is the tyro’s business, not yours,
  To hunger after fate’s supremest crown. 
  Until this hour you took what gift she gave. 
  The dragon that made desolate the Mark
  Beneath your very nose has been repelled
  With gory head!  What could one day bring more? 
  What matters it if, for a fortnight yet,
  Spent in the sand, he lies and salves his wounds? 
  We’ve learnt the art of conquering him, and now
  Are full of zeal to make the most of it. 
  Give us a chance at Wrangel, like strong men,
  Breast against breast once more; we’ll make an end
  And, down into the Baltic, down he goes! 
  They did not build Rome in a single day.

ELECTOR.  What right have you, you fool, to hope for that,
  When every mother’s son is privileged
  To jerk the battle-chariot’s reins I hold? 
  Think you that fortune will eternally
  Award a crown to disobedience? 
  I do not like a bastard victory,
  The gutter-waif of chance; the law, look you,
  My crown’s progenitor, I will uphold,
  For she shall bear a race of victories.

KOTTWITZ.  My liege, the law, the highest and the best,
  That shall be honored in your leaders’ hearts—­
  Look, that is not the letter of your will! 
  It is the fatherland, it is the crown,
  It is yourself, upon whose head it sits. 
  I beg you now, what matters it to you
  What rule the foe fights by, as long as he
  With all his pennons bites the dust once more? 
  The law that drubs him is the highest law! 
  Would you transform your fervid soldiery
  Into a tool, as lifeless as the blade
  That in your golden baldrick hangs inert? 
  Oh, empty spirit, stranger to the stars,
  Who first gave forth such doctrine!  Oh, the base,
  The purblind statecraft, which because of one
  Instance wherein the heart rode on to wrack,
  Forgets ten others, in the whirl of life,
  Wherein the heart alone has power to save! 
  Come, in the battle do I spill in dust
  My blood for wages, money, say, or fame? 
  Faith, not a bit!  It’s all too good for that! 
  Why!  I’ve my satisfaction and my joy,
  Free and apart, in quiet solitude,
  Seeing your splendor and your excellence,
  The fame and crescence of your mighty name! 
  That is the wage for which I sold my heart! 
  Grant that, because of this unplanned success;
  You broke the staff across the Prince’s