On the way he receives a last impressive confirmation of the seriousness of his situation.  He sees his grave being dug by torchlight.  In the apartment of the Electress now takes place the much decried scene, which people refuse to comprehend, and therefore, of course, will not forgive the poet for writing.  The Prince, in the presence of the girl he loves, begs for his life.  He does so in the most ignominious fashion; indeed, in order to remove what he considers one of the worst rocks of offense, he even renounces Nathalie, while she stands by shuddering at the state of humiliation in which she beholds her heart’s ideal.  Certainly that is utterly unworthy of a hero and of a man, and we may unquestionably depend upon it that the poet, who in the same piece created the Elector beside the Prince, knew that as well as any of us.  In fact, this scene has no other purpose than to show us that the Prince is not yet either a hero or a man, and that along the path he has trodden so far nobody can become either the one or the other.  Up to this time he has led a hollow, sham existence, which could very well fill his head with giddy intoxication, but could not put any real backbone into him.  Now, however, the true meaning of life, at least in one form, in the form of love, has at last come close enough to him to make the continuation of this sham existence impossible; therein lies the real import of the scene in which he and Nathalie declare their love, the great significance of which I pointed out above.  If that had not taken place he would probably have become a duelling-celebrity, and after the first shock of surprise he would have been able to show the same contempt of death as a professional fencer accustomed to the duelling-ground, who, with perfect right, considers life—­his own namely—­to be a mere cipher; he would have awaited the bullets defiantly, with his arms crossed a la Napoleon, and the Elector would have had him shot, would indeed have been forced to have him shot.  He can no longer sink to such depths as that now, but still less can he find the real moral strength soberly to make up his mind to take voluntary leave of the world; for he has as yet no feeling of completed existence and of duty performed to take away with him; his life is still a blank.  Therefore at this moment he must act exactly as he does act; to be sure, the poet must not leave him in this doubtful stage for any length of time; but neither, indeed, does he do so.  The Electress considers that any further step would be useless, as she has already of her own accord done her utmost.  Nathalie, however, with death in her heart, promises to venture one last word with her uncle for the fallen man, but bitterly advises the Prince in any case to take another look at his grave, and to persuade himself that it is not one whit gloomier than the battle has showed it a thousand times.