[Exeunt.

Scene II.—­A Prison

Lighted by a lamp, a couch in the background

Egmont (alone).  Old friend!  Ever faithful sleep, dost thou too forsake me, like my other friends?  How wert thou wont of yore to descend unsought upon my free brow, cooling my temples as with a myrtle wreath of love!  Amidst the din of battle, on the waves of life, I rested in thine arms, breathing lightly as a growing boy.  When tempests whistled through the leaves and boughs, when the summits of the lofty trees swung creaking in the blast, the inmost core of my heart remained unmoved.  What agitates thee now?  What shakes thy firm and steadfast mind?  I feel it, ’tis the sound of the murderous axe, gnawing at thy root.  Yet I stand erect, but an inward shudder runs through my frame.  Yes, it prevails, this treacherous power; it undermines the firm, the lofty stem, and ere the bark withers, thy verdant crown falls crashing to the earth.

Yet wherefore now, thou who hast so often chased the weightiest cares like bubbles from thy brow, wherefore canst thou not dissipate this dire foreboding which incessantly haunts thee in a thousand different shapes?  Since when hast thou trembled at the approach of death, amid whose varying forms, thou weft wont calmly to dwell, as with the other shapes of this familiar earth.  But ’tis not he, the sudden foe, to encounter whom the sound bosom emulously pants;—–­’tis the dungeon, emblem of the grave, revolting alike to the hero and the coward.  How intolerable I used to feel it, in the stately hall, girt round by gloomy walls, when, seated on my cushioned chair, in the solemn assembly of the princes, questions, which scarcely required deliberation, were overlaid with endless discussions, while the rafters of the ceiling seemed to stifle and oppress me.  Then I would hurry forth as soon as possible, fling myself upon my horse with deep-drawn breath, and away to the wide champaign, man’s natural element, where, exhaling from the earth, nature’s richest treasures are poured forth around us, while, from the wide heavens, the stars shed down their blessings through the still air; where, like earth-born giants, we spring aloft, invigorated by our Mother’s touch; where our entire humanity and our human desires throb in every vein; where the desire to press forward, to vanquish, to snatch, to use his clenched fist, to possess, to conquer, glows through the soul of the young hunter; where the warrior, with rapid stride, assumes his inborn right to dominion over the world; and, with terrible liberty, sweeps like a desolating hailstorm over the field and grove, knowing no boundaries traced by the hand of man.