Of grinning fiends, fierce horses, bodiless hands,
Which clutch at one to whom my spirit yearns
As to a mother. There's some fearful tie
Between me and that spirit-world, which God
Brands with his terrors on my troubled mind.
Speak! tell me, nurse! is she in heaven or hell?

Isen. God knows, my child: there are masses for her soul
Each day in every Zingar minster sung.

Eliz. But was she holy?--Died she in the Lord?
Isen [weeps]. O God! my child! And if I told thee all,
How couldst thou mend it?

Eliz. Mend it? O my Saviour!
I'd die a saint!
Win heaven for her by prayers, and build great minsters,
Chantries, and hospitals for her; wipe out
By mighty deeds our race's guilt and shame--
But thus, poor witless orphan! [Weeps.]

[Count Walter enters.]

Wal. Ah! my princess! accept your liegeman's knee;
Down, down, rheumatic flesh!

Eliz. Ah! Count Walter! you are too tall to kneel to little girls.

Wal. What? shall two hundredweight of hypocrisy bow down to his
four-inch wooden saint, and the same weight of honesty not worship