The German Classics Of The Nineteenth And Twentieth Centuries V
Chapter 14
_A room in a village. A gentleman-in-waiting, booted and spurred, enters. A peasant and his wife are sitting at a table, at work._
GENTLEMAN-IN-WAITING. God greet you, honest folk! Can you make room To shelter guests beneath your roof?
PEASANT. Indeed! Gladly, indeed!
THE WIFE. And may one question, whom?
GENTLEMAN-IN-WAITING. The highest lady in the land, no less. Her coach broke down outside the village gates, And since we hear the victory is won There'll be no need for farther journeying.
BOTH (_rising_). The victory won? Heaven!
GENTLEMAN-IN-WAITING. What! You haven't heard? The Swedish army's beaten hip and thigh; If not forever, for the year at least The Mark need fear no more their fire and sword!-- Here comes the mother of our people now.