To these enter the COUNTESS TERZKY, pale and disordered.
Her utterance is slow and feeble, and unimpassioned.

OCTAVIO
(meeting her).
Oh, Countess Terzky! These are the results
Of luckless, unblest deeds.

COUNTESS.
They are the fruits
Of your contrivances. The duke is dead,
My husband too is dead, the duchess struggles
In the pangs of death, my niece has disappeared;
This house of splendor, and of princely glory,
Doth now stand desolated: the affrighted servants
Rush forth through all its doors. I am the last
Therein; I shut it up, and here deliver
The keys.

OCTAVIO
(with a deep anguish).
Oh, countess! my house, too, is desolate.

COUNTESS.
Who next is to be murdered? Who is next
To be maltreated? Lo! the duke is dead.
The emperor's vengeance may be pacified!
Spare the old servants; let not their fidelity
Be imputed to the faithful as a crime—
The evil destiny surprised my brother
Too suddenly: he could not think on them.
OCTAVIO.
Speak not of vengeance! Speak not of maltreatment!
The emperor is appeased; the heavy fault
Hath heavily been expiated—nothing
Descended from the father to the daughter,
Except his glory and his services.
The empress honors your adversity,
Takes part in your afflictions, opens to you
Her motherly arms. Therefore no further fears.
Yield yourself up in hope and confidence
To the imperial grace!

COUNTESS
(with her eye raised to heaven)
To the grace and mercy of a greater master
Do I yield up myself. Where shall the body
Of the duke have its place of final rest?
In the Chartreuse, which he himself did found
At Gitschin, rests the Countess Wallenstein;
And by her side, to whom he was indebted
For his first fortunes, gratefully he wished
He might sometime repose in death! Oh, let him
Be buried there. And likewise, for my husband's
Remains I ask the like grace. The emperor
Is now the proprietor of all our castles;
This sure may well be granted us—one sepulchre
Beside the sepulchres of our forefathers!
OCTAVIO.
Countess, you tremble, you turn pale!

COUNTESS
(reassembles all her powers, and speaks with energy and
dignity).
You think
More worthily of me than to believe
I would survive the downfall of my house.
We did not hold ourselves too mean to grasp
After a monarch's crown—the crown did fate
Deny, but not the feeling and the spirit
That to the crown belong! We deem a
Courageous death more worthy of our free station
Than a dishonored life. I have taken poison.

OCTAVIO.
Help! Help! Support her!

COUNTESS.
Nay, it is too late.
In a few moments is my fate accomplished.

               [Exit COUNTESS.

GORDON.
Oh, house of death and horrors!
               [An OFFICER enters, and brings a letter with
               the great seal. GORDON steps forward and meets him.

What is this
It is the imperial seal.

               [He reads the address, and delivers the letter to
               OCTAVIO with a look of reproach, and with
               an emphasis on the word.

To the Prince Piccolomini.

               [OCTAVIO, with his whole frame expressive of sudden anguish,
               raises his eyes to heaven.

The Curtain drops.