Song of One Eleven Years in Prison

  WHENE’ER with haggard eyes I view     This dungeon that I ’m rotting in,   I think of those companions true     Who studied with me at the U-                 niversity of Gottingen,                 niversity of Gottingen.   [Weeps and pulls out a blue kerchief, with which he wipes his eyes; gazing tenderly at it, he proceeds:]   Sweet kerchief, checked with heavenly blue,     Which once my love sat knotting in—   Alas, Matilda then was true!     At least I thought so at the U-                 niversity of Gottingen,                 niversity of Gottingen.   [At the repetition of this line he clanks his chains in cadence.]   Barbs! barbs! alas! how swift you flew,     Her neat post-wagon trotting in!   Ye bore Matilda from my view;     Forlorn I languished at the U-                 niversity of Gottingen,                 niversity of Gottingen.   This faded form! this pallid hue!     This blood my veins is clotting in!   My years are many—they were few     When first I entered at the U-                 niversity of Gottingen,                 niversity of Gottingen.   There first for thee my passion grew,     Sweet, sweet Matilda Pottingen!   Thou wert the daughter of my tu-     tor, law-professor at the U-                 niversity of Gottingen,                 niversity of Gottingen.   Sun, moon, and thou, vain world, adieu,     That kings and priests are plotting in;   Here doomed to starve on water gru-     el, never shall I see the U-                 niversity of Gottingen,                 niversity of Gottingen.   [During the last stanza he dashes his head repeatedly against the walls of his prison, and finally so hard as to produce a visible contusion. He then throws himself on the floor in an agony. The curtain drops, the music still continuing to play till it is wholly fallen.]