But oh, Catharine, you are a noble, great and strong woman; you are incapable of such petty fear--such low calculation; therefore, stand by me; be my savior and protectress! By virtue of that oath which we have just now mutually taken--by virtue of that mutual clasp of the hands just given--I call you to my help and my assistance.

Oh, Catharine, allow me this high pleasure, so full of blessing, of being at some time, perhaps, able to make him whom I love great and powerful by my will.

Allow me this intoxicating delight of being able with my hand to offer to his ambition at once power and glory--it may be even a crown.

Oh, Catharine, on my knees I conjure you--assist me to repeal this hated law, which wants to bind my heart and my hand!" In passionate excitement she had fallen before the queen, and was holding up her hands imploringly to her.
Catharine, smiling, bent down and raised her up in her arms.
"Enthusiast," said she, "poor young enthusiast! Who knows whether you will thank me for it one day, if I accede to your wish; and whether you will not some time curse this hour which has brought you, perhaps, instead of the hoped-for pleasure, only a knowledge of your delusion and misery ?" "And were it even so," cried Elizabeth, energetically, "still it is better to endure a wretchedness we ourselves have chosen, than to be forced to a happy lot.

Say, Catharine--say, will you lend me your assistance?
Will you induce the king to withdraw this hated clause?
If you do it not, queen, I swear to you, by the soul of my mother, that I will not submit to this law; that I will solemnly, before all the world, renounce the privilege that is offered me; that I--" "You are a dear, foolish child," interrupted Catharine--"a child, that in youthful presumption might dare wish to fetch the lightnings down from heaven, and borrow from Jupiter his thunderbolt.