"You will not shoot yourself, count, for the enemy will not overtake us.
Forward! Put spur to your horses. Heigh! Huzza! Forward!"
They rush through the darkness!
Clouds dark and threatening course swiftly through the sky, horsemen dark and threatening course swiftly over the earth.
"Waldow! they come nearer! But we have still the start of them!"
"Only see, count! That dark mass there against the sky. That is our goal.
Just one quarter of an hour and we shall be safe in Spandow."
"One quarter of an hour! An eternity! Heigh! Huzza! On! on!"
"Halt!" is heard behind them. "Halt! in the name of the Elector, in the name of the law! Halt! halt!"
"That is Burgsdorf's voice!" cries Count Schwarzenberg, and spurs his horse with such violence that it rears and then shoots forward, swift as an arrow from a bow. But the pursuers, too, dash forward, as if borne upon the wings of the wind, and the distance between them constantly grows less. Already they hear the horses pant; ever clearer, ever more distinct become the passionate outcries of Colonel Burgsdorf.
He swears, he threatens, he rages! He orders the fugitives to halt, and swears to shoot them if they do not.
What care they for threats or orders? Forward! forward! Behind them sounds a shot—a second, then a third! The balls whistle past their ears, and they laugh aloud, to prove to the enemy that they are still alive.