________________________________________________
_ PART SECOND. ACT FIFTH. SCENE VII.
[One of the private apartments is disclosed, in which the Empress-mother and Alexander are seated.]
EMPRESS-MOTHER
So one of Austrian blood his pomp selects
To be his bride and bulwark--not our own.
Thus are you coolly shelved!
ALEXANDER
Me, mother dear?
You, faith, if I may say it dutifully!
Had all been left to me, some time ere now
He would have wedded Kate.
EMPRESS-MOTHER
How so, my son?
Catharine was plighted, and it could not be.
ALEXANDER
Rather you swiftly pledged and married her,
To let Napoleon have no chance that way.
But Anne remained.
EMPRESS-MOTHER
How Anne?--so young a girl!
Sane Nature would have cried indecency
At such a troth.
ALEXANDER
Time would have tinkered that,
And he was well-disposed to wait awhile;
But the one test he had no temper for
Was the apparent slight of unresponse
Accorded his impatient overtures
By our suspensive poise of policy.
EMPRESS-MOTHER
A backward answer is our country's card--
The special style and mode of Muscovy.
We have grown great upon it, my dear son,
And may such practice rule our centuries through!
The necks of those who rate themselves our peers
Are cured of stiffness by its potency.
ALEXANDER
The principle in this case, anyhow,
Is shattered by the facts: since none can doubt
Your policy was counted an affront,
And drove my long ally to Austria's arms,
With what result to us must yet be seen!
EMPRESS-MOTHER
May Austria win much joy of the alliance!
Marrying Napoleon is a midnight leap
For any Court in Europe, credit me,
If ever such there were! What he may carve
Upon the coming years, what murderous bolt
Hurl at the rocking Constitutions round,
On what dark planet he may land himself
In his career through space, no sage can say.
ALEXANDER
Well--possibly! . . . And maybe all is best
That he engrafts his lineage not on us.--
But, honestly, Napoleon none the less
Has been my friend, and I regret the dream
And fleeting fancy of a closer tie!
EMPRESS-MOTHER
Ay; your regrets are sentimental ever.
That he'll be writ no son-in-law of mine
Is no regret to me! But an affront
There is, no less, in his evasion on't,
Wherein the bourgeois quality of him
Veraciously peeps out. I would be sworn
He set his minions parleying with the twain--
Yourself and Francis--simultaneously,
Else no betrothal could have speeded so!
ALEXANDER
Despite the hazard of offence to one?
EMPRESS-MOTHER
More than the hazard; the necessity.
ALEXANDER
There's no offence to me.
EMPRESS-MOTHER
There should be, then.
I am a Romanoff by marriage merely,
But I do feel a rare belittlement
And loud laconic brow-beating herein!
ALEXANDER
No, mother, no! I am the Tsar--not you,
And I am only piqued in moderateness.
Marriage with France was near my heart--I own it--
What then? It has been otherwise ordained.
[A silence.]
EMPRESS-MOTHER
Here comes dear Anne Speak not of it before her.
[Enter the GRAND-DUCHESS, a girl of sixteen.]
ANNE
Alas! the news is that poor Prussia's queen,
Spirited Queen Louisa, once so fair,
Is slowly dying, mother! Did you know?
ALEXANDER (betraying emotion)
Ah!--such I dreaded from the earlier hints.
Poor soul--her heart was slain some time ago.
ANNE
What do you mean by that, my brother dear?
EMPRESS-MOTHER
He means, my child, that he as usual spends
Much sentiment upon the foreign fair,
And hence leaves little for his folk at home.
ALEXANDER
I mean, Anne, that her country's overthrow
Let death into her heart. The Tilsit days
Taught me to know her well, and honour her.
She was a lovely woman even then! . . .
Strangely, the present English Prince of Wales
Was wished to husband her. Had wishes won,
They might have varied Europe's history.
ANNE
Napoleon, I have heard, admired her once;
How he must grieve that soon she'll be no more!
EMPRESS-MOTHER
Napoleon and your brother loved her both.
[Alexander shows embarrassment.]
But whatsoever grief be Alexander's,
His will be none who feels but for himself.
ANNE
O mother, how can you mistake him so!
He worships her who is to be his wife,
The fair Archduchess Marie.
EMPRESS-MOTHER
Simple child,
As yet he has never seen her, or but barely.
That is a tactic suit, with love to match!
ALEXANDER (with vainly veiled tenderness)
High-souled Louisa;--when shall I forget
Those Tilsit gatherings in the long-sunned June!
Napoleon's gallantries deceived her quite,
Who fondly felt her pleas for Magdeburg
Had won him to its cause; the while, alas!
His cynic sense but posed in cruel play!
EMPRESS-MOTHER
Bitterly mourned she her civilities
When time unlocked the truth, that she had choked
Her indignation at his former slights
And slanderous sayings for a baseless hope,
And wrought no tittle for her country's gain.
I marvel why you mourn a frustrate tie
With one whose wiles could wring a woman so!
ALEXANDER (uneasily)
I marvel also, when I think of it!
EMPRESS-MOTHER
Don't listen to us longer, dearest Anne.
[Exit Anne.]
--You will uphold my judging by and by,
That as a suitor we are quit of him,
And that blind Austria will rue the hour
Wherein she plucks for him her fairest flower!
[The scene shuts.] _
Read next: Part 2: Act 5: Scene 8. Paris. Grand Gallery And Salon-Carre
Read previous: Part 2: Act 5: Scene 6. Courcelles
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