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_ PART THIRD. ACT THIRD. SCENE I.
[The sitting-room of a private mansion. Evening. A large stove-fire and candles burning. The October wind is heard without, and the leaded panes of the old windows shake mournfully.]
SEMICHORUS I OF IRONIC SPIRITS (aerial music)
We come; and learn as Time's disordered dear sands run
That Castlereagh's diplomacy has wiled, waxed, won.
The beacons flash the fevered news to eyes keen bent
That Austria's formal words of war are shaped, sealed, sent.
SEMICHORUS II
So; Poland's three despoilers primed by Bull's gross pay
To stem Napoleon's might, he waits the weird dark day;
His proffered peace declined with scorn, in fell force then
They front him, with yet ten-score thousand more massed men.
[At the back of the room CAULAINCOURT, DUKE OF VICENZA, and
JOUANNE, one of Napoleon's confidential secretaries, are unpacking
and laying out the Emperor's maps and papers. In the foreground
BERTHIER, MURAT, LAURISTON, and several officers of Napoleon's
suite, are holding a desultory conversation while they await his
entry. Their countenances are overcast.]
MURAT
At least, the scheme of marching on Berlin
Is now abandoned.
LAURISTON
Not without high words:
He yielded and gave order prompt for Leipzig
But coldness and reserve have marked his mood
Towards us ever since.
BERTHIER
The march hereto
He has looked on as a retrogressive one,
And that, he ever holds, is courting woe.
To counsel it was doubtless full of risk,
And heaped us with responsibilities;
--Yet 'twas your missive, sire, that settled it (to MURAT).
How stirred he was! "To Leipzig, or Berlin?"
He kept repeating, as he drew and drew
Fantastic figures on the foolscap sheet,--
"The one spells ruin--t'other spells success,
And which is which?"
MURAT (stiffly)
What better could I do?
So far were the Allies from sheering off
As he supposed, that they had moved in march
Full fanfare hither! I was duty-bound
To let him know.
LAURISTON
Assuming victory here,
If he should let the advantage slip him by
As on the Dresden day, he wrecks us all!
'Twas damnable--to ride back from the fight
Inside a coach, as though we had not won!
CAULAINCOURT (from the back)
The Emperor was ill: I have ground for knowing.
[NAPOLEON enters.]
NAPOLEON (buoyantly)
Comrades, the outlook promises us well!
MURAT (dryly)
Right glad are we you tongue such tidings, sire.
To us the stars have visaged differently;
To wit: we muster outside Leipzig here
Levies one hundred and ninety thousand strong.
The enemy has mustered, OUTSIDE US,
Three hundred and fifty thousand--if not more.
NAPOLEON
All that is needful is to conquer them!
We are concentred here: they lie a-spread,
Which shrinks them to two-hundred-thousand power:--
Though that the urgency of victory
Is absolute, I admit.
MURAT
Yea; otherwise
The issue will be worse than Moscow, sire!
[MARMONT, DUKE OF RAGUSA (Wellington's adversary in Spain), is
announced, and enters.]
NAPOLEON
Ah, Marmont; bring you in particulars?
MARMONT
Some sappers I have taken captive, sire,
Say the Allies will be at stroke with us
The morning next to to-morrow's.--I am come,
Now, from the steeple-top of Liebenthal,
Where I beheld the enemy's fires bespot
The horizon round with raging eyes of flame:--
My vanward posts, too, have been driven in,
And I need succours--thrice ten thousand, say.
NAPOLEON (coldly)
The enemy vexes not your vanward posts;
You are mistaken.--Now, however, go;
Cross Leipzig, and remain as the reserve.--
Well, gentlemen, my hope herein is this:
The first day to annihilate Schwarzenberg,
The second Blucher. So shall we slip the toils
They are all madding to enmesh us in.
BERTHIER
Few are our infantry to fence with theirs!
NAPOLEON (cheerfully)
We'll range them in two lines instead of three,
And so we shall look stronger by one-third.
BERTHIER (incredulously)
Can they be thus deceived, sire?
NAPOLEON
Can they? Yes!
With all my practice I can err in numbers
At least one-quarter; why not they one-third?
Anyhow, 'tis worth trying at a pinch. . . .
[AUGEREAU is suddenly announced.]
Good! I've not seen him yet since he arrived.
[Enter AUGEREAU.
Here you are then at last, old Augereau!
You have been looked for long.--But you are no more
The Augereau of Castiglione days!
AUGEREAU
Nay, sire! I still should be the Augereau
Of glorious Castiglione, could you give
The boys of Italy back again to me!
NAPOLEON
Well, let it drop. . . . Only I notice round me
An atmosphere of scopeless apathy
Wherein I do not share.
AUGEREAU
There are reasons, sire,
Good reasons for despondence! As I came
I learnt, past question, that Bavaria
Swerves on the very pivot of desertion.
This adds some threescore thousand to our foes.
NAPOLEON (irritated)
That consummation long has threatened us! . . .
Would that you showed the steeled fidelity
You used to show! Except me, all are slack!
(To Murat) Why, even you yourself, my brother-in-law,
Have been inclining to abandon me!
MURAT (vehemently)
I, sire? It is not so. I stand and swear
The grievous imputation is untrue.
You should know better than believe these things,
And well remember I have enemies
Who ever wait to slander me to you!
NAPOLEON (more calmly)
Ah yes, yes. That is so.--And yet--and yet
You have deigned to weigh the feasibility
Of treating me as Austria has done! . . .
But I forgive you. You are a worthy man;
You feel real friendship for me. You are brave.
Yet I was wrong to make a king of you.
If I had been content to draw the line
At vice-king, as with young Eugene, no more,
As he has laboured you'd have laboured, too!
But as full monarch, you have foraged rather
For your own pot than mine!
[MURAT and the marshal are silent, and look at each other with troubled countenances. NAPOLEON goes to the table at the back, and bends over the charts with CAULAINCOURT, dictating desultory notes to the secretaries.]
SPIRIT IRONIC
A seer might say
This savours of a sad Last-Supper talk
'Twixt his disciples and this Christ of war!
[Enter an attendant.]
ATTENDANT
The Saxon King and Queen and the Princess
Enter the city gates, your Majesty.
They seek the shelter of the civic walls
Against the risk of capture by Allies.
NAPOLEON
Ah, so? My friend Augustus, is he near?
I will be prompt to meet him when he comes,
And safely quarter him. (He returns to the map.)
[An interval. The clock strikes midnight. The EMPEROR rises abruptly, sighs, and comes forward.]
I now retire,
Comrades. Good-night, good-night. Remember well
All must prepare to grip with gory death
In the now voidless battle. It will be
A great one and a critical; one, in brief,
That will seal France's fate, and yours, and mine!
ALL (fervidly)
We'll do our utmost, by the Holy Heaven!
NAPOLEON
Ah--what was that? (He pulls back the window-curtain.)
SEVERAL
It is our enemies,
Whose southern hosts are signalling to their north.
[A white rocket is beheld high in the air. It is followed by a second, and a third. There is a pause, during which NAPOLEON and the rest wait motionless. In a minute or two, from the opposite side of the city, three coloured rockets are sent up, in evident answer to the three white ones. NAPOLEON muses, and lets the curtain drop.]
NAPOLEON
Yes, Schwarzenberg to Blucher. . . . It must be
To show that they are ready. So are we!
[He goes out without saying more. The marshals and other officers withdraw. The room darkens and ends the scene.] _
Read next: Part 3: Act 3: Scene 2. The Same. The City And The Battlefield
Read previous: Part 3: Act 2: Scene 4. A Fete At Vauxhall
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