Complete Works of Thomas Hardy (Illustrated)
Page 825
SPIRIT OF THE YEARS
What lewdness lip those wry-formed phantoms there!
IRONIC SPIRITS
Nay, Showman Years! With holy reverent air
We hymn the nuptials of the Imperial pair.
[The scene thickens to mist and obscures the scene.]
SCENE VII
PETERSBURG. THE PALACE OF THE EMPRESS-MOTHER
[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.]
SCENE VIII
PARIS. THE GRAND GALLERY OF THE LOUVRE AND THE SALON-CARRE ADJOINING
[The view is up the middle of the Gallery, which is now a spectacle
of much magnificence. Backed by the large paintings on the walls
are double rows on each side of brightly dressed ladies, the pick
of Imperial society, to the number of four thousand, one thousand
in each row; and behind these standing up are two rows on each side
of men of privilege and fashion. Officers of the Imperial Guard
are dotted about as marshals.
Tempor
ary barriers form a wide passage up the midst, leading to the
Salon-Carre, which is seen through the opening to be fitted up as
a chapel, with a gorgeous altar, tall candles, and cross. In front
of the altar is a platform with a canopy over it. On the platform
are two gilt chairs and a prie-dieu.
The expectant assembly does not continuously remain in the seats,
but promenades and talks, the voices at times rising to a din amid
the strains of the orchestra, conducted by the EMPEROR'S Director
of Music. Refreshments in profusion are handed round, and the
extemporized cathedral resolves itself into a gigantic cafe of
persons of distinction under the Empire.]
SPIRIT SINISTER
All day have they been waiting for their galanty-show, and now the
hour of performance is on the strike. It may be seasonable to muse
on the sixteenth Louis and the bride's great-aunt, as the nearing
procession is, I see, appositely crossing the track of the tumbril
which was the last coach of that respected lady.... It is now
passing over the site of the scaffold on which she lost her head.
... Now it will soon be here.
[Suddenly the heralds enter the Gallery at the end towards the
Tuileries, the spectators ranging themselves in their places.
In a moment the wedding procession of the EMPEROR and EMPRESS
becomes visible. The civil marriage having already been performed,
Napoleon and Marie Louise advance together along the vacant pathway
towards the Salon-Carre, followed by the long suite of illustrious
personages, and acclamations burst from all parts of the Grand
Gallery.
SPIRIT OF THE PITIES
Whose are those forms that pair in pompous train
Behind the hand-in-hand half-wedded ones,
With faces speaking sense of an adventure
Which may close well, or not so?
RECORDING ANGEL [reciting]
First there walks
The Emperor's brother Louis, Holland's King;
Then Jerome of Westphalia with his spouse;
The mother-queen, and Julie Queen of Spain,
The Prince Borghese and the Princess Pauline,
Beauharnais the Vice-King of Italy,
And Murat King of Naples, with their Queens;
Baden's Grand-Duke, Arch-Chancellor Cambaceres,
Berthier, Lebrun, and, not least, Talleyrand.
Then the Grand Marshal and the Chamberlain,
The Lords-in-Waiting, the Grand Equerry,
With waiting-ladies, women of the chamber,
An others called by office, rank, or fame.
SPIRIT OF RUMOUR
New, many, to Imperial dignities;
Which, won by character and quality
In those who now enjoy them, will become
The birthright of their sons in aftertime.
SPIRIT OF THE YEARS
It fits thee not to augur, quick-eared Shade.
Ephemeral at the best all honours be,
These even more ephemeral than their kind,
So random-fashioned, swift, perturbable!
SPIRIT OF THE PITIES
Napoleon looks content—nay, shines with joy.
SPIRIT OF THE YEARS
Yet see it pass, as by a conjuror's wand.
[Thereupon Napoleon's face blackens as if the shadow of a winter
night had fallen upon it. Resentful and threatening, he stops the
procession and looks up and down the benches.]
SPIRIT SINISTER
This is sound artistry of the Immanent Will: it relieves the monotony
of so much good-humour.
NAPOLEON [to the Chapel-master]
Where are the Cardinals? And why not here? [He speaks so loud that
he is heard throughout the Gallery.]
ABBE DE PRADT [trembling]
Many are present here, your Majesty;
But some are feebled by infirmities
Too common to their age, and cannot come.
NAPOLEON
Tell me no nonsense! Half absent themselves
Because they WILL not come. The factious fools!
Well, be it so. But they shall flinch for it!
[MARIE LOUISE looks frightened. The procession moves on.]
SPIRIT OF THE PITIES
I seem to see the thin and headless ghost
Of the yet earlier Austrian, here, too, queen,
Walking beside the bride, with frail attempts
To pluck her by the arm!
SPIRIT OF THE YEARS
Nay, think not so.
No trump unseals earth's sepulchre's to-day:
We are the only phantoms now abroad
On this mud-moulded ball! Through sixteen years
She has decayed in a back-garden yonder,
Dust all the showance time retains of her,
Senseless of hustlings in her former house,
Lost to all count of crowns and bridalry—
Even of her Austrian blood. No: what thou seest
Springs of the quavering fancy, stirred to dreams
By yon tart phantom's phrase.
MARIE LOUISE [sadly to Napoleon]
I know not why,
I love not this day's doings half so well
As our quaint meeting-time at Compiegne.
A clammy air creeps round me, as from vaults
Peopled with looming spectres, chilling me
And angering you withal!
NAPOLEON
O, it is nought
To trouble you: merely, my cherished one,
Those devils of Italian Cardinals!—
Now I'll be bright as ever—you must, too.
MARIE LOUISE
I'll try.
[Reaching the entrance to the Salon-Carre amid strains of music
the EMPEROR and EMPRESS are received and incensed by the CARDINAL
GRAND ALMONERS. They take their seats under the canopy, and the
train of notabilities seat themselves further back, the persons-
in-waiting stopping behind the Imperial chairs.
The ceremony of the religious marriage now begins. The choir
intones a hymn, the EMPEROR and EMPRESS go to the altar, remove
their gloves, and make their vows.]
SPIRIT IRONIC
The English Church should return thanks for this wedding, seeing
how it will purge of coarseness the picture-sheets of that artistic
nation, which will hardly be able to caricature the new wife as it
did poor plebeian Josephine. Such starched and ironed monarchists
cannot sneer at a woman of such a divinely dry and crusted line like
the Hapsburgs!
[Mass is next celebrated, after which the TE DEUM is chanted in
harmonies that whirl round the walls of the Salon-Carre and quiver
down the long Gallery. The procession then re-forms and returns,
amid the flutterings and applause of the dense assembly. But
Napoleon's face has not lost the sombre expression which settled
on it. The pair and their train pass out by the west door, and
the congregation disperses in the other direction, the cloud-
curtain closing over the scene as they disappear.
ACT SIXTH
SCENE I
THE LINES OF TORRES VEDRAS
[A bird's-eye perspective is revealed of the peninsular tract of
Portuguese territory lying between the shining pool of the Tagus on
the east, and the white-frilled Atlantic lifting rhythmically on
the west. As thus beheld the tract features itself somewhat like a
late-Gothic shield, the upper edge from the dexter to the sinister
<
br /> chief being the lines of Torres Vedras, stretching across from the
mouth of the Zezambre on the left to Alhandra on the right, and
the south or base point being Fort S. Julian. The roofs of Lisbon
appear at the sinister base, and in a corresponding spot on the
opposite side Cape Roca.
It is perceived in a moment that the northern verge of this nearly
coast-hemmed region is the only one through which access can be
gained to it by land, and a close scrutiny of the boundary there
reveals that means are being adopted to effectually prevent such
access.
From east to west along it runs a chain of defences, dotted at
intervals by dozens of circular and square redoubts, either made
or in the making, two of the latter being of enormous size.
Between these stretch unclimbable escarpments, stone walls, and
other breastworks, and in front of all a double row of abatis,
formed of the limbs of trees.
Within the outer line of defence is a second, constructed on the
same shield-shaped tract of country; and is not more than a twelfth
of the length of the others. It is a continuous entrenchment of
ditches and ramparts, and its object—that of covering a forced
embarkation—is rendered apparent by some rocking English
transports off the shore hard by.]
DUMB SHOW
Innumerable human figures are busying themselves like cheese-mites
all along the northernmost frontage, undercutting easy slopes into
steep ones, digging ditches, piling stones, felling trees, dragging
them, and interlacing them along the front as required.
On the second breastwork, which is completed, only a few figures move.
On the third breastwork, which is fully matured and equipped, minute
red sentinels creep backwards and forwards noiselessly.
As time passes three reddish-grey streams of marching men loom out
to the north, advancing southward along three roads towards three
diverse points in the first defence. These form the English army,
entering the lines for shelter. Looked down upon, their motion
seems peristaltic and vermicular, like that of three caterpillars.
The division on the left is under Picton, in the centre under Leith
and Cole, and on the extreme right, by Alhandra, under Hill. Beside
one of the roads two or three of the soldiers are dangling from a
tree by the neck, probably for plundering.
The Dumb Show ends, and the point of view sinks to the earth.
SCENE II
THE SAME. OUTSIDE THE LINES