The Poetical Works of Coleridge, Shelley, and Keats

I know a spell that will soon dispossess

The evil spirit in him.

Their little army faithful to its duty,

And daily it becomes more numerous.

Nor can he take us by surprise: you know

QUESTENBERG (walking up and down in evident disquiet.) I hold him all encompass'd by my listeners.

Friend, friend!

0! this is worse, far worse, than we had suffer'd
Ourselves to dream of at Vienna. There
We saw it only with a courtier's eyes,
Eyes dazzled by the splendor of the throne.

We had not seen the War-chief, the Commander, The man all-powerful in his camp. Here, here, 'Tis quite another thing.

Here is no Emperor more-the Duke is Emperor. Alas, my friend! alas, my noble friend!

Beware, you do not think,

This walk which you have ta'en me through the camp That I, by lying arts, and complaisant Strikes my hopes prostrate.

How shall we hold footing Beneath this tempest, which collects itself And threats us from all quarters? The enemy Of the empire on our borders, now already The master of the Danube, and still farther, And farther still, extending every hour! In our interior the alarum-bells Of insurrection-peasantry in arms— All orders discontented-and the army, Just in the moment of our expectation Of aidance from it-lo! this very army Seduced, run wild, lost to all discipline, Loosen'd, and rent asunder from the state And from their sovereign, the blind instrument Of the most daring of mankind, a weapon of fearful power, which at his will he wields!

OCTAVIO.

Nay, nay, friend! let us not despair too soon.
Men's words are ever bolder than their deeds:
And many a resolute, who now appears
Made up to all extremes, will, on a sudden
Find in his breast a heart he wot not of,
Let but a single honest man speak out
The true name of his crime! Remember too,
We stand not yet so wholly unprotected.
Counts Altringer and Galas have maintain'd

Hypocrisy, have skulked into his graces:
Or with the substance of smooth professions
Nourish his all-confiding friendship! No-
Compell'd alike by prudence, and that duty
Which we all owe our country, and our sovereign,
To hide my genuine feelings from him, yet
Ne'er have I duped him with base counterfeits!

QUESTENBERG.

It is the visible ordinance of Heaven.

OCTAVIO.

I know not what it is that so attracts
And links him both to me and to my son.
Comrades and friends we always were-long hab
Adventurous deeds perform'd in company,
And all those many and various incidents
Which store a soldier's memory with affections,
Had bound us long and early to each other-
Yet I can name the day, when all at once

His heart rose on me, and his confidence

Shot out in sudden growth. It was the morning
Before the memorable fight at Lutzner.
Urged by an ugly dream, I sought him out,
To press him to accept another charger.

At distance from the tents, beneath a tree,

I found him in a sleep. When I had waked him
And had related all my bodings to him,
Long time he stared upon me, like a man
Astounded; thereon fell upon my neck,

And manifested to me an emotion

That far outstripp'd the worth of that small service
Since then his confidence has follow'd me
With the same pace that mine has fled from him.

QUESTENBERG.

You lead your son into the secret?

OCTAVIO.

No!

QUESTENBERG.

What! and not warn him either what bad hands His lot has placed him in?

OCTAVIO.

I must perforce

Leave him in wardship to his innocence.
His young and open soul-dissimulation
Is foreign to its habits! Ignorance
Alone can keep alive the cheerful air,
The unembarrass'd sense and light free spirit
That make the Duke secure.

QUESTENBERG (anxiously).

My honor'd friend! most highly do I deem
Of Colonel Piccolomini-yet-if-
Reflect a little-

OCTAVIO.

I must venture it.

Hush!-There he comes!

SCENE IV.

MAX. PICCOLOMINI, OCTAVIO PICCOLOMINI, QUESTENBERG.

MAX.

Ha! there he is himself. Welcome, my father! [He embraces his father. As he turns round, he observes QUESTENBERG, and draws back with a cold and reserved air.

You are engaged, I see. I'll not disturb you.

OCTAVIO.

How, Max.? Look closer at this visitor.
Attention, Max., an old friend merits-Reverence
Belongs of right to the envoy of your sovereign.
MAX. (drily).

Von Questenberg!-Welcome-if you bring with you
Aught good to our head-quarters.

QUESTENBERG (seizing his hand).
Nay, draw not
Your hand away, Count Piccolomini !
Not on mine own account alone I seized it,
And nothing common will I say therewith.

OCTAVIO (to QUESTENBERG).

Hush! Suppress it, friend! Unless some end were answer'd by the utterance.-Of him there you'll make nothing.

MAX. (continuing).

In their distress

They call a spirit up, and when he comes,
Straight their flesh creeps and quivers, and they
dread him

More than the ills for which they call'd him up.
The uncommon, the sublime, must seem and be
Like things of every day.-But in the field,
Ay, there the Present Being makes itself felt.
The personal must command, the actual eye
Examine. If to be the chieftain asks
All that is great in nature, let it be
Likewise his privilege to move and act
In all the correspondencies of greatness.
The oracle within him, that which lives,
He must invoke and question-not dead books,
Not ordinances, not mould-rotted papers.

OCTAVIO.

My son of those old narrow ordinances
Let us not hold too lightly. They are weights
Of priceless value, which oppress'd mankind
Tied to the volatile will of their oppressors.
For always formidable was the league

[Taking the hands of both. And partnership of free power with free will.

Octavio-Max. Piccolomini!

O savior names, and full of happy omen!
Ne'er will her prosperous genius turn from Austria,

While two such stars, with blessed influences
Beaming protection, shine above her hosts.

MAX.

Heh!-Noble minister! You miss your part.
You came not here to act a panegyric.

You're sent, I know, to find fault and to scold us-
I must not be beforehand with my comrades.

OCTAVIO (to MAX.).

He comes from court, where people are not quite So well contented with the Duke, as here.

MAX.

What now have they contrived to find out in him?
That he alone determines for himself
What he himself alone doth understand!
Well, therein he does right, and will persist in 't.
Heaven never meant him for that passive thing
That can be struck and hammer'd out to suit
Another's taste and fancy. He 'll not dance
To every tune of every minister:

It goes against his nature-he can't do it.
He is possess'd by a commanding spirit,
And his too is the station of command.
And well for us it is so! There exist
Few fit to rule themselves, but few that use
Their intellects intelligently.-Then
Well for the whole, if there be found a man,
Who makes himself what nature destined him,
The pause, the central point to thousand thousands-
Stands fix'd and stately, like a firm-built column,
Where all may press with joy and confidence.
Now such a man is Wallenstein; and if
Another better suits the court-no other
But such a one as he can serve the army

QUESTENBERG

The army? Doubtless!

The way of ancient ordinance, though it winds,
Is yet no devious way. Straight forward goes
The lightning's path, and straight the fearful path
Of the cannon-ball. Direct it flies and rapid,
Shattering that it may reach, and shattering what i
reaches.

My son the road, the human being travels,
That, on which BLESSING comes and goes, doth follow
The river's course, the valley's playful windings,
Curves round the corn-field and the hill of vines,
Honoring the holy bounds of property!
And thus secure, though late, leads to its end.

QUESTENBERG.

O hear your father, noble youth! hear him, Who is at once the hero and the man.

OCTAVIO.

My son, the nursling of the camp spoke in thee!
A war of fifteen years

Hath been thy education and thy school.
Peace hast thou never witness'd! There exists
A higher than the warrior's excellence.
In war itself war is no ultimate purpose.
The vast and sudden deeds of violence,
Adventures wild, and wonders of the moment,
These are not they, my son, that generate
The Calm, the Blissful, and the enduring Mighty!
Lo there! the soldier, rapid architect!

Builds his light town of canvas, and at once
The whole scene moves and bustles momently,
With arms, and neighing steeds, and mirth and quarrel
The motley market fills; the roads, the streams
Are crowded with new freights, trade stirs and hurries
But on some morrow morn, all suddenly,
The tents drop down, the horde renews its march
Dreary, and solitary as a church-yard

The meadow and down-trodden seed-plot lie
And the year's harvest is gone utterly

MAX.

O let the Emperor make peace, my father!
Most gladly would I give the blood-stain'd laurel
For the first violet* of the leafless spring,
Pluck'd in those quiet fields where I have journey'd !

OCTAVIO.

What ails thee? What so moves thee all at once?
MAX.

The joyous vespers of a bloody day.

O happy man, O fortunate! for whom
The well-known door, the faithful arms are open,
The faithful tender arms with mute embracing.
QUESTENBERG (apparently much affected).
O! that you should speak

Of such a distant, distant time, and not
Of the to-morrow, not of this to-day.

Peace have I ne'er beheld? I have beheld it.
From thence am I come hither: O! that sight,
It glimmers still before me, like some landscape
Left in the distance,-some delicious landscape!
My road conducted me through countries where
The war has not yet reach'd. Life, life, my father-Crowded and press'd my inmost soul together.
My venerable father, Life has charms

MAX (turning round to him, quick and vehement).
Where lies the fault but on you in Vienna!
I will deal openly with you, Questenberg.
Just now, as first I saw you standing here,
(I'll own it to you freely) indignation

Which we have ne'er experienced. We have been
But voyaging along its barren coasts,

Like some poor ever-roaming horde of pirates,
That, crowded in the rank and narrow ship,
House on the wild sea with wild usages,
Nor know aught of the main land, but the bays
Where safeliest they may venture a thieves' landing.

Whate'er in the inland dales the land conceals
Of fair and exquisite, O! nothing, nothing,
Do we behold of that in our rude voyage.

OCTAVIO (attentive, with an appearance of
uneasiness).

And so your journey has reveal'd this to you?

MAX.

Twas the first leisure of my life. O tell me,
What is the meed and purpose of the toil,
The painful toil, which robb'd me of my youth,
Left me a heart unsoul'd and solitary,
A spirit uninform'd, unornamented,
For the camp's stir and crowd and ceaseless larum,
The neighing war-horse, the air-shattering trumpet,
The unvaried, still returning hour of duty,
Word of command, and exercise of arms-
There's nothing here, there's nothing in all this
To satisfy the heart, the gasping heart!
Mere bustling nothingness, where the soul is not-
This cannot be the sole felicity,

These cannot be man's best and only pleasures!

OCTAVIO.

Much hast thou learnt, my son, in this short journey.

MAX.

O! day thrice lovely! when at length the soldier
Returns home into life; when he becomes
A fellow-man among his fellow-men.
The colors are unfurl'd, the cavalcade
Marshals, and now the buzz is hush'd, and hark!

Now the soft peace-march beats, home, brothers, home!
The caps and helmets are all garlanded
With green boughs, the last plundering of the fields.
The city gates fly open of themselves,
They need no longer the petard to tear them.
The ramparts are all fill'd with men and women,
With peaceful men and women, that send onwards
Kisses and welcomings upon the air,

Which they make breezy with affectionate gestures.
From all the towers rings out the merry peal,

In the original,

Den blut'gen Lorbeer geb ich hin mit Freuden
Fürs erste Veilchen, das der Mærz uns bringt,
Das dürftige Pfand der neuverjüngten Erde.

'Tis ye that hinder peace, ye!—and the warrior,
It is the warrior that must force it from you.
Ye fret the General's life out, blacken him,
Hold him up as a rebel, and Heaven knows
What else still worse, because he spares the Saxons,
And tries to awaken confidence in the enemy;
Which yet 's the only way to peace for if
War intermit not during war, how then

And whence can peace come?-Your own plagues
fall on you!

Even as I love what's virtuous, hate I you.
And here make I this vow, here pledge myself;
My blood shall spurt out for this Wallenstein,
And my heart drain off, drop by drop, ere ye
Shall revel and dance jubilee o'er his ruin.

SCENE V.

QUESTENBERG, OCTAVIO PICCOLOMINI.

QUESTENBERG.

Alas, alas! and stands it so?

[Exit

[Then in pressing and impatient tones.
What, friend! and do we let him go away
In this delusion-let him go away?
Not call him back immediately, not open
His eyes upon the spot?

OCTAVIO (recovering himself out of a deep study).
He has now open'd mine,

And I see more than pleases me.

QUESTENBERG.

What is it?

OCTAVIO.

Curse on this journey!

QUESTENBERG.

But why so? What is it?

OCTAVIO.

Come, come along, friend! I must follow up
The ominous track immediately. Mine eyes
Are open'd now, and I must use them. Come!
[Draws QUESTENBERG on with him.

QUESTENBERG.

What now? Where go you then?

OCTAVIO.

To her herself

QUESTENBERG.

OCTAVIO (interrupting him, and correcting himself)
To the Duke. Come, let us go-"T is done, '. is done
I see the net that is thrown over him.
Oh! he returns not to me as he went.
QUESTENBERG

Nay, but explain yourself.

OCTAVIO.

And that I should not Foresee it, not prevent this journey! Wherefore Did I keep it from him?-You were in the right. I should have warn'd him! Now it is too late.

QUESTENBERG.

But what's too late? Bethink yourself, my friend,
That you are talking absolute riddles to me.

OCTAVIO (more collected).

Come to the Duke's. "Tis close upon the hour,
Which he appointed you for audience. Come!
A curse, a threefold curse, upon this journey!

[He leads QUESTENBERG off.

SCENE VI.

Changes to a spacious Chamber in the House of the Duke of Friedland.-Servants employed in putting the tables and chairs in order. During this enters SENI, like an old Italian doctor, in black and clothed somewhat fantastically. He carries a white staff, with which he marks out the quarters of the heaven.

FIRST SERVANT.

Come to it, lads, to it! Make an end of it. I hear the sentry call out, “ Stand to your arms!" They will

be there in a minute.

SECOND SERVANT.

Why were we not told before that the audience would be held here? Nothing prepared-no orders -no instructions

THIRD SERVANT.

Ay, and why was the balcony-chamber countermanded, that with the great worked carpet?-there one can look about one.

FIRST SERVANT.

I did even that
Which you commission'd me to do. I told them,
You had determined on our daughter's marriage,

Nay, that you must ask the mathematician there. And wish'd, ere yet you went into the field,
He says it is an unlucky chamber.
To show the elected husband his betrothed.

SECOND SERVANT.

WALLENSTEIN.

Poh! stuff and nonsense! That's what I call a hum. And did they guess the choice which I had made? A chamber is a chamber; what much can the place signify in the affair?

SENI (with gravity).

My son, there's nothing insignificant,

Nothing! But yet in every earthly thing

First and most principal is place and time.

FIRST SERVANT (to the second).

Say nothing to him, Nat. The Duke himself must let him have his own will.

SENI (counts the chairs, half in a loud, half in a low
voice, till he comes to eleven, which he repeats).
Eleven! an evil number! Set twelve chairs.
Twelve! twelve signs hath the zodiac: five and seven,
The holy numbers, include themselves in twelve.

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And what may you have to object against eleven? O! my dear Lord, all is not what it was. I should like to know that now.

I have been long accustom'd to defend you,
To heal and pacify distemper'd spirits.

No; no one rail'd at you. They wrapp'd them up,
O Heaven! in such oppressive, solemn silence!-
Here is no every-day misunderstanding,
No transient pique, no cloud that passes over:
Something most luckless, most unhealable,
Has taken place. The Queen of Hungary
Used formerly to call me her dear aunt,
And ever at departure to embrace me-

WALLENSTEIN.

Now she omitted it?

DUCHESS (wiping away her tears, after a pause).
She did embrace me,

But then first when I had already taken
My formal leave, and when the door already
Had closed upon me, then did she come out
In haste, as she had suddenly bethought herself,
And press'd me to her bosom, more with anguish
Than tenderness.

WALLENSTEIN (seizes her hand soothingly).
Nay, now collect yourself.
And what of Eggenberg and Lichtenstein,
And of our other friends there?

DUCHESS (shaking her head).·

I saw none.

Of a second

-Dismission.

DUCHESS.

WALLENSTEIN. Proceed!

DUCHESS.

They talk

WALLENSTEIN.

DUCHESS.

-(catches her voice and hesitates).

WALLENSTEIN.

Second

DUCHESS.

WALLENSTEIN.

Talk they?

More disgraceful

[Strides across the Chamber in vehement agitatu O! they force, they thrust me

With violence against my own will, onward!

DUCHESS (presses near to him, in entreaty). O! if there yet be time, my husband! if By giving way and by submission, this Can be averted-my dear Lord, give way! Win down your proud heart to it! Tell that heart, It is your sovereign Lord, your Emperor, Before whom you retreat. O let no longer Low tricking malice blacken your good meaning With venomous glosses. Stand you up Shielded and helm'd and weapon'd with the truth, And drive before you into uttermost shame These slanderous liars! Few firm friends have weYou know it!-The swift growth of our good fortune It hath but set us up a mark for hatred. What are we, if the sovereign's grace and favor Stand not before us?

SCENE VIII.

Enter the Countess TERTSKY, leading in her hand the Princess THEKLA, richly adorned with Brilliants. COUNTESS, THEKLA, WALLENSTEIN, DUCHESS.

COUNTESS.

These suns then are eclipsed for us. Henceforward How, sister! What, already upon business! Must we roll on, our own fire, our own light.

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The Poetical Works of Coleridge, Shelley, and Keats: Complete in One Volume