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.
O! 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!
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!
It is the visible ordinance of Heaven.
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 habit, 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- His heart rose on me, and his confidence Yet I can name the day, when all at once 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.
MAX. PICCOLOMINI, OCTAVIO PICCOLOMINI, QUESTENBERG.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
He comes from court, where people are not quite So well contented with the Duke, as here.
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
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 it 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.
O hear your father, noble youth! hear him, Who is at once the hero and the man.
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 With arms, and neighing steeds, and mirth and quarrel. The whole scene moves and bustles momently, 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
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!
What ails thee? What so moves thee all at once? MAX.
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-
My venerable father, Life has charms
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?
'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!
Much hast thou learnt, my son, in this short journey.
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,
Den blut'gen Lorbeer geb ich bin mit Freuden Fürs erste Veilchen, das der Marz uns bringt, Das dürftige Pfand der neuverjüngten Erde.
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.
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 Crowded and press'd my inmost soul together. "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.
QUESTENBERG, OCTAVIO PICCOLOMINI.
Alas, alas! and stands it so?
[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.
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.
What now? Where go you then?
OCTAVIO (interrupting him, and correcting himself). To the Duke. Come, let us go-"Tis done, 'tis done,
I see the net that is thrown over him. Oh! he returns not to me as he went. QUESTENBERG.
Nay, but explain yourself.
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.
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.
They only hoped and wish'd it may have fallen Upon no foreign nor yet Lutheran noble.
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.
Eleven is transgression; eleven oversteps
The ten commandments.
That's good! and why do you call five a holy number?
Five is the soul of man: for even as man Is mingled up of good and evil, so
A canker-worm, my Lord, a canker-worm Has stolen into the bud.
Not of respect. No honors were omitted, No outward courtesy ? but in the place Of condescending, confidential kindness, Familiar and endearing, there were given me
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, 0 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—
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).
The ambassador from Spain, who once was wont To plead so warmly for me?—
WALLENSTEIN. Proceed!
DUCHESS.
catches her voice and hesitates).
WALLENSTEIN.
Second
[Strides across the Chamber in vehement agitation. 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 we- You 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?
Enter the Countess TERTSKY, leading in her hand the Princess THEKLA, richly adorned with Brilliants. COUNTESS, THEKLA, WALLENSTEIN, DUCHESS.
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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