Part 23
[Midsummer-day breaks, and the sun rises on the right, revealing the position clearly. The eminence overlooks for miles the river Niemen, now mirroring the morning rays. Across the river three temporary bridges have been thrown, and towards them the French masses streaming out of the forest descend in three columns.
They sing, shout, fling their shakos in the air and repeat words from the proclamation, their steel and brass flashing in the sun. They narrow their columns as they gain the three bridges, and begin to cross--horse, foot, and artillery.
NAPOLEON has come from the tent in which he has passed the night to the high ground in front, where he stands watching through his glass the committal of his army to the enterprise. DAVOUT, NEY, MURAT, OUDINOT, Generals HAXEL and EBLE, NARBONNE, and others surround him.
It is a day of drowsing heat, and the Emperor draws a deep breath as he shifts his weight from one puffed calf to the other. The light cavalry, the foot, the artillery having passed, the heavy horse now crosses, their glitter outshining the ripples on the stream.
A messenger enters. NAPOLEON reads papers that are brought, and frowns.]
NAPOLEON
The English heads decline to recognize The government of Joseph, King of Spain, As that of “the now-ruling dynast”; But only Ferdinand's!--I'll get to Moscow, And send thence my rejoinder. France shall wage Another fifty years of wasting war Before a Bourbon shall remount the throne Of restless Spain!... [A flash lights his eyes.]
But this long journey now just set a-trip Is my choice way to India; and 'tis there That I shall next bombard the British rule. With Moscow taken, Russia prone and crushed, To attain the Ganges is simplicity-- Auxiliaries from Tiflis backing me. Once ripped by a French sword, the scaffolding Of English merchant-mastership in Ind Will fall a wreck.... Vast, it is true, must bulk An Eastern scheme so planned; but I could work it.... Man has, worse fortune, but scant years for war; I am good for another five!
SPIRIT OF THE PITIES
Why doth he go?-- I see returning in a chattering flock Bleached skeletons, instead of this array Invincibly equipped.
SPIRIT OF THE YEARS
I'll show you why.
[The unnatural light before seen usurps that of the sun, bringing into view, like breezes made visible, the films or brain-tissues of the Immanent Will, that pervade all things, ramifying through the whole army, NAPOLEON included, and moving them to Its inexplicable artistries.]
NAPOLEON [with sudden despondency]
That which has worked will work!--Since Lodi Bridge The force I then felt move me moves me on Whether I will or no; and oftentimes Against my better mind.... Why am I here? --By laws imposed on me inexorably! History makes use of me to weave her web To her long while aforetime-figured mesh And contemplated charactery: no more. Well, war's my trade; and whencesoever springs This one in hand, they'll label it with my name!
[The natural light returns and the anatomy of the Will disappears. NAPOLEON mounts his horse and descends in the rear of his host to the banks of the Niemen. His face puts on a saturnine humour, and he hums an air.]
Malbrough s'en va-t-en guerre, Mironton, mironton, mirontaine; Malbrough s'en va-t-en guerre, Ne sait quand reviendra!
[Exeunt NAPOLEON and his staff.]
SPIRIT SINISTER
It is kind of his Imperial Majesty to give me a lead. [Sings.]
Monsieur d'Malbrough est mort, Mironton, mironton, mirontaine; Monsieur d'Malbrough est mort, Est mort et enterre!
[Anon the figure of NAPOLEON, diminished to the aspect of a doll, reappears in front of his suite on the plain below. He rides across the swaying bridge. Since the morning the sky has grown overcast, and its blackness seems now to envelope the retreating array on the other side of the stream. The storm bursts with thunder and lightning, the river turns leaden, and the scene is blotted out by the torrents of rain.]
## SCENE II
THE FORD OF SANTA MARTA, SALAMANCA
[We are in Spain, on a July night of the same summer, the air being hot and heavy. In the darkness the ripple of the river Tormes can be heard over the ford, which is near the foreground of the scene.
Against the gloomy north sky to the left, lightnings flash revealing rugged heights in that quarter. From the heights comes to the ear the tramp of soldiery, broke and irregular, as by obstacles in their descent; as yet they are some distance off. On heights to the right hand, on the other side of the river, glimmer the bivouac fires of the French under MARMONT. The lightning quickens, with rolls of thunder, and a few large drops of rain fall.
A sentinel stands close to the ford, and beyond him is the ford- house, a shed open towards the roadway and the spectator. It is lit by a single lantern, and occupied by some half-dozen English dragoons with a sergeant and corporal, who form part of a mounted patrol, their horses being picketed at the entrance. They are seated on a bench, and appear to be waiting with some deep intent, speaking in murmurs only.
The thunderstorm increases till it drowns the noise of the ford and of the descending battalions, making them seem further off than before. The sentinel is about to retreat to the shed when he discerns two female figures in the gloom. Enter MRS. DALBIAC and MRS. PRESCOTT, English officers wives.]
SENTINEL
Where there's war there's women, and where there's women there's trouble! [Aloud] Who goes there?
MRS. DALBIAC
We must reveal who we are, I fear [to her companion]. Friends! [to sentinel].
SENTINEL
Advance and give the countersign.
MRS. DALBIAC
Oh, but we can't!
SENTINEL
Consequent which, you must retreat. By Lord Wellington's strict regulations, women of loose character are to be excluded from the lines for moral reasons, namely, that they are often employed by the enemy as spies.
MRS. PRESCOTT
Dear good soldier, we are English ladies benighted, having mistaken our way back to Salamanca, and we want shelter from the storm.
MRS. DALBIAC
If it is necessary I will say who we are.--I am Mrs. Dalbiac, wife of the Lieutenant-Colonel of the Fourth Light Dragoons, and this lady is the wife of Captain Prescott of the Seventh Fusileers. We went out to Christoval to look for our husbands, but found the army had moved.
SENTINEL [incredulously]
“Wives!” Oh, not to-day! I have heard such titles of courtesy afore; but they never shake me. “W” begins other female words than “wives!”--You'll have trouble, good dames, to get into Salamanca to-night. You'll be challenged all the way down, and shot without clergy if you can't give the countersign.
MRS. PRESCOTT
Then surely you'll tell us what it is, good kind man!
SENTINEL
Well--have ye earned enough to pay for knowing? Government wage is poor pickings for watching here in the rain. How much can ye stand?
MRS. DALBIAC
Half-a-dozen pesetas.
SENTINEL
Very well, my dear. I was always tender-hearted. Come along. [They advance and hand the money.] The pass to-night is “Melchester Steeple.” That will take you into the town when the weather clears. You won't have to cross the ford. You can get temporary shelter in the shed there.
[As the ladies move towards the shed the tramp of the infantry draws near the ford, which the downfall has made to purl more boisterously. The twain enter the shed, and the dragoons look up inquiringly.]
MRS. DALBIAC [to dragoons]
The French are luckier than you are, men. You'll have a wet advance across this ford, but they have a dry retreat by the bridge at Alba.
SERGEANT OF PATROL [starting from a doze]
The moustachies a dry retreat? Not they, my dear. A Spanish garrison is in the castle that commands the bridge at Alba.
MRS. DALBIAC
A peasant told us, if we understood rightly, that he saw the Spanish withdraw, and the enemy place a garrison there themselves.
[The sergeant hastily calls up two troopers, who mount and ride off with the intelligence.]
SERGEANT
You've done us a good turn, it is true, darlin'. Not that Lord Wellington will believe it when he gets the news.... Why, if my eyes don't deceive me, ma'am, that's Colonel Dalbiac's lady!
MRS. DALBIAC
Yes, sergeant. I am over here with him, as you have heard, no doubt, and lodging in Salamanca. We lost our way, and got caught in the storm, and want shelter awhile.
SERGEANT
Certainly, ma'am. I'll give you an escort back as soon as the division has crossed and the weather clears.
MRS. PRESCOTT [anxiously]
Have you heard, sergeant, if there's to be a battle to-morrow?
SERGEANT
Yes, ma'am. Everything shows it.
MRS. DAlBIAC [to MRS. PRESCOTT]
Our news would have passed us in. We have wasted six pesetas.
MRS. PRESCOTT [mournfully]
I don't mind that so much as that I have brought the children from Ireland. This coming battle frightens me!
SPIRIT OF THE YEARS
This is her prescient pang of widowhood. Ere Salamanca clang to-morrow's close She'll find her consort stiff among the slain!
[The infantry regiments now reach the ford. The storm increases in strength, the stream flows more furiously; yet the columns of foot enter it and begin crossing. The lightning is continuous; the faint lantern in the ford-house is paled by the sheets of fire without, which flap round the bayonets of the crossing men and reflect upon the foaming torrent.]
CHORUS OF THE PITIES [aerial music]
The skies fling flame on this ancient land! And drenched and drowned is the burnt blown sand That spreads its mantle of yellow-grey Round old Salmantica to-day; While marching men come, band on band, Who read not as a reprimand To mortal moils that, as 'twere planned In mockery of their mimic fray, The skies fling flame.
Since sad Coruna's desperate stand Horrors unsummed, with heavy hand, Have smitten such as these! But they Still headily pursue their way, Though flood and foe confront them, and The skies fling flame.
[The whole of the English division gets across by degrees, and their invisible tramp is heard ascending the opposite heights as the lightnings dwindle and the spectacle disappears.]
## SCENE III
THE FIELD OF SALAMANCA
[The battlefield--an undulating and sandy expanse--is lying under the sultry sun of a July afternoon. In the immediate left foreground rises boldly a detached dome-like hill known as the Lesser Arapeile, now held by English troops. Further back, and more to the right, rises another and larger hill of the kind--the Greater Arapeile; this is crowned with French artillery in loud action, and the French marshal, MARMONT, Duke of RAGUSA, stands there. Further to the right, in the same plane, stretch the divisions of the French army. Still further to the right, in the distance, on the Ciudad Rodrigo highway, a cloud of dust denotes the English baggage-train seeking security in that direction. The city of Salamanca itself, and the river Tormes on which it stands, are behind the back of the spectator.
On the summit of the lesser hill, close at hand, WELLINGTON, glass at eye, watches the French division under THOMIERE, which has become separated from the centre of the French army. Round and near him are aides and other officers, in animated conjecture on MARMONT'S intent, which appears to be a move on the Ciudad Rodrigo road aforesaid, under the impression that the English are about to retreat that way.
The English commander descends from where he was standing to a nook under a wall, where a meal is roughly laid out. Some of his staff are already eating there. WELLINGTON takes a few mouthfuls without sitting down, walks back again, and looks through his glass at the battle as before. Balls from the French artillery fall around. Enter his aide-de-camp, FITZROY SOMERSET.]
FITZROY SOMERSET [hurriedly]
The French make movements of grave consequence-- Extending to the left in mass, my lord.
WELLINGTON
I have just perceived as much; but not the cause. [He regards longer.] Marmont's good genius is deserting him!
[Shutting up his glass with a snap, WELLINGTON calls several aides and despatches them down the hill. He goes back behind the wall and takes some more mouthfuls.]
By God, Fitzroy, if we shan't do it now! [to SOMERSET]. Mon cher Alava, Marmont est perdu! [to his SPANISH ATTACHE].
FITZROY SOMERSET
Thinking we mean to attack on him, He schemes to swoop on our retreating-line.
WELLINGTON
Ay; and to cloak it by this cannonade. With that in eye he has bundled leftwardly Thomiere's division; mindless that thereby His wing and centre's mutual maintenance Has gone, and left a yawning vacancy. So be it. Good. His laxness is our luck!
[As a result of the orders sent off by the aides, several British divisions advance across the French front on the Greater Arapeile and elsewhere. The French shower bullets into them; but an English brigade under PACK assails the nearer French on the Arapeile, now beginning to cannonade the English in the hollows beneath.
Light breezes blow toward the French, and they get in their faces the dust-clouds and smoke from the masses of English in motion, and a powerful sun in their eyes.
MARMONT and his staff are sitting on the top of the Greater Arapeile only half a cannon-shot from WELLINGTON on the Lesser; and, like WELLINGTON, he is gazing through his glass.
SPIRIT OF RUMOUR
Appearing to behold the full-mapped mind Of his opponent, Marmont arrows forth Aide after aide towards the forest's rim, To spirit on his troops emerging thence, And prop the lone division Thomiere, For whose recall his voice has rung in vain. Wellington mounts and seeks out Pakenham, Who pushes to the arena from the right, And, spurting to the left of Marmont's line, Shakes Thomiere with lunges leonine.
When the manoeuvre's meaning hits his sense, Marmont hies hotly to the imperilled place, Where see him fall, sore smitten.--Bonnet rides And dons the burden of the chief command, Marking dismayed the Thomiere column there Shut up by Pakenham like bellows-folds Against the English Fourth and Fifth hard by; And while thus crushed, Dragoon-Guards and Dragoons, Under Le Marchant's hands [of Guernsey he], Are launched upon them by Sir Stapleton, And their scathed files are double-scathed anon.
Cotton falls wounded. Pakenham's bayoneteers Shape for the charge from column into rank; And Thomiere finds death thereat point-blank!
SEMICHORUS I OF THE PITIES [aerial music]
In fogs of dust the cavalries hoof the ground; Their prancing squadrons shake the hills around: Le Marchant's heavies bear with ominous bound Against their opposites!
SEMICHORUS II
A bullet crying along the cloven air Gouges Le Marchant's groin and rankles there; In Death's white sleep he soon joins Thomiere, And all he has fought for, quits!
[In the meantime the battle has become concentrated in the middle hollow, and WELLINGTON descends thither from the English Arapeile.
The fight grows fiercer. COLE and LEITH now fall wounded; then BERESFORD, who directs the Portuguese, is struck down and borne away. On the French side fall BONNET who succeeded MARMONT in command, MANNE, CLAUSEL, and FEREY, the last hit mortally.
Their disordered main body retreats into the forest and disappears; and just as darkness sets in, the English stand alone on the crest, the distant plain being lighted only by musket-flashes from the vanquishing enemy. In the close foreground vague figures on horseback are audible in the gloom.
VOICE OF WELLINGTON
I thought they looked as they'd be scurrying soon!
VOICE OF AN AIDE
Foy bears into the wood in middling trim; Maucune strikes out for Alba-Castle bridge.
VOICE OF WELLINGTON
Speed the pursuit, then, towards the Huerta ford; Their only scantling of escape lies there; The river coops them semicircle-wise, And we shall have them like a swathe of grass Within a sickle's curve!
VOICE OF AIDE
Too late, my lord. They are crossing by the aforesaid bridge at Alba.
VOICE OF WELLINGTON
Impossible. The guns of Carlos rake it Sheer from the castle walls.
VOICE OF AIDE
Tidings have sped Just now therefrom, to this undreamed effect: That Carlos has withdrawn the garrison: The French command the Alba bridge themselves!
VOICE OF WELLINGTON
Blast him, he's disobeyed his orders, then! How happened this? How long has it been known?
VOICE OF AIDE
Some ladies some few hours have rumoured it, But unbelieved.
VOICE OF WELLINGTON
Well, what's done can't be undone.... By God, though, they've just saved themselves thereby From capture to a man!
VOICE OF A GENERAL
We've not struck ill, Despite this slip, my lord.... And have you heard That Colonel Dalbiac's wife rode in the charge Behind her spouse to-day?
VOICE OF WELLINGTON
Did she though: did she! Why that must be Susanna, whom I know-- A Wessex woman, blithe, and somewhat fair.... Not but great irregularities Arise from such exploits.--And was it she I noticed wandering to and fro below here, Just as the French retired?
VOICE OF ANOTHER OFFICER
Ah no, my lord. That was the wife of Prescott of the Seventh, Hoping beneath the heel of hopelessness, As these young women will!--Just about sunset She found him lying dead and bloody there, And in the dusk we bore them both away.[18]
VOICE OF WELLINGTON
Well, I'm damned sorry for her. Though I wish The women-folk would keep them to the rear: Much awkwardness attends their pottering round!
[The talking shapes disappear, and as the features of the field grow undistinguishable the comparative quiet is broken by gay notes from guitars and castanets in the direction of the city, and other sounds of popular rejoicing at Wellington's victory. People come dancing out from the town, and the merry-making continues till midnight, when it ceases, and darkness and silence prevail everywhere.]
SEMICHORUS I OF THE YEARS [aerial music]
What are Space and Time? A fancy!-- Lo, by Vision's necromancy Muscovy will now unroll; Where for cork and olive-tree Starveling firs and birches be.
SEMICHORUS II
Though such features lie afar From events Peninsular, These, amid their dust and thunder, Form with those, as scarce asunder, Parts of one compacted whole.
CHORUS
Marmont's aide, then, like a swallow Let us follow, follow, follow, Over hill and over hollow, Past the plains of Teute and Pole!
[There is semblance of a sound in the darkness as of a rushing through the air.]
## SCENE IV
THE FIELD OF BORODINO
[Borodino, seventy miles west of Moscow, is revealed in a bird's- eye view from a point above the position of the French Grand Army, advancing on the Russian capital.
We are looking east, towards Moscow and the army of Russia, which bars the way thither. The sun of latter summer, sinking behind our backs, floods the whole prospect, which is mostly wild, uncultivated land with patches of birch-trees. NAPOLEON'S army has just arrived on the scene, and is making its bivouac for the night, some of the later regiments not having yet come up. A dropping fire of musketry from skirmishers ahead keeps snapping through the air. The Emperor's tent stands in a ravine in the foreground amid the squares of the Old Guard. Aides and other officers are chatting outside.
Enter NAPOLEON, who dismounts, speaks to some of his suite, and disappears inside his tent. An interval follows, during which the sun dips.
Enter COLONEL FABVRIER, aide-de-camp of MARMONT, just arrived from Spain. An officer-in-waiting goes into NAPOLEON'S tent to announce FABVRIER, the Colonel meanwhile talking to those outside.]
AN AIDE
Important tidings thence, I make no doubt?
FABVRIER
Marmont repulsed on Salamanca field, And well-nigh slain, is the best tale I bring!
[A silence. A coughing heard in NAPOLEON'S tent.]
Whose rheumy throat distracts the quiet so?
AIDE
The Emperor's. He is thus the livelong day.
[COLONEL FABVRIER is shown into the tent. An interval. Then the husky accents of NAPOLEON within, growing louder and louder.]
VOICE OF NAPOLEON
If Marmont--so I gather from these lines-- Had let the English and the Spanish be, They would have bent from Salamanca back, Offering no battle, to our profiting! We should have been delivered this disaster, Whose bruit will harm us more than aught besides That has befallen in Spain!
VOICE OF FABVRIER
I fear so, sire.
VOICE OF NAPOLEON
He forced a conflict, to cull laurel crowns Before King Joseph should arrive to share them!
VOICE OF FABVRIER
The army's ardour for your Majesty, Its courage, its devotion to your cause, Cover a myriad of the Marshal's sins.
VOICE OF NAPOLEON
Why gave he battle without biddance, pray, From the supreme commander? Here's the crime Of insubordination, root of woes!... The time well chosen, and the battle won, The English succours there had sidled off, And their annoy in the Peninsula Embarrassed us no more. Behoves it me, Some day, to face this Wellington myself! Marmont too plainly is no match for him.... Thus he goes on: “To have preserved command I would with joy have changed this early wound For foulest mortal stroke at fall of day. One baleful moment damnified the fruit Of six weeks' wise strategics, whose result Had loomed so certain!”--[Satirically] Well, we've but his word As to their wisdom! To define them thus Would not have struck me but for his good prompting!... No matter: On Moskowa's banks to-morrow I'll mend his faults upon the Arapeile. I'll see how I can treat this Russian horde Which English gold has brought together here From the four corners of the universe.... Adieu. You'd best go now and take some rest.
[FABVRIER reappears from the tent and goes. Enter DE BAUSSET.]
DE BAUSSET
The box that came--has it been taken in?
AN OFFICER
Yes, General 'Tis laid behind a screen In the outer tent. As yet his Majesty Has not been told of it.
[DE BAUSSET goes into the tent. After an interval of murmured talk an exclamation bursts from the EMPEROR. In a few minutes he appears at the tent door, a valet following him bearing a picture. The EMPEROR'S face shows traces of emotion.]
NAPOLEON
Bring out a chair for me to poise it on.
[Re-enter DE BAUSSET from the tent with a chair.]
They all shall see it. Yes, my soldier-sons Must gaze upon this son of mine own house In art's presentment! It will cheer their hearts. That's a good light--just so.
[He is assisted by DE BAUSSET to set up the picture in the chair. It is a portrait of the young King of Rome playing at cup-and-ball being represented as the globe. The officers standing near are attracted round, and then the officers and soldiers further back begin running up, till there is a great crowd.]
Let them walk past, So that they see him all. The Old Guard first.
[The Old Guard is summoned, and marches past surveying the picture; then other regiments.]
SOLDIERS
The Emperor and the King of Rome for ever!
[When they have marched past and withdrawn, and DE BAUSSET has taken away the picture, NAPOLEON prepares to re-enter his tent. But his attention is attracted to the Russians. He regards them through his glass. Enter BESSIERES and RAPP.]
NAPOLEON
What slow, weird ambulation do I mark, Rippling the Russian host?
BESSIERES
A progress, sire, Of all their clergy, vestmented, who bear An image, said to work strange miracles.
[NAPOLEON watches. The Russian ecclesiastics pass through the regiments, which are under arms, bearing the icon and other religious insignia. The Russian soldiers kneel before it.]
NAPOLEON
Ay! Not content to stand on their own strength, They try to hire the enginry of Heaven. I am no theologian, but I laugh That men can be so grossly logicless, When war, defensive or aggressive either, Is in its essence pagan, and opposed To the whole gist of Christianity!
BESSIERES
'Tis to fanaticize their courage, sire.
NAPOLEON
Better they'd wake up old Kutuzof.--Rapp, What think you of to-morrow?
RAPP