Front matter
ti*w '
THE POETICAL WORKS
OF
Part Third.— First Edition 1908 Complete Edition 1910
981059
AN EPIC-DRAMA OF THE WAR WITH NAPOLEON,
IN THREE PARTS, NINETEEN ACTS, AND
ONE HUNDRED & THIRTY SCENES
THE TIME COVERED BY THE ACTION BEING ABOUT TEN YEARS
And I heard soutuis of insult, shame, and wrong And trumpets blown /or wars.
Preface
The Spectacle here presented in the hkeness of a Drama is concerned with the Great Historical Calamity, or Clash of Peoples, artificially brought about some hundred years ago.
The choice of such a subject was mainly due to three accidents of locaUty. It chanced that the writer was familiar with a part of England that lay within hail of the watering-place in which King George the Third had his favourite summer residence during the war with the first Napoleon, and where he was visited by ministers and others who bore the weight of English affairs on their more or less competent shoulders at that stressful time. Secondly, this district, being also near the coast which had echoed with rumours of invasion in their intensest form while the descent threatened, was formerly animated by memories and traditions of the desperate military preparations for that contingency. Thirdly, the same countryside happened to include the village which was the birthplace of Nelson's flag-captain at Trafalgar.
When, as the first published result of these accidents. The Trumpet-Major was printed, more than twenty years ago, I found myself in the tantalizing position of having touched the fringe of a vast international tragedy without being able, through limits of plan, knowledge, and opportunity, to enter further into its events ; a restriction that prevailed for many years. But the slight regard paid to English influence and action throughout the struggle by those viii THE DYNASTS
Continental writers who had dealt imaginatively with Napoleon's career, seemed always to leave room for a new handling of the theme which should re-embody the features of this influence in their true proportion ; and accordingly, on a belated day about six years back, the following drama was outlined, to be taken up now and then at wide intervals ever since.
It may, I think, claim at least a tolerable fidelity to the facts of its date as they are given in ordinary records. Whenever any evidence of the words really spoken or written by the characters in their various situations was attainable, as close a paraphrase has been aimed at as was compatible with the form chosen. And in all cases outside oral tradition, accessible scenery, and existing relics, my indebtedness for detail to the abundant pages of the historian, the biographer, and the journalist, English and Foreign, has been, of course, continuous.
It was thought proper to introduce, as supernatural spectators of the terrestrial action, certain impersonated abstractions, or Intelligences, called Spirits. They are intended to be taken by the reader for what they may be worth as contrivances of the fancy merely. Their doctrines are but tentative, and are advanced with little eye to a systematized philosophy warranted to lift " the burthen of the mystery " of this unintelligible world. The chief thing hoped for them is that they and their utterances may have dramatic plausibility enough to procure for them, in the words of Coleridge, *' that willing suspension of disbelief for the moment which constitutes poetic faith." The wide prevalence of the Monistic theory of the Universe forbade, in this twentieth century, the importation of Divine personages from any antique Mythology as ready-made sources or channels of Causation, even in verse, and excluded the celestial machinery of, say. Paradise Lost, as peremptorily as that of the Iliad or
PREFACE ix
the Eddas. And the abandonment of the mascuHne pronoun in allusions to the First or Fundamental Energy seemed a necessary and logical consequence of the long abandonment by thinkers of the anthropomorphic conception of the same.
These phantasmal Intelligences are divided into groups, of which one only, that of the Pities, approximates to "the Universal Sympathy of human nature — the spectator idealized"^ of the Greek Chorus ; it is impressionable and inconsistent in its views, which sway hither and thither as wrought on by events. Another group approximates to the passionless Insight of the Ages. The remainder are eclectically chosen auxiliaries whose signification may be readily discerned. In point of literary form, the scheme of contrasted Choruses and other conventions of this external feature was shaped with a single view to the modern expression of a modern outlook, and in frank divergence from classical and other dramatic precedent which ruled the ancient voicings of ancient themes.
It may hardly be necessary to inform readers that in devising this chronicle-piece no attempt has been made to create that completely organic structure of action, and closelywebbed development of character and motive, which are demanded in a drama strictly self-contained. A panoramic show like the present is a series of historical " ordinates " (to use a term in geometry) : the subject is familiar to all ; and foreknowledge is assumed to fill in the junctions required to combine the scenes into an artistic unity. Should the mental spectator be unwilling or unable to do this, a historical presentment on an intermittent plan, in which the dramatis personce number some hundreds, exclusive of crowds and armies, becomes in his individual case unsuitable.
In this assumption of a completion of the action by those to whom the drama is addressed, it is interesting, if un-
^ Schlegel.
X THE DYNASTS
necessary, to name an exemplar as old as Aeschylus, whose plays are, as Dr. Verrall reminds us,^ scenes from stories taken as known, and would be unintelligible without supplementary scenes of the imagination.
Readers will readily discern, too, that The Dynasts is intended simply for mental performance, and not for the stage. Some critics have averred that to declare a drama " as being not for the stage is to make an announcement whose subject and predicate cancel each other. The question seems to be an unimportant matter of terminology. Compositions cast in this shape were, without doubt, originally written for the stage only, and as a consequence their nomenclature of " Act," " Scene," and the like, was drawn directly from the vehicle of representation. But in the course of time such a shape would reveal itself to be an eminently readable one ; moreover, by dispensing with the theatre altogether, a freedom of treatment was attainable in this form that was denied where the material possibilities of stagery had to be rigorously remembered. With the careless mechanicism of human speech, the technicalities of practical mumming were retained in these productions when they had ceased to be concerned with the stage at all.
To say, then, in the present case, that a writing in playshape is not to be played, is merely another way of stating that such writing has been done in a form for which there chances to be no brief definition save one already in use for works that it superficially but not entirely resembles.
Whether mental performance alone may not eventually be the fate of all drama other than that of contemporary or frivolous life, is a kindred question not without interest. The mind naturally flies to the triumphs of the Hellenic and Elizabethan theatre in exhibiting scenes laid "far in the
^ Introduction to the Choephori. 2 It is now called an Epic-drama (1909).
PREFACE xl
Unapparent," and asks why they should not be repeated. But the meditative world is older, more invidious, more nervous, more quizzical, than it once was, and being unhappily perplexed by —
Riddles of Death Thebes never knew may be less ready and less able than Hellas and old England were to look through the insistent, and often grotesque, substance at the thing signified.
In respect of such plays of poesy and dream a practicable compromise may conceivably result, taking the shape of a monotonic delivery of speeches, with dreamy conventional gestures, something in the manner traditionally maintained by the old Christmas mummers, the curiously hypnotizing impressiveness of whose automatic style — that of persons who spoke by no will of their own — may be remembered by all who ever experienced it. Gauzes or screens to blur outlines might still further shut off the actual, as has, indeed, already been done in exceptional cases. But with this branch of the subject we are not concerned here.
T. H.
September 1903.
Scene I. England. A Ridge in Wessex , , . 8
II. Paris. Office of the Minister of Marine . , 12
III. London. The Old House of Commons . . i6
IV. The Harbour of Boulogne . . . ,27 V. London. The House of a Lady of Quality . 28
VI. Milan. The Cathedral . . . .32
Act Second
Scene I. The Dockyard, Gibraltar . . . -37
II. OffFerrol ...... 40
,, III The Camp and Harbour of Boulogne . .43
,, IV. .South Wessex. A Ridge-like Down near the
,, V. The Same. Rainbarrows' Beacon, Egdon Heath 48
Act Third
Scene I. Boulogne. The Chateau at Pont-de-Briques . 56
,, II. The Frontiers of Upper Austria and Bavaria . 61
,, III. Boulogne. The St. Omer Road . . . 62
xiii
XIV
Act Fourth Scene
I. King George's Watering-place, South Wessex . 63
II. Before the City of Uhn . . . .68
III. Ulm. Within the City .... 68
IV. Before Ulm. The Same Day . . -74 V. The Same. The Michaelsberg . . -74
VI. London. Spring Gardens . . . '77
Act Fifth
.Scene I. Off Cape Trafalgar . . . . .81
II. The Same. The Quarter-deck of the " Victory " . 85
,, III. The Same. On Board the " Bucentaure " . 89
„ IV. The Same. The Cockpit of the "Victory " . 92
,, V. London. The Guildhall . . . .100 ,, VI. An Inn at Rennes ..... 104
,, VII. King George's Watering-place, South Wessex . 106
Act Sixth
Scene I. The Field of Austerlitz. The French Position . 109
,, II. The Same. The Russian Position . .113
,, III. The Same. The French Position . . ^S
,, IV. The Same. The Russian Position . . .120
,, V. The Same. Near the Windmill of Paleny . 121
,, VI. Shockerwick House, near Bath . . .126
,, VII. Paris. A Street leading to the Tuileries . .128
,, VIII. Putney. Bowling Green House . . . 133
Act First
Scene I. London. Fox's Lodgings, Arlington Street ,, II. The Route between London and Paris „ III. The Streets of Berlin
„ IV. The Field of Jena .... „ V. Berlin. A Room overlooking a Public Place
143 149
153 157 160
CONTENTS
Scene VI. The Same .
„ VII. Tilsit and the River Niemen „ VIII. The Same .
Act Second Scene I
. The Pyrenees and Valleys adjoining IT. Aranjuez, near Madrid. A Room in the Palace of Godoy, the *' Prince of Peace "
III. London. The Marchioness of Salisbury's .
IV. Madrid and its Environs .... y. The Open Sea between the English Coasts and
the Spanish Peninsula ....
VI. St. Cloud. The Boudoir of Josephine VII. Vimiero ......
Act Third
Scene I. Spain. A Road near Astorga ,, II. The Same . . . . .
,, III. Before Coruna . . . .
,, IV. Corufia. Near the Ramparts ,, V. Vienna. A Cafe in the Stephans-Platz
Act Fourth
.Scene I. A Road out of Vienna
II. The Island of Lobau, with Wagram beyond
III. The Field of Wagram
IV. The Field of Talavera V. The Same . . . .
VI. Brighton. The Royal Pavilion VII. The Same. The Asseml)ly Rooms ,,VIII. Walcheren ....
Act Fifth
Scene I. Paris II. Paris
A Ballroom in the House of Cambaceres .
The Tuileries ....
III. Vienna. A Private Apartment in the Imperial Palace ......
I\'. London. A Club in St. James's Street V. The old West Highway out of Vienna
181 190 196
197 199
206 210
222 224
234 243 244
247 249 251
253 259
273 278 xvi THE DYNASTS
Scene VI. Courcelles ......
,, VII. Petersburg. The Palace of the Empress-Mother .
„ VIII. j^aris. The Grand Gallery of the Louvre and the
Salon-Carre adjoining ....
Act Sixth
Scene I. The Lines of Torres Vedras
,, II. The Same. Outside the Lines
„ III. Paris. The Tuileries
,, IV. Spain. Albuera ....
,, V. Windsor Castle. A Room in the King's Apart
ments .....
,, VI. London. Carlton House and the Streets adjoining
„ VII. The Same. The Interior of Carlton House
289 290 292 298
302 310 312
Act First
Scene I. The Banks of the Niemen, near Kowno
II. The Ford of Santa Marta, Salamanca
III. The Field of Salamanca
IV. The Field of Borodino
V. The Same .
VI. Moscow
VII. The Same. Outside the City
VIII. The Same. The Interior of the Kremlin
IX. The Road from Smolensko into Lithuania
X. The Bridge of the Beresina
XL The Open Country between Smorgoni and Wilna
XII. Paris. The Tuileries
Act Second
Scene I. The Plain of Vitoria
,, II. The Same, from the Puebla Heights „ III. The Same. The Road from the Town IV. A Fete at Vauxhall Gardens
364 367 370 372
CONTENTS xvii
Act Third
Scene I. Leipzig. Napoleon's Quarters in the Reudnitz Suburb ....
II. The Same. The City and the Battlefield . ,, III. The Same, from the Tower of the Pleissenburg ,, IV. The Same. At the Thonberg Windmill . ,, V. The Same. A Street near the Ranstadt Gate ,, \l. The Pyrenees. Near the River Nivelle
377 382
385 388
389 393
Act Fourth
Scene I. The Upper Rhine . . ...
II. Paris. The Tuileries
III. The Same. The Apartments of the Empress
IV. Fontainebleau. A Room in the Palace V. Bayonne. The British Camp
VI. A Highway in the Outskirts of Avignon VII. Malmaison. The Empress Josephine's Bed chamber ....
VIII. London. The Opera-House
397 398 402
408 416 416
420 424
Act Fifth
Scene I. Elba. The Quay, Porto Ferrajo . ,, II. Vienna. The Imperial Palace ,, III. La Mure, near Grenoble . ., IV. Schonbrunn
,, V. London. The Old House of Commons ,, VI. Wessex. Durnover Green, Casterbridge
428 430 435 437 443 449
Act Sixth .Scene
The Belgian Frontier II. A Ballroom in Brussels
III. Charleroi. Napoleon's Quarters .
IV. A Chamber overlooking a Main Street in Brussels V. The Field of Ligny
VI, The Field of Quatre-Bras .
VII. Brussels. The Place Royale VIII. The Road to Waterloo
453 454 463 468
471 475 478 480
Act Seventh : — PAGE
Scene I. The Field of Waterloo
II. The Same. The French Position .
„ III. Saint Lambert's Chapel Hill
„ IV. The Field of Waterloo. The English Position
,, V. The Same. The Women's Camp near Mont Saint
,, VI. The Same. The French Position .
„ VII. The Same. The English Position
„ VIII. The Same. Later ....
„ IX. The Wood of Bo^su
After Scene. The Overworld
Part First Characters
I. Phantom Intelligences
{The Ancient Spirit of the Years.
Chorus of the Years.
/The Spirit of the Pities. ^^Chorus of the Pities.
['Spirits Sinister and Ironic. 4 Choruses of Sinister and I Ironic Spirits.
/"The Spirit of Rumour. 1 Chorus of Rumours.
The Shade of the Earth.
Spirit-Messengers.
Recording Angels.
II. Persons
The names printed in italics are those of mute figures.
George the Third.
The Duke of Cumberland.
Pitt.
Fox.
Sheridan.
Windham.
Whitbread.
TiERNEY.
Bath UR ST and Fuller.
Lord Chancellor Eldon.
Earl of Malmesbury.
Lord Mulgrave.
Another Cabinet Minister.
Lord GrenvilU.
Viscount Castlereagh.
MEN
Viscount Sidmouth.
Another Noble Lord.
Rose.
Canning.
Perceval.
Grey.
Speaker Abbot.
ToMLiNE, Bishop of Lincoln.
Sir Walter Farquhar.
Count Mtmster.
Other Peers, Ministers, cx-Ministers,
Members of Parliament, and
Persons of Quality.
XIX
XX
Nelson.
Colling WOOD.
Hardy.
Secretary Scott.
Dr. Beatty.
Dr. Magrath. 'Dr. Alexander Scott.
Burke, Purser.
Lieutenant Pasco.
Another Lieutenant.
Pollard, a Midshipman.
Another Midshipman.
Captain Adair.
Lieutenants Ram^ and Whipple.
Other English Naval Officers.
Sergeant- Major Seeker and Marines.
Staff and other Officers of the English
Army.
A Company of Soldiers.
Regiments of the English Army afid
Hanoverian.
Sailors and Boatmen.
A Militiaman.
Naval crews.
The Lord Mayor and Corporation of London.
A Gentleman of Fashion.
Wiltshire, a Country Gentleman.
A Horseman.
Two Beacon-watchers.
English Citizens and Burgesses.
Coach and other Highway Passengers.
Messengers, Servants, and Rustics.
Napoleon Bonaparte.
Daru, Napoleon's War Secretary.
Lauriston, Aide-de-camp.
Monge, a Philosopher.
Berthier.
MuRAT, Brother - in - l.\w of Napol^n.
SOULT.
Ney.
Lannes.
Bernadotte.
Marmont.
Dupont.
Oudinot.
Davout.
yandamme.
Other French Marshals.
A Sub- Officer.
Villeneuve,NapolEon's Admiral.
Decres, Minister of Marine.
Flag-Captain Magendie.
Lieutenant Daudignon.
Lieutenant Fournier. de Pkigny, Head of Staff.
Captain Lucas.
Other French Naval Officers
AND Petty Officers.
Seamen of the French a7id Spa?iish
Navies.
Regiments of the French Army.
Couriers.
Heralds.
Aides, Officials, Pages, etc.
Attendants.
French Citizens.
Cardinal Caprara.
Halia7i Doctors and Presidents of
Institutions.
Milanese Citizens.
The Emperor Francis.
The Archduke Ferdinand.
Prince John of Lichtenstein.
Prince Schwarzenberg, Mack, Austrian General.
Jellachich.
RiESC.
Weirother.
Another Austrian General.
Two Austrian Officers.
The Emperor Alexander.
Prince Kutuzof, Russian Field- Marshal.
Count Langeron.
Count Buxhovden.
CHARACTERS OF THE FIRST PART
Count MilorAdovich.
DOKHTdROF.
Giulay, Gottesheim, Klenatc, and
Prschebiszexvsky.
Regiments of the Austrian Army, Regiments of the Russian Army.
WOMEN
Queen Charlotte.
English Princesses.
Ladies of the English Court.
Lady Hester Stanhope.
A Lady.
Lady Caroline Lamb, Mrs. Darner, arid other English Ladies,
The Empress Josephine.
Princesses and Ladies of Josephine'
Court.
Seven Milanese Young Ladies.
City- and Towns-women.
Country-women.
A Militiaman's Wife.
A Street-woman.
Ship-women.
Servants,
FORE SCENE THE OVERWORLD
Enter the Ancient Spirit and Chorus of the Years, the Spirit and Chorus of the Pities, the Shade of the Earth, the Spirits Sinister and Ifonic with their Choruses, Rumours, Spirit-Messengers, and Recording Angels.
Shade of the Earth What of the Immanent Will and Its designs ?
Spirit of the Years It works unco7isciously^ as heretofore^ Eternal artistries in Circumsta?ice^ Whose patterns, ivrought by rapt cBsthetic rote. Seem in themselves Its single listless aim.
And not their consequence.
Still thus ? Still thus ?
Ever uncofiscious /
An automatic sense
Unweeting why or whence ?
Be, then, the inevitable, as of old, Although that SO it be we dare not hold!
Spirit of the Years Hold what ye list, fond unbelieving Sprites, You cannot swerve the pulsion of the Byss, Which thinking on, yet weighing not Its thought, Unchecks Its clock-like laws.
Spirit Sinister (aside)
Good, as before.
My little engines, then, will still have play. IS B
THE DYNASTS fore scene
IV/iy doth It so and so, a?id ever so,
This viewless, voiceless Turner of the Wheel f
As one sad story runs. It lends Its heed
To other worlds, being wearied out with this ;
Wherefore Its niindlessness of earthly woes.
Some, too, have told at whiles that rightfully
Its warefulness. Its care, this planet lost
When i?t her early growth and crudity
By bad mad acts of severance men contrived.
Working such nescience by their ow?t device. —
Yea, so it stands in certain chroiiicles,
Though not in mine.
Meet is it, no7ic the less, To bear in thought that though Its consciousness May be estranged, engrossed afar, or sealed.
Sublunar shocks may wake Its watch a?ton f
Nay. In the Foretime, even to the germ of Being, Nothing appears of shape to indicate That cognizance has marshalled thi?igs terrene. Or will {such is 7ny thi?tking) in ?ny span.
Rather they show that, like a knitter drowsed. Whose fingers play in skilled unmindfulness.
The Will has zuoven with an absent heed Since life first was j and ever will so weave.
He7tce we^ve rare dramas going — more so since It wove Its web in that Ajaccia?t womb /
Well, no more thus on what no mind can J7tete. Our scope is but to register and watch By means of this great gift accorded us — The free trajectian of our etitities.
FORE SCENE PART FIRST
Spirit of the Pities On things terrene^ then, I would say that though The human news wherewith the Rumours stirred us May please thy temper. Years, Hwere better far Such deeds were nulled, and this strajige ?na?i^s career Wound up, as making inharmoniozis jars In her creation whose meek wraith we know.
The 7nore that he, turned man of mere traditiofts, Now prof ts naught. For the large potencies Instilled into his idiosyncrasy — To throne fair Liberty in Privilege' room — Are taking taint, and sink to common plots For his own gain.
And who, then. Cordial One, Wouldst substitute for this Intractable ?
Chorus of the Pities (aerial music) We would establish those of kindlier build.
In fair Compassions skilled.
Men of deep art in life-development j Watchers and warders of thy varied lands.
Men surfeited of laying heavy hands
Upon the innocent.
The mild, the fragile, the obscu7'e content Among the inyriads of thy family.
TJiose, too, who love the true, the excellent^ And make their daily moves a melody.
Shade of the Earth They may come, will they. I am not averse.
Yet know I am but the inejectual Shade Of her the Travailler, herself a thrall To It ; in all her labourings curbed and kinged!
Spirit of the Years Shall such be mooted now ? Already change Hath played strange pranks since first I brooded here. But old Laws operate yet ; and phase and phase Of meris dynastic and imperial moils Shape on accustomed lines. Though, as for me, I care not how they shape, or what they be.
THE DYNASTS fore scene
Spirit of the Pities Vou seem to have small sense of mercy ^ Sire ?
Mercy I view, not urge; — nor more thati mark
What desig7iate your titles Good atid III.
' Tis not in me to feel with, or against,
These flesh-hitiged tnannikins Its hand upwinds
To click-clack off Its preadjusted laws ;
But only through my centuries to behold ^
Their aspects, a?id their moveinents, a7id their mould.
They are shapes that bleed, mere inannikins or no. And each has parcel in the total Will.
Which overrides them as a whole its parts In other entities.
Spirit Sinister (aside)
Limbs of Itself : Each one a jot of It in quaint disguise ?
P II fear all men henceforward !
Spirit of the Pities Go to. Let this terrestrial tragedy —
Nay, comedy —
Let this earth-tragedy Whereof ye spake, afford a spectacle Forthwith conned do seller than your custom is. —
How does it stand? (To a Recording Angel)
Open and chant the page Thou'st lately writ, that sums these happenings^ In brief reminder of their insta?tt points Slighted by us amid otcr converse here.
FORE SCENE PART FIRST
Recording Angel (from a book, in recitative)
Now mellow-eyed Peace is made captive^
And Vengeance is chartered To deal forth its dooms on the Peoples
With sword and with spear,
Men^s musings are busy with forecasts
Of musters and battle^ And visions of shock and disaster
Pise red on the year.
The easternmost ruler sits wistful.
And tense he to midward; The King to the west mans his borders
In front and in rear.
While one they eye, flushed from his crowning.
Ranks legions around him To shake the enisled neighboitr nation
And close her career !
Semichorus I. OF Rumours (aerial music)
O woven-winged squadrons of Toulofi
And fellows of Roche fort, Wait, wait for a wind, and draw westward
Ere Nelson be near I
For he reads not your force, or your f'eightage
Of warriors fell-handed, Or when they will join for the 07iset,
Or whither they steer!
O Nelson, so zealous a watcher
Through months-long of cruizing,
Thy foes may elude thee a moment.
Put forth, and get clear;
And rendezvous westerly straightway With Sftain^s aiding navies,
And haste7i to head violation Of A Ibion's frontier /
6 THE DYNASTS fore scene
Methifiks too muck assurance thrills your note On secrets m my locker^ gentle sprites ; But it may serve. — Our thought beifig now reflex ed To forces operant on this Eiiglish isle, Behoves it us to enter scene by scene, And watch the spectacle of Europe's moves In her embroil, as they %uere self ordained Accordifig to the naive and liberal creed Of our great-hearted you7ig Coinpassionates, Forgetting the Prime Mover of the gear.
As puppet-watchers him who pulls the strings. — YouUl mark the twitchings of this Bonaparte As he with other figures foots his reel, Ufitil he twitch him into his lo?iely grave : Also regard the frail ones that his flings Have ifiade gyrate like ajzijnalctda I?t tepid pools. — Hence to the precinct, then, A?id count as framework to the stagery Yon architraves of sunbeam-smitten cloud. — So may ye judge Earth^s jackaclocks to be Not fugled by one Will, but functio7i-free.
The nether sky opens, and Europe is disclosed as a prone and emaciated figure, the Alps shaping like a backbone, and the branching mountain-chains like ribs, the peninsular plateau of Spain forming a head. Broad and lengthy lowlands stretch from the north of France across Russia like a grey-green garment hemmed by the Ural mountains and the glistening Arctic Ocean.
The point of view then sinks downwards through space, and draws near to the surface of the perturbed countries, where the peoples, distressed by events which they did not cause, are seen writhing, crawling, heaving, and vibrating in their various cities and nationalities.
Spirit of the Years (to the Spirit of the Pities)
As key-scene to the whole, I first lay bare The Will-webs of thy fearful questioning ; For know that of my a?ttique privileges This gift to visualise the Mode is one ( Though by exhaustive strain and eflbrt only). See^ then, and learn, ere iny power pass again.
A new and penetrating light descends on the spectacle, enduing men and things with a .seeming transparency, and exhibiting as one organism the anatomy of life and movement in all humanity and vitalized matter included in the display.
FORE SCENE PART FIRST
Spirit of the Pities (after a pause)
Amid this scene of bodies substantive Strange waves I sight like winds grow?t visible, Which bear men^s forms on their innumerous coils^ Twining and serpentining 7'ound and through.
Also retracting threads like gossamers — Except in being irresistible — Which complicate with some, and balance all.
These are the Prime Volitions, — fibrils, veins,- Will-tissues, nerves, and pulses of the Cause, That heave throughout the Earth^s compositure. Their sum is like the lobule of a Braifi Evolving always that it wots not of; A Brain whose whole connotes the Everywhere, And whose procedure may but be discerned By phantom eyes like ours; the while unguessed Of those it stirs, who {even as ye do) dream Their motions free, their orderings supreme; Each life apart from each, with pozuer to mete Its own day's measures ; balanced, self complete ; Though they subsist but atotns of the One Labouring tJu-ough all, divisible from none; But this no further now. Deem yet man^s deeds self done. The anatomy of the Immanent Will disappears.
General Chorus of Intelligences (aerial music)
W^ll close up Time, as a bird its van.
We'll traverse Space, as spirits can,
Link pulses severed by leagues and years,
Bring cradles into touch with biers; So that the far-off Consequence appears
Prompt at the heel of foregone Cause. —
The Prime, that willed ere wareness was.
Whose Brain perchame is Space, whose Thought its laws^
Which we as threads and streams discern.
We may but muse oft, never learn.
END OF THE FORE SCENE
Act First Scene I
ENGLAND. A RIDGE IN WESSEX
The time is a fine day in March 1805. A highway crosses the ridge, which is near the sea, and the south coast is seen bounding the landscape below, the open Channel extending beyond.
Hark now, and gather how the martial mood Stirs England'' s hwnblest hearts. A7ton we'll trace Its heavings in the upper coteries there.
Ay ; begin small, and so lead up to the greater. It is a sound^ dramatic principle. I always aim to follow it in my pestilences, fires, famines, and other coniedies. A7id though, to be sure, I did not in my lisbon earthquake, I did in my French Terror, aiid my St. Domi7igo burlesque.
Thy Lisbon earthquake, THY Fre?ich Terror. Wait. Thinking thou wilPst, thou dost but indicate.
A stage-coach enters, with passengers outside. Their voices after the foregoing sound small and commonplace, as from another medium.
There seems to be a deal of traffic over Ridgeway, even at this time o' year.
Second Passenger
Yes. It is because the King and Court are coming down here later on. They wake up this part rarely ! . . . See, now, how the Channel and coast open out like a chart. That patch of mist below us is the town we are bound for. There's the Isle of Slingers beyond, like a floating snail. That wide bay on the right is where the " Abergavenny," Captain John Wordsworth, was wrecked last month. One can see half across to France up here.
SCENE I PART FIRST 9
Half across. And then another little half, and then all that's behind — the Corsican mischief!
Second Passenger
Yes. People who live hereabout — I am a native of these parts — feel the nearness of France more than they do inland.
That's why we have seen so many of these marching regiments on the road. This year his grandest attempt upon us is to be made, I reckon.
Second Passenger May we be ready !
First Passenger Well, we ought to be. We've had alarms enough, God knows.
Third Passenger I much doubt his intention to come at all.
Some companies of infantry are seen ahead, and the coach presently overtakes them.
Soldiers (singing as they walk)
We be the King's men, hale and hearty, Marching to meet one Buonaparty ; If he won't sail, lest the wind should blow.
We shall have marched for nothing, O !
Right fol-lol !
We be the King's men, hale and hearty^ Marching to meet one Buonaparty ; If he be sea-sick, says " No, no ! "
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The end
You’ve reached the end of The dynasts; an epic-drama of the war with Napoleon, in three parts, nineteen acts, & one hundred & thirty scenes, the time covered by the action being about ten years.