The Dynasts: An Epic-Drama of the War with Napoleon - LightNovelsOnl.com
You're reading novel online at LightNovelsOnl.com. Please use the follow button to get notifications about your favorite novels and its latest chapters so you can come back anytime and won't miss anything.
[He beckons from the window, and goes out in another direction.]
METTERNICH
So much for form's sake! Can the river-flower The current drags, direct its face up-stream?
What she must do she will; nought else at all.
[Enter through one of the windows MARIA LOUISA in garden-costume, fresh-coloured, girlish, and smiling. METTERNICH bends.]
MARIA LOUISA
O how, dear Chancellor, you startled me!
Please pardon my so brusquely bursting in.
I saw you not.--Those five poor little birds That haunt out there beneath the pediment, Snugly defended from the north-east wind, Have lately disappeared. I sought a trace Of scattered feathers, which I dread to find!
METTERNICH
They are gone, I ween, the way of tender flesh At the a.s.saults of winter, want, and foes.
MARIA LOUISA
It is too melancholy thinking, that!
Don't say it.--But I saw the Emperor here?
Surely he beckoned me?
METTERNICH
Sure, he did, Your gracious Highness; and he has left me here To break vast news that will make good his call.
MARIA LOUISA
Then do. I'll listen. News from near or far?
[She seats herself.]
METTERNICH
From far--though of such distance-dwarfing might That far may read as near eventually.
But, dear Archd.u.c.h.ess, with your kindly leave I'll speak straight out. The Emperor of the French Has sent to-day to make, through Schwarzenberg, A formal offer of his heart and hand, His honours, dignities, imperial throne, To you, whom he admires above all those The world can show elsewhere.
MARIA LOUISA [frightened]
My husband--he?
What, an old man like him!
METTERNICH [cautiously]
He's scarcely old, Dear lady. True, deeds densely crowd in him; Turn months to years calendaring his span; Yet by Time's common clockwork he's but young.
MARIA LOUISA
So wicked, too!
METTERNICH [nettled]
Well-that's a point of view.
MARIA LOUISA
But, Chancellor, think what things I have said to him!
Can women marry where they have taunted so?
METTERNICH
Things? Nothing inexpungeable, I deem, By time and true good humour.
MARIA LOUISA
O I have!
Horrible things. Why--ay, a hundred times-- I have said I wished him dead! At that strained hour When the first voicings of the late war came, Thrilling out how the French were smitten sore And Bonaparte retreating, I clapped hands And answered that I hoped he'd lose his head As well as lose the battle!
METTERNICH
Words. But words!
Born like the bubbles of a spring that come Of zest for springing--aimless in their shape.
MARIA LOUISA
It seems indecent, mean, to wed a man Whom one has held such fierce opinions of!
METTERNICH
My much beloved Archd.u.c.h.ess, and revered, Such things have been! In Spain and Portugal Like enmities have led to intermarriage.
