L'Aiglon Part 116

ALL THE VOICES.

Long live the Emperor!

THE DUKE.

Ah! Pardon, for the glory's sake!--I thank you.

I understand. I am the expiation.

All was not paid, and I complete the price.

'Twas fated I should seek his battle-field, And here, above the mult.i.tudinous dead, Be the white victim, growing daily whiter, Renouncing, praying, asking but to suffer, Yearning toward heaven, like sacrificial incense!

And while betwixt the heavens and this field I am outstretched with all my soul and body, Father, I feel the shuddering furrows rise, I feel the hill upheaved beneath my feet To lift me gently to the stooping heavens!

'Tis meet and right the battle-field should offer This sacrifice, that henceforth it may bear Pure and unstained its name of Victory.

Wagram, behold me! Ransom of old days, Son, offered for, alas! how many sons!

Above the dreadful haze wherein thou stirrest, Uplift me, Wagram, in thy scarlet hands!

It must be so! I know it! Feel it! Will it!

The breath of death has rustled through my hair!

The shudder of death has pa.s.sed athwart my soul!

I am all white: a sacramental Host!

What more reproaches can they hurl, O Father, Against our hapless fate?--Oh, hus.h.!.+ I add In silence Schonbrunn to Saint Helena!-- 'Tis done!--But if the Eaglet is resigned To perish like the innocent, yielding swan, Nailed in the gloom above some lofty gate, He must become the high and holy signal That scares the ravens and calls back the eagles.

There must be no more meanings in the field, Nor dreadful writhings in the underwood.

Bear on thy wings, O whirlwind of the plain, The shouts of conquerors and songs of triumph!

[_A proud and joyous clamor arises in the distance._]

I've changed the meanings into trumpet blasts!

[_The wind wafts vague sounds of trumpet-calls._]

I've earned the right to see what crawled and writhed, Suddenly leap into a phantom charge!

[_Noise as of a cavalcade. The_ VOICES, _which before were lugubrious, now call to each other with commands and signals._]

THE VOICES.

Forward!

[_The drums of the wind beat the charge._]

THE DUKE.

The pomp and pageantry of battle, The dust that's raised by charging cavalry!

VOICES.

Charge!

THE DUKE.

The wild laughter of the fierce Hussars!

VOICES.

[_In a shout of epic laughter._]

Ha! Ha!

THE DUKE.

Now, G.o.ddess of the hundred mouths, Victory, from whose lips I've torn the gag, Sing in the distance!

VOICES.

[_Far away._]

Form battalions!

THE DUKE.

[_Upright in the first glow of dawn._]

Glory! O G.o.d, to battle in this blaze!

VOICES.

Fire!--Half-columns, by your right, advance!

THE DUKE.

To battle in this tumult you commanded!

O Father! Father!--

[_Amid the noise of battle, which is dying away in the distance, a haughty, metallic voice is heard, preceded and followed by a roll of drums._]

THE VOICE.

Officers--and--men!

THE DUKE.

[_In wild delirium, drawing his sword._]

I come!--I fight!--Laugh, fife! and banners wave!

Fix bayonets! Fall on the whitecoats! Forward!

[_And while the dream-sounds die away toward the right, swept by the wind, all of a sudden, on the left, a real military band bursts out; and abruptly, like the awaking out of a dream, there is the contrast between the furious battle-music of the French, and a tame march of Schubert's Austrian and dance-like, drawing near in the rosy glow of the morning._]

THE DUKE.

[_Who has turned with a shudder._]