The Dynasts: An Epic-Drama of the War with Napoleon Part 112

I am most truly sorry, gentlemen, If I have used language that would seem to show Discourtesy to you for your good help In this unhappy malady of mine!

My nerves unstring, my friend; my flesh grows weak: "The good that I do I leave undone, The evil which I would not, that I do!"

Shame, shame on me!

WILLIS [aside to the others]

Now he will be as low as before he was in the other extreme.

KING

A king should bear him kingly; I of all, One of so long a line. O shame on me!...

--This battle that you speak of?--Spain, of course?

Ah--Albuera! And many fall--eh? Yes?

HALFORD

Many hot hearts, sir, cold, I grieve to say.

There's Major-General Houghton, Captain Bourke, And Herbert of the Third, Lieutenant Fox, And Captains Erck and Montague, and more.

With Majors-General Cole and Stewart wounded, And Quartermaster-General Wallace too: A total of three generals, colonels five, Five majors, fifty captains; and to these Add ensigns and lieutenants sixscore odd, Who went out, but returned not. Heavily t.i.thed Were the attenuate battalions there Who stood and bearded Death by the hour that day!

KING

O fearful price for victory! Add thereto All those I lost at Walchere.--A crime Lay there!... I stood on Chatham's being sent: It wears on me, till I am unfit to live!

WILLIS [aside to the others]

Don't let him get on that Walcheren business. There will be another outbreak. Heberden, please ye talk to him. He fancies you most.

HEBERDEN

I'll tell him some of the brilliant feats of the battle. [He goes and talks to the KING.]

WILLIS [to the rest]

Well, my inside begins to cry cupboard. I had breakfast early. We have enough particulars now to face the Queen's Council with, I should say, Sir Henry?

HALFORD

Yes.--I want to get back to town as soon as possible to-day. Mrs Siddons has a party at her house at Westbourne to-night, and all the world is going to be there.

BAILLIE

Well, I am not. But I have promised to take some friends to Vauxhall, as it is a grand gala and fireworks night. Miss Farren is going to sing "The Canary Bird."--The Regent's fete, by the way, is postponed till the nineteenth, on account of this relapse. Pretty grumpy he was at having to do it. All the world will be THERE, sure!

WILLIS

And some from the Shades, too, of the fair, s.e.x.--Well, here comes Heberden. He has pacified his Majesty nicely. Now we can get away.

[The physicians withdraw softly, and the scene is covered.]

SCENE VI

LONDON. CARLTON HOUSE AND THE STREETS ADJOINING

[It is a cloudless midsummer evening, and as the west fades the stars beam down upon the city, the evening-star hanging like a jonquil blossom. They are dimmed by the unwonted radiance which spreads around and above Carlton House. As viewed from aloft the glare rises through the skylights, floods the forecourt towards Pall Mall, and kindles with a diaphanous glow the huge tents in the gardens that overlook the Mall. The hour has arrived of the Prince Regent's festivity.

A stream of carriages and sedan-chairs, moving slowly, stretches from the building along Pall Mall into Piccadilly and Bond Street, and crowds fill the pavements watching the bejewelled and feathered occupants. In addition to the grand entrance inside the Pall Mall colonnade there is a covert little "chair-door" in Warwick Street for sedans only, by which arrivals are perceived to be slipping in almost un.o.bserved.]

SPIRIT IRONIC

What domiciles are those, of singular expression, Whence no guest comes to join the gemmed procession; That, west of Hyde, this, in the Park-side Lane, Each front beclouded like a mask of pain?

SPIRIT OF RUMOUR

Therein the princely host's two spouses dwell; A wife in each. Let me inspect and tell.

[The walls of the two houses--one in Park Lane, the other at Kensington--become transparent.]

I see within the first his latter wife-- That Caroline of Brunswick whose brave sire Yielded his breath on Jena's reeking plain, And of whose kindred other yet may fall Ere long, if character indeed be fate.-- She idles feasting, and is full of jest As each gay chariot rumbles to the rout.

"I rank like your Archbishops' wives," laughs she; "Denied my husband's honours. Funny me!"

[Suddenly a Beau on his way to the Carlton House festival halts at her house, calls, and is shown in.]

He brings her news that a fresh favourite rules Her husband's ready heart; likewise of those Obscure and unmissed courtiers late deceased, Who have in name been bidden to the feast By blundering scribes.

[The Princess is seen to jump up from table at some words from her visitor, and clap her hands.]

These tidings, juxtaposed, Have fired her hot with curiosity, And lit her quick invention with a plan.

PRINCESS OF WALES

Mine G.o.d, I'll go disguised--in some dead name And enter by the leetle, sly, chair-door Designed for those not welcomed openly.

There un.o.bserved I'll note mine new supplanter!

'Tis indiscreet? Let indiscretion rule, Since caution pensions me so scurvily!